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Carbon Tax
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Emissions Trading Scheme
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Federated Farmers
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New taxes
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The Greens
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William Shakespeare
It was the Bard, William Shakespeare who wrote in Romeo and Juliet:
| What’s in a name? That which we call a rose | |
| By any other name would smell as sweet; |
Now it's not often that you'll catch us quoting Shakespeare, but those verses seem apt today as we reflect on the Green Party's measures announced yesterday; a Carbon Tax. Stuff reports:
The Greens have launched a controversial new climate change policy - a carbon tax.
In the audience for the announcement was Hollywood actress and environmental activist Lucy Lawless.
Co-leader Russel Norman wants to scrap the current carbon pricing system - the Emissions Trading Scheme.
In its place would be a tax of $25 per tonne of carbon on industry polluters.
Norman told around 200 delegates at the party's Upper Hutt conference that in Government, the Greens would aim for carbon neutrality by 2050.
The Greens are also proposing a Climate Change Commissioner, costing about $2 million. This will be funded by administration savings from scrapping the ETS.
New Zealand, once a world leader in climate change reduction, is now on track to be ''the worst performing developing country,'' he said.
''The Government's current response is indistinguishable from business as usual... as lines go it is flawed and dangerous.''
Critics of the tax claim the tax is a burden on households, who pay higher electricity and fuel costs.
However, the Greens say their levy would be offset by a ''climate tax cut'' on the first $2000 of income.
''We can reduce our emissions without hurting household budgets,'' he said. ''Households will be on average $319 better off every year under the Green party policy.''
We reckon that the average New Zealander's appetite for more taxes is pretty low. And when it's on something as nebulous as carbon, that appetite is likely to be lower still. That seems to be bourne out by the first poll we've seen on the new tax.
Oddly, airlines won't have to shell out this tax, despite being amongst the biggest polluters and users of fossil fuels. We know that the Greens are very attached to their Koru Club cards and love flying up and down the country for the opening of a paper bag (recycled paper, of course!), but why cut the airlines some slack and tax the cow cockies who are producing a huge proportion of our export earnings?
We'll tell you for why, as our Dear Departed Dad used to say. Taxes only work when they are fair, and without exemptions. What the Greens are proposing is a bit like Labour's plan in 2011 to exempt fresh fruit and veges from GST. The cost of administering the nightmare that the Greens are proposing will take care of any revenue generated. And either everybody has to be taxed, or nobody does.
We weren't fans of National's Emissions Trading Scheme. But replacing the ETS with a carbon tax will cost households as businesses put up their prices to compensate. Already BusinessNZ has said that it will ultimately result in job losses, and Federated Farmers claim it will make New Zealand dairy farmers less competitive in key export markets.
New Zealand does not need to be a world leader in climate change. We are a small country at the bottom of the world, and a reduction in emissions here will have barely a ripple around the globe.
The Greens can dress this up any way they like. But a tax by any other name is still a tax, and there is nothing remotely sweet about its odour.
