The issue isn’t the carbon tax it’s climate change [Video]

When the going gets tough, political leaders sometimes feel the need to get going. And the scramble for safer ground is not always elegant.

So it was for NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh when he tried (again) last week to put some distance between himself and the Liberal government’s carbon pricing policies.

Speaking to reporters in Montreal, Singh offered two thoughts on the government’s consumer carbon tax. First, he cited his disagreement with the government’s decision to exempt home heating oil from the federal fuel levy. Second, he said New Democrats “want to see an approach to fighting the climate crisis where it doesn’t put the burden on the backs of working people.”

The NDP is hardly alone in quibbling with the exemption for home heating oil that was announced last fall. The wisdom of that change is certainly debatable.

But inconsistency in the Liberal government’s approach doesn’t compel the NDP to abandon the policy entirely. If …