This week a landmark report…

This week a landmark report from the United Nations scientific panel on climate change concluded that the consequences of global warming - categorically linked to carbon emissions caused by human activity - are even more dire than originally imagined, and there is a strong risk of crisis as early as 2040.

Already today, global warming is resulting in more extreme weather events, including those that have cost Canadians billions of dollars such as the 2013 floods in Calgary and the 2016 forest fires in Fort McMurray. Indeed across the country, more intense forest fires, inland floods, loss of ecological biodiversity, coastal storm surges and crop failures are already occurring.

The singular accepted path towards staving off the entire collapse of human habitat is the sharp reduction of carbon emissions and the most widely-accepted tool towards achieving that goal is through putting a price on carbon. In fact US economists Nordhaus and Romer just this week won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics for their research that concludes that putting a price on carbon can be a powerful force for curbing emissions.

Lest this be perceived as a partisan issue, the NY Times this week also highlighted the efforts of prominent US Republican James A. Baker III and his group 'Americans for Carbon Dividends' to advocate for a tax on carbon emissions with the revenue returned to Americans via refunds.

Canadians are already paying for climate change, but right now we're simply throwing good money after bad to fix, post-hoc, catastrophic impacts that are unlikely to slow down. If we do not curb carbon emissions, we literally will not have a future. I urge the government to abandon its proposal to cancel the cap and trade program.

Cap and Trade is not a Liberal issue. It is good environment and fiscal policy and can be implemented in a revenue neutral way.

Without radical change that begins with political leadership for all Canadians - not partisan populism - humanity's very existence is at risk.

Cancelling the Cap and Trade program saves nobody any money. In fact, it costs and will continue to cost Canadians ever more dearly as the effects of climate change mount and the demands to mitigate and adapt get every more expensive.