Attacks on the carbon tax are both easy and counterintuitive.
The federal price on carbon, implemented in 2019, is still relatively new. After a period of unusually high inflation, Canadians are newly sensitive to the price of goods and necessities. And the carbon tax, by design, increases each year (on April 1, in fact).
Meanwhile, the benefits that derive from putting a price on carbon, and the greater economic and environmental harm that might result from lacking such a policy, are not immediately tangible — although Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions are falling.
So when Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre encourages his supporters to chant “axe the tax” and “spike the hike,” he’s aiming at an easy target.
But unlike most other taxes, and everything else that could be said to be contributing to the cost of goods, the carbon tax comes with a rebate. In fact — as its proponents like to point out — it’s estimated that most households receive more from the rebate than they pay in added costs created by the tax.
Given that most people — particularly those with lower incomes — are expected to receive more from the rebate than they pay in additional costs, many households might actually end up worse off if the carbon tax is repealed.
For the sake of comparison, consider federal excise taxes on fuel, which long predate the carbon tax. Since 1995, the excise tax has added 10 cents to every litre of gas. The resulting revenue is not rebated directly to households (although some people with a mobility impairment can apply for a partial refund).
But no opposition leaders or premiers are clamouring right now for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government to repeal those excise taxes — perhaps because they generate $5 billion annually for the federal government, $2 billion of which is distributed to provinces to fund municipal infrastructure.
But the political value of carbon tax rebates depends on Canadians being aware that they’re receiving them. A lack of public awareness might explain why the federal government recently changed the name of the payment from the Climate Action Incentive to the Canada Carbon Rebate.
If a rebate falls in a bank account and no one hears it
In January, Abacus Data asked Canadians in provinces where the federal carbon tax is applied whether they had received a payment from the federal government in the past week. Of the 49 per cent who said yes, the vast majority correctly identified it as a rebate connected to the carbon tax. But that still left 51 per cent who said they hadn’t received a rebate.
In fact, the federal government sent carbon rebates to 12 million Canadians in January.
That finding by Abacus might be affected by the fact that, in the case of married and common-law couples, only one person receives the rebate. But the result only gets slightly better for the Liberal government when the question is worded more broadly. In November, a quarter of respondents told the Angus Reid Institute that neither they nor their household had received a rebate in the past year. (Another 12 per cent weren’t sure.)
Even among those who had received a payment, 54 per cent said they paid more in the carbon tax than they received in rebates.
Several factors may be undermining the Liberal government’s communication efforts. While energy suppliers specify the federal carbon charge on the bills they send to customers, banks are not obliged to clearly label the rebates when deposits are made to Canadians’ accounts.
But when David Coletto at Abacus released his findings in January, he suggested another possible explanation — the restrictions on government advertising the Liberals implemented in 2016.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper attends a press conference on the Economic Action Plan in Mississauga, Ont., on Dec. 2, 2010. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press)
From 2009 to 2015, the previous Conservative government spent tens of millions of dollars promoting what it called “Canada’s Economic Action Plan” — a slogan used at first to promote the government’s belated response to the Great Recession and then applied to a broad swath of Conservative policy. The opposition parties howled at the use of public funds to promote the sitting government.
When the Liberals came to office they not only slashed spending on advertising, they also created new rules and oversight to limit how government advertising could be used. Ads produced by the federal government are now required to be “objective, factual and explanatory” and cannot be “self-congratulatory or self-praising in nature.”
Is this a failure to communicate?
If you want to know how persnickety the non-partisan reviewers of ads can be, the changes to ad scripts are posted publicly. In 2019, an ad proposed by the Canada Revenue Agency was flagged because one phrase — “the new Climate Action Incentive is making a cleaner economy more affordable for everyone” — was deemed to be self-congratulatory.
It’s impossible to know exactly what the Liberals might have done in the absence of those rules. It’s possible that the carbon tax and rebate would now enjoy better support (or at least broader awareness) if it had been promoted like the Economic Action Plan.
But if it was a gross abuse of public funds when the Conservatives did it, it would be a gross abuse of public funds now. (Coletto was not specifically recommending that kind of massive advertising campaign.)
Perhaps there’s some acceptable middle ground between the relatively restrained advertising of recent years and how government advertising budgets were used in the past. But the Liberal government’s struggles to defend the carbon tax might simply indicate new challenges all governments face in communicating with voters — another idea Coletto has written about in recent months.
Convincing voters to accept a new tax (even with a rebate) might be an eternal challenge (Brian Mulroney knew this well). The fragmented media environment of 2024 might make it even harder. But if gaps in public awareness suggest the Liberals need to make more of an effort, it doesn’t necessarily follow that such an effort needs to involve government ads.
It’s also fair to ask whether the arguments Trudeau’s government has made have been good enough.
WATCH: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau defends carbon tax in Alberta
Trudeau defends carbon tax policy as premiers call for pause on increase
16 hours ago
Duration 2:31
Speaking in Calgary, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said ‘short-term thinker politicians’ are the ones rallying against the Liberal government’s price on pollution.
“Your question, Rick, is sort of, well, that all makes sense, why are so many people still against it?” Trudeau said to the Calgary Sun’s Rick Bell after laying out the logic behind the federal government’s decision to implement a carbon tax. “Well, that’s a question that we all have to ask.”
Maybe that’s a question for everyone to ask. But it’s most pertinent for Trudeau himself.
In response to an earlier question about the carbon tax, Trudeau said he understood that there’s a lot of “political misinformation and disinformation” about the policy. But if “misinformation” is polluting the debate, that only increases the burden on Liberals, as the authors of the policy, to cut through it.
Voters may ultimately decide they don’t want the carbon tax. If that happens, the first question to be asked will be whether Trudeau and his government did enough to sell it.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
