A request

With an extra hour (leaving time was moved from 12:00 to 1:00)
the following letter to the editor was keyboarded and posted
out to newspapers.

Should it appear in one you read, please let me know.

        Joe

(I hope you agree with the thought expressed)

________________________________________
To: Letter to the Editor <joe.hueglin@bellnet.ca>
From: Joe  Hueglin <joe.hueglin@bellnet.ca>
Subject: Green protectionism: Charting Canada's future

Dear Editor,

There are always choices.

Look at the place of origin of goods in whatever store you go into.  Few goods have a "Made in Canada" label.  This before adding any direct or indirect costs associated with fighting global warming or climate change.

Increasingly there is little to protect aside from services. Call centres are increasingly offshore as well.  India some say has 100, 000 lawyers knowledgeable in Common Law whose services might in some way be employed.

Canada's (or some will argue the provinces rather than Canada's) raw materials are in demand.  They are exported, yes, but as raw logs to be sawn elsewhere or through petroleum pipelines to be refined in the U.S. of A. .

Is there a point at which current trends are considered in long range terms?

Classical economics has four factors: land, labour, capital and management. Canada's raw materials being sold offshore, Canada's workers being supplanted by those in other lands, capital setting up firms abroad and management content to do all three of the others 'cause they serve to benefit the bottom line.

There is a fifth factor of production and distribution, government.

It is time for the options, the positives and negatives of following various courses of action, are investigated. Investigated in a non-partisan manner drawing upon the knowledge of the public service, the private sector and academics and presented in a comprehensible manner.

Rather than partisan wrangling over Green protectionism what is necessary is a Royal Commission Charting Canada's future. Now, not when the full effects of current trends are upon us.

Yours truly,

Joe Hueglin
5838 Mouland Avenue
Niagara Falls, Ontario
Tel 905-356-3901