Commentary
Federal governments like scheduling tax increases for April 1 for a couple of reasons. Canadians are typically in good spirits as the end of winter is in sight and folks who qualified for tax refunds are feeling flush. The government also likes to give themselves raises at the beginning of April with the hope taxpayers won’t take notice. This year, the
prime minister enjoyed a $10,200 raise while backbench MPs garnered an extra $5,100. Nice work if you can get it.
Things have changed, though. Cost-of-living increases have put citizens under a great deal of stress as the price of nearly everything is rising. People are sensitive to tax increases, and when Canada’s carbon tax did its annual rise on April 1, citizens started asking questions after Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) Yves Giroux
released a report indicating the carbon tax will cost families hundreds of dollars per year despite the rebate program.
The Liberal government has long claimed most families will see a net financial benefit from carbon taxes. In 2018, Ontarians were told an average family of four would pay an extra $564 by 2022 due to carbon taxes, but would
receive a rebate of $718 making it a net benefit of $217 per year. Now it is reported the average Ontario family will take a net annual loss of $478 per year. In Alberta, that loss rises to $710.
The federal government has been disingenuous with the carbon tax almost since its inception. In June 2019, Trudeau’s then-environment minister,
Catherine McKenna claimed of carbon taxes: “The plan is not to increase the price post-2022.” That message changed after the 2019 election, and the carbon tax is expected to continue increasing.
The selling point from the beginning with the carbon tax was that it would compel Canadians to reduce emissions and it would be revenue neutral. Neither of these claims has proven to be true so far.
In response to the PBO report, Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault was forced to admit that the carbon tax would cost most Canadians more than they get back from the rebate program.
Guilbeault went beyond just admitting what the costs would be though when he said during a CTV interview: “If you do the average, yeah, it’s true, it’s going to cost more money to people, but the people who are paying are the richest among us, which is exactly how the system was designed,”
Exactly how the system was designed?
Was the system designed to reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses or was it designed as a wealth redistribution scheme?
Guilbeault went further in saying: “When you look at the details, the better off Canadians, richer Canadians, in the jurisdictions where the federal pricing system is being applied, will pay thousands of dollars more in carbon pricing.”
So the tax is acceptable because “richer” Canadians will pay thousands more than others?
Guilbeault is playing the politics of envy in trying to deflect from the reality the carbon tax is hitting the bottom line for most Canadians. The “rich” who will be paying thousands per year make up a tiny percentage of Canadians. The middle class makes up the majority of Canadians and will cumulatively be paying out a massive amount due to the rising carbon taxes.
What Canadians would like to see is an indication the carbon tax has reduced emissions as it was supposedly created to do. While
emissions did drop in 2020, that can be attributed to pandemic lockdowns. Emissions have been rising again since.
B.C. imposed Canada’s first carbon tax back in 2008.
By 2020, it was well established the tax had little to no impact on emissions in the province. Nobody can pretend we haven’t seen domestic examples of a carbon tax in action.
Carbon taxes are a tax on everything. Every product we buy and every service we use are impacted by the cost of energy. A carbon tax could be effective if we could avoid using energy products. We can’t escape using energy and as a winter nation, we pay a lot for it.
If the Liberal government intends to battle inequity through wealth redistribution, it should be honest about it. Changing the income tax structure would be a more effective and transparent way to pursue that goal. I’m not saying the government should do so, by the way, I’m just saying it would be more sincere.
Canadians are struggling to pay their bills on every front from housing, to utilities, to food. The cost of all those items would immediately come down if the government repealed the carbon tax. Does the government care about the cost of living for common citizens or not?
If the government won’t drop the tax, perhaps they should rename it and start calling it the wealth redistribution tax that it is.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
