[Dion]

Editorial: NDP is spending 'big money' on climate change ads (with poll)

It’s true the tax will provide the NDP with money it can use to encourage homeowners to update their furnaces, install insulation or buy better windows, but unless they’re going to cover the entire bill, it will still leave many families deciding whether to put food on the table or throw out a functioning clothes washer and dryer in favour of a pair that’s more efficient.

And if the savings are so compelling, shouldn’t Albertans be making the upgrades themselves, without a sleight of hand — taxing them on the gasoline and energy they need to exist so people who can afford to buy new appliances can get a bit of a discount?

Whatever views a person might have about the tax, the spending is excessive, especially with so many Albertans out of work, an almost $11-billion deficit on the books and a shortage of money for important programs.

The expenditure on advertisements comes as the NDP brings in restrictions on how much political parties can raise and spend during an election.

“Albertans deserve to know that big money isn’t influencing our electoral system,” the NDP’s minister for democratic renewal, Christina Gray, has said of the reforms.

But “big money” is being expended by the NDP in an attempt to shape public opinion. It has spent more flogging its climate change agenda than four political parties will be permitted to spend in the next general election combined.

If that’s not “big money,” it’s difficult to imagine what is.

http://calgaryherald.com/opinion/edi...is-being-spent