Greens are committed to improving our collective well-being. Greens recognize that we need new measurements of our societal health and well-being. Greens know that the notion of unending economic growth is a dangerous illusion. Much of what we accept as normal – salaries, pensions, wealth and comfort - is an illusion, based on levels of borrowing that cannot be sustained by our province and our country. We must devise ways to achieve a stable, growthless economy that avoids both financial and ecological collapse.
We can do far more with far less. The central driving principle of Green Economic Policy is to improve well-being by increasing efficiency and eliminating waste. Our society has embedded wasteful practices at every turn. We waste raw materials, water and energy. In fact, of all the energy used by Canadians, more than half is wasted. Green economic policies aim to improve the efficiency of resource and energy use by a factor of four.
In their seminal book, Factor Four, Ernst von Weizacker, Amory B. Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins concluded:
“The amount of wealth extracted from one unit of natural resources can quadruple.”
There is abundant evidence to support this contention. We must improve the efficiency of resource and energy use so that we have more to share and use less.
To get there from here, market distortions created by a failure to internalize externalities must be removed. In other words, we must get the prices right. The single most significant government policy tool to advance or retard economic sustainability resides in the fiscal framework.
Our fiscal plan is straightforward. Use the tax system to help meet societal and ecological goals. Get the prices right. Allow business to pursue profit, with clear signals of environmental and societal objectives.
The Green commitment to Green tax relief will:
· Reduce income taxes.
· Reduce payroll taxes.
· Introduce a carbon tax, sending a clear economic signal that wasting energy and resources implies real costs.
According to an editorial in The Economist, September 9, 2006:
“IDEALLY, POLITICIANS WOULD CHOOSE THE MORE EFFICIENT CARBON TAX, WHICH IMPLIES A RELATIVELY STABLE PRICE THAT PRODUCERS CAN BUILD INTO THEIR INVESTMENT PLANS."
The Greens will also eliminate large corporate subsidies and grants programs. These perverse subsidies must be removed. It makes sense to reduce taxes on things we want – income and employment – while increasing taxes on things we do not want, like chemical pesticides and fertilizers that pollute drinking water, kill wildlife and harm human health.
Canadian businesses want two things from their government: predictability and policy coherence. The Green Government will ensure that the rules are clear, the playing field is level and decision making is transparent.
Key societal goals:
· Ensure Islanders have more time for friends, family and community engagement.
· Send the right price signals to the economy. The days of cheap, abundant energy are over. A carbon tax will send that signal and generate the revenue to cut income taxes, care for the less fortunate members of society and reduce the tax burden on small business.
· Eliminate perverse corporate subsidies. No more “corporate welfare bums.”
The bigger the challenge, the greater the opportunity. PEI and the world community face an environmentally-linked energy challenge of historic proportions over the next few decades. The reality of rising fossil fuel prices, increased losses due to extreme weather events caused by the worsening climate crisis, higher global temperatures, and worsening pollution levels will make mitigation and adaptation responses absolutely essential. Focusing community economic development and investment towards clean technology and services is both a smart economic development strategy and a superb investment opportunity.
Green technology has been called the greatest business opportunity of this century. All levels of government need to advance this green economic approach through effective tax and policy measures, and appropriate skills and trades training at the secondary and post-secondary levels.
As part of the provincial government’s contribution to advancing this green economic vision, the Green Party of PEI Government will gradually and progressively shift current consumption taxes onto products and services that harm people and the environment, while reducing taxes on income, products and economic activities that do no harm. As pollution taxes increase, other taxes, such as income and payroll, decrease. This approach is called being “revenue neutral.”
By moving to "true” or "full-cost” accounting, whereby products and services are priced according to the positive or negative impacts they cause throughout their life cycle, our society can make rational market choices that will guide the economy toward environmental sustainability.
By some accounts, the PEI economy is performing adequately. But prosperity is more than just the exchange of dollars. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) – our national bottom line – is a measure of money changing hands without regard to whether we are reducing social inequalities, advancing sustainability or safeguarding our primary resources such as wild fish populations, natural forests, drinking water and fertile soils. Most economists agree that GDP is a poor measure of economic well-being or quality of life, yet our government continues to use it as the basis for its most important taxation and policy decisions.
The Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) is a new and innovative accounting method that embraces a more systematic and comprehensive definition of well-being. Literacy, health and fitness, housework, family time, public infrastructure, cultural institutions, community volunteerism, water and air quality, forests, farmland, wetlands and employment are all measured by the GPI. Some countries, led by France following a ground-breaking study by Nobel award winners in economics, Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen, are working to broaden measurements of prosperity beyond the GDP. Canada and PEI need to catch up.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Introduce legislation to establish a GPI, such as the Canadian Index of Well-being developed by the Institute of Well-being, to provide the government with better information so it can do a better job of taxation and revenue sharing with the other levels of government.
· Modify PEI’s system of accounts so that annual changes in the depletion and addition to PEI’s principal natural resources are measured as an integral part of PEI’s worth.
“Too much and too long, we have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things...The (GDP) counts air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country. It measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.”
Senator Robert F. Kennedy, 1968
Most people do not like paying taxes, especially if they think that the taxes are unfair or do not deliver good value for money. People do not like wasteful spending by an over-bureaucratized government. Fair enough. However, about half of Canadians say that they would not mind paying more taxes for a cleaner environment, better health care and education, and to support people in need.
Taxation and spending policies shape society by sending signals about which sectors of society governments think are important. Both the Progressive Conservatives and Liberals have used our taxes to benefit large corporations like the Irvings and McCains by enabling the potato industry. Much of the Department of Agriculture budget is devoted to supporting industrial potato production so that corporate processing plants reap huge profits at the expense of human and environmental health.
At the same time, the cost of living has increased. Islanders save less, carry more debt and work more hours for the same money. Even before the current recession hit, people were having a harder time providing for their families and paying for a decent place to live.
The Green Party believes in reforming our tax system to make it fairer and more in tune with Islanders’ desire for a healthy environment, a sustainable economy and a vibrant, caring society. It makes no sense to subsidize the wealthy corporations.
The Green Party will reduce taxes on things we all want, like income and employment, and we will increase taxes on things we do not want – like pollution that harms people and our environment.
Our "green tax cuts" will be progressive, with a schedule that gives industry time to gear up or down. And they will be revenue neutral because a tax shift is not a tax grab. Income and payroll taxes will decline and the changes will help, not hurt, less fortunate members of our society.
To set the right prices, we have to change to a "true" or "full-cost” accounting method that incorporates economic, social, and environmental costs and benefits in the national accounts. Using this method, products and services are taxed, and thus priced, according to the positive or negative impacts caused throughout their lifecycle. We have already done this with tobacco products. Such taxes help consumers make more rational choices.
There are other ways to put taxes to work improving our society. Our tax system must be designed to reduce poverty, encourage environmentally beneficial activities, and generate more wealth for the 90% of Island families who are currently working harder without getting further ahead.
The Greens’ fiscal plan is straightforward: gradually reduce our debt, give clear tax signals that enable companies to pursue profits on a level playing field, and shift taxes to ensure that both revenue streams and expenditures meet social, economic and ecological goals.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Institute a full range of “polluter pays” taxes, including a carbon tax designed to reduce the use of fossil fuels by making them more expensive to produce and burn. All these taxes will be revenue neutral. The revenues generated will be offset by reduced taxes on personal income, payroll and on green products and technologies. The new taxes will also be non-regressive (e.g. the carbon tax will include a rebate program for low-income Islanders).
· Phase in carbon taxes to allow businesses and individuals time to make adjustments.
· Eliminate personal taxes on incomes below the low-income cut-off (no taxes on incomes of $20,000 or less).
· Increase taxes on tobacco and alcohol.
· Develop a specific tax-shifting schedule to provide tax incentives and direct rebates to businesses and individuals investing in the low-carbon economy (e.g. installing solar hot water systems, refitting homes and businesses to conserve energy).
· Provide increased tax breaks for Islanders who donate to registered charities.
For the first time in decades, the economic situation has pushed many governments to accept deficits. Greed and an addiction to higher-than-achievable rates of return on investments created a casino economy. Greens favour a steady economy, maximizing meaningful work and economic health. The highs and lows of booms and busts may be bearable for those with lots of chips to gamble away, but are brutal for the average Canadian.
Now that PEI is in the business of increasing deficits, we have to be very mindful of how we get out of a deficit. The Ghiz 2011 budget is on track to create a whopping $42 million deficit.
Economists warn of creating a “structural deficit.” Greens are very concerned. A future structural deficit could threaten our health care system and other indispensable government-funded programs. Greens are concerned that the Ghiz government is creating a structural deficit by cutting gas taxes, increasing government spending, and not finding any new forms of government revenues, as Greens would do through a carbon tax.
As long as the province is in deficit, it cannot find the resources to pay down the debt.
PEI’s net debt is expected to climb to $1.8-billion by March 2012 — about $12,500 for every man, woman and child in the province. The cost of servicing that debt is about $110 million per year. That debt burden drains support from essential government programs. Imagine what $110 million could do to alleviate poverty and provide affordable housing and affordable post-secondary education in PEI.
The Green Party believes in living within our limits, ecologically and fiscally. We are committed to a balanced budget and to reducing the provincial debt. It won’t be easy. To pay down the debt while supporting programs that meet immediate social, economic and environmental needs, we must maintain a healthy and fair level of taxation and we must ensure that Islanders get good value for their tax dollars.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Ensure we can climb out of the deficit once the recession is over, by placing taxes on pollution and junk food to replace those cut in income by avoiding the creation of a structural deficit.
· Set a disciplined schedule to gradually pay down the debt while maintaining public services and programmes that meet immediate social and environmental needs, increasing debt reduction over time but starting with modest targets to permit investment in critical programs.
Canadians are among the most overworked people in the industrialized world. The Green Party wants to help restore balance in the lives of Island workers by increasing paid vacation entitlement introducing shorter working hours.
The Green Party will raise the minimum paid vacation entitlement to three weeks. Many countries with minimum standards of four weeks and longer also have more productive and internationally-competitive economies than Canada’s.
Countries such as Denmark and the Netherlands have much higher labour standards and far lower rates of unemployment than Canada, resulting in lower social costs to the country as a whole. Scandinavian countries, with the world’s highest labour and social standards, rank near the top in international competitiveness.
Recent studies show that a growing number of Canadians are not taking their full vacation or any vacation at all, and are working more unpaid overtime. This high-stress lifestyle is costing Canada’s already overburdened health care system more than $5 billion a year, according to the National Work-Life Conflict Study produced for Health Canada.
The current payroll tax system discourages employers from hiring more workers, even when the business needs them. It particularly discourages employers from hiring full-time salaried staff who are entitled to benefits other than an hourly wage or monthly salary. It is more cost-effective to hire temporary and short-term workers or get existing workers to work longer hours, including paid overtime, than to hire additional staff. This leads to greater worker and family stress. Revenue from the carbon tax will allow the Green Party Government to reduce payroll taxes and reduce this perverse incentive.
The Green Party believes in the rights of workers to organize and in the free collective bargaining process. Labour rights are human rights. We believe in pay equity for women, in the equal treatment of organized and non-organized workers, and in workers’ right to fair wages, healthy and safe working conditions and working hours compatible with a good quality of life.
Our jobs strategy is directly linked to the development of a green economy. There are thousands of “green collar” jobs, for example, associated with refitting homes and businesses for energy efficiency and renewable energy.
The Green Party wants PEI to follow the example of countries that treat their workers well and reap the benefits of low unemployment rates, less stress-related illness, and economies that rank among the world’s best in productivity and competitiveness.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Advocate for changes that establish a minimum of three weeks paid vacation and a managed reduction in the standard work week to 35 hours.
· Support changes to the Employment Standards law to provide equal protection to contract and temporary workers.
· Strengthen non-union workers’ rights and protections to close the widening gap between union and non-union workplaces.
· Not invest public funds in P3’s (Public Private Partnerships)..
· Offer tax rebates to companies that provide on-site daycare, healthy food and facilities for exercise and commuting by bicycle.
Raising venture capital has become a lot more difficult since the 2008 financial market meltdown, particularly for small businesses and new technologies. The shift to a smart, lower-carbon economy requires venture capital investment in a wide range of innovative firms, including smaller firms that historically have had a much more difficult time in raising capital.
An easily-accessible and integrated system for business development and growth must be made available to create the business climate that will entice home-grown entrepreneurs to stay.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Establish a Green Venture Capital Fund to support viable small local green business start-ups.
The United Nations has declared 2012 the International Year of Co-operatives. Co-operatives have historically played an important role in PEI economic activities, especially in the Acadian community.
The Green party believes that consumer and producer cooperatives should play a greater role in PEI’s economy and society.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Work to examine the laws, regulations and tax system to determine how they may be changed to enhance opportunities for co-operatives, including cooperative federations incorporating banks or credit unions such as the highly successful Mondragon and Valencia cooperative federations of Spain.
· Revise and improve the Co-operative Associations Act.
· Work with the Co-op Housing Federation of PEI to ensure ongoing availability of co-op housing
Urban sprawl means commuters crawl. More roads don’t solve the problem; they make it worse. Clogged roads means more air pollution and more greenhouse gas emissions, even in small cities like Charlottetown. An expansion of the Charlottetown and area bus system will take cars off our roads, breaking the cycle of an increasing number of cars on increasingly-crowded roads to make our communities more livable. Dedicated bicycle lanes and accessible and secure bicycle parking will take even more cars off Island roads as biking becomes a viable means of transportation, not just a form of exercise and recereation.
We must build our way out of the problem of clogged roads and smog-choked cities, not by building more roads and bridges and more distant suburbs, but by building “smart growth” infrastructure. Excellent public transit and efficient housing in high-density nodes along transit corridors will make cities more livable and people-friendly.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Increase funding for pedestrian, cycle and car-sharing infrastructure in towns and cities.
· Increase funding to stimulate a investment in expanded public transportation infrastructure in the capital city region to make it convenient, safe, comfortable and affordable.
· Provide free public transit passes to people living below the poverty line.
· Oppose funding for highway expansions that encourage urban sprawl, increase private vehicle use and truck transport of goods, and consequently increase greenhouse gas emissions.
· Implement an Island-wide public transportation system.
Over the last five decades, government policies, subsidies and changing technologies have shifted food production from small ecologically-sustainable family farms to agribusinesses. This shift has given multinational corporations control over our food supply and contributed to the de-population of rural PEI and he demise of small family farms. It has become evident here in PEI, and around the world, that many of our more urgent environmental problems are the direct result of our food production system.
Our drinking water is polluted with chemical fertilizer and we don’t know just how polluted it may be with pesticides. According to Environment Canada, we inhale a cocktail of pesticides during spray season that are linked to cancer, learning disabilities, decreased IQ, Parkinsons, reproductive problems, miscarriages and birth defects. Depleted of organic matter, soil is disappearing faster than it can be replaced. One Agriculture Canada scientist warned that if we did not care for our soil, the Island would be incapable of supporting agriculture within 30years.
Industrial agriculture has also taken its toll on community and culture. Once an Island of thriving rural local economies, PEI is now largely urban with rural residents commuting to the cities for employment, young people moving away, and farmland mainly consolidated under large producers beholden to corporations for their markets.
But now, more than ever, Islanders are making the connections betwee industrial food production and environmental and social havoc. More of us are eating organic than ever before and organic food production is the fastest growing sector of Canadian food production today.
Organic agriculture is commercially practiced in countries around the world. Officials with the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization say that a shift to organic agriculture could be beneficial and that organic agriculture could produce enough food per capita to feed the world's current population.
A grassroots public movement for organic, humane and ecological food is now challenging the half-century long monopoly of the corporate industrial model.
Cuba met this challenge and demonstrated that organic agriculture can bring about ecological and economic benefits in a socially equitable manner. It has been shown in Cuba and elsewhere that small farms are actually more productive than large ones – by as much as 200 to 1,000 percent greater output per unit of area.
The Green Party of PEI envisions a culture and an agriculture for PEI that is organic, local, family-scale and fully integrated with the diversity of Nature. In a world with increasingly expensive fossil fuel, we need to achieve food security for Islanders. At least 80% of what we eat is imported. If we fail to move to organic agriculture, it will eventually be forced upon us with no option for an orderly transition.
The health of Islanders today and in the future depends on the environmentally sustainable production of wholesome food. We believe that local organic agriculture must play a role in mitigating and reversing climate change, providing food security, restoring soil health, improving human health, protecting water, and providing sustainable livelihoods for citizens. We must restructure our agricultural markets to sustain farming and provide farm families with a fair share of the consumer food dollar. We want to expand local small-scale agriculture and support a rapid transition to 100% organic agriculture rather than subsidizing costly agro-chemicals, industrial food production and genetically modified crops.
People need healthy food and the healthiest food choices are organic and local. With growing concerns over economic and climatic instability, a reliable local food supply is essential. Most of the food consumed in PEI comes from out of province. Family- owned and operated farms of small to medium size constitute the most reliable, high quality and economical food production system, now and into our uncertain future.
As the scale of industrial agriculture increases, so too does its scale of abuses. Emerging from the destruction is a vision the Green party holds of a food future that is healthy, humane and sustainable - a food future that has the potential to revitalize rural communities as well as the Prince Edward Island economy.
Green Party MLAs will develop a Provincial Agricultural and Food Policy which will:
· Transition PEI to a100% organic province as quickly and as orderly as possible, taking into account issues of toxic chemical trespass and the resulting damage to human health, organic crops and the environment.
· Ban the production of genetically engineered plants and animals.
· Shift Department of Agriculture focus from industrial food production to organic food production; experienced organic extension agents will be hired.
· Levy toxic taxes on chemical pesticides
· Levy pollution taxes on chemical fertilizers.
· Increase property taxes to reflect the loss of topsoil on industrial farmland.
· End all subsidies to industrial agriculture within one year.
· Establish a government procurement policy of “organic and local first” for schools, hospitals, jails, nursing homes and other government-run facilities.
· Establish a fund for income support during transition from chemical to organic agriculture.
· Provide tax incentives and subsidies for new and existing small food processing facilities.
· Provide funding for organic agriculture training, including apprenticeships on organic farms.
· Establish training programs for small-scale production of handcrafted foods and products.
· Promote urban agriculture to encourage food security as well as supplemental income.
· Support farmer’s markets and community supported agriculture programs.
· Investigate the potential to acquire the federal experimental farm property for use as community gardens, especially for low-income Islanders, and as a demonstration site for urban agriculture, an educational facility for healthy cooking, and working gardens to supply food for the Food Bank and other charitable organizations with healthy organic food.
· Encourage the establishment of community gardens and orchards in all Island communities.
· Require all new subdivisions to set aside land for community gardens.
· Establish an experimental farm in rural PEI for organic crop research.
· Provide tax incentives to allow young people to purchase land for organic farms.
· Provide organic growers with interest-free loans and other incentives to encourage expansion to family-farm size operations.
· Provide a stipend for apprentices on small organic farms.
· Allow small organic farms to operate independently of marketing boards.
· Protect highly productive agricultural land from development.
· Prohibit the land application of sewage sludge.
· Not support growing crops for the commercial production of biofuel.
Island forests are degraded and fragmented after decades of government policies enabling wholesale liquidation and offered no incentives for landowners to protect and conserve forests. It will be generations before the Acadian forest ecosystem can recover enough to provide sustainable employment, carbon capture and the inter-connected wildlands necessary for wildlife to flourish.
The Green Party understands that forests are the foundation of complex ecological systems performing important services that purify our air and water, prevent floods and erosion, and stabilize our climate. Two-thirds of our plant and animal species live in forests. Large expanses of forest, especially old growth forests, must remain intact to maintain natural habitats and biodiversity. Our forests also sustain those who seek recreation and rejuvenation in the wilderness.
Green MLAs will:
- Ban clear-cutting.
- Provide tax incentives to leave forested land intact except for personal use for firewood and building.
- Provide tax incentives for landowners to put covanenants on forested land.
- Develop a plan for an interconnected system of wildlands across the Island to allow wildlife and plants the space they need to flourish with a long range goal of 25% of our land base as protected wild areas.
- Provide eco-forestry training to land owners.
- Implement environmental certification standards for all commercial forest operations.
- Prohibit the burning of slash for the commercial production of energy and heat.
Travel and tourism is the world’s number one employer and is a major contributor to the PEI economy. Tourism can play a role in protecting and conserving PEI’s environment and culture or it can contribute to ecosystem degradation and the commercialization of cultural stereotypes.
The Greens believe we must foster a sustainable, green, low-carbon tourism industry and market it responsibly. We believe he tourism industry must fit into the overall plan for PEI as an organic food destination, a place of natural beauty with clean and intact ecosystems and a centre of exceptional cultural experiences.
Green Party MLAs will:
- Increase funding for the heritage, culture, arts and music sectors.
- Build a low-carbon tourism sector based on bicycle touring, nature appreciation, culture and organic artisan food experiences.
- Shift the Department of Tourism focus to ecotourism.
- Develop a long-term plan for tourism that accounts for the reality of travel in climate of escalating fossil fuel prices.
As the fossil fuel era comes to a close, industry is desperately exploiting sources of oil and gas that are increasingly difficult to extract and pose unacceptable environmental risks. The process of fracking threatens to pollute groundwater with chemicals used to extract gas from shale deposits. With no other source of drinking water in PEI except groundwater, fracking permits must not be denied.
Likewise, the threat of an oil spill in the Gulf of St. Lawrence as a result of oil drilling is too great a risk. The marine ecology of the Gulf must be protected from disaster and the tourism industry employs too many people to risk ruining livelihoods for corporate profit.
Green MLAs will:
- Place an open-ended moratorium on all fossil fuel exploration and extraction, especially on the process of fracking.
- Oppose all fossil fuel exploration and extraction in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
“If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that co2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm”
James Hansen, NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies
During a Toronto heat wave in 1988, Canada hosted the first-ever international scientific conference on climate change, “Our Changing Atmosphere: Implications for Global Security”. The consensus statement from the assembled scientists was “Humanity is conducting an unintended, uncontrolled, globally pervasive experiment, whose ultimate consequences are second only to global nuclear war.”
When the Kyoto agreement was signed, Canada committed to reducing its emissions by 6% below 1990 levels during the period 2008-2012.
Due to government inaction, our emissions during the Kyoto commitment period of 2008-2012 are expected to be about 30% higher than we promised. Meanwhile, other countries, such as Germany, Sweden and England, have achieved double-digit emissions reductions since signing onto the Kyoto Protocol.
Globally, emissions have risen faster than any of the models produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), with alarming results. Glaciers are melting, threatening global water supplies. Polar ice is receding at an alarming rate and what remains is spongy and vulnerable, so many climate scientists now expect Arctic ice to disappear many decades ahead of when they believed just a few short years ago. Sea levels are rising, leading to evacuations of people from low-lying island nations and increasing the threats of storm damage due to tidal surges in coastal areas. Storm intensities with higher precipitation are increasing. Coral reefs are dying. Tropical storms are intensifying. The Amazon is drying out and becoming a tinderbox. Many areas are experiencing unprecedented heat waves and droughts. Conflict in places like Darfur is exacerbated by climate-induced drought, and heralds the arrival of resource wars fueled by the climate crisis.
The situation is getting worse. As the ice melts in the Arctic, less sunlight is reflected and the ocean heats up more quickly. This accelerates the melting of permafrost, releasing ancient deposits of methane (a greenhouse gas more than twenty times as powerful as carbon dioxide) into the atmosphere. The oceans are slowly absorbing some of the increased atmospheric carbon, but this causes ocean acidification, which harms many of the organisms in the food chain on which our fisheries depend.
It is estimated that climate change now claims the lives of over 315,000 people annually and is expected to create 700 million environmental refugees by mid-century. If unchecked, it will reduce the Earth's human carrying capacity to less than a billion by century's end. Less than a tenth of humanity may survive unless we act now.
Canadians have already felt the impacts from coast to coast to coast: more floods and firestorms, droughts and water shortages, heat waves and smoggy days, hurricanes, catastrophic wind and ice storms shutting down communities, insect infestations killing millions of hectares of trees.
The permafrost from Siberia to the Mackenzie Valley is melting. As it melts, whole villages face the need to relocate, and caribou sink in the mud as they try to migrate. The glaciers, whether in the Alps, the Rockies, the Yukon, or the Andes, are all in rapid retreat.
The intensity of hurricanes is increasing. While some hurricane specialists are not yet convinced, increasingly research demonstrates that the energy packed in the hurricane’s punch has increased by 50-80% from 1950 to 2003. Warmer waters in the ocean lead to more severe hurricanes. In the fall of 2003, Hurricane Juan was the first full force tropical hurricane ever to slam into Nova Scotia and PEI. Formerly, cooler ocean water to our south would have downgraded Juan to a tropical storm, but, with warmer ocean surface waters, it hit PEI and Nova Scotia as a tropical hurricane.
Scientists are increasingly talking about climate change as being less a dial, than a switch. What is described in the literature as “non-linear perturbations” can be translated as “nasty shocks” or sudden and abrupt climate catastrophes.
A number of scientists have determined that the risk of “tipping point events” -- the loss of the Gulf Stream, the collapse of the Western Antarctic Ice Shelf, and the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet -- is increased if global average temperature goes up by 2 degrees C above the pre-Industrial Revolution temperature. This, they estimate, could happen if concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere were to increase to somewhere between 400 to 450 ppm. We are at 389 ppm now, up from 275 ppm in the 1800s, and now it is rising at 3 ppm per year. And yet, our government resists shifting to a low-carbon economy. Many other countries have begun to make this shift successfully. At a meeting of provincial and federal energy ministers this year, PEI Environment, Energy and Forestry Minister Richard Brown signed on to a statement the ministers produced, supporting the tar sands by calling them “responsible and sustainable”.
The coming decade will largely determine the type of planet we will have at century's end and for millennia thereafter. If we act boldly and decisively to reduce our dependence on finite polluting energy, we can still deliver a planet that sustains humanity and most other life. If we fail to change existing patterns, we will almost surely usher in an era of conflict and irreversible changes. PEI must do its share to make substantial progress in reducing greenhouse gases by embracing a truly green economy.
PEI must adopt these positions on the targets we will meet:
· A commitment to reduce emissions 30% below 1990 levels by 2020, and to 85% reduction below 1990 by 2040.
· Phasing out carbon emissions as quickly as possible until we become “carbon neutral” must be the overarching goal. A complete phase-out will occur eventually in any case as fossil fuels run out and the sooner we embrace a low-carbon economy, the better off we will be.·
We must implement policies that make it possible to meet the greenhouse gas emissions targets to which we commit and then we must allocate the necessary resources to ensure that we actually achieve these objectives.
"We are risking the ability of the human race to survive."
Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Climate change remains a major concern for Islanders. Despite the immediate concerns over the recession and loss of jobs, Islanders have continued to say they will not trade off environmental protection to help the economy. In fact, Islanders, like all Canadians, understand that ending waste is good economics. Real solutions enhance the economy and the environment at the same time.
While completely phasing out carbon emissions seems daunting, the challenge looks much less intimidating when we realize that more than half the energy we release is never used, but escapes into the environment as waste heat. Even what is traditionally considered useful energy is questionably so. Is it useful to move 2 tonnes of steel, glass and rubber when our real objective is to move an 80 kg person? Is it useful to heat a home that's so leaky that most of the heat escapes within an hour? Is it useful to keep light bulbs and televisions on when no one is home? Our real energy needs are a fraction of what we use. Efficiency is our friend.
Creating energy from non-polluting sources is neither novel nor difficult. The only challenge is ensuring that energy is available when and where we need it. Fully renewable electrical grids are now being modelled in Germany. The Green Party embraces the challenge set by Al Gore and James Hansen to replace all power generation from fossil fuels with renewable energy within a decade.
In his report to the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Nicholas Stern, former senior economist to the World Bank, warned that, left unchecked, climate change could constitute a $7 trillion hit to the world economy, create water shortages for 1 in 6 people planet-wide, cause the extinction of up to 40 % of species, and result in up to 200 million environmental refugees. Taking action now, says Stern, would cost just one to 3% of global gross domestic product annually.
We will build an economy powered by the renewable energy sources. We will discourage wasteful practices, dramatically reducing our overall energy needs. By phasing out carbon emissions, we will simultaneously clean up our air, improve water quality and help re-establish healthier forests. We will transform our buildings so they stay warm in winter and cool in summer without burning fossil fuels. We will change the way we move, bringing in an efficient and convenient public transit system supported by non-polluting personal vehicles and communities based on walking and cycling. We will create jobs installing, operating and maintaining wind turbines, solar panels, public transit vehicles and infrastructure, insulation, and other elements of a clean and efficient economy. We will build local economies and strong communities responsive to local needs.
In addition to tax shifting, a Green government will leave no stone unturned to establish practical and pragmatic programs in all areas of the economy to accelerate our reduction in carbon emissions.
The provincial government should apply the same provincial GHG reduction goals to all its own operations. All new provincial government buildings must meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) standards. Provincially-owned buildings must adhere to LEED® Gold; leased buildings LEED® Silver standards. Standards should be continuously upgraded.
Carbon conditionality clauses. A Green government will negotiate with every business, NGO, institution, municipality and community that receives funding of any kind from the provincial government to establish benchmarks and policies to reduce its GHG emissions in accordance with PEI’s goals. This will be phased on so that after 2012, 25% of all funding will include carbon reduction requirements, rising to 100% by 2025. Carbon conditionality will be a part of a wider set of sustainability conditionality clauses, reflecting other changes that are needed on the road to a healthier economy.
Most of today's housing stock will still be standing in 2040, the date we target to have achieved an 85% overall reduction in PEI’s carbon emissions, so retrofitting PEI’s existing stock of buildings for energy conservation is critical.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Develop a provincial energy retrofit standard designed for a post-carbon economy that will reduce energy use in existing buildings by an average of at least 80% below that of 2009 average structures.
· Develop timelines and targets for raising existing building stock to the new standard with the goal of retrofitting 100% of PEI’s buildings to a high level of energy efficiency by 2025.
· Promote the adoption of this high efficiency standard by:
o Providing revolving provincial loans for retrofits to homeowners.
o Funding a program to upgrade all low-income rental housing on a phased year-by-year basis to be completed by 2025, as Germany is doing.
o Identifying the barriers to sustainable energy retrofits and eliminating them.
o Providing refundable tax credits for all energy retrofit costs, based on before-and-after EnerGuide or infrared heat tests for residential, commercial, industrial and institutional buildings.
o Promoting tax-deductible Green Mortgages for home-owner energy retrofit costs.
o Introducing a program of energy retrofits to public sector buildings such as universities, schools and hospitals.
o Establishing a 100% Accelerated Capital Cost Allowance for all businesses for energy retrofit costs.
o Providing revolving federal loans for residential or business energy retrofits.
o Instituting mandatory energy audits of buildings that become available for sale and requiring that the audit results be made available.
· Develop and implement within two years, and update annually after that, a new building code that:
o Reduces overall energy demand to 15% of current conventional structures.
o Minimizes the use of fossil fuel based heating and cooling systems.
o Considers the embodied energy of construction materials.
o Results in structures where possible that produce more energy than they consume.
o Promotes structures that harvest, reuse and purify their own water.
o Is performance-based, opening the way to innovation and unlocking barriers to green design.
o Require mandatory installation of solar hot water systems and pre-wiring for solar PV on all new buildings.
o Provide grants of 50% of the cost of solar thermal roofs or walls including solar hot water, as in Sweden;
o Green Mortgage loans for the remainder of the cost. Establish free energy audits.
o Provide PST credits for all materials used in buildings that are LEED® Silver or better.
The Green Party embraces the challenge set by Al Gore and James Hansen to replace all power generation from fossil fuels within a decade. A successful efficiency and building retrofit program coupled with peak load reductions could reduce the required capacity by 25%. Population increase could raise the capacity requirements again, as will the electrification of transport.
Electric vehicle producers should be encouraged to ensure the production of whatever additional electrical capacity (from renewable sources) their cars will require, as some producers offer to do. Vehicle batteries can provide useful support for load shifting to and from the grid, powering up at night when demand is low and potentially releasing energy back to the grid if it is needed at times of peak demand. This can make electric vehicles more affordable.
All carbon-based fuels will be subject to rising carbon taxes. Approvals for new oil-fired power generation will not be granted.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Work to accelerate the rapid deployment of Island-owned community-based wind turbines.
· Provide incentives for projects with approved Advanced Renewable Tariffs that provide power purchase contracts for a diversity of small renewable energy projects.
· Implement net metering and peak power pricing
· Support local energy co-operatives forming that adopt ART+.
· Work with the solar industry to install solar PV.
Employing currently available green technologies and encouraging transportation shareholders to be more efficient will dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the transport sector, which accounts for about 20% of our emissions.
Carbon conditionality. A Green government will establish transport-based carbon conditionality clauses affecting all provincial funds and loans.
Walking and cycling. All bicycles and bicycle gear will be tax deductible and PST free. All provincial staff will receive a cycling allowance equal to the vehicle allowance.
A Green government will match municipal investments designed to increase walking and cycling, with a baseline contribution of 25% of the total cost, rising to 50% where municipalities pay bicycle allowances to their staff and equip all government buildings with cycling facilities, increasing the kilometers of cycling lanes and trails, and establishing policies to encourage smart growth and prevent sprawl.
Transit.
A Green government will create an Island-wide public transit system and match municipal investments in transit where municipalities have established working policies to encourage smart growth and prevent sprawl, and where transit authorities introduce progressive programs designed to increase ridership such as annual U-passes for colleges, eco-passes for neighbourhoods, commuter passes for businesses, and requirements that new developments must be served by transit. A Green government will make it compulsory for developers to provide three- year transit passes for all their development’s new residents (as in Boulder, Colorado).
Teleworking. A Green government will pay a no-trip vehicle allowance to all provincial staff working from home, give a tax credit for the cost of establishing a home office, and establish a parking cash-out system (cash to employees not using a company parking space) to encourage reduced use of cars and parking.
Vehicles. When it comes to vehicle technologies, corn and grain-based biofuels pose an unacceptable cost in reducing food available for people, depleting soil of nutrients and organic matter, as well as having dubious net greenhouse gas reductions. Hydrogen will not deliver in the near term nor possibly in the long-term due to inherent storage, distribution and production efficiency reasons. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles can be 100% electric for short distance trips and fully electric vehicles are already available. Today's fully electric vehicles are economical for city driving and models are in development that can economically replace the full function of an internal combustion engine vehicle. As more electric and hybrid vehicles become available at affordable prices, non-hybrid internal combustion engine personal vehicles should be phased out.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Accelerate the market arrival of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and fully electric vehicles working with all governments and businesses in Canada to join a Canadian green car buying pool and to join the Plug-In Partners buying pool.
· Offer scale-based rebates of up to $5,000 for the purchase of the most efficient vehicles, and scale-based fees on the purchase of inefficient vehicles.
· Allow tax write-off benefits only for energy efficient company cars.
The Green Party opposes current laws requiring the use of biofuels.
All provincial support for municipalities will be subject to carbon conditionality clauses. All current provincial funding that encourages urban sprawl and greater vehicle use will be eliminated.
Support will be provided to local non-profits and associations that sponsor programs that concretely reduce carbon emissions.
Provincial disaster assistance will be available to help communities prepare for climate change impacts (floods, storms, disasters), subject to carbon conditionality clauses. Communities that do not satisfy the clauses will not be eligible for disaster assistance. This requirement is similar to an insurance company refusing fire insurance on a building that does not meet code requirements for fire safety.
One of the binding commitments of nations signing on to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was to prepare adaptation strategies to cope with that level of climatic disruption that is no longer avoidable. If anything, this commitment has been ignored by Canada even more than the obligation to reduce emissions. Sectors requiring immediate attention include agriculture, forestry, fishing and tourism. Protecting vulnerable areas and population also need to be addressed. Climatic impacts have already cost the Island economy millions of dollars.
The Green Party believes that the provincial government must show leadership in developing an adaptation strategy in collaboration with municipalities that aims to mitigate and reduce the impacts of climate change. Even with significant global GHG reductions to stabilize the climate, it will take decades, perhaps centuries, to arrest climate change.
We must improve municipal infrastructure, especially water treatment facilities, to meet a changing water regime. We are already experiencing increased deluge precipitation events during which current systems allow raw sewage to bypass treatment in Charlottetown. We must start curtailing developments in areas of high vulnerability, like low-elevation coastal areas. We must undertake greater flood control measures in areas made more prone to flooding because of climate change.
We must act to reduce emissions and we must prepare for the “new normal” of a destabilized climate. These are not, as often presented, mutually exclusive goals. We need both and we needed them yesterday.
Green Party MLAs will:
· Establish a special task force involving all stakeholders, all levels of government and scientific experts to prepare, over the next two years, area-specific climate change adaptation strategies.
Our natural environment is the source of our wealth and our health. PEI’s forests, water, soil and energy resources fuel our economy. However, if we treat our environment like a business in liquidation, those resources and our economy will suffer. The lack of provincial regulation, monitoring, and action has made PEI one of Canada’s most tragic offenders against the environment. Successive governments subsidized the potato industry so that acreage increased by 70%. Pesticide and chemical fertilizer use skyrocketed through the 1990’s, contaminating our soil, air and water. Environment Canada says PEI has the highest intensity of pesticide use in Canada. Through inadequate environmental protection we risk leaving our children the deplorable legacy of a debilitated and degraded environment. How can we be so thoughtless?
The Green Party of PEI has set out its plan for a sustainable future grounded in fiscal responsibility, ecological health and social justice.
As the only party working within a triple bottom line (economic, ecological and social) approach to every policy, our position on key environmental issues is clear.
It is urgent that the PEI government set real targets, with measurable objectives, and put in place the resources to deliver on those goals. Recent history makes it clear that purely voluntary efforts do not work. Recent history also demonstrates that policies must be consistently applied. For example, it is not possible to eliminate cancer-causing pesticides in our air while subsidizing industrial agriculture.
We need to correct the perception that economic success is dependent on growth and build understanding of the benefits of a steady-state economy (non-boom/bust economy). Continued exponential growth is counter to the realities of a finite planet.
Environment Canada says PEI’s air is filled with a cocktail of agricultural pesticides at all times of the day and in places not near sprayed fields. The most used pesticides in PEI are potato fungicides. Three of these fungicides represent 80% of pesticide use in PEI and all are classed as cancer-causing by various agencies. Other pesticides are neurotoxic, affecting child learning; many are endocrine disruptors; some affect reproduction, causing sterility, miscarriages and birth defects. Pesticides, even after they have dried on leaf surfaces and soil, volatilize for days and weeks afterwards and continue to contaminate our air.
Green MLAs will:
Our only source of drinking water in PEI comes from groundwater. Fractured bedrock is mostly overlaid with sandy soil so that anything dumped on the ground can easily find its way into our groundwater. Nitrates from chemical fertilizer used on potato fields have been leaching into our groundwater for decades and despite repeated warnings, governments have done nothing to end the ongoing assault. Virtually every drop of drinking water in PEI is now contaminated with nitrates, mainly from chemical fertilizer.
Evidence is emerging of adverse human health effects from the consumption of water contaminated with nitrates below levels considered safe by the PEI government. People with contaminated wells are forced to bear the cost of drilling deeper wells or installing costly water treatment systems.
The Green Party believes the right to pure uncontaminated drinking water is a basic human right.
“EXPERT OPINION GIVEN TO US IN THE COURSE OF OUR DELIBERATION HAS SUGGESTED THAT . . . THE LEACHING OF NITRATES AND OTHER FERTILIZER RESIDUES INTO SURFACE AND GROUNDWATER SOURCES PRESENT A “TICKING BOMBSHELL” IN THE ENVIRONMENTAL MILIEU.”
Report of the Royal Commission on the Land (PEI), October 1990
The ongoing contamination of streams and estuaries from agricultural chemicals, topsoil and sewage has resulted in massive kills of all manner of life in and around waterways. Irrespective of the inherent right of all species to exist, the contamination has impacted the right of some Islanders to earn a living. The shellfish industry regularly loses money when sewage and nitrates affect water quality. Nitrates in the Southwest River resulted in hundreds of dead eels along a huge swath of the river. The Island is ringed with closures for clam digging and fishing because of bacterial contamination.
Green Party MLAs will:
The Clean Drinking Water Act
The aim of the Act is to protect groundwater from pollutants by controlling the direct and indirect discharges of known contaminants into groundwater. Government must do a better job of protecting drinking water in a province that is 100% dependant on groundwater. Virtually all PEI groundwater is contaminated with nitrates, mainly from chemical fertilizer.
The traditional approach to water quality management is centred on routine monitoring. Water test results are compared against acceptable concentrations of pollutants in order to estimate public health risks. The focus of attention is on the test results rather than ensuring that the water supply is not polluted to being with. The Ghiz government’s primary response to widespread concern over nitrate contaminated drinking water was to offer free nitrate tests.
A further weakness in this water quality management approach is that the number of samples taken, especially for monitoring pesticide contamination, is very small and not statistically representative. The focus on tap water testing means that action is only taken after test results are known and polluted water has been consumed. The reliance on tap water testing is not supportive of public health protection.
The Drinking Water Protection Act would recognize that every citizen of PEI has the right to pure and safe drinking water. It is based on five basic principles:
1. a high level of protection
2. application of the precautionary principle
3. the prevention of pollution
4. the rectification of pollution at source
5. adoption of the polluter pays principle
The Act would regulate:
Nitrates
PEI’s agriculture industry, specifically potato and corn production, is nitrogen intensive. The goal is to return nitrate levels back to natural levels - less than 1 mg/L.
Nitrogen, like pesticides, will be a regulated product. Sales of nitrogen fertilizer for commercial use must be reported to government, including name of purchaser, and quantity and type of fertilizer. Purchasers must submit monthly fertilizer application records information including name of business and where, when and how much fertilizer is applied. This information will be available to the public on the government website.
Provincial Sales Tax and a Pollution Tax will be levied on nitrogen fertilizers.
The amount of fertilizer applied per acre will be restricted.
The safe level of nitrate contamination will be lowered to 2 mg/L.
The residential use of nitrogen fertilizer will be restricted.
Fracking
Fracking will not allowed.
Pesticides
All known groundwater polluting pesticides will be prohibited.
Sales of pesticides for commercial use must be reported to government, including name of purchaser, and name and quantity of pesticide. Purchasers must submit monthly pesticide application records including name of business, name of pesticide, and where, when and how much pesticide is applied. This information will be available to the public on the government website.
Provincial Sales Tax and a Pollution Tax will be levied on pesticides.
Sewage Sludge
The disposal of sewage sludge on land will be prohibited.
Septic Systems
The regulations for septic systems will be upgraded to bring PEI in line with industry best practices for the protection of groundwater.
Licensing requirements for contractors will be upgraded.
Site assessments for septic systems will be conducted by government, not the septic system industry.
An intensive and ongoing best practices education program will be established for septic systems users.
Animal Confinement Operations
The commercial application of manure will be regulated. Applications of manure must be reported monthly, including name of business, and where, when and how much manure is applied. This information will be available to the public on the government website.
Polluter Pays Compensation
The Pollution Tax will compensate landowners forced to dig new wells or install water treatment systems when pollutant levels reach unacceptable levels, allow free nitrate tests for private wells, and when property is devalued because of contaminated well water not caused by the landowner, compensation will paid upon sale of the property.
Other Contaminants
All substances and practices that may cause groundwater pollution will be regulated.
Earlier generations grew up living by the aphorism “waste not, want not.” Our generation seems to embrace “shop till you drop.”
Landfills, formerly called garbage dumps, account for more greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than do mining, construction and domestic aviation combined. Most of these GHG emissions are in the form of methane gas, which is over 20 times more heat absorbing than carbon dioxide. Landfills also leach toxic chemicals into soil and water. There has to be a better way to deal with garbage.
The Green goal is “zero waste.” This means shifting from thinking of waste as a problem to considering waste as a resource. Our failure to manage waste properly represents a huge loss of resources and revenue. Reusing and recycling wastes have been shown to generate 10 to 15 times more jobs than incineration or land filling. We believe that strong incentives must be in place for industry and consumers to reduce waste to zero. Setting a goal of zero waste will provide direction and inspiration.
Green MLAs will:
· Close down the Charlottetown garbage incinerator to end the release of toxic chemicals into our air and the disposal of toxic fly ash into landfills.
· Require a record of all dump locations to be attached permanently to property deeds.
· Expand product responsibility programs where manufacturers are responsible for the entire lifespan of their products.
· Promote the concept of a conserver society as an alternative to a consumer society.
· Close all private construction and demolition sites and hold owners responsible for environmental contamination. All new C&D sites will be owned and managed by the Island Waste Management Corporation.
The Green Party of PEI sees both human and non-human species as having intrinsic value. We believe that the key to better protection for animals begins with a greater understanding of the non-human species with whom we share our world. Our traditionally anthropocentric views have led humans to see animals as resources to be used, rather than living beings who deserve to live their lives free from human abuse, manipulation and harassment.
Science has established beyond question that many species suffer not only physical but emotional pain, that they experience fear, grief, and a host of responses not previously understood to exist outside the human experience. As we continually learn more about the non-human experience, humanity’s subjection and abuse of other species for everything from food, to research to entertainment becomes increasingly untenable. While we acknowledge that society’s habits of thousands of years are not going to change overnight, we support the ongoing pursuit of identifying and implementing viable and sustainable alternatives to the use of other species for human benefit.
The Green Party’s key principles regarding animal welfare are:
· Humans share the planet with other species, who have an innate desire to survive and enjoy their lives in their own environment, which must be respected.
· It is a government’s responsibility to provide protection not just for those who vote, but for those who require our protection.
· “Jobs at all costs” is not an acceptable approach. Sacrificing the humane treatment of animals for economic or other gain is both ethically untenable and counterproductive, as greater opportunity lies in humane, green economies.
· We must ensure that animals in our care are provided as a minimum standard the Five Freedoms: a) freedom from hunger and thirst; b) freedom from discomfort; c) freedom from pain, injury or disease; d) freedom to express normal behaviour; e) freedom from fear and distress.
Our goal is to make PEI a province where we can be proud of the respect and empathy that we show not only to each other, but to all living beings. We believe that this is best achieved through a combination of education at all levels, incentives and support to businesses and individuals who promote these values, and vigorous enforcement of strict legislation.
Legislation
Current legislation that covers animals in PEI is outdated, vague, and includes significant loopholes that allow abusers to escape penalty.
The Green Party will:
· Launch an immediate review of provincial legislation in order to bring it in line with modern standards of protection and humane animal care.
· Legislate that all animals in care of people receive the Five Freedoms (as established by the Farm Animal Welfare Council): a) freedom from hunger and thirst; b) freedom from discomfort; c) freedom from pain, injury or disease; d) freedom to express normal behaviour; e) freedom from fear and distress.
Jurisdiction
Currently, wildlife falls under the jurisdiction of The Department of Environment, Energy and Forestry, and farm and companion animals come under the Department of Agriculture. Animal welfare organizations widely agree that placing responsibility for protecting animals from abuse in the hands of authorities whose priority is to promote the economic success of agriculture, and who are susceptible to pressure and lobbying from agri-food industries, places the safety of animals in significant jeopardy.
The Green Party will:
· Establish an independent Commissioner of Animal Welfare which will be independent of political parties and government departments, and which will report to the Legislature.
· Establish an Animal Welfare and Ethics Advisory Committee whose members are appointed by and report to the Commissioner of Animal Welfare.
· Ensure that the new Commissioner of Animal Welfare has the power to develop, implement and monitor codes of animal welfare which prevent animals in PEI from suffering due to the direct or indirect actions of humans. The commissioner will also have the power to investigate and rule on complaints regarding animal welfare.
· Introduce mandatory reporting of suspected animal abuse. In PEI, it is mandatory to report suspected cases of child abuse. We will introduce similar reporting requirements concerning animals.
· Ensure that the Commissioner of Animal Welfare and Child and Family Services Director are able to work in conjunction with each other. Animal abuse is often an indicator of wider domestic violence.
· Increase funding for training of inspectors responsible for investigating and acting on complaints of animal abuse so that they are qualified and receive ongoing independent training to meet current standards of animal care. Currently, inspectors are untrained.
Animals in Agriculture
While everyone is against animal cruelty, factory farming has been allowed to create systematic and routine cruelty to livestock production. Chickens are packed tightly in cages their whole lives, cattle crowd in feedlots, and pigs are kept indoor in small cages all their lives. Small-scale organic farms that are provided support and incentives to meet set standards are the best way to ensure that animals on farms have a comfortable, safe and healthy environment at every stage of their lives. By actively supporting and promoting farmers in this way we will also help to reverse the current tide of agricultural and economic decline in rural areas.
Farming practices must allow animals to live without undue stress and in conditions in which they are allowed to exercise normal behaviours. Many animals that live in intensive farming systems show signs of stress such as stereotypes (repetitive behaviours with no purpose) and aggression. Mortalities, disease and injuries from transport are common occurrences.
The new Commissioner of Animal Welfare will develop a comprehensive strategy for the treatment of all animals used in agriculture, which aims to protect them from abuse and ensure they do not suffer. The new Commissioner of Animal Welfare will also strengthen existing legal codes of welfare for all food animals.
The Green Party will work to eliminate, over time, methods that cause animals to suffer or prevent them from expressing normal patterns of behaviour. In particular we will move to:
· Introduce a farm certification and labelling programme similar to British Columbia’s SPCA Certified. In response to growing public concern over the welfare of animals on farms, programmes like this certify and promote farms that comply with accepted animal welfare standards.
· Provide training and incentives to assist farmers in meeting certification requirements.
· Introduce penalties and eliminate subsidies and incentives for farmers and related businesses that do not meet certification standards.
· Ensure the immediate appointment of a chief veterinary officer. PEI is currently the only province in Canada without this position.
· Ban confinement of sows in farrowing crates
· Phase out battery hen cages within 5 years.
· Phase out, within 5 years, cruel techniques including debeaking of hens, in association with the development of alternative, humane practices.
· Prohibit new, and phase out existing, factory farming of animals, including highly intensive outdoor facilities such as feedlots and indoor facilities such as battery hen farms.
· Ban the importation, sale and production of genetically engineered animals.
· Ban veal production.
· Ban the importation, sale and production of foie gras.
Companion Animals
Companion animals play an important part in people’s lives, providing comfort and friendship. In return, it is our responsibility to provide them with the care and protection necessary for them to live healthy and comfortable lives.
The Green Party will:
· Provide financial and human resources support to licensed shelters and rescue organizations.
· Work with licensed breeders to support adoption through animal shelters.
· Ban the sale of companion animals through retail stores, backyard breeders, and over the internet.
· Ban the breeding, import of and trade in exotic animals.
· Provide support for spay/neuter assistance programmes.
· Work with animal welfare organizations, veterinarians and other interested parties in developing and promoting responsible and humane pet care.
Animal Acts
Bears, elephants, tigers, and other animals do not voluntarily ride bicycles, stand on their heads, balance on balls, or jump through rings of fire. They don't perform these and other difficult tricks because they want to; they perform them because they're afraid of what will happen if they don't.
The Green Party will:
· ban animal acts in entertainment.
Wildlife
The Green Party sees the great potential that our ecosystems and the species who inhabit them hold for promoting PEI as a premier ecotourism destination. We see the PEI “brand” not only as a province that could offer exceptional organic and cultural experiences, but also as a province that could lead the way in protecting its beautiful natural spaces and wildlife. The Green Party supports policies that encourage residents and visitors to respect wildlife and their habitats, allowing other species to exist unmolested.
The Green Party will:
· Protect habitats for wildlife by:
1. Preserving and rehabilitating natural spaces
2. Averting urban sprawl through enhancement of already-existing built areas
3. Provide support to municipalities for the greening of urban areas
· End inhumane approaches to species management by:
1. Discontinuing government programmes that include killing or forcible removal of wildlife from their habitats.
2. Adopting progressive, humane, non-toxic approaches to species management, where needed.
3. Supporting programmes that provide the public with the knowledge and tools to co-exist safely with other species.
· Ban the farming of wildlife, including mink and fox
· Support public education that promotes preservation and respect for wildlife, including:
1. Working with schools to develop programmes that encourage children to respect wildlife and their habitats.
2. Working with the tourism industry in promoting non-consumptive ways for residents and visitors to enjoy wildlife and their habitats as part of the PEI experience.
Once we envision the society we want, we clearly see its outlines.
Vibrant communities are places where people know their neighbours, streets are safe and friendly, and volunteering for the public good is common, leading to feelings of affiliation, belonging, and empowerment.
Without intending to do so, government policy, by treating such goals as peripheral to economic growth, has allowed feelings of alienation, hostility, and selfishness to crowd out shared values of decades ago.
When the human scale of government policy is ignored, when the tax system, employment strategies, and labour policies all mitigate towards less leisure and family time, more time in long commutes, and an increasingly “time-stressed” population, as measured by Statistics Canada, government policy should adjust its goals to re-balance and protect these fundamental pillars of our civilization – family and community.
In the last few years, quality of life, as measured in our ability to get ahead and enjoy more leisure time, has declined for 90% of Canadians. Homelessness, and mental health and drug addiction problems, have increased. The cost of post-secondary education and training has sky-rocketed. The gap between rich and poor has widened. Women, on average, still earn far less than men. The middle class is struggling. Given the potential of our province, this is tragic.
Increasingly, national and international studies document significant stress on Canadian children and their parents. While it is true that an unacceptably large number of Canadian families live in poverty, many more are suffering from “time poverty.” Statistics Canada tracks time stress of Canadians and reports a steady increase in Canadians who report not having enough time in their lives to accomplish all required tasks. Longer commutes rob Canadians of time at home. Longer working hours rob community members of time for volunteer activities. Poorly planned transit and the lack of convenient workplace child care spaces rob parents of time with their kids.
There is a real cost to society as citizens have less and less time to contribute to community and school activities. Not surprisingly, Statistics Canada also reports a steady decline in volunteer hours donated by Canadians. Lack of time to contribute to community also leads to feelings of loss and alienation. On the other hand, time spent in effort to better our society leads to positive feelings of affiliation (belonging) and of empowerment (knowing one’s actions make a difference.) Greens will address this multi-layered problem in many policies: fiscal, labour and social programs.
The tax policy of a Green Government will increase the opportunity for Canadians to spend more time with family. More and more adults with full-time employment outside the home are stressed and stretched to care for elderly parents, children, partners or spouses with debilitating illness, and any family members with disabilities. Families deserve the option of having one partner work from home, maintaining a family garden, pursuing a career in the arts where steady paid work is hard to secure, or for any number of reasons.
The Greens are committed to nurturing families and communities through integrated policies that focus on the welfare of the child, starting with prenatal nutrition all the way to affordable housing and accessible post-secondary education. We believe we must stop designing our communities around the car and start designing them around families and children. There are no easy solutions. We have to address the multi-layered problems facing families through new, innovative fiscal, labour, and social policies.
Green Party MLAs will:
PEI governments have focused on treating acute health problems after they arise and failed to place sufficient priority on preventing illness in the first place. Greens subscribe to the World Health Organization’s definition of health as “a complete state of physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.
The state of our health is getting worse with increasing asthma rates and almost half of Islanders facing cancer at some time in their lives. There is an epidemic in obesity in adults and children and 5-10% of Islanders have Multiple Chemical Sensitivities. We are in the midst of a cancer epidemic with hundreds of chemicals in everyday use causing increased cancer, infertility, learning disabilities and other intellectual impairment, and damage to the immune system.
Our present health care system addresses only one dimension, the treatment of disease and trauma by professionals in medical facilities. We will increase funding for health promotion and illness prevention. The Green Party will commit to developing a plan to expand access for Islanders to Community Health Centre (CHC) services through a combination of new resources for existing Community Health Centres so that they may extend services and programs, and funding for new CHCs in communities where none exist.
Community Health Centres currently provide care and support to roughly two million Canadians. What distinguishes this “CHC model” most is that it brings diverse first-line health services and providers out from isolation and their traditional silos and connects high-quality health care with community and social interventions.
Together, within the Community Health Centre, nurse practitioners, family physicians, nurses, dietitians, health promoters and other care providers and health program staff will deliver comprehensive, team-based care and support under a single roof. CHCs will integrate primary clinical care with health promotion programs, illness prevention programs and community development initiatives.
CHCs will also support clients and communities to achieve health by addressing social determinants of health, such as poverty and inadequate housing that lead to poor health outcomes and community destabilization. Through an integrated health care approach, CHCs will help keep Islanders healthy in the first place by providing the right type of care by the right provider when needed.
In 2014, during the term of the next PEI government, the current 2004 Health Accord – the deal that sets funding and healthcare service delivery agreement between the federal and provincial will expire and must be renegotiated. The Green Party would take advantage of this unique opportunity to commit to action on health services reform.
Health services reforms will help Canada’s health system evolve toward what Medicare’s founders called the “second phase/stage of Medicare”. In setting up Medicare, they argued that once a system of universal health insurance coverage for all Canadians was achieved, it would be necessary to reform the way services are delivered so that we do a better job preventing illness in the first place.
The Green Party MLAs will:
· Commit 2% of the health care budget, about $10 million, to health promotion and illness prevention.
· Expand access for all Islanders to Community Health Centre services.
· Remove from use those chemicals known to pose a significant risk to human health.
· Increase taxes on products known to be harmful to health, including introducing a Junk Food Tax. Relieve taxes on products that promote health, such as vitamins and bicycles.
· Move to extend preventative and essential dental care to the list of treatments covered by the provincial health insurance plan.
· Include proven effective complementary health care, like acupuncture, naturopathy, massage, mid-wifery and meditation, to the list of treatments covered by the provincial health insurance plan
· Provide programs to teach adults and children about nutrition, healthy cooking, growing gardens, lifestyle choices and fitness.
· Make physical education mandatory, including yoga as an option, in schools.
· Reduce travel time on school buses to no longer than a half hour.
· Include kitchens in all schools so that children have access at least once a day to locally grown organic food cooked from scratch, rather than importing frozen meals.
· Eliminate agricultural and cosmetic pesticides and GMOs by transitioning to a 100% organic PEI.
· Provide free yoga and mediation to all Islanders.
· Increase support to the Soup Kitchen and food banks to provide good quality healthy food options. Eliminate income tax on incomes below the Low Income Cut Off measure (about $20,000 annually).
· Transform urban centres so that public transportation, walking and biking become the preferred means of transportation.
· Recognize environmental sensitivities as a health care issue and implement legislation that will result in increased public health protection by reducing the quantities and variety of toxic chemicals in our environment, including using least toxic materials in provincially-owned buildings like schools. Ensure adequate support for people with environmental sensitivities.
· Provide access to mental health professionals in Community Care Centres and increased funding for a mental health strategy.
· Support the reduction of psychoactive drugs through better rehabilitation and prevention programs, especially for children.
· Develop and fund a program to greatly reduce the entirely preventable occurrence of fetal alcohol syndrome.
· Put greater resources into the prevention of HIV/AIDS in high-risk populations.
Women make up over 50 % of PEI's population, the majority of seniors, and a disproportionate share of the people living in poverty in PEI. Pay inequity is still the rule. Women earn, on average, only 81 cents for every dollar earned by a man in PEI. Lack of access to affordable housing, affordable post-secondary education, and affordable child care make the lives of women, who head the majority of single-parent households, much more difficult. Women under 30 earn less than women in that age group, when adjustments are made for inflation, than they did twenty years ago. Government benefits from the work performed by non-profit organizations in areas of family violence and rape and sexual assault, yet staff in these groups are underpaid for the kind of work they do. Women make up only 22% of the MLAs in PEI's Legislature.
Green Party MLAs will:
Islanders have become cynical about politicians and government. The Provincial Nominee Program scandal, patronage appointments and a rapidly increasing debt now approaching $2 billion are among scandals and broken promises causing Islanders to lose trust in government. People are disillusioned with government inefficiency and wasteful spending, and the failure of government to address critical issues like out-of-control health care costs and pesticide-contaminated air and water. On top of this, we have an outdated voting system where the popular vote is not translated into seats, leaving many voters unrepresented and an official opposition too small to be effective. Elections are influenced by campaign donations from corporations, banks and wealthy individuals. Many citizens, especially youth, are so frustrated that they don’t even bother to vote.
When our government is at its best, it represents all of us and brings us together to accomplish things we cannot accomplish alone. Our legislature should be a model of statesmanship and cooperation, working for the good of all Islanders. It should deal creatively and constructively with issues and spend taxpayers’ money prudently. MLAs should be elected through a fair voting system that ensures parties get a share of seats in the legislature that is equal to their share of the popular vote. Islanders should be proud of their government and trust that it is acting in their best interests.
In the last provincial election the Liberals received 52% of the vote, allowing them to take 88% of the seats in the legislature. The official opposition was reduced to 4 MLAs even though that party received 41% of the vote. This unfair electoral system, which also elects far more men than women, regularly creates governments with little to no effective opposition. Ultimately, it does not produce governments that do a good job of accurately reflecting voters’ wishes. Canada and its provinces are some of the last few parliamentary democracies in the world to still use the antiquated first-past-the-post voting system, and Islanders are ready for positive change.
Legislation regulating political party financing and elections in PEI is fundamentally undemocratic and deplorably out of step with regulations in more progressive provinces and at the federal level.
Green Party MLAs will:
- Establish a commission to implement a two-year public information campaign on the benefits of proportional representation, leading to the creation of a new made-in-PEI electoral system. Hold a vote and implement the new system before the next election.
- Increase the budget for Elections PEI so it can better fulfill its mandate to inform and engage electors.
- Establish a commission of citizens and all-parties to reform election legislation.
- Immediately:
1. ban political party donations from corporations, unions and non-residents.
2. limit donations from individuals to $1000 annually.
3. eliminate the $1000 fee to register new political parties. Refund this fee to the two parties forced to pay it.
4. revise the party per-vote allowance threshold so that parties must receive 2% of the vote.
5. set the per-vote allowance at $2, indexed to the Consumer Price Index
6. Allow more people with modest incomes to influence election outcomes by increasing political donation amounts that are eligible to receive a 75% rebate to $400.
7. Change the fixed election date to the first week of November to allow more Islanders to fully participate in the electoral process.
Both Progressive Conservative and Liberal governments have used the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act to block citizen access to government information. Transparency and accountability in government have been replaced with secrecy and arrogance.
The Green Party believes in the decentralization of decision-making powers and in open, honest government.
Green Party MPs will: