so only the rich can contribute to global warming while the poor rural folks who actually need to use vehicles and heavy machinery get shafted one more time? so much for freedom, equal opportunity, reducing class gaps and all that garbage.

If the government hands out carbon cards, it sure wouldn't give me hope.

Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater just yet. Creating transparent feedback loops is a good idea. People being faced witht hte costs of their actions is a good idea. If poor people are hitting barriers, let's assume that the government will try to offset that, albeit as pathetically as they address other systemic barriers. Our current plan of doing the wrong thing is not working. We need the feedback.

so instead of imposing yet another regressive economy on regular people, the focus should be on industry and the products they make. don't throw liberty and hope out with that bathwater too.

I posted the following to Miliband's blog; I think it's a good idea...
----------

Ok, first I'll undercut my credibility...

I'm an American. (I'm a Democrat/I didn't vote for Bush/I don't eat babies...)

That said, I wish we'd adopt this proposal. It is utterly brilliant and has many ancillary benefits that make it more compelling than any alternatives.

a) On Rich v Poor and the inequality of the system
This would be compelling except that any carbon tax is equally inequal, except the poor who are not over-using don't have the option for another revenue stream. The solution is increasing the minimum wage, the UK equivalent of EITC (a negative income tax, where you'd have a negative sum due in your taxes, and thus have a working wage support that is gov't financed. In combination w/ a minimum wage, this ensures each business _and_general_society_ share the cost of restoring economic dignity to the poor.), etc, rather than compromising environmental policy.

The response the the fellow w/ the old, polluting used car is that the rich fellow who bought the new car had to use carbon credits to defray the carbon released in:
* the mining of raw materials (power)
* the manufacture (power, lack of carbon sequestration by wood logged, pastureland for cows for leather, etc)
* the transport of components (land/sea)
etc etc

He will pay for having that new car, just not at the pump. You will benefit in having conserved by having an old car, in selling him those credits.

b) On Access
You all are getting a National ID card; it can swipe for carbon use... (why is it such a big deal over there (or over here)?)

c) On Businesses
They would be required to charge themselves negative carbon credits for all carbon use (including the carbon use that occurs overseas in their name) that have to be "paid" by charging the consumer that carbon cost (the way VAT or sales taxes are collected).

When one car is £10000 + 40 CC and one is £8000 + 120 CC, you'd really begin to see responsible engineering pay off.

d) On Awareness
People often want to do the right thing, but the environment only comes up when they read the newspaper (or hear RH Miliband speak). This system impacts each poor decision to them. The incentive created goes beyond the economic costs of those credits, people will want to use fewer of them to assuage their guilty consciences.

e) On balance of trade
The Indonesian-manufactured good that is build on coal power, transported by an old, dirty truck to the docks where a diesel ship carries it across two oceans would arrive in the UK with such a large CC cost that suddenly UK businesses could compete despite cost of labour.

This provides a morally (and legally) defensible trade barrier. All countries' goods are subject to the same policy but the very advantages low-cost manufacturing has overseas would condemn it when the carbon costs were tallied up. No discrimination and yet local industry is advantaged.

This is brilliant!

You can make your own carbon-offset economy like I did.
While the 4 cyl SUV I drive is very eco-friendly, the several times a year that I drive my larger vehicle to get 3 days off does use 9.5 miles per gallon. It is a Winnebago. I have devised a plan to carbon-offset those 124 annual gallons of gasoline for the 2-or-3 mini-vacation trips in it. (3 days off feels like 5 days off in an RV, since you are not chasing meals, entertainment, lodging, and etc.)
This is how I have set up my own carbon-offset economy.
I have calculated that the giving-away of 356 100-watt compact florescent bulbs is what is in order to offset the gasoline use of my RV, very well in excess of what I use in my RV for my 3 annual trips in it.
I have given them away as a promotion in my Automotive Technician Education business (whereby, every gallon of gasoline I teach techs to save for each customer each day saves 20 pounds of carbon dioxide.)
This is why I strenuously support plug-in 30 to 40-miles- on-electric vehicles which are in the works. (And please do not let anyone whine if the battery pack only lasts 3 or four years. Others will be glad to buy it out from underneath them if they say the words "for sale".)
Calculate the 33,705 watts per gallon of gasoline you use, and, offset that by buying compact florescent bulbs if you can afford to. (I buy the 4 packs for 9.97 at my favorite home supply store, they are located way in the back on an end-display).
Give them away to folks whom you know can not afford compact florescent bulbs. Give them away to folks whom you might feel have not thought a lot about saving money/greenhouse-gas from coal-power. When I give away ten bucks of bulbs, every single person listens very respectfully for 10 minutes. Each bulb saves $77 of electricity over their 7 year lifespan.
That is how I offset the use of my Winnebago.
My Winnebago usage is Carbon-Offset for 7 years.
It has cost me $1044. That is only a measly $149 a year. (I have gotten them in $348 batches, and have gotten free interest on my credit card for 6 months at my favorite home supply store.).
Thank you for your interest in my Carbon-offset
economy. People like you and respect you a lot when you do this for them.
Sincerely,
Dan Petit in Austin Texas.

So we should start paying people who live on the streets for not using cars or flying... what a great idea!

We exhale carbon dioxide, so is this a breathing tax? Plants need carbon dioxide to live. The ice caps on Mars (farther from the sun than earth) are melting too! The sun is cycling through a hot cycle. See the movie "Global Warming or Global Governance.

Yeh, and mercury and arsenic are naturally occurring too, but we don't (knowingly) feed them to our kids in their breakfast cereals. It is all to do with degrees of magnitude. Carbon dioxide is good, but too much is bad.

Besides, what's the upside of acting on global warming and proven to be wrong, compared to not acting and it turns out to all be true?

It's a good idea. However, I think people will find a lot of ways to go behind the system. So I would suggest the company to work on its security and accountability of the points.