VICTORIA—New Democrat environment critic Rob Fleming is outlining a new vision for the Pacific Carbon Trust which would end the practise of subsidizing big polluters using funds taken from schools and hospitals.

“Today, by design, the sector responsible for just over 1 per cent of B.C.’s total of 74 megatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions – B.C.’s public sector – is transferring scarce tax dollars towards some of the provinces richest and biggest environmental polluters,” said Fleming, who took the opportunity to make a presentation on the issue in the legislature.

“And, worse still, in the process of giving scarce education and health care dollars to massive greenhouse gas emitters like EnCana, our public sector entities are being unnecessarily constrained in their their own ability to plan, save and invest in projects that will green our schools and hospitals and actually lower the energy costs paid by the taxpayer.”

Last year the Liberals’ Pacific Carbon Trust paid Canadian Energy Giant EnCana an undisclosed amount for work done on one of its oil and gas projects. That money was taken from schools and hospitals, who are legally obligated to buy offsets from the Pacific Carbon Trust for things such as heating emergency rooms and classrooms.

Adrian Dix and the New Democrats have called for government to restructure the carbon trust so that it helps schools and hospitals pool funds to invest in greening their own outdated buildings and replacing inefficient heating, cooling and mechanical systems with innovative renewable energy sources.

“By failing to invest in cutting carbon emissions as the key part of getting to carbon neutral government, more than $18 million of our tax dollars are annually leaving the public sector to buy offsets. These are funds that should be used to reduce the carbon footprint of government, rather than continuing to emit the same amount or more carbon into the atmosphere,” said Fleming.

“The B.C. Liberals need to act quickly and transparently if they want to salvage credibility for carbon neutral government. That means eliminating the perverse transfer of health and education funds to big polluters immediately.”