Finance Canada has calculated costs to modest income & poor households — but the Liberals blacked it out
OTTAWA, ON — The House of Commons will debate and vote on a Conservative motion requiring the government to release data on the cost of the carbon tax to Canadian households. The government has admitted it has the calculations, but blacked them out in response to an access to information request by Conservative Work and Opportunity Critic Pierre Poilievre.
Removing the black ink would allow Canadians to see for themselves if the Prime Minister has kept his signature election promise to lower taxes for the middle class. It also puts to the test the Liberals’ promise to run an open and transparent government.
The motion comes a day after a 68-year-old Ontario man exposed the growing problem of “energy poverty” by giving up his truck and home because he could no longer afford heat and gas.
“Whether or not you agree with carbon taxes, everyone should agree that Canadians have a right to know what it is costing them. Over-taxation is nothing new,” said Poilievre. “But this is the first time in memory a government has covered up the cost of a tax to those paying it. That’s why it’s the ‘carbon tax cover-up.’”
Poilievre’s motion will be debated tomorrow, February 23, 2017. It is expected to be voted on in early March. The text reads:
“That, given:
- the Liberal election platform states that ‘’government and its information should be open by default’’ and ‘’data paid for by Canadians belongs to Canadians’’;
- the Department of Finance has indicated that a federally-mandated carbon tax will cause higher prices to ‘’cascade through the economy in the form of higher prices’’;
- such regressive taxes cause low-income people to bear a larger burden as heat, gas, and groceries form a larger portion of their family budgets; and
- the Department of Finance has produced numerous calculations of the impact of these taxes on low and middle-income families, and their effect on the gap between rich and poor;
an Order of the House do issue for a copy of the Department of Finance’s documents titled “Impact of a carbon price on households’ consumption costs across the income distribution” and ‘’Estimating economic impacts from various mitigation options for greenhouse gas emissions,’’ and any other documents that calculate the cost of carbon taxes on Canadian workers, businesses, and families.”
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