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Put aside whether O’Leary knows what he’s talking about, or cares. The vehemence of the sentiment is what matters here. “Carbon taxes don’t work and need to be repealed immediately,” he says.

(Pricing carbon emissions, and especially doing it via capping them and letting emitters buy and sell emissions permits, used to be the conservative solution to climate change. Price signals and markets working their efficient magic, etc.)

The arrival of the Ontario Liberals’ actual cap-and-trade program has helped Brown a little: He’s been able to focus on the implementation rather than the principle. Brown and other Tories have attacked the Liberals’ plans in the legislature — for raising the price of gasoline an estimated 4.3 cents a litre, for burying the effect on natural-gas prices in home heating bills, for increasing the cost of living generally.

The Liberals claim the plan is revenue-neutral, but what they mean by that is they’re planning to spend the money their carbon-permit auctions raise (the first auction brought in $470 million, they announced Monday) on environmental initiatives. That’s not what “revenue-neutral” means to any normal person.

There’s stuff there to go after and opposing is the opposition’s job. But at some point Brown will have to put forward his alternative plan for governing. His public support for pricing carbon emissions is clear and he’s going to have to say what that’ll mean if he becomes premier.

Clark is, for now, standing on the one bit of common ground Brown and O’Leary share. It’s in danger of crumbling under him.

dreevely@postmedia.com

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