Opinion: Canada’s oil-loving Conservatives bet on climate change indifference
Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario. By J.J. McCullough J.J. McCullough Email Bio Follow Global Opinions contributing writer May 21 at 6:56 PM On the issue of climate change, Canada’s Conservatives comprise three factions of skeptics.
Third are those who think it’s worth addressing but are skeptical the policies offered by Justin Trudeau’s Liberal administration in particular will work. Both forms of recalcitrance are largely outgrowths of the Tories’ preoccupation with being champions of Alberta’s oil industry, whose present hardships they universally blame on Liberal policy. This is partially because the province is such a reliable source of Tory votes and partially because any party that defines itself through faith in free markets must be seen sympathizing with dominant sectors of Canadian capitalism.
An uncompromising defense of big oil at the expense of climate activism may seem counterintuitive to this strategy, but it is easily rationalized with the logic that oil is fundamentally an “economic issue.” Secular, suburban, middle-class swing voters love parties that campaign on economic issues, declares Conservative Party conventional wisdom — what they hate are parties that wade into “moral” matters such as abortion, immigration and LGBT rights.
That said, even if climate change is closer to a moral cause such as gay marriage than an economic issue such as tax rates, it doesn’t necessarily follow that the Tories will immediately suffer for it.
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