British Columbia just got a Carbon Tax

Well, nobody got a vote, nobody got a say, the Dictatorship of British Columbia Canada just gave everyone a Carbon Tax.
BASTARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[link to www.theglobeandmail.com]

VICTORIA — B.C. Finance Minister Carole Taylor introduced an escalating carbon tax on most fossil fuels Tuesday, one she says is designed to ignite an environmental social movement in British Columbia and across Canada to fight climate change.

And she's handing every British Columbian $100 in June as seed money to get them thinking green.

“This is an important turning point for British Columbia,” she said. “We think for Canada.”

The carbon tax , effective July 1, will be phased in over five years to give consumers and businesses time to adjust to the new tax and understand there is a cost associated with generating harmful greenhouse gases, she said.

The carbon tax will start at a rate based on $10 per tonne of carbon emissions and rise $5 a year to $30 per tonne by 2012, Ms. Taylor said. The tax works out to an extra 2.4 cents on a litre of gasoline, rising to 7.24 cents per litre of gasoline by 2012.

Ms. Taylor said the carbon tax on diesel and home heating oil will start at 2.7 cents per litre and increase to 8.2 cents per litre over the same five-year period.

British Columbians already pay a 3.5-cent-per-litre gasoline tax to help fund transportation projects.

“We're not just going to be talking about climate change,” said Ms. Taylor. “We are acting. This could be a social movement in British Columbia.”

Ms. Taylor said the carbon tax will be revenue neutral, meaning the government will not use money generated from the tax to fill its coffers. The carbon tax revenue, estimated to hit $1.8-billion over three years, will be returned to taxpayers through personal income tax and business tax cuts, she said.

The government will introduce legislation that requires it to table an annual plan that shows how the carbon tax revenue will be returned to taxpayers, Ms. Taylor said.

To coax British Columbians to start thinking green, the government will send every resident a one-time $100 Climate Action Dividend in June. Ms. Taylor said the province hopes British Columbians will use the $100 to help adopt greener lifestyles.

Lower income British Columbians will receive an annual Climate Action Credit of $100 per adult and $30 per child to offset the cost of the carbon tax, she said.

Ms. Taylor said the carbon tax is one of the government's key building blocks to help it reach its legislated goal of reducing British Columbia's greenhouse gas emissions by 33 per cent by 2020.

“We have to find a way that we can work towards improving our environment and at the very same time do it in a way that keeps our economy strong,” she said. “One piece of the puzzle, not the whole story, is a carbon tax.”

Quebec has already introduced a form of a carbon tax, but the revenues return to government green technology initiatives, not taxpayers.

She said she believes British Columbia is already at the forefront of an environmental movement in Canada.

Ms. Taylor said British Columbia led Canada into the healthy lifestyles movement decades ago by choosing aerobics and granola over the beer fridge and living room couch, and the province now is ready to cut greenhouse gas emissions by driving less and walking more.

She said the budget attempts to balance the needs of fighting climate change while continuing to nurture a healthy economy.

“It is a budget that confronts and completely overturns the outdated notion that you have to choose either a healthy environment or a strong economy,” Ms. Taylor said. “That either-or-thinking belongs to the past.”

She said the B.C. government has decided to tackle the climate change issue despite concerns from Ottawa about patchwork green solutions that include carbon taxes and cap-and-trade emissions deals like the one British Columbia and other provinces are exploring.

“We had made the decision not to wait for a consensus,” Ms. Taylor said.

The budget forecasts a $50-million surplus and annual growth of 2.4 per cent.

Ms. Taylor said the downturn in the U.S. economy will hurt the province's export and manufacturing industries, especially the forest industry, but the provincial economy should remain strong due to strong trading relationships with Asia and robust provincial job growth.

The tax incentives aimed at keeping the carbon tax “revenue neutral” will be dispersed as follows: the bottom two personal income tax rates will be cut by 2 per cent in 2008 and 5 per cent in 2009 on the first $70,000 in earnings; effective July 1, the corporate tax rate will drop to 11 per cent from 12 per cent; effective July 1, the small-business tax rate will be cut from 4.5 per cent to 3.5 per cent..........................