In recent weeks we’ve all opened home heating bills — sticker shock would be an understatement!
On top of food inflation, mortgage rate hikes and rising rents, it’s another hit for Canadians already struggling with affordability.
Those bills could — and should — have been lower. That’s because back in the fall the Conservative caucus motioned in Parliament to exempt home heating from the federal carbon tax.
Conservatives understand that home heating is an essential in Canada — not a luxury. It was a sensible and compassionate proposal to directly and immediately help Canadians.
In fact, the Liberal premier of Newfoundland, as well as the premier of Nova Scotia, also asked for this carbon tax break on home heating because 40 per cent of Atlantic Canadians are already living in energy poverty.
We’re impacted in Ontario, too. Especially home heating in rural Ontario, including parts of Flamborough-Glanbrook, where homes must heat with propane, or home heating oil, because natural gas lines don’t exist. Heating oil costs for a typical home this winter is estimated to rise to an astonishing $6,700 or more.
Unfortunately, the Liberal-NDP coalition voted against our October motion to provide Canadians relief on home-heating fuels. Now we’re seeing the bills.
Energy prices were already rising, but taxes didn’t have to. The Liberals and NDP rejected each of the four ways Conservatives have fought for, over the past four months, to help lower the cost of living for Canadians:
1. Remove the carbon tax from home heating.
2. Cancel the tripling of the carbon tax — which impacts gas, groceries and home heating.
3. Stop all new tax increases (for Jan. 1 and April 1).
4. Take the carbon tax off all food inputs.
The Trudeau government still plans to triple the carbon tax from its current rate. It will go up again April 1. Instead of a technology plan to actually help our environment, the carbon tax is a tax plan.
The money goes to general revenue. By contrast, the Biden administration in the U.S. is investing in clean technology, rather than a carbon tax. That’s what we need here, too — a technology plan.
Conservatives will continue to fight for tax relief for Canadians in 2023. More taxes are the very last thing Canadian families, seniors and individuals can afford right now.