Angry in the Great White North

This polling result is so surprising that I'm still not sure I really believe it.  Canadians trust the Conservatives over the Liberals when it comes to deal with environmental issues by a margin 26%!

A majority of Canadians aren't especially worried about the economy and support the Conservative government's approach to climate change, according to a poll released Sunday, as Prime Minister Stephen Harper triggered an Oct. 14 general election.

[The poll, conducted by Environics for the CBC,] shows clear support for the governing party on the issue of global warming.

Some 68 per cent said they agreed with the government's approach to climate change and only 26 per cent disagreed with it.

By contrast, only 42 per cent agreed with the Liberal approach, while 51 per cent disagreed with the main opposition party on an issue that Liberal Leader Stephane Dion has made a central plank of the campaign.

Dion has proposed a "Green Shift" plan that would raise taxes on fossil fuels to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

The poll surveyed more than 2,500 Canadians between Aug. 29 and Sept. 2. It is considered accurate to within plus or minus two percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

This result flies in the face of accepted wisdom.  There are only two files that Canadians would prefer Stephane Dion's approach over Stephen Harper's leadership -- culture and the environment.

Or so we've been told in earlier polls:

Yesterday, Le Devoir's front page had a Leger Marketing poll that painted the Quebec race as a neck-and-neck fight between the Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois, with the Liberals an afterthought beyond their bastions in Montreal and western Quebec. Outside metropolitan Montreal, the poll gave the Conservatives 35% of support, the Bloc 34% and the Liberals just 20%.

Respondents preferred Conservative leader Stephen Harper over Mr. Dion on most issues: public security, economic development, managing public finances, good relations with provinces and managing the war in Afghanistan. Mr. Dion came out on top on environmental and cultural issues.

Given Stephane Dion's useless tenure as environment minister in Paul Martin's government, this trust with regards to the environment has always seemed misplaced to me, but it has also been very resilient.

Until now. 

But is this poll an outlier?  Of course, it's possible, but the sample size if two-and-a-half times larger than the normal sample size used in most national polls.

And then there is this news.  Resistance to the provincial carbon tax in British Columbia is breaking out of the rural areas and appearing in the lower mainland:

The carbon-tax revolt among municipalities has spread to the Lower Mainland with Delta and Maple Ridge registering their opposition to aspects of the tax plan through a resolution up for debate this month at the annual meeting of the Union of B.C. Municipalities.

The prospect of two communities close to the urban heart of British Columbia protesting the green-tax regime could lead to a political collision with the Liberal government, which has ruled out any adjustments to the tax.

In Maple Ridge, Mayor Gordon Robson says he is part of the revolt.

"I understand the feeling in the north," he said.

Maple Ridge's resolution says the carbon tax creates a "financial barrier" to funding greenhouse-gas reduction initiatives so he wants the province to establish a "long-term predictable, unconditional" funding stream to support greenhouse-gas reduction efforts.

Now strangely enough, Mayor Robson is not against the carbon tax.  He likes the idea.  He wants it to be much higher so that it hurts drivers even more acutely.  Mayor Robson's problem is that he thinks his city ought to be given big fat cheques (no strings attached) paid out of that carbon tax.  Until he sees his share of the tax money, he's against the tax.

Maybe this isn't so strange after all.  It explains perfectly why Canadians are coming to reject Stephane Dion's carbon tax in such large numbers.

Canadians realize that if Stephane Dion should get the chance to implement his carbon tax, average Canadians will be caught in the middle.  On one side will be politicians taking your money on the pretense of saving the planet.  On the other will be politicians complaining bitterly that they didn't get enough of your money for them to spend (since apparently the spending of tax money has a cooling affect via a mechanism that is still a mystery to me).

Stephen Harper's Conservatives are the only politicians who don't want your money.  They've cut two points off the GST to prove it.  They've given every Canadian $5,000 in tax free saving space with the Tax-Free Savings Account to prove it.  If given another mandate, I'm sure we'll see even more proof. 

Indeed, the whole carbon tax issue is devilishly complicated, and no one with two brain cells to rub together believes for a moment that it is "revenue neutral".  Thanks to politicians like Mayor Robson, Canadians are not falling for that line.

So we have widespread dissatisfaction in British Columbia regarding the provincial carbon tax because local politicians want more tax money for themselves.  In response, we have a poll showing that Canadians across the country prefer Stephen Harper's approach to greenhouse gas emission policy over Stephane Dion's plan for a massive tax grab and the inevitable squabbling from politicians trying to their mitts on as much of that money, your money, as they can.

I guess that just leaves Stephane Dion being trusted to be the best leader to keep money flowing to Canada's starving artists.