Liberal Policy Ideas By Glen Phillips 28 April 2009

[shofarot]

Our Liberal electoral strategy needs to be built on 4 primary objectives, focusing on a clear positive message ALL Canadians can understand:

1. Health - Reduce health care costs for ALL Canadians
2. Wealth - More money in the pockets of ALL Canadians
3. Knowledge - Affordable education for ALL Canadians.
4. Energy - Energy independence for national security

Preamble

We must ensure the differences in health, wealth, and education between Canada’s rich and poor (Gini Curve) decreases. A large Gini Factor tarnishes our international credibility, and diminishes our democracy.

We must remind Canadians of the success of previous Liberal governments in repairing the mess of unbalanced national finances left to them by Conservative predecessors. Ex Mulroney to Chretien/Martin, and Harper to Ignatieff/Goodale.

We must convince Canadians that Harper has never had a plan for Canada’s economic, geopolitical, and strategic place in the world - this is a serious problem for our children and country’s future.

Health

We are an aging population, which means health care costs will only continue to rise per GDP. To better manage this we need to:

1. Create a national drug formulary modeled after Quebec to allow Canada to be able to achieve greater economy of scale in drug purchases. Doing so will save Canadians billions in drug costs. Quebec and the NHS have had much success with this.
2. Invest in a national health care council run by the provinces.
   
   
   1. All provinces can voluntarily opt into this council, and Quebec can be encouraged to join by being the ambassador of a national drug formulary modeled on their “Carte Soleil” system.
   2. This council will allow us to reduce the cost of health care infrastructure planning, allow greater sharing of knowledge and patient data, and permit easier training and mobility of new (and immigrant) medical personnel.
3. Coerce the food industry to apply clear labels to all products sold in Canada, and work with the provinces to ban processed foods and drinks from schools, universities, and public spaces.
4. Apply aggressive excise taxes to all products that negatively affect the health of Canadians so as to encourage behavioral changes. E.g. tax cigarettes, booze, fast foods, candies, chocolates, chips, processed foods, legalize and tax marijuana.
5. Eliminate taxes on all foods that can be consumed without requiring cooking. E.g. fruits, vegetables, nuts, grains, etc.
6. Tax or ban products deemed hazardous to human and animal health. E.g. Asbestos, plastic bags, etc.

Wealth

Canada is a wealthy country. We have a better than average infrastructure combined with a well-educated population, a wealth of natural resources, and well established institutions. A new Liberal platform should leverage this reality by:

1. Investing the revenue from natural resources into future growth industries such as energy, information, transportation, and health care (bio tech included). We have much to learn from countries such as Norway.
2. Tax middle class and wealthy Canadians to ensure the public space is well funded to the greater good of all Canadians. Public spaces include libraries, universities, parks, public transit, rail, and hospitals.
3. The “bus and farm” concept to clean our cities and give many homeless people a ticket out of drugs and poverty by offering housing and education and self-empowerment. This will help reduce the Gini Curve.
4. Trade, cooperation, and mobility with BRIC countries as well as the EU, but not forgetting that our natural ally will always be the USA.

Education

1. Canada needs to invest in education to enable all Canadians to be able to participate and benefit from a shift to creating an energy exporting super power.
2. Our future greatness is in the Kindergartens of the country. We must fund education and make it possible for young Canadians to achieve their educational objectives regardless of the socio-economic background.
3. We must fund post secondary education to encourage bright minds to come here and innovate on our soil.

1. Removing taxes on everything from books to newspapers and the Internet.

1. Establishing free and national high-speed wireless Internet access for all Canadians.
2. We must provide huge tax incentives to biotech, energy, and technology firms to set up manufacturing and R&D in our revitalized, well-connected green cities. We can sell our low health care costs, excellent education system, and leading energy efficient transport system as benefits.

“Energy Independence”

Canada needs to make a comprehensive change to its tax system to encourage us to move in sync with the hemisphere’s superpowers (United States and Brazil) towards energy independence through low carbon foot print energy production.

Why target energy independence through low carbon sources?

1. Energy independence means greater national security for Canada and the Americas.
2. Reduced energy use means greater efficiency, which allows us to sell this efficiency to other parts of the world in the form of consulting services, carbon credits, and international goodwill.
3. Cleaner energy is better for our current ecosystem, and for human health
4. Carbon is going to be the next be trade tariff - to be high carbon in the future will mean having to pay higher levies on our exports, which means less jobs.

How to achieve energy independence through low carbon energy sources?

1. Via tax cuts on low carbon technology
   
   
   1. The new tax code must count on a series of tax cuts to services and goods that consume less energy and are more innovative.
   2. Tax cuts and credits to processes that reduce energy use and increase the robustness of our transport and continental infrastructure. E.g. Credits to people who ride public transit or take intercity rail, whilst tax charges to people who drive or fly. Why, because air travel and cars consume more energy than rail, and they are also less robust to energy and security shocks (terror attacks) than fixed links.
2. Tax hikes on high carbon technology
   
   
   1. Tax old industries to transform them, or to displace them with more efficient high value industries.
3. Via services to encourage Canadians to adopt low carbon footprint services
   
   
   1. Modernize our national infrastructure and integrate it with the United States. To not do so, leaves us vulnerable to security threats and being left behind. This means building national high-speed rail to get goods and services from the heartland to transport hubs faster. We are behind Europe and Asia in this. Fixed rail versus freeways are like European rivers versus African ones - slow rail services will kill us in the future.
   2. Modernize our urban centers by retrofitting every piece of abandoned rail with new urban rail to enable as many Canadians as to get out their cars and onto rail, buses, and bikes. To not do so risks the health of Canadians, and puts our cities on a downward spiral.
   3. We must offer cities with funding to enable neighborhoods to be retrofitted with local transit systems and park networks to encourage livability and reduced need for cars.
   4. Subsidize public transit and national rail with tax revenue acquired from taxation on gasoline and national highway tolls.

“To achieve greatness, we must be able to let go of the past and look to the future.”