National Post Letter

Electoral reform opponents are once again pulling out the old Israel canard. I’ve responded with a letter attempting to set the record straight in today’s National Post:

Electoral reform

Re: Think you want elect­oral reform? Kelly McPar­land, July 9

Accord­ing to Kelly McPar­land, “Israel has a pro­por­tional rep­res­ent­a­tion sys­tem of the type reform enthu­si­asts like to advoc­ate.”

In fact, Canada’s elect­oral reform sup­port­ers almost uni­ver­sally favour sys­tems like mixed-mem­ber pro­por­tional and single trans­fer­able vote. While these are forms of pro­por­tional repres­ent­a­tion — i.e. they pro­duce elec­tion res­ults that closely match the wishes of the electorate — they also pre­serve local rep­res­ent­a­tion and allow voters to choose indi­vidual candid­ates.

If elect­oral reform back­ers had their way, Canada would look less like Israel than like New Zealand, Ger­many or Ire­land.

David Taub Bancroft, Vancouver

National Post Letter

The old poli sci major in me could not allow John Ivison’s column to stand. Please see the letters section in today’s National Post for my response to the argument that it is somehow “illiberal” for governments to impel individuals to get vaccinated.

Re: Trudeau shows liberal principles have left the Liberal Party, John Ivison, Jan. 12

The essence of liberalism is not, as John Ivison claims, that “individuals should not be forced to conform to other people’s beliefs,” but rather John Stuart Mill’s harm principle: “the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”

Choosing not to get vaccinated against a dangerous and highly transmissible virus puts the lives and safety of other people at risk. This places vaccination squarely within the rightful exercise of government authority.

We can agree or disagree on the specifics of any given policy, but let’s not muddy the terms of debate. For Justin Trudeau or anyone else to employ legislative power in favour of vaccination falls well within the parameters of Mill’s liberalism.

David Taub Bancroft, Vancouver

Globe and Mail Letter

The Letters section in today’s Globe and Mail is filled with readers’ thoughts on climate change. One such reader is me. Please see the fifth letter from the top for my response to the “What about China?” excuse for Canadian climate inaction.

National Post Letter

In today’s National Post, I’ve got another letter to the editor on everyone’s favourite topic: the Trans Mountain pipeline. (I’ll stop repeating myself once people start listening!) My letter appears only in the print edition, so I cannot provide a link. Accordingly, here is the full text:

The pipeline crisis

Re: PM takes right tack on Trans Mountain, Andrew Coyne, April 17

Regarding the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, Andrew Coyne writes, “this is not a debate about a pipeline, or not any longer. It is about who decides.”

With all due respect, it absolutely is about the pipeline.

If greenhouse gas emissions do not peak and subsequently decline within the next couple of years, the world will fail to meet its commitment to limit warming to no more than 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius. The time for building new fossil fuel infrastructure has come and gone — not just in other countries, but here at home, too.

To insist on procedural niceties — in the face of the climate chaos we risk unleashing and the burden we are placing on future generations — is narrow-minded provincialism at its worst.

David Taub Bancroft, Vancouver

Of Premiers and Pipelines

In an interview with the National Observer last week, Justin Trudeau raised more than a few eyebrows by comparing B.C. premier John Horgan to former Saskatchewan premier and climate policy obstructionist Brad Wall.

“Similarly and frustratingly,” said the prime minister, “John Horgan is actually trying to scuttle our national plan on fighting climate change. By blocking the Kinder Morgan pipeline, he’s putting at risk the entire national climate change plan, because Alberta will not be able to stay on if the Kinder Morgan pipeline doesn’t go through.”

All this over a timid proposal by the B.C. government to study the effects of bitumen spills before allowing increased shipments through the province.

Clumsy “guilt by association” attempts aside, I understand what the prime minister is trying to get at. His approval of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain expansion, so goes the reasoning, is part of a grand national compromise. Alberta gets a pipeline (flowing through B.C.) and environmentalists get carbon pricing. Win-win, everyone’s happy. Remove one piece of the strategy and the whole thing comes crashing down.

Except that it doesn’t. The Alberta government’s willing participation — while preferable — is not strictly needed. As Trudeau himself admits, “there is a federal backstop that will ensure that the national price on carbon pollution is applied right across the country.”

Furthermore, his climate plan was a pretty rotten compromise to begin with. The federal carbon pricing requirement is set to rise to $50 per tonne by 2022, but then it stops. This is not nearly enough to get us to the 30 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that Canada pledged to achieve by 2030 at the Paris climate conference. To meet that commitment would require an eventual price of $200 per tonne (if pursued through carbon pricing alone). Or, at the very least, a federal government with the political backbone to say no to environmentally destructive fossil fuel projects.

The international community has agreed to limit warming to no more than 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. That means reaching peak global emissions no later than 2020. Simply put: now is not the time to be building new pipelines.

Nobody suggests shutting down the oil sands tomorrow. But at the very least, at this moment in our history, we must stop moving so aggressively in the wrong direction. If the Trans Mountain pipeline is allowed to go forward, alongside other fossil fuel infrastructure proposals with decades-long lifespans, that would mean sabotaging the meagre gains made by our inadequate federal carbon scheme.

A transformation on the scale required demands bold national leadership. Sadly, beyond a few token half-measures, said leadership has been lacking from Trudeau. It is no ideal solution for the mantle to pass to a provincial premier, but under the circumstances, I don’t see what other options we have.

While the Kinder Morgan kerfuffle has gotten very ugly very fast, and will likely only get uglier, Canada is morally obligated to do more than free-ride on international efforts. So let’s brace ourselves for the coming ugliness and keep our eye on the prize of climate justice.

This post appears on rabble.ca.

Globe and Mail Letter

In today’s Globe and Mail, you will find a letter from me (fourth from the top, under the heading “In the national interest”) relating the present interprovincial pipeline kerfuffle to global efforts efforts to solve the climate crisis. Never hurts to remind ourselves how much is really at stake.

An Open Letter to Justin Trudeau on Donald Trump’s Muslim Ban

Dear Prime Minister Trudeau,

In the wake of Sunday’s horrendous terrorist attack on Quebec’s Muslim community, I am writing to ask that you forcefully condemn not just the shooting itself, but the rising tide of Islamophobia that appears to have prompted it.

On January 27, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning the entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries and suspending America’s refugee program. It is not enough that you meekly defend the ability of Canadian dual citizens to cross the border. You must join with other members of the international community in denouncing Trump’s racist policy in the strongest terms possible.

Furthermore, Canada must put its money where its mouth is by significantly increasing its intake of refugees over and above the current target for 2017, prioritizing those who have been left stranded by Trump’s Muslim ban. We must also rescind our “Safe Third Country Agreement” with the United States.

Finally, in the event that the Trump administration continues to escalate its policies of bigotry and exclusion in the months and years to come, Canada must be willing to seriously consider measures such as expelling the American ambassador or withdrawing from practices of military cooperation. I realize this is not something to take lightly — the United States being our closest neighbour and ally — but some values must take precedence over friendship and loyalty, such as the fundamental equality of all human beings regardless of race, religion, or nationality.

A light touch is not what is currently needed. (Much less a “pivot.”) The desperate circumstances unleashed by Trump’s hateful actions require that Canada’s government be more steadfast than ever in declaring the universality of human rights.

Thank you for considering my thoughts.

Sincerely,

David Taub Bancroft

Vancouver, BC

cc: Harjit Sajjan, MP for Vancouver South

An Open Letter to Elizabeth May Regarding BDS

Dear Elizabeth May,

Please don’t resign over Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions.

Far from being “polarizing, ineffective and unhelpful,” the BDS movement seeks to employ moderate, non-violent means (i.e. boycotts and other economic measures) to pressure Israel to end its decades-long occupation of Palestinian land. Originating in 2005 with a call to action by 170 grassroots Palestinian organizations, the campaign seeks to emulate tactics that helped bring an end to apartheid in South Africa. For the Green Party of Canada to pass a resolution supporting this cause puts us on the right side of history.

Let us further dispense with the juvenile notion, peddled by some of the more inflammatory segments of the Canadian media (but thankfully not you), that BDS or any other criticism of Israel is inherently anti-Semitic. The governments of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey routinely (and rightly) face condemnation over their human rights records without the debate being lowered by facile charges of Islamophobia. Similarly, objections to American foreign policy are not dismissed out of hand for displaying anti-Christian bias. Many supporters of BDS are themselves Jewish, such as the members of Independent Jewish Voices Canada (as well as yours truly), and find allegations of bigotry so frivolously tossed about to be offensive.

I understand that my letter will likely not convince you to embrace a movement that you seem so profoundly opposed to, but at the very least, I urge you to stay on as leader even if you do not approve of every single one of your party’s policies. Surely we are strong enough to withstand a little internal disagreement. Such is the nature of an open and democratic organization. Furthermore, the resolution in question is so broadly worded as to give the party considerable leeway with respect to implementation.

So please walk back your threat to reevaluate your future with the Greens. You are a fine leader and a major asset to the party, just as the party is an asset to Canada’s political discourse. The media fracas will die down if we allow it to do so. We must not let our differences get in the way of building a just, peaceful, and sustainable world.

Sincerely,

David Taub Bancroft

This post appears on rabble.ca.

National Post Letter

You will find a letter of mine in today’s National Post enumerating the many benefits of proportional representation. In order to read it, please click here and scroll down to the second last entry (or see the last entry in the print edition) under the heading “PR delivers the goods.”

Vancouver Sun Letter

I have a letter on The Vancouver Sun’s website (online only, it would appear) replying to a ridiculous op-ed piece that blames the high cost of housing on “mass immigration.” My response is restrained in both tone and word count, but suffice it to say I disagree with the op-ed writer’s argument. To read my letter, click here and scroll down to the second entry, under the heading “Massive investment in affordable housing needed.”