PC Leader Tim Hudak to Scrap Ontario Vehicle Emissions Test If Elected!

Tim Hudak, the Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader, promised to phase out the flawed Ontario Drive Clean Emissions Test requirement, if he is elected the next Premier of Ontario!!

Here's the story from the Toronto Sun:

Hudak says Drive Clean tests outlived usefulness

Drive Clean is getting overhauled.

Cars and light trucks would not require a Drive Clean test until they were seven years old instead of the current five years, Environment Minister John Wilkinson announced Thursday.

But PC Leader Tim Hudak said the program has outlived its usefulness and he would scrap it entirely.

Drive Clean, introduced under the Mike Harris government in 1999, was meant to encourage car companies to improve emissions standards.

Technology has now improved to the point where the program is redundant, Hudak said.

“Instead of picking an arbitrary number out of the air like seven years, let’s put a plan in place to phase out the program altogether,” he said. “It’s achieved its purpose, but now it’s time to move it off into the sunset.”

Hudak said his 2003 Chevy Avalanche passed Drive Clean with flying colours recently and yet he’ll have to purchase the test again in two years, a typical experience for most Ontario drivers.

The Drive Clean test costs a maximum of $35, but car owners can be required to spend up to $450 on repairs if the vehicle flunks.

The Ontario Drive Clean Emissions Tests have been riddled in scandal and controversy over the past years, as they've been proven, firstly, to be completely unreliable in detecting emissions issues with vehicles.

SOURCE: Wikipedia - Ontario's Drive Clean - Test Accuracy

Drive Clean's emissions test results have been shown to be unreliable in surveys carried out by the media such as in-depth work done by the Hamilton Spectator, The Fraser Institute, and consumer advocacy groups such as the Automobile Protection Association. In APA surveys, it was shown that the same car can have extremely variable results in test results (up to 800 percent in one survey), even at the same garage or on the same day with no work being carried out on the car. (APA). In 2004, the Ontario Auditor General reported on myriad cases of fraud within the Drive Clean program, such as test facilities (garages) that, for a fee, would test a clean car and report those results instead. Other test facilities would fail a well-tuned car to generate additional work. For these reasons and others, consumer reports suggest drivers try another garage if their car fails a Drive Clean test, before proceeding with expensive repairs.

Second, the Drive Clean Emissions program has also been proven to have had "little real impact" on the reduction of air pollution in Ontario, especially after 2004 (it's originally intended end-date).

SOURCE: Wikipedia - Ontario's Drive Clean - Impacts on Air Pollution

Drive Clean has had little real impact on air pollution in Ontario. 2005 was Toronto's worst year on record for smog with a total of 48 smog alert days. The Ontario Medical Association estimated in 2005 that total air pollution (from all sources) would cause some 5,800 deaths and 17,000 hospital admissions that year. It also estimated that the direct health care costs of air pollution in Ontario were about $507 million, and the total economic cost of air pollution to be about $7.8 billion.

In late 2004, Norm Sterling, who served as the Environment Minister in Progressive Conservative premier Mike Harris's cabinet, stated that Drive Clean had already had its greatest impact on air pollution and had served its purpose. Mr. Sterling is often referred to as the founder of Drive Clean. Drive Clean can only address a small fraction of the total automobile emissions problem, because all internal combustion vehicles burn fuels which ultimately pollute the air (including most so-called "alternative" fuels).

Greenpeace co-founder Robert Hunter (journalist) wrote in 1999 that Drive Clean "has turned out to be an agonizing bureaucratic nightmare that hits drivers with what is basically another tax and a huge hassle, while accomplishing -- in Environmental Commissioner Eva Ligeti's assessment -- 'minimal benefits.'"

Tim Hudak, a refreshing change from scandal-plagued and completely out-of-touch Dalton McGuinty, is finally an Ontario Leader that understands the struggle of Ontario families.

In addition to abolishing the punishing and no longer necessary Ontario Drive Clean Emissions test, Hudak also promises to unplug McGuinty's so-called "Smart Meters", he's raised possibilities of reducing the HST, and in ending McGuinty's Green Energy Experiments and reducing his Government's consistent boondoggle, waste, and severely bloated bureaucracy, he will reduce taxes and save Ontarians money.

--jackandcokewithalime


(Image:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tim_Hudak.jpg by NuclearWarfare on Wikipedia
)