Can the next Conservative leader steer clear of stinking albatrosses?  (Aug. 22).

Re: Can the next Conservative leader steer clear of stinking albatrosses?  (Aug. 22).While for most of us opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage suggests the stinking albatross of the ancient mariner, but Columnist Yakabuski has sadly missed the even-more-stinking-albatross issue of climate change. Not a word in his column on it, the need for a carbon tax (as a minimum measure) and much more required to bring down emissions.

If greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced, there will be far more than one stinking bird around our necks, but vast numbers, up to whole-scale extinctions, in due course, our own.

Why can’t Canadian Conservatives get it? In the UK, GHG emissions have been reduced 38%  based on 1990 levels; in the same period of time ours have gone up 21%. U.K. Conservatives voted massively for the Climate Change Act of 2008 and a Conservative government in 2019 brought in an even tougher target. Conservatives in other countries evidently believe in conservation.

Lynn McDonald, former MP and co-founder JustEarth: A Coalition for Environmental Justice