The Clean Air Act, or "Why Do Something Today When It Can Be Put Off Until Tomorrow"

It has been pointed out to me that I’ve been delinquent in commenting upon the Canadian political arena, and I agree. So this is the first post in a three-parter to deal with Canadian politics. And the Conservatives new “Clean Air Act” is a doozy to start with!

Everyone was feeling good about it until Environment Minister Ambrose mentioned the time frame. The year 2050? You might as well make it 1765 while you’re at it, toss in some legislation on time travel to make it completely realistic. For those of you who can’t add (you know who you are) that would be 44 years from now. Can you imagine legislation that takes 44 years to enact? Conservatives often bitch about the inefficiency of big government and the painfully slow process of passing legislation. Then they produce a bill that doesn’t require results for half a century. I’ve been hearing the word ‘smoke screen’ being passed around, and I like it.

Having such a distant timeframe really limits the power of accountability. Corporate heads in 1960 didn’t include in their business plans objectives for the year 2000. Capitalism is a much more short-sighted frame of mind: profits now, accountability later. Perhaps simplistic, but not altogether untrue. The business community is heralding the Act, not for it’s indecisiveness, but because it finally gives corporations tangible guidelines to follow. The Act also allows for consultation with the business community. The speakers in this newspaper story say that corporations are working towards this anyway, but do they speak for the entire business community?

I envision a future like this: Companies will wait 20 years before they start dealing with it. If you have 40 years to comply, why worry about it right now? By 2040 the business community will appear to start taking legitimate action to curb them. Even if air emissions are the same in 2040 as they are now, the companies will realized what a huge undertaking the Act will require. So they will petition government, stating that the goals of the Act are unrealistic and will cost people jobs, etc. Sound familiar? It’s the equivalent of students complaining that it is unrealistic to expect them to write an A paper because they only have one day to do it (conveniently forgetting to mention that they had been given 2 months to work on it, and they just kept putting it off). This is why children hate their parents. Every generation feels that the previous one shrugged off the hard work onto them.

Maybe it’s all mute, because every opposition party has already declared that they will vote this bill down. But is it RIP, Kyoto?

And in case you care, here is Environment Minister Rona Ambrose's previous track record in Parliament.