By Ray Rivers
November 8th, 2018
BURLINGTON, ON
The Gazette sent columnist Ray Rivers out on a news assignment to cover a subject dear to his heart – climate change. He did Ok.
Ontario fired the first shot. Doug Ford was clear that as soon as he became premier of all the people, all of Ontario’s climate change programs would be history. He’s not a climate change denier, though he has yet to develop an alternate plan. And killing Ontario’s cap and trade carbon pricing regime put the province in the gun sights of the federal government and its promise/threat to implement a carbon tax-and-rebate program if the provinces didn’t have one of their own by 2019.
Ford also drew first, announcing on day one that he would be taking the feds to court. They were not going to levy any kind of carbon tax-and-rebate on all his people if he could help it.
But Ford’s not the only lawman in town. So come the new year Mr. Trudeau will be implementing a carbon tax of $20 a ton on Ontario residents. That works out to a mind-boggling nickel a litre at the pumps and 3 cents or so for your gas furnace.
And we’ll all be getting something like $300 per family back through the income tax system. The idea is to gradually seduce folks into reducing their carbon footprint. Drive less, lower your thermostat or switch to Ontario’s still mostly fossil-free electricity for heating and driving, and wham bang – that $300 is mostly pure profit. That is unless Mr. Ford and his family compact of Tory premiers and federal Conservative leader Scheer can stop the feds in the courts.
But that’s not the only story. The feds have this $1.4 billion Low Carbon Leadership Fund, $400 million or so which was destined for Ontario’s government. But since Ford has cancelled everything which might qualify he’s not getting a penny. Instead the money will be given directly to various institutions in Ontario; hospitals, universities and school boards; which lost out when the Ontario Climate Change fund was burned to the ground.
Minister McKinnon setting out what the federal government is going to do when it comes to climate change at a presentation in Milton.
Federal Minster of Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna came to Rockwool’s insulation manufacturing operation in Milton to announce her department’s intent on this matter. There were almost no details so it was much of a nothing announcement otherwise – announcing an intent to do something.
This was likely only meant as a shot across the bow of the good ship Ford anyway, to show them what they are missing out on by not playing nice. Ford’s finance and accounting office has already determined that killing cap and trade will cost all of his people some $3 billion. So what is another $400 million for a government which claims to be facing a $15 billion deficit?
The minister didn’t offer any hope of grants to individuals though. Something, for example, like the axed GreenON program or the formerly hugely popular electric vehicle grant (EV) program is not in the cards apparently. But who knows? She might be back with a promise to waive the HST on EVs, as we get closer to an election.
The minister said it plain: the environment should not be a partisan issue. But Mr. Ford and his fellow conservative leaders in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba and now New Brunswick are making it that. And Mr. Ford is now their ringleader, thumbing his nose and giving the middle finger to our Mr. Trudeau. And then there is this lawsuit thing. Does anyone seriously expect the feds to give a grant to someone who is suing them?
Federal Minster of Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna
Minister McKenna made clear that Ottawa will step in if a province is shedding its responsibility to all of its people. It’s called law and order and good government. Climate change is a very serious and dangerous global matter.
It is also a national priority since our federal government and nine provinces agreed to sign onto an international agreement only a few years ago. Mr. Ford and his like-minded fellows opposing carbon taxes may not have been at the table then, but that won’t erase the consent given by the federation to action on climate change.
We are still only seeing the early effects of global warming on this planet and Canada. As the consequences become more severe, it will be harder to pretend that ‘we’re all right jack’. Mr. Ford may think it’s good politics to hit-out at the Liberal government because it’s Liberal.
But as he’s finding out, the Federation can and will strike back.
Ray Rivers is a Gazette columnist who normally cover Queen’s Park and some federal issues related to the environment
Ray ….I wish you could be less partisan on this. Your comment…..
….”The minister said it plain: the environment should not be a partisan issue. But Mr. Ford and his fellow conservative leaders in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Manitoba and now New Brunswick are making it that. And Mr. Ford is now their ringleader, thumbing his nose and giving the middle finger to our Mr. Trudeau. And then there is this lawsuit thing. Does anyone seriously expect the feds to give a grant to someone who is suing them?”….
You are conveniently forgetting that your buddies in Ottawa let BC get away with this and signed a multi-billion dollar infrastructure deal while BC was going to the courts on the pipeline. This all resulted in the feds overpaying for an existing pipeline by probably a billion dollars and now saying they will build the twin pipeline whatever it costs.
Let’s just acknowledge they have very poor judgement when it comes to economics and business because they favour telling us all, and other governments, how people should live and be treated and pushing these agendas. (i.e. we got no economic value from the USMCA for what we gave up and probably could have, had they focused there instead on human rights issues which pissed off the U.S.).
So who is being partisan with their intentions …..the answer is that they all are …they are politicians. If the Trudeau government truly wanted to not be partisan, they would convene all the premiers into a meeting and come up with a new plan everyone would support now. But of course they are not …why …because as always, they know better than the rest of us and are trying to win a 2nd term by saying they are the climate change champions ….what a load of B.S. If this tax goes ahead, you watch what happens to the funds it generates when Canada’s credit rating gets dropped due to the deficits/debt they are piling up and the bad business climate they have created.
Brian -thanks for your comments – I would point to a Globe and Mail report which stated that…
“B.C.’s tax, implemented in 2008, covers most types of fuel use and carbon emissions. It started out low ($10 per tonne of carbon dioxide), then rose gradually to the current $30 per tonne, which works out to about 7 cents per litre of gas. “Revenue-neutral” by law, the policy requires equivalent cuts to other taxes. In practice, the province has cut $760-million more in income and other taxes than needed to offset carbon tax revenue.
The result is that taxpayers are coming out ahead. B.C. now has the lowest personal income tax rate in Canada (with additional cuts benefiting low-income and rural residents) and one of the lowest corporate rates in North America. You shouldn’t need an economist and a mining entrepreneur to tell you that’s good for business and jobs.”
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/the-insidious-truth-about-bcs-carbon-tax-it-works/article19512237/
Ray,
– Re: the Globe’s “The result is that taxpayers are coming out ahead. B.C. now has the lowest personal income tax rate in Canada…” – perhaps it would be prudent to wait and see if those low rates are sustainable in the long run.
– Commuters, whose demand for transportation fuel is the most inelastic in the short term, would appear to be penalized the most.
– Lower corporate tax rates don’t necessarily create jobs; mainly they increase corporate profits and CEO bonuses.
– Refunding/transferring the gasoline tax via income tax takes money out of circulation for the length of the tax-refund cycle and improves the government’s short term cash holdings.
– The majority of contributors to this thread appear to disagree with a carbon tax and I do too.
Ray, you may have missed what’s been happening in BC over the last 2 years. The new coalition between the NDP and the Green Party has eliminated the Revenue Neutral by law provision, meaning this is now strictly a general revenue tax. They are not giving money back to taxpayers anymore, they are using dubious projects like upgrading fans at schools that already run on carbon free hydroelectric power and using those project values and others like Film Grants to declare that they are Revenue Neutral.
This is the problem with Tax Creep. You give the government permission to take a little, then they end up taking a lot, and changing the rules so they can take forever.
BCs emmissions have probably only really gone down due to the death of Forestry, Mining, and Cement in that province anyway. Those are down globally, not due to BC’s carbon pricing.
Pure nonsense about the Carbon Tax. At the levels of 20-50 dollars per Tonne that Trudeau is suggesting, the models say the tax will do absolutely nothing to improve the environment. The number that the UN Suggested in their own report is closer to $5500 dollars per Tonne for it to have any meaningful effect. Even then, countries would have to band together to put duties on to other countries that don’t have a carbon tax. Now, I don’t know if you’re aware, but we live in Canada. It’s cold here. We need to heat our homes for most of the year. If you’re comfortable paying a thousand or so dollars in carbon tax every month and choking our entire economy, then that’s fine. I’m not. Otherwise this is just another tax that will make it’s way into General Revenue (just like it did in British Columbia) and have no effect on the environment, but a huge effect on what it costs to live.
Even crusty old Preston Manning, (extreme right wing guy) has suggested that pricing carbon is a good idea, so why are the CON’s so dead set against it? The opposition to carbon pricing is not based on science, or good policy, just them trying to get any advantage so we can return to the 1950’s. Where is the plan Doug? Oh yah, you don’t have one.
Pricing BTUs makes more sense than pricing carbon.
Fred, couple of points:
– I met Preston Manning and was a member of the Reform Party, mainly as I wanted property rights restored. I found he was a very thoughtful and considerate person. Not very right wing in the aspect as to how most people position it. His focus was more on economic responsibility and government efficiency / effectiveness in its spending and having better control of governments by the citizens they are supposed to serve.
– Having a carbon tax is not an environment plan. That is the reason the Liberals in Ottawa and in the provinces cannot sell it. The general population does not see the linkage. You can say it is a piece of the puzzle and I would disagree but if there was a plan, at least people would be able to see all the assumptions and conclusions as to how the various components would contribute to the end goals and then these could be measured and tracked. The current government has none of this and is just being political with the topic by saying this is what is needed and of course, trust them as they know best for us. (The Paris climate accord is no different, yes it has targets for emission reductions, but it is mainly a deal with lots of countries to get billions in subsidies from other countries and be managed by bureaucrats in UN. Canada is contributing over Cdn$300 million annually, the US 10x that and all of this is to grow to a minimum total of US$100 billion annually…..note that China, 2nd largest economy is not a contributor, neither is India.)
When any level of government comes up with a true plan that is properly communicated and therefore can be vetted by everyone, them we will really have something to talk about.
Luke. Trust the force.
Since the $400 million in federal money “will be given directly to various institutions in Ontario; hospitals, universities and school boards….”, it will be a simple matter for Ford to find out how how much was given to each of the recipient institutions and then reduce the amounts that the institutions would have received from Ontario by the same amount.