Green Party gives thumbs down to “bits and pieces” budget
Ottawa – The Green Party has rejected the federal budget brought down today by Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. “This is a budget that is heavy on public relations but lacking any real substance when it comes to the key issues,” said Green Party leader Elizabeth May.
“The government has included lots of small goodies for just about everyone but all those bits and pieces don’t add up to much,” she said. “It’s a most unimpressive budget and the Green Party would certainly join with the Liberal Party and the NDP in voting against it.”
Ms. May singled out the budget’s climate change initiatives for particular criticism, calling them piecemeal and, in the final analysis, insignificant.
“There is no way this government will ever be able to deliver credible climate policy while it insists on adhering to the regressive greenhouse gas reduction targets of 45-60% below 2003 levels by 2050,” she said. “That translates to about 30% below 1990 levels and we need to reach that by 2020. These targets are a formula for disaster.”
Ms. May did welcome Mr. Flaherty’s decision to borrow a plank from the Green Party platform by introducing a “feebate” tax incentive to shift drivers out of gas guzzlers and into fuel-efficient vehicles but said that one eye-catching initiative did not constitute effective climate policy.
“If this was part of an overall strategy that included a suite of similar initiatives, we could actually look forward to significant progress on climate change,” she said. “By itself, it will hardly make a dent in Canada’s emissions.”
She also criticized the budget’s weak response in the areas of child care, support for aboriginal communities and tax relief for poor and middle class families. “They included some personal finance breaks but exclude broad-based income splitting,” she said. “In almost every area, Mr. Flaherty has chosen to tinker around the edges rather than take substantive action.”
March 21st, 2007 at 10:38 am
No rebates for small cars like the smart car or small Honda’s why is that? Rebate only applies if you buy the car after March 20, 2007.
If you live in rural area owning a hybrid has no real benefit since most of the driving is highway driving. It seems wrong to focus on hybrids so much. Honda dealer I talked to say he sells 6-10 hybrids per year, in Calgary. Not going to change much overall.
March 27th, 2007 at 8:25 am
The Harper budget, if you have read it properly, contains some serious initiatives to help alternative fuel producers, including the loan guarantee to Iogen corporation (who have a patent on straw-based ethanol production)…incidentally, something the Liberals had considered but not implemented in the past.
I agree that it might be “bits and pieces” approach, but so has been every federal budget for the last several years. This one is actually greener and somewhat more systematic, in some ways, than the previous two or three Liberal budgets. If anything, the Conservatives have raided their predecessors’ cache of ideas and adopted quite a few of them.
What the Greens may have to do in the future is point out specific parts of budgets and then give a qualified opinion on what they would have done differently. Then, we’ll be talking to the nation.