Archive
What California’s Drought Means for BC: Putting Our Coast into Perspective
Jun 3, 2015
Below is a guest post from Erin Daly, a graduate student in Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University. Erin is doing a practicum at CCPA-BC and has primarily been supporting the Conversation on Climate Justice. What California’s Drought Means for BC: Putting Our Coast into Perspective Erin Daly As a province that imports half of its… View Article
Climate Justice and the Good Life, for Everyone
Jun 2, 2015
In our Climate Justice Project, our research has stressed structural changes and collective action to lower carbon footprints rather than individual behavioural change. The ability of many actors to respond to incentives like a carbon tax is constrained by their circumstances. Suburban households often have no realistic option but to keep driving. Renters have little agency over… View Article
David Hughes responds to BC government and LNG industry
May 28, 2015
Our recent report by David Hughes, A Clear Look at BC LNG, prompted dismissive comments from the BC government and the LNG industry. They argue that David’s numbers about energy security are wrong, and theirs are right. We asked David to respond: Response to Rich Coleman and the BC LNG Alliance criticism of my “Clear Look… View Article
A Clear Look at BC LNG
May 26, 2015
Today we released a major new report, A Clear Look at BC LNG: Energy Security, Environmental Implications and Economic Potential, by geoscientist David Hughes. The report considers the ambition of the LNG enterprise as envisioned by the BC government, and delivers the first assessment of the cumulative impacts on LNG development, and in particular the huge… View Article
Economic Development and the Environment
May 9, 2015
The biggest challenge facing the new NDP government in Alberta, and an NDP government in British Columbia should one be elected in 2017, is finding the right balance between economic development and environmental objectives. There are some who suggest that there is no conflict — there can be jobs and environmental policies effectively prohibiting certain… View Article
BC’s Carbon Emissions on the Rise
May 8, 2015
It was a good story while it lasted. Over the past few years, the BC government and many in the policy community have spun a tale about the remarkable success of BC’s climate action policies, with a big spotlight on the carbon tax as a driver of lower emissions while BC’s economy outperformed the rest… View Article
Why the Metro Vancouver living wage is not enough for single parents and how to fix it
Apr 29, 2015
The living wage calculation is based on the needs of two-parent families with young children, but the idea behind it is that this wage would also support different types of families throughout the life cycle so that young adults are not discouraged from having children and older workers have some extra income as they age. In… View Article
Doubling contribution limit to Tax-Free Savings Accounts exposes true intent of a bad policy
Apr 15, 2015
Last week, federal finance minister Joe Oliver re-affirmed that his government seeks to double the annual limit to Tax-Free Savings Accounts (TFSAs), from $5,500 to $11,000. This is a terrible idea. When the TFSA was first introduced, the claim at the time was that the policy was intended to support modest income people wanting to… View Article
Balanced Budget Legislation – another zombie policy returns from the dead
Apr 11, 2015
Ah, here we go again – when seeking to assert credibility as sound fiscal managers, governments reach for the tired gimmick of “balanced budget legislation” (BBL). It’s not about good economics. Nor about good public policy. Just crass politics. And now the federal government is once again dangling this useless policy ploy. The CCPA-BC was… View Article
A Conversation on Climate Justice
Apr 9, 2015
In February and March, the Climate Justice Project hosted This Changes BC: A Conversation on Climate Justice. Over four Saturdays, a group of 34 citizens from Metro Vancouver gathered to talk about what climate solutions could look like in their lives and our province. Having worked on these issues for many years now, we had a… View Article
Parents want to reduce their car use, so let’s invest in transit, walking and cycling infrastructure
Apr 2, 2015
There’s a popular belief that parents chauffeur their young children everywhere. And certainly parents have many reasons for preferring cars over other modes of transportation: Children get easily tired. Parents need to pack things like food, diapers, etc. Parents want to keep their children comfortable and safe. Parents have busy and complicated schedules and taking… View Article
Discussing “Just Transition” with Karen Cooling
Mar 30, 2015
In late January, we at the CCPA came out with a paper about “just transition”—an approach that aims to minimize the impact of environmental policies on workers and communities in affected industries—for resource workers. Drawing on extensive interviews with workers in several resource industries, our report informs a strategy to ensure climate action doesn’t worsen… View Article
Fire the Auditor General for Local Government? It’ll cost us
Mar 29, 2015
When BC Community Minister Coralee Oakes fired the Auditor General for Local Government (AGLG) last week the issue that had been in the news was the performance of her office. However, AGLG Basia Ruta has now taken the matter to the courts and the issue there is likely to be the independence of her office. … View Article
Transit referendum: if no vote wins, what is Plan B?
Mar 20, 2015
I got my plebiscite ballot today and of course voted yes. Whatever you think of TransLink management, its governance, the rough and largely undefined edges of the mayor’s plan, and the politically expedient but otherwise not particularly appropriate sales tax source of revenues, the simple fact remains that I and most residents of Greater Vancouver… View Article
Seniors have major stake in transit referendum: Access to transportation a key factor for health, wellbeing
Mar 17, 2015
By Shannon Daub, Co-Director of the CCPA-BC’s Seniors Project, and Sandra (Sandy) James LEED AP MCIP CCPI, Director, Walk Metro Vancouver Society Between now and May, residents of Metro Vancouver will receive a mail-in ballot asking if they are in favour of a .5 percentage point increase on sales tax to fund transportation improvements in… View Article
BC minimum wage increase leaves workers in poverty
Mar 12, 2015
After close to three years of no change, the BC minimum wage was overdue for an increase. But the measly raise announced today falls far short of what is necessary. The 20c per hour increase, scheduled to come into effect on Sept 15, 2015, amounts to a raise of just under 2% over more than 3 years…. View Article
Don’t pit generations against each other in transit referendum
Mar 10, 2015
The Georgia Straight published a column yesterday by Charlie Smith claiming that “selfish old people” will vote “no” in the upcoming transit referendum, depriving younger generations of a decent quality of life and an opportunity to act on climate change. We were shocked by the inflammatory tone of the article, and the very inaccurate picture… View Article
Apples and oranges: Comparing BC and Ontario debt ratios
Mar 4, 2015
The February 18, 2015 edition of the Globe and Mail featured an article by the paper’s B.C. correspondent Gary Mason, which in part drew favourable attention to BC’s debt-to-GDP ratio in comparison with that of Ontario. On face value, B.C.’s reported debt-to-GDP ratio calculated from its most recent audited statements of 18.2% looks pretty good… View Article
Why we’re voting YES to new transit and transportation funding
Mar 2, 2015
By Seth Klein, Marc Lee and Iglika Ivanova In the upcoming transit and transportation referendum, we think the benefits of a YES outcome outweigh the negatives for the following reasons: Referenda are a terrible way to make tax policy. But a referendum is nevertheless before Metro Vancouver residents, and we can’t afford to ignore it…. View Article
BC Budget 2015: Missed opportunity for climate change action
Feb 27, 2015
Global warming and the other ecological impacts of climate change threaten our health—our very survival. As the impacts of climate change unfold, society will face increasing economic costs. Even the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy, which some have criticized as being unduly influenced by the Conservative government, estimates these costs, which include… View Article