Latest news with #Greens'
Vancouver Sun
2 days ago
- Business
- Vancouver Sun
NDP under fire, Conservatives divided, and Greens struggle as B.C. legislative session ends
All three of B.C.'s political parties will be licking their wounds this summer as the last few months have left First Nations and municipalities united in their anger at the governing NDP, the Conservatives dealing with a number of defections, and the Greens' caucus of two struggling. Premier David Eby in February said the session would be focused on addressing the 'existential threat' posed by U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff threats. It ended this week with the premier using all the political capital at his disposal to push controversial fast-tracking legislation, despite condemnation from Indigenous leaders and local governments. And one former member of the NDP government opposes the government's direction. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. 'What is most astounding and disheartening is why David Eby and his cabinet are turning their backs on such a diverse group of leaders and allies like the First Nations Leadership Council, local governments, environmentalists, and business leaders,' said Melanie Mark, a former minister in John Horgan's government and the first First Nations woman to hold a cabinet portfolio. Both Eby and Infrastructure Minister Bowinn Ma said Bills 14 and 15 — which would speed up renewable energy projects and transmission lines, and grant the provincial government broad powers to expedite major infrastructure projects — are needed to build hospitals, roads, schools, clean power projects and mines. Those opposed argue the government didn't consult before bringing forward the legislation and that the bills give the provincial cabinet carte blanche to pick winners and losers for development. It took a tiebreaking vote from Speaker Raj Chouhan on Wednesday night to save the government from potentially falling, after government house leader Mike Farnworth had made the bill a matter of a confidence vote. The fracas over Bills 14 and 15 wasn't the only issue as a previous attempt by the NDP to give themselves broad emergency powers over the economy through Bill 7 ran into public outcry. The bill, which grants government the power to respond to tariffs or other economic measures taken by other jurisdictions, was widely criticized. Farnworth told reporters Thursday there are always going to be disagreements but the government passed its agenda. 'The public expects things to get done. They expect things to be built. It's about our economy. It's about jobs. It's about dealing with the threats that we are facing from south of the border and the recognition that we have to diversify our economy,' he said. As well, Eby came under fire for hiring former Legal Aid CEO Michael Bryant as his Downtown Eastside czar without disclosing the contract, tabling a budget with an almost $11 billion deficit, and scrapping the carbon tax without a plan to make up a $1.8 billion shortfall. Meanwhile, the Conservatives struggled to maintain unity after o nly two weeks into their first legislative session when three MLAs defected after Rustad sided with house leader Á'a:líya Warbus against Vancouver-Quilchena representative Dallas Brodie's residential school denialism. Rustad also faced issues with Heather Maahs of Chilliwack North, who hosted an anti-abortion group inside the legislature, and Surrey-Panorma MLA Bryan Tepper welcomed a far-right influencer. In December, Surrey-Cloverdale MLA Elenore Sturko was at the centre of another controversy when 13 MLAs signed a letter disagreeing with her comments that former Vancouver police board vice-chair Comfort Sakoma-Fadugba was correct to resign over comments on gender transition and immigration. Rustad will have to deal with a leadership review this year while members of caucus and MPs are reportedly lining up to replace him — and if he is worried about keeping his party together and his job as their leader, he didn't show it Thursday. 'We are very united in terms of everything that we are fighting for and I am proud of the fact that there could be some differences in voices,' said Rustad. As for the Greens, its new MLAs Rob Botterell and Jeremy Valeriote started out signing a responsible government accord that gives the NDP their backing on certain confidence motions in exchange for cooperation on specific priorities, such as an expedited review of the CleanBC action plan. But the pair failed to gain traction and government scrapped the carbon tax despite their objections. They also faced a potential threat as the third party if any independents form their own party. This could come with a reduction in party funding and potential staff layoffs. Despite the disagreements and lack of attention, Botterell and Valeriote said the agreement has been successful, but it will be reviewed this fall. 'We get our voice heard by being measured, moderate, reasonable representatives who don't fly off the handle, don't indulge in personal attacks, or cast back 20 years to something that might have happened,' said Valeriote.
Scoop
3 days ago
- Business
- Scoop
Gordon Campbell: On Wealth Taxes And Capital Flight
In the wake of the Greens' alternative Budget – and the criticism levelled at it – it seems pretty obvious that when it comes to tax policy, Labour's only election campaign concession to left wing voters is going to be a capital gains tax (CGT). A wealth tax is not on the cards. Yet in the run-up to next year's election, even a CGT is going to be demonised as a plunge into radicalism. It is a sign of just how restrictive the politics of progressive taxation are in New Zealand.
Scoop
4 days ago
- Business
- Scoop
On Wealth Taxes And Capital Flight
In the wake of the Greens' alternative Budget – and the criticism levelled at it – it seems pretty obvious that when it comes to tax policy, Labour's only election campaign concession to left wing voters is going to be a capital gains tax (CGT). A wealth tax is not on the cards. Yet in the run-up to next year's election, even a CGT is going to be demonised as a plunge into radicalism. It is a sign of just how restrictive the politics of progressive taxation are in New Zealand, that a tax seen to be an utterly conventional tool in every other developed country in the world is still widely regarded here as being a surrender to the 'tax and spend' forces of radical left wing extremism. On the evidence, a wealth tax would be entirely justified on the grounds of fairness and equity. Only two years ago, IRD research showed that the income of the wealthiest New Zealanders is being taxed at less than half the average rate of ordinary wage and salary earners. Not surprisingly, the coalition government quickly shut down this IRD line of research. If, in future, a meaningful attempt was ever made to correct that injustice by way of a wealth tax, one immediate concern is capital flight i.e. the tax will allegedly cause the wealthiest Kiwis to up stakes and move to tax havens elsewhere. To some extent, that concern looks bizarrely misplaced. Right now, an estimated 191 New Zealanders are leaving this country every day, for what they regard as greener pastures elsewhere. This is happening without any meaningful response from the government presiding over this outflow of the best and the brightest, the hopeful and the desperate. Yet if a few billionaires left in high dudgeon after being asked to pay a little more tax for the general good? Perish the thought! Moreover, how transferable would these riches actually be, given that much of the wealth in question is sunk in property empires or in neo-monopoly businesses firmly located here. Even more to the point, many of the possible socially desirable destinations operate a capital gains tax and have other revenue gathering taxes comparable to, or in excess of, what we have here. Not everyone – and their sack of gold – can get into Switzerland. That said, there is overseas evidence of a link between a net wealth tax and significant levels of capital flight. There's a reason why the number of OECD countries with a wealth tax has shrunk from 12 to 5 over the past 20 years. Norway's experience – where its expected revenue gains were well outweighed by its losses via capital flight – is a sign that creating more fairness in the tax system will almost certainly come with a price tag: In 2022, Norway's Labour-led government raised the wealth tax to 1.1%, hoping to boost annual revenues by $146 million. 50 of Norway's richest citizens packed their bags and left, including high-profile investors and founders of tech firms. Switzerland emerged as a favoured destination, thanks to its lenient tax regime and predictable fiscal policy. The net effect? A reported $594 million loss in tax revenue—four times the projected gain. Other reports on Norway's capital flight experience can be found here. And also here. How the Norwegian wealth tax is structured, and how the Swiss tax system operates – and how it benefits the ultra-rich – is outlined here. Yet evidently, even Switzerland has a capital gains tax on transactions involving Swiss real estate. (New Zealand's lack of a CGT on property transactions in particular has made this country a bizarre outlier, for decades. ) In sum, a significant extent of capital flight is likely to be the transitional cost of arriving at a more equitable system of taxing wealth as much as we tax wages. Would those fleeing billionaires be a loss felt by many ordinary citizens ? Chances are, some of those departing tycoons may not have enhanced the lives of ordinary Norwegians all that much, and it cannot be assumed they will be conferring added value to the lives of the Swiss either, or to wherever else they land. Meaning: the social argument for a wealth tax remains, whatever the transitional costs may be: 'If you have enjoyed success and become rich in Norway, we hope you will stay and continue taking part in the Norwegian society,' Erlend Grimstad, an official in Norway's Finance Ministry told the Guardian: 'We do encourage Norwegians to succeed in creating value and become rich. And we believe the Norwegian model with a strong public welfare system and high education levels are important factors in making that success possible. The model in Norway is that everyone should contribute relevant to ability, and therefore those that have a greater ability to pay taxes, should pay a little more.' Exactly. People who become wealthy owe something more to the society in which their success was possible. The Norwegian annual 1.1% added tax on the very high layers of accumulated wealth and assets hardly seems exorbitant. Neither, in New Zealand, does the 2.5% rate the Green Party advocated (in its alternative budget) on assets above a personal threshold of $2 million for individuals, and $4 million for couples. To repeat: in a situation where, as the IRD found, the ultra-rich people are currently paying less than half the taxes on their sources of wealth as average Kiwis are paying on their wages, such a tax looks entirely fair. To anyone willing to abandon this country if asked to contribute a little more of their wealth to serve the greater one could easily be forgiven for saying: 'Goodbye, and good riddance.' Trump: No Joke Laughing at the latest weird utterance of Donald Trump may provide us with a brief sense of superiority, but we were never the intended audience. Treating Trump as being deranged at worst or not very bright at best, tends to obscure the logical consistency of his positions on the wars in Ukraine and in Gaza. Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu are hearing the same message loud and clear: Trump is solidly in their corner, and the US is giving them the greenlight to proceed as they wish, without fear of the US imposing any meaningful sanctions, and without the US joining up with any sanctions regime initiated by the Europeans, either. With Trump's help, Putin's stated goal of splitting up the old trans-Atlantic alliance between the US and Europe has been achieved. If we regard Trump as a Russian proxy – and there is plenty of evidence for why we should – then the fatuity of Trump's criticism of Putin makes perfect sense. The 'Vladimir: STOP! ' text from a month ago came in response to a massive Russian attack on civilian centres in Ukraine. It was a signal that the US was A-OK with those military actions. Similarly, last weekend's Trump's comment 'I don't know what the hell happened to has gone absolutely CRAZY' followed on from unprecedentedly heavy drone attacks on Ukrainian cities. To Putin, the fatuity of Trump's language makes the pantomime of concern reassuringly obvious. (Just kidding, Vladimir.) To the MAGA faithful, the inflated rhetoric sounds like the Big Man is talking tough. In reality, Trump has refused to impose US sanctions on Russia and consistently refused to join in any EU sanctions regime. Only days after last week's 'excellent' phone call between Putin and Trump that – according to Trump, was going to be directly followed by peace negotiations, Russia carried out its heaviest ever drone attacks on Ukraine. As the New York Times pointed out yesterday: Trump has never linked the attacks with his own decision, reaffirmed last week, to refuse to join the Europeans in new financial sanctions on Russia, or to offer new arms and help to the Ukrainians. The result is a strategic void in which Mr. Trump complains about Russia's continued killing but so far has been unwilling to make Mr. Putin pay even a modest price. This is a very familiar pattern. As the NYT added: Trump signals he is pulling back from a conflict he often describes as Europe's war, then expresses shock that Mr. Putin responds with a familiar list of demands that amount to a Ukrainian surrender, followed by accelerating attacks. Mr. Trump episodically insists he is 'absolutely' considering sanctions, including on Sunday. Yet each time when he is forced to make a decision about joining Europe in new economic penalties, he has pulled back. The US stance on a ceasefire and on peace negotiations involves striking the same zigzag path between feigned concern on one hand, and absolutely no follow through actions on the other. Only a fortnight ago, Trump was saying that peace in Ukraine would only be achieved until he and Putin talked. After they did, Trump's line has been that peace can come only after the leaders of Russia and Ukraine conduct direct negotiations. And so it goes. At some point, Ukraine's allies – including New Zealand – are going to have to summon the courage to call out the Trump administration for its bad faith expressions of feigned concern, and its related willingness to aid and abet Putin over Ukraine, and Netanyahu over Gaza. Laughing incredulously at Trump may make some people feel superior, but he – and his pal in the Kremlin – are having the last laugh. Kneecapping The criminal prosecution of a member of the Irish rap trio Kneecap for displaying a Hezbollah flag thrown onstage at a London gig will go to a hearing on June 18. In their press release, the band defended their actions in these terms: 14,000 babies are about to die of starvation in Gaza, with food sent by the world sitting on the other side of a wall, and once again the British establishment is focused on us. We deny this 'offence' and will vehemently defend ourselves. This is political policing. This is a carnival of distraction. We are not the story. Genocide is... What's the objective? To restrict our ability to travel. To prevent us speaking to young people across the world. To silence voices of compassion. To prosecute artists who dare speak out. Instead of defending innocent people, or the principles of international law they claim to uphold, the powerful in Britain have abetted slaughter and famine in Gaza, just as they did in Ireland for centuries. Then, like now, they claim justification. The IDF units they arm and fly spy plane missions for are the real terrorists, the whole world can see it. WE STAND PROUDLY WITH THE PEOPLE. YOU STAND COMPLICIT WITH THE WAR CRIMINALS. WE ARE ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY. YOU ARE NOT. WE WILL FIGHT YOU IN YOUR COURT. WE WILL WIN. Kneecap's new single 'The Recap' – which alludes to their current legal troubles - can be found by scrolling down at this site. Kneecap also have starred in a critically acclaimed semi-biographical film. Here is the trailer:
Politico
22-05-2025
- Business
- Politico
Who's Winning the Climate War? Australia.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese took office in 2022 pledging to end the country's climate wars — and he may have just done it. 'The wars are on, but the good guys are winning them more,' Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen told me ahead of Albanese reappointing him to his post last week, after his Labor Party won its largest majority in 80 years. Climate does not generally win elections — but it can help lose them, as demonstrated by four previous Australian prime ministers and the Greens' recent losses in the EU. More often, it simply becomes a partisan cudgel, as in the United States, where Republicans are fast dismantling the Biden administration's clean-energy agenda after Democrats failed to defend it in the 2024 election. So the fact that Albanese became Australia's first prime minister in 20 years to serve a full term and win another in part on his climate agenda is worth unpacking, even for politicians and energy leaders who have never heard of Warringah or Kooyong. His trajectory holds lessons for not only how to win on climate-friendly energy policies, but how to hold power while executing on them. Key among his tactics is a relentless focus on positive economic messaging — namely, that Australia has hitched its economic engine to renewable energy. At the same time, he's pursued a decidedly all-of-the-above energy policy that envisions continued exports of coal and natural gas from the country's ample deposits. (Compare that to the indifference of national Democrats in the U.S. when party leaders in natural gas-rich states protested against former President Joe Biden's moratorium on export permits.) The campaign marked a new chapter in selling voters on not just the prospect of climate action, but the specific policies needed to get there. 'The 2022 election, when we came to office, was a climate win,' Bowen said. 'The 2025 election was an energy win.' It also helped that Albanese and his party got a big assist from Donald Trump. The election was a toss-up until late February, when Trump and his trade wars began dragging down MAGA-embracing Liberal leader Peter Dutton in the polls. But the climate formula is simple — not to say boring — to hear Bowen tell it. The win was not particularly sexy. It was basic economics and a willingness to course correct in response to voters' anxieties about the cost of energy. 'Climate change in Australia has cost several prime ministers their job,' Bowen said. 'We won the argument when we turned the debate around and didn't accept the premise that action on climate change can come at an economic cost, but in fact was an economic opportunity for Australia.' Albanese's achievement in getting voters to accept this idea comes after a decade and a half of painful political lessons. One key takeaway: double down on carrots over sticks. Where enervated Democrats in the U.S. are now backing away from climate policies in the name of 'affordability,' Australia's Labor fended off cost-of-living arguments by giving out $300 energy bill credits and corporate tax exemptions for electric vehicles. It handed out subsidies for renewable energy — rooftop solar in particular, which is now on a third of Australian homes, the highest concentration in the world — but also batteries and efficient appliances. Another message other countries are already heeding is to jettison carbon pricing, the policy that toppled Labor's Julia Gillard in 2013. Turning away from carbon taxes has proved a political winner in two hemispheres. It's much the same story as in Canada, where, before Trump proved decisive to that election as well, now-Prime Minister Mark Carney's first campaign move was to cut himself loose from Justin Trudeau's consumer carbon tax (he kept a cap on big industrial emitters, though). At the same time, on Australia's right, worsening wildfires and heat waves eventually coalesced enough independents into a loose coalition known as the Teals that campaigned on climate change. In 2019, a Teal ousted Tony Abbott, the former Liberal prime minister who unseated Gillard six years earlier over her carbon tax. That set up the 2025 election along a broad axis of nominal support for maintaining the country's net-zero emission goal. But where Labor campaigned on more renewables to replace aging coal plants, the Liberals threw their weight behind nuclear power — complete with a $331 billion price tag, by their own estimate. Energy policy turned into an own goal, with Dutton losing his seat after he proposed putting a nuclear plant in his district. 'They weren't vulnerable to cost of living being tied to their electricity policies or their car policies or anything, because the Liberals had already made a terrible blunder in going for really expensive nuclear,' said Mark Kenny, a professor at Australian National University and a former chief political correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald. Albanese also hasn't made any moves away from the country's considerable coal and natural gas reserves, which have made it the world's second-largest exporter of both (after the U.S., for gas, and Indonesia, for coal). 'We are a traditional energy superpower, and we want to become a renewable energy superpower, but it takes time,' Bowen said. (Carney is similarly pledging, 'We can be an energy superpower.') Bowen's now seeking to secure Australia's bid to host next year's U.N. climate talks, on the basis of his record. 'We'll be making economic arguments to other countries,' he said. 'Even if you don't think this is a moral obligation, the economics can work pretty well for us.'' That's how Australia has arrived at something of a Goldilocks moment. When automakers protested Labor's first-ever vehicle emissions standards, they scaled them back some. Not everything is kumbaya — farmers are still revolting over transmission lines being built across their property — but by and large, the wars have receded. 'You must thread the needle of economic benefit first and foremost, then climate benefit,' said Andrew Forrest, the Australian mining magnate turned climate evangelist who's made his Fortescue iron mining empire into an advertisement for the economic benefits of going green. If these policies sound a lot like Biden's, who signed laws that were projected to unleash roughly $1 trillion for clean energy and infrastructure while presiding over a historic boom in both fossil fuels and renewables, it's not a coincidence. 'My little slogan is, 'The world's climate emergency is Australia's jobs opportunity,'' Bowen said. 'That was, in part, to be fair to our American cousins, inspired by Joe Biden saying, 'I see climate change and I see jobs.' We're really saying the same sorts of things, but we've been able to, I guess, continue to argue and continue to prosecute it.' Yet for all the lessons other countries might take from Albanese's win, Australia's success in extricating climate from the culture wars into the realm of policy debates may not be replicable here. As the Trump administration dismantles everything from fuel efficiency rules to power plant emissions standards, the biggest remaining question is whether Republicans will muster the motivation to maintain any scraps of the Inflation Reduction Act. There's something almost quaint about Australians having actually had it out over a period of decades, compared to the U.S.'s trajectory of pushing Democrats' profferings ever more irretrievably into the partisan fray. Australians concede a certain cynicism is lacking from their politics — in part thanks to mandatory voting, which reduces the incentive for politicians to pander to their bases. 'They take what a politician says, as we say in Australia, with a pinch of salt, and look for the facts,' Forrest said. 'And therefore you got a different result in Australia than you did in North America.' Still, politicians in other countries around the world would do well to look to Australia for how to turn down the temperature.
New European
16-05-2025
- Politics
- New European
It's time to decriminalise abortion
Said offences, for which women can still be prosecuted, mostly derive from the Offences Against the Person Act of 1861, and the Infant Life (Preservation) Act of 1929. Though it is, in practice, legal to get an abortion during the first 24 weeks of a pregnancy – and afterwards in some very specific circumstances – the legislation has, until now, essentially acted as a series of loopholes, as opposed to a thorough rewriting of the law. It is, if anything, remarkable that it hasn't happened yet. Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi should be applauded for her amendment to the crime and policing bill, of course, but it feels incredible that it is needed at all. If it passes, it will remove 'women from the criminal law related to abortion', and would mean 'no offence is committed by a woman acting in relation to her own pregnancy'. Antoniazzi's amendment seeks to change that, and currently has the backing of over 50 MPs, from Liberal Democrat Christine Jardine and the Greens' Carla Denyer, to Conservative Caroline Dinenage, the SDLP's Claire Hanna and Llinos Medi from Plaid Cymru. Also in favour of the legal change are – deep breath – the British Medical Association, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the Royal College of Midwives, the Royal College of Nursing, and the Royal College of General Practitioners. In short: it ought to be a slam dunk. It's also not the first time the Commons has been set to vote on the topic, as Labour MP Diana Johnson had put forward a similar amendment under the last Conservative government, but the general election was called before the criminal justice bill could go through Parliament. Though the government is yet to give its formal backing to the changes, it is hoped that ministers will do so. Keir Starmer has, so far, not exactly excelled in the realm of socially liberal issues, and ensuring that women are no longer criminalised for what happens inside their bodies would be a step in the right direction. Read more: Europe is fighting its own abortion battle As Antoniazzi has said, 'there is simply no world in which prosecuting a vulnerable woman who may have experienced a medical complication, miscarriage or stillbirth is the right course of action'. It also seems worth saying that, given both the global context and the way various parties are currently polling, now feels like the right time to enshrine women's rights in law, with little room for tweaking or backtracking. Americans thought that Roe v Wade had become untouchable, but clearly it wasn't. We in Britain would struggle to think of a world in which abortion would get criminalised again, but we should still prepare for a world in which it is a possibility. Govern for the times you're in, not the ones you wish you could be having, and all that. On a lighter note, there is something quite comforting about this amendment, which has so far been hiding in plain sight. Over 50 MPs have backed it, most of them women, and they're from every corner of the political spectrum. Perhaps most importantly, many of them were also at war with each other until recently. Antoniazzi is a prominent gender critical campaigner; Nadia Whittome, a fellow Labour MP, is one of Parliament's most outspoken campaigners on transgender rights. Many of the parliamentarians now agitating for the same thing were, and probably will be again at some point, on opposite sides of the gender debate. That they are now able to work together on such an important feminist issue should feel like encouraging news. Liberation movements have, after all, often had to become broad coalitions of people who otherwise disagreed on most things to be effective. It was sometimes feared that the rise of social media, algorithms and echo chambers would put an end to such large tents. It is a tremendous relief to see that it hasn't happened and, when the circumstances demand it, all these people can still work together. All that is needed now is for the government to remember that it ought to, once in a while, act as the progressive party it professes to be. Politics currently feels like the place where good news goes to die, and wouldn't it be nice for that to no longer be the case, even for one day?
