CORCORAN … Beware the carbon tax ‘love fest.’

You know the ideological pendulum is swinging off kilter when the radical left has begun applauding Big Oil. In a tweet Tuesday, Toronto leftist Linda McQuaig hailed the arrival of Canadian oil executives aboard the carbon tax bandwagon. “Except for Luddite #PMHarper, Canadians — including key Alberta oil CEOs — ready for #carbon tax, greener era.”

The object of McQuaig’s Twitter affection is Steve Williams, CEO of Suncor Energy, the Alberta oilsands developer. Williams has endeared himself to activists and green think tanks with his endorsement of a carbon tax. Williams is also on the advisory board of Canada’s Ecofiscal Commission, a self-appointed “commission” of economic interventionists dedicated to imposing a carbon tax on all Canadians. Ecofiscal is headed by McGill University’s Chris Ragan, who is quoted as having said that a recent industry/ political/academic/environmental meeting on carbon taxes in Alberta was a “love fest.”

Apparently it’s now also an international group fest. The top executives of six major EU oil giants — BP, BG Group, Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Statoil and Total — this week distributed a joint letter calling for a global carbon tax (see below).

Now “love fest” sounds like a fun 1960s thing, but before everybody strips down, it might be best if McQuaig and others read the fine print. It is best not to jump into bed with Big Oil without first knowing exactly what Big Oil has in mind, especially when the plan calls for a carbon tax on fossil fuels. How often do the CEOs of an industry get together and issue a statement saying: “Sir, please tax our products.”

What’s really going on here is elaborate positioning leading up to the UN climate talks in Paris in December. International bureaucrats have their eye on a major tax on carbon. In the words of Angel Gurria, head of the OECD: “We should hit it (carbon) on the head with a blunt instrument as hard as possible … a big fat price.”

The words “big fat price” do not appear in the European CEO letter. Instead, the heads of BP and Royal Dutch Shell et al seem more preoccupied with supporting natural gas as a source of electricity and dumping on coal, although they generously claim to be interested only in the equal treatment of all carbon sources. Their request, as stated in their letter to the media, is “to ensure … widespread carbon pricing in all countries.”

This is where the Big Oil carbon pricing love-in gets messy, politically and for consumers. The CEO’s formal letter to the UN is significantly more direct. “If governments act to price carbon, this discourages high carbon options and encourages the most efficient ways of reducing emissions widely, including reduced demand for the most carbon intensive fossil fuels, greater energy efficiency, the use of natural gas in place of coal, increased investment in carbon capture and storage, renewable energy, smart buildings and grids, off-grid access to energy, cleaner cars and new mobility business models and behaviours.”

To get there, the CEOs offered up their corporate services. “Our companies would like to open direct dialogue with the UN and willing governments. We have important areas of interest in and contributions to make to creating and implementing a workable approach to carbon pricing.”

Is the world, and Canada, ready to jump into bed with the oil industry to impose a global tax that would have to be borne by all consumers? At Alberta’s Suncor, Williams has said any carbon tax should target consumers, not just corporations.

So far, the love fest has failed to tell us how big any such tax would have to be, perhaps because the number would have to approach $200 a tonne, adding 50 cents to the price of a litre of gasoline — although still not enough to rid the world of carbon emissions.

Note to Linda McQuaig: When at a love fest, always check on who the other partiers are.

When Big Oil joins campaigns for a carbon tax the rest of us are going to pay