I'm writing to express my…

I'm writing to express my grave concern about Bill 4, which will cancel the cap and trade program without replacing it with any sort of climate plan. The beauty of the cap and trade program is that it made the polluter pay, and the money generated funded wonderful programs to reduce emissions and increase energy efficiencies. Such things as needed repairs and retrofits to schools, hospitals and social housing were being paid for by the cap and trade money instead of from tax revenue. This program successfully discouraged bad behaviours while encouraging good ones. As the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario noted in her recent report, repealing cap and trade actually rewards bad behaviour and discourages good behaviour. A new plan must include a pricing mechanism on carbon. This is the only way that we will bring down emissions in accordance with our commitments to the Paris Climate Accord and begin to mitigate the astronomically costly damage caused by the climate induced extreme weather events that have been inflicting our province with ever greater frequency. With regard to carbon pricing, I urge the government to drop its expensive and ill conceived legal action against the federal government's carbon tax plan.