Ontario recruits Suzuki in climate agenda
The Ontario government has enlisted the help of David Suzuki to sell its “climate change action plan.”
Canada’s most famous environmentalist is front and centre — literally — in a slick new 30-second commercial promoting the forthcoming scheme. In the ad, Suzuki stands on a stage peering up at scores of schoolchildren sitting above him in a theatre.
“What does climate change mean?” Suzuki intones from the lectern in a voice known to millions of Canadians from his decades of CBC broadcasts.
“Simply that we’re in trouble, and not enough adults are listening,” says Suzuki, who endorsed former Liber- al premier Dalton McGuinty in 2011.
“And, if we don’t act now, the damage could be irreversible,” he says, against a backdrop of highway traffic gridlock and a soon-to-be-homeless beaver and a caribou.
“Who will have to live with the consequences? You,” the scientist tells the bewildered children, some of whom raise their eyebrows and crinkle their noses in disbelief.
“So you’re going to have to solve it,” he concludes before a tag line appears reading: “Let’s not leave this for our kids to figure out. Our today. Their tomorrow.”
The ad, which will soon be broadcast around the province, is designed to highlight Premier Kathleen Wynne’s new cap-and-trade system, which puts a price on carbon.
That will make gasoline 4.3 cents a litre more expensive starting next year and mean an average of $5 more for monthly natural gas bills.
It will also usher in incentives to conserve energy bankrolled by the additional $1.9 billion a year the treasury will take in as Ontario, Quebec and California get their joint capand-trade program up and running.
In March, Environment and Climate Change Minister Glen Murray conceded that there’s a delicate balance in promoting the plan.
“The energy ministry in the U.K. ran one (ad) that scared the hell out of people . . . so a lot of people have been rolling it back,” said Murray.
At the time, he said Ontario would echo Quebec’s marketing approach.