Pierre Poilievre’s purloined climate policy

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/09/2024 (342 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A career politician who first entered Parliament with little prior work experience. A man prone to fiery rhetoric and described by others as an ideological bomb thrower. He took delight in baiting his political opponents.

As leader of the opposition, he challenged an unpopular sitting prime minister to a carbon tax election. He described the carbon tax as a “great big tax on everything” that will wreck the economy. And his favourite slogan? Axe the tax.

Sound familiar? No, it’s not Pierre Poilievre. It’s Tony Abbott. Pierre Poilievre has plagiarized his entire election shtick from this Australian politician.

And it worked for Tony Abbott.

Then-Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard introduced a carbon tax in 2011, and then-opposition leader Abbott saw his opening. He made repeal of the carbon tax key to his campaign for the upcoming federal election. The polls showed that Gillard and her Labour party were headed for a landslide defeat, and just five months before the election in the fall of 2013, she was dumped by her own party, replaced by Kevin Rudd.

Abbott and his Liberal-Coalition won the election handily and he axed the tax as promised. Is the similarity between Poilievre and Abbott coincidence? Hardly.

Abbott and Stephen Harper were like-minded individuals sharing the same approach to climate policy: Do nothing to harm the economy. Abbott visited Harper in Ottawa in June of 2014, when Poilievre was a Harper cabinet minister. Harper was effusive in his praise for Abbott axing the “job-killing carbon tax.” Abbott in turn described Harper as “an exemplar of a contemporary, centre-right prime minister.” It was a mutual admiration society.

Poilievre, who observed all this bonhomie in 2014, has in 2024 taken more than just a page from the Abbott playbook. He’s using it as an instruction manual. He sees the parallel between Gillard and Trudeau and is repeating Abbott’s strategy, starting with his disinformation campaign on carbon taxes.

He’s blamed Mr. Trudeau’s carbon tax for runaway inflation and declared that it will result in an “economic nuclear winter.” Is there any truth to his claims?

Almost none.

Economists estimate that the contribution of the carbon tax to Canada’s inflation rate has been miniscule, about one-sixth of one per cent. And the carbon tax has risen while inflation has fallen back to the Bank of Canada target rate of two per cent. Carbon taxes were not responsible for the surge in inflation.

And will Canada’s carbon tax cause an economic nuclear winter? Obviously not. We can look to the Australian experience, as we now have had a decade to assess the efficacy of Gillard’s carbon tax.

It worked.

During its brief two-year life, Australia’s steadily rising carbon emissions fell for the first time.

And its effects on the Australian economy? There were no obvious effects.

Retrospective analysis of the Gillard carbon tax showed that when it was recycled, by lowering income taxes, and coupling it to research and development on reducing carbon emissions, it brought net benefits to the economy.

Poilievre’s claims about an economic disaster stemming from carbon taxes are fraudulent.

Just as disturbingly, Poilievre won’t tell us what his climate action policy actually is.

But we can look to Abbott’s playbook for next steps.

Abbott called his climate policy “Direct Action,” replacing a system where big polluters paid Australian taxpayers, with one where Australian taxpayers paid big polluters.

He shovelled public money into subsidizing emission reductions for the fossil fuel industry. The Department of the Treasury estimated that this would be twice as costly as the carbon tax and Abbott was unable to find any economist to endorse his plan. But subsidize the fossil fuel industry he did.

And that is what Poilievre will do.

He will squander eye-watering sums (our tax dollars) on subsidies to Big Oil and Gas for carbon capture.

But what’s the problem with carbon capture?

It doesn’t work.

Despite greenwashing campaigns funded by Big Oil and Gas, it has failed to reduce emissions in any meaningful way. It has enormous upfront costs, which will be borne by the taxpayer. This makes no sense in a world that is rapidly moving to renewable energy.

Carbon capture is effective for one thing. Getting gullible politicians to deliver massive public subsidies to an industry that is already obscenely profitable. And it is a key tactic in delaying the clean energy transition.

But it will be the cornerstone of the Poilievre policy climate change. You can bet your last petrodollar on it.

Australia lost nearly a decade in its clean energy transition under the regressive policies of successive right-wing governments.

Canada will make the same mistake by electing a Poilievre Conservative government.

Scott Forbes is an ecologist at the University of Winnipeg.