The Globe and Mail - 24.10.2019

B4| REPORTONBUSINESS O THEGLOBEANDMAIL| THURSDAY,OCTOBER24,2019

OPINION&ANALYSIS

DILBERT

D

id you hear that solitary,
plaintive bugle in the back-
ground as the election re-
sults rolled in Monday night?
That wasThe Last Postplaying for
balanced budgets in Canadian
federal politics.
Nearly two-thirds of the newly
elected House of Commons is
made up of parties whose plat-
forms offered no promise of bud-
get balances. That includes the
Liberals, who will form a minority
government, and the NDP and
Bloc Québécois, either of which
could hold the balance of power.
The Conservatives spent the
campaign railing about broken

Liberal promises to eliminate def-

icits and vowing a return to bal-

ance in five years – and went

down to demoralizing defeat,

their message never really gain-

ing traction. Maxime Bernier’s

fledgling People’s Party of Canada

outdid the Conservatives with a

pledge to wipe out the deficit in

two years – and was wiped off the

political map, with just 1.6 per

cent of the popular vote and Mr.

Bernier himself losing his seat.

The death of balanced budgets

has come remarkably swiftly.

Heading into the 2015 cam-

paign, every major party advocat-

ed deficit reduction and eventual

balances. But then the Liberals

under Justin Trudeau broke ranks

mid-campaign, rolling the dice

with a proposal to run modest,

short-term deficits to fund a dra-

matic increase in infrastructure

spending. It worked. Barely four

years later, budget balancing has

become a non-starter. Pre-elec-

tion opinion polls put deficits far

down the list of voter priorities. It

showed at the ballot box.

Even in Quebec, where the pro-

vincialgovernment turned back

from the brink of financial disas-

ter a few years ago to become a

model budget balancer, deficit

fighting no longer excites the

electorate. Last fall, the provincial

Liberals ran on their stellar record

for balancing the books – and lost

big. Federally, Quebec voters

swung hard toward the Bloc Qué-

bécois, which advocates main-

taining deficits in the $12-billion

to $18-billion range. The province

also elected 35 federal Liberals –

down only five from 2015 – de-

spite the party breaking its 2015

campaign promise of returning to

a balance this year, instead pledg-

ing to increase its deficit spending

even more.

The NDP, on whom the Liber-

als will most likely rely to support

their minority, is in agreement

with the Liberals that deficits are

just fine – as long as you keep a

rein on the ratio of debt to gross

domestic product (GDP). The

NDP’s platform even quotes a re-

port last year from Canada’s Par-

liamentary Budget Officer (PBO)

saying that Ottawa “could perma-

nently increase spending or re-

duce taxes by 1.4 per cent of GDP”

without raising debt-to-GDP. In

current-dollar terms, that repre-

sents a $32-billion cushion.

The NDP, unsurprisingly, fa-

vours the “increase spending” op-

tion. Its platform mapped out a

whopping $35-billion in new ex-

penditures (or “investments,” as

politicians of all stripes have tak-

en to euphemistically calling

them) next fiscal year. The Liber-

als have proposed a much more

modest $9-billion. But it’s not

hard to imagine scenarios in

which the NDP might push the

Liberals to loosen the purse

strings for some key priorities, in

exchange for NDP support in the

House of Commons.

It’s notable that the biggest-

ticket item in the NDP’s platform

is a national universal prescrip-

tion-drug program – an idea the

Liberals also support in principle,

although it’s not included in the

party’s formal platform spending

plans. While it’s pure conjecture

at this point, this is an area in

which the two parties could con-

ceivably see mutual interest in

working together. The annual

cost of such a program? More

than $10-billion, according to

PBO calculations.

The Conservatives will likely

see their role in the next Parlia-

ment as the defender of fiscal dis-

cipline – and it’s a role that Parlia-

ment still needs, even if obsessing

over balances has become passé.

Consider that in the Trudeau Lib-

erals’ first four years in office, an-

nual federal program spending is

not only up nearly $60-billion, or

22 per cent – it’s also $15-billion

higher than the Liberals them-

selves originally projected for the

end of their first term. The Con-

servatives raise a compelling

point when they argue that, with-

out setting a return to balance as

the ultimate objective, Mr. Tru-

deau “has had no incentive to say

no” when departments and

members of his own government

came to him with costly propos-

als. A balanced-budget anchor

can shield a government from its

own worst spending impulses.

But even if it had help from

other parties, the Conservatives

won’t have the votes to impose

that discipline on any Liberal

spending initiatives supported by

the NDP – or, for that matter, by

the Bloc. Perhaps more impor-

tantly, it doesn’t look as if it will

win a lot of public love by fighting

that fight, either. At least on the

federal level, this has become yes-

terday’s battle. Rightly or wrong-

ly, voters have moved on.

Thedeathofbudgetbalancingcameswiftly

TheLiberal,NDPand

Blocplatformsmadeno

promisetofightdeficits,

andpollsshowedthe

issuewasfardownthe

listofvoterpriorities

DAVID
PARKINSON

OPINION

I

never thought I would become
a passionate champion for nu-
clear energy. But after 20 years
of advocating for renewable ener-
gy, I’ve overcome the misconcep-
tions I had in the past and I am
convinced by the evidence we
can’t fight climate change with-
out nuclear.
When I was the chief executive
of the Canadian Solar Industries
Association, I thought the “holy
grail” was to make renewable en-
ergy cost-competitive so it could
fulfill our energy needs. Today,
wind and solar are among the
cheapest forms of energy in many
places around the world. The gen-
erous subsidies that fuelled early
growth are no longer at play, yet
the growth of wind and solar con-
tinues.
Despite the strong growth, the
percentage of emissions-free
electricity in the world has not in-
creased in 20 years. It’s stuck at 36
per cent, according to a recent IEA
report.
This is because global demand
keeps increasing, renewables of-
ten need to be backed up by new
fossil fuel sources and existing
nuclear plants are being shut
down prematurely. We must face
a sobering reality: Renewable en-
ergy alone is simply not enough

to address the climate crisis.

This is a difficult thing for me to

admit. In 2014, I delivered a TEDx

talk in which I was an unabashed

champion for solar energy. I in-

stalled solar panels on the roof of

my home and smart battery stor-

age in my basement. I bought an

electric vehicle. And I continue to

be a supporter of wind and solar

because we need every clean en-

ergy solution available. But I now

realize I dedicated 20 years – very

precious years from a climate-

change perspective – promoting a

partial solution.

An overly optimistic view of re-

newables has affected major deci-

sions about other energy sources,

particularly nuclear. Our global

focus on renewables has caused

existing nuclear plants to be re-

tired early and has stalled invest-

ment in new projects. It’s given

people a false sense of security

that we don’t need nuclear any

more when nothing could be fur-

ther from the truth.

What’s worse, because wind

and solar are variable (they pro-

duce electricity only when the

wind blows or the sun shines),

they must be paired with other

energy sources to support de-

mand, and these are almost al-

ways fossil fuels. In the absence of

enough nuclear energy, renew-

ables are effectively prolonging

the life of coal and gas plants that

can produce power around the

clock.

Unfortunately, many Cana-

dians wrongly believe our future

energy demands can be met with

renewables alone. A recent Aba-

cus Data poll found that more

than 40 per cent of Canadians be-

lieve a 100-per-cent renewable

energy future is possible. This is

simply not true. The deadline to

save the planet is approaching

and we are no closer to a real solu-

tion.

A critical issue is that nuclear is

vastly misunderstood by policy

makers and the general public.

These well-intentioned people –

and I used to be one of them –

continue to believe fallacies, mis-

conceptions and even fear-mon-

gering about nuclear, including

claims that it’s expensive, danger-

ous and produces large quantities

of radioactive waste.

The truth is that when you con-

sider the entire power generation

life cycle, nuclear energy is one of

the least expensive energy sourc-

es. That’s because uranium is

cheap and abundant, and nuclear

reactors – though costly to build –

last for several decades. Further-

more, it’s safe: Used nuclear fuel is

small in quantity, properly stored,

strictly regulated and poses no

threat to human health or the en-

vironment.

There’s a staggering lack of

knowledge and understanding of

nuclear. I was active in the energy

business, and I’ve lived my whole

life in a province – Ontario –

where nuclear makes up a signif-

icant portion of the electricity

supply, and I still didn’t know the

facts about nuclear energy until

very recently.

People fail to realize that nucle-

ar is the only proven technology

that has decarbonized the econo-

mies of entire countries, includ-

ing France and Sweden. We can

pair renewables with nuclear en-

ergy and start to meet our energy

targets. But it will take a change in

mentality and new investment in

nuclear energy.

So this is why I’m now on a mis-

sion to help people discover and

rediscover nuclear as the clean

technology solution to decarbo-

nize our electricity systems and

solve the climate crisis. We need

to extend the life of existing

plants rather than close them pre-

maturely. We need to invest in

new modern technologies includ-

ing small modular reactors, which

can be deployed in off-grid set-

tings such as remote communi-

ties and mining sites. And we

need to use nuclear alongside re-

newables to power the grid. We

must act before it’s too late. And

we can’t afford to be distracted

from real, practical solutions by a

completely impossible dream of

100 per cent renewable energy.

We don’t want to look back on this

time and realize we made the

wrong decisions. The time for nu-

clear is now.

Nuclearenergyisoneoftheleastexpensiveenergysourcesbecauseuraniumisabundantandcheap,andalthoughthey’recostlytobuild,nuclearreactors–suchastheDarlington
NuclearGeneratingStationinClarington,Ont.,seenin2016–lastforseveraldecades.FRED LUM/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

Nuclearenergyisanimportantpartofsolvingtheclimatecrisis

JOHNGORMAN

OPINION

President and chief executive officer,
Canadian Nuclear Association