Tax babies!

A rare and sensible suggestion by a medical expert in Western Australia. Naturally, family-obsessed groups are indignant:

Baby levy plan to offset carbon emissions

FAMILIES would pay a $5000-plus baby levy at birth and an annual carbon tax of up to $800 a child under a plan flagged in Australia's top medical journal.

Every couple with more than two children would be taxed to pay for enough trees to offset the carbon emissions generated over each child's lifetime.

Perth Assoc Prof Barry Walters outlines his proposal in yesterday's Medical Journal of Australia.

He calls for condoms and greenhouse-friendly services such as sterilisation procedures to earn carbon credits for the user and prescriber.

And he implies the Federal Government should ditch the $4133 baby bonus and intimates we ought to consider population controls like those in China and India.

"Every newborn baby in Australia represents a potent source of greenhouse gas emissions for an average of 80 years, not simply by breathing, but by the profligate consumption of resources typical of our society," he wrote.

"Far from showering financial booty on new mothers and thereby rewarding greenhouse-unfriendly behaviour, a baby levy in the form of a carbon tax should apply, in line with the polluter pays principle."

Assoc Prof Walters is clinical associate professor of obstetric medicine at the department of women's and infants' health at the University of Western Australia and the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Perth.

Australian Family Association spokeswoman Angela Conway attacked the proposal and said it was ridiculous to blame babies for global warming.

"I think self-important professors with silly ideas should have to pay carbon tax for all the hot air they create," she said.

"There's masses of evidence to say that child-rich families have much lower resource consumption per head than other styles of households.

"How many families with more than a few children trip off overseas once or twice a year? How many overseas trips has the professor made recently?"

Australian Breastfeeding Association spokeswoman Karen Commisso said the idea was crazy.

"What a bizarre suggestion -- so now we have to pay to have children?"

The plan won praise from high-profile doctor Garry Egger, best known as the mastermind behind the GutBusters weight-loss program.

Responding to the plan in the Medical Journal of Australia, Dr Egger wrote: "I agree with Walters".

"One must wonder why population control, which was such a popular topic during the 1970s, is spoken of today only in whispers," wrote Dr Egger, director of the Centre for Health Promotion and Research in Sydney.

Assoc Prof Walters said each child born needed to be offset by planting 4ha of trees, allowing for time taken to reach maturity and loss through bushfires and other events.

Problem is, many people tend to get very irrational when it comes to reproduction (as is evident with some of the negative responses).