The controversial Liberal plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions is being defended by Huron-Bruce MP Paul Steckle.
The plan introduced by Opposition Leader Stephane Dion last month calls for a tax on emissions.
The levy would be offset by tax breaks the Liberals say would benefit Canadians in other areas.
Steckle says the so-called Green Shift plan makes both environmental and fiscal sense.
Steckle says the plan is based on a philosophy of not taxing what we earn but taxing what we burn.
He says it’s an approach to cleaning up the air Canadians would find acceptable.
Steckle says the current system of voluntarily reducing emissions simply doesn’t work.
He says the voluntary approach embraced by the Harper government is one reason Canada could never reach emission reduction targets set out in the Kyoto Accord.
Steckle says the Green Shift was more than two years in the making and went through a lot of changes.
Steckle says ideas to make the initiative as palatable as possible were thrown around, and the Grits called in environmental experts for advice.
Prime Minister Harper compares the Green Shift to the Liberals’ National Energy Program of the 1970s and ’80s.
The P-M says the only difference is that the Dion Plan would penalize all Canadians equally while the NEP targeted the West.
