goldstein: even liberals are running away from trudeau’s carbon tax
prime minister justin trudeau’s carbon tax has become s...
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prime minister justin trudeau’s carbon tax has become such a stink bomb to liberal fortunes everywhere that even ontario liberal leader bonnie crombie is now denouncing it. as she put it at a liberal fundraiser on tuesday night, as reported by the toronto star:
“i’m not here to tell the prime minister how to do his job. but i promise you, i will tell him when he’s wrong. like on the carbon tax.”
that was in response to months of ontario premier doug ford and the progressive conservatives labelling her as “the queen of the carbon tax” because, they said, of her previous support for it when she was a liberal mp, plus describing her “as one of the only provincial liberal leaders in canada who won’t speak out against the carbon tax.”
crombie had previously pledged not to introduce a provincial carbon tax if she becomes premier.
while taking her at her word, her problem in terms of credibility is the history of ontario and federal liberals saying one thing and doing another when it comes to carbon taxes.
during the 2014 ontario election that brought her predecessor as ontario liberal leader, kathleen wynne, to power, wynne said nothing about imposing a provincial carbon tax on ontarians.
shortly after her victory, she said she had no plans to introduce a carbon tax
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then she introduced cap-and-trade, another form of a carbon tax.
prior to the 2019 federal election, then liberal environment minister catherine mckenna said the liberals wouldn’t raise their carbon tax beyond $50 per tonne of emissions in 2022.
after the 2019 election, in which the liberals were reduced from a majority to a minority government, trudeau announced he would raise the federal carbon tax every year after 2022 until it reached $170 per tonne of emissions in 2030.
the trudeau liberals have claimed for years that the rebate system under their carbon tax leaves 80% of families paying it with more money in their pockets than they pay in carbon taxes.
independent, non-partisan parliamentary budget officer yves giroux subsequently pointed out that this was true if one considered only the fiscal impact of the carbon tax.
but if you added in its drag on the canadian economy, plus the fact the liberal rebate system doesn’t return revenue generated by their imposition of the gst on top of the carbon tax to canadians, 60% of families ended up with less money in their pockets every year.
trudeau says he introduced his carbon tax as an alternative to less efficient and more expensive ways to reduce emissions such as government regulations and government subsidies.
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but in addition to his carbon tax, trudeau has introduced costly clean fuel, clean electricity and methane regulations, along with a cap on oil and gas emissions, in addition to multi-billion subsidies to the private sector to create a supply chain for electric vehicles in canada.
in reality, there are 149 government programs aimed at reducing emissions to which the trudeau liberals have earmarked more than $200 billion.
finally the trudeau liberals said no political considerations went into the creation of their carbon tax.
but gudie hutchings, trudeau’s minister for rural economic development and the atlantic canada opportunities agency, said last year that if provinces like alberta wanted special deals to defray the costs of carbon pricing as they had just announced for atlantic canada, “perhaps they need to elect more liberals on the prairies so that we can have that conversation, as well.”
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