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Economy

Business Council of Canada warns Trudeau’s oil and gas emissions cap could cripple economy

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Business Council of Canada’s Michael Gullo

From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

‘Canada’s GDP outlook for this year will be a dismal 0.6 % and Canada is poised to be the worst-performing advanced economy from 2020 to 2030 and from 2030 to 2060,’ said the Business Council of Canada’s Michael Gullo.

The Business Council of Canada has warned that the Trudeau government’s proposed oil and gas emissions cap could cripple the economy. 

On February 5, the Business Council of Canada wrote an open letter to Assistant Deputy Minister Environmental Protection Branch John Moffet to voice concerns over the Liberal government’s proposed regulations on oil and gas.  

“Imposing an emissions cap will likely force operators to involuntarily curtail their production.  This would effectively reduce the overall capacity of the most productive segment of Canada’s economy at a time when investment and growth is desperately needed,” Michael Gullo, the council’s vice-president of policy, wrote.  

Furthermore, Gullo warned that the emissions cap could “exacerbate the country’s inflation and affordability problems by applying a broad-based economic shock that will reduce tax revenues and add pressure to the federal deficit.” 

“Canada’s GDP outlook for this year will be a dismal 0.6 % and Canada is poised to be the worst-performing advanced economy from 2020 to 2030 and from 2030 to 2060,” he added.  

“Our energy sector is a stalwart of the country’s economy,” Gullo explained. “It accounts for more than 10 per cent of Canada’s GDP, drives our trading relationship with the United States, and props up real wages and household and retirement incomes.” 

Gullo’s warning comes in response to the Liberal government’s Regulatory Framework to Cap Oil and Gas Sector Greenhouse Gas Emissions. The draft regulations, published in December, aim to severely limit the gas and oil emissions by 2030 to make a net-zero goal by 2050 possible.  

The regulations seek to set emission caps for all provinces, which Gullo pointed out could interfere with current emission policies, potentially leading to lawsuits. Gullo also explained that the policy’s proposed timeline is “unrealistic.”  

He argued the new regulations could undermine carbon pricing mechanisms and endanger the competitiveness of the oil and gas industry within Canada.  

The Business Council of Canada’s warning comes on the heels of Alberta announcing that it would not be enforcing the proposed regulations.  

“Albertans will not accept this cap or the attack on its constitutional jurisdiction, economy, and citizens that the cap represents,” Alberta (Environment Minister Rebecca Schulz) wrote.  

Alberta pointed out that the proposed regulations are unconstitutional, unrealistic, would prove detrimental to Canada’s economy, and would not necessarily reduce emissions worldwide.  

However, the Liberal government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, seems intent on pushing emission regulations regardless of their effects on Canadians.  

Currently, the Trudeau government is trying to force net-zero regulations on all Canadian provinces, notably on electricity generation, as early as 2035. His government has also refused to extend a carbon tax exemption on heating fuels to all provinces, allowing only Atlantic provinces this benefit. 

Trudeau’s current environmental goals are in lockstep with the United Nations’ “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” and include phasing out coal-fired power plants, reducing fertilizer usage, and curbing natural gas use over the coming decades. 

The reduction and eventual elimination of the use of so-called “fossil fuels” and a transition to unreliable “green” energy has also been pushed by the World Economic Forum (WEF) – the globalist group behind the socialist “Great Reset” agenda – an organization in which Trudeau and some of his cabinet are involved. 

In November, after announcing she had “enough” of Trudeau’s extreme environmental rules, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said her province has no choice but to assert control over its electricity grid to combat federal overreach by enacting its Sovereignty Act. The Sovereignty Act serves to shield Albertans from future power blackouts due to the federal government’s decisions.  

Unlike most provinces in Canada, Alberta’s electricity industry is nearly fully deregulated. However, the government still could take control of it at a moment’s notice. 

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Premiers fight to lower gas taxes as Trudeau hikes pump costs

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From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Jay Goldberg 

Thirty-nine hundred dollars – that’s how much the typical two-car Ontario family is spending on gas taxes at the pump this year.

You read that right. That’s not the overall fuel bill. That’s just taxes.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau keeps increasing your gas bill, while Premier Doug Ford is lowering it.

Ford’s latest gas tax cut extension is music to taxpayers’ ears. Ford’s 6.4 cent per litre gas tax cut, temporarily introduced in July 2022, is here to stay until at least next June.

Because of the cut, a two-car family has saved more than $1,000 so far. And that’s welcome news for Ontario taxpayers, because Trudeau is planning yet another carbon tax hike next April.

Trudeau has raised the overall tax burden at the pumps every April for the past five years. Next spring, he plans to raise gas taxes by another three cents per litre, bringing the overall gas tax burden for Ontarians to almost 60 cents per litre.

While Trudeau keeps hiking costs for taxpayers at the pumps, premiers of all stripes have been stepping up to the plate to blunt the impact of his punitive carbon tax.

Obviously, Ford has stepped up to the plate and has lowered gas taxes. But he’s not alone.

In Manitoba, NDP Premier Wab Kinew fully suspended the province’s 14 cent per litre gas tax for a year. And in Newfoundland, Liberal Premier Andrew Furey cut the gas tax by 8.05 cents per litre for nearly two-and-a-half years.

It’s a tale of two approaches: the Trudeau government keeps making life more expensive at the pumps, while premiers of all stripes are fighting to get costs down.

Families still have to get to work, get the kids to school and make it to hockey practice. And they can’t afford increasingly high gas taxes. Common sense premiers seem to get it, while Ottawa has its head in the clouds.

When Ford announced his gas tax cut extension, he took aim at the Liberal carbon tax mandated by the Trudeau government in Ottawa.

Ford noted the carbon tax is set to rise to 20.9 cents per litre next April, “bumping up the cost of everything once again and it’s absolutely ridiculous.”

“Our government will always fight against it,” Ford said.

But there’s some good news for taxpayers: reprieve may be on the horizon.

Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s promises to axe the carbon tax as soon as he takes office.

With a federal election scheduled for next fall, the federal carbon tax’s days may very well be numbered.

Scrapping the carbon tax would make a huge difference in the lives of everyday Canadians.

Right now, the carbon tax costs 17.6 cents per litre. For a family filling up two cars once a week, that’s nearly $24 a week in carbon taxes at the pump.

Scrapping the carbon tax could save families more than $1,200 a year at the pumps. Plus, there would be savings on the cost of home heating, food, and virtually everything else.

While the Trudeau government likes to argue that the carbon tax rebates make up for all these additional costs, the Parliamentary Budget Officer says it’s not so.

The PBO has shown that the typical Ontario family will lose nearly $400 this year due to the carbon tax, even after the rebates.

That’s why premiers like Ford, Kinew and Furey have stepped up to the plate.

Canadians pay far too much at the pumps in taxes. While Trudeau hikes the carbon tax year after year, provincial leaders like Ford are keeping costs down and delivering meaningful relief for struggling families.

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Bank of Canada admits ‘significant’ number of citizens would resist digital dollar

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

A significant number’ of Canadians are suspicious of government overreach and would resist any measures by the government or central bank to create digital forms of official money.

A Bank of Canada study has found that Canadians are very wary of a government-backed digital currency, concluding that “significant number” of citizens would resist the implementation of such a system.

The study, conducted by the Bank of Canada, found that a “significant number” of Canadians are suspicious of government overreach, and would resist any measures by the government or central bank to create digital forms of official money.  

According to results from the BOC’s report titled The Consumer Value Proposition For A Hypothetical Digital Canadian Dollar, “cash remains an important method of payment” for Canadians and “[c]ertain groups may strongly resist a digital dollar if they conflate its launch with the end of cash issuance.” 

The BOC noted that not only would a “significant number” of Canadians “reject” digital money, but that for some “mindset segments, their lack of interest in a hypothetical digital Canadian dollar was heavily influenced by perceptions of government overreach.” 

As reported by LifeSiteNews in September, the BOC has already said that plans to create a digital “dollar,” also known as a central bank digital currency (CBDC), have been shelved. 

The shelving came after the BOC had already forged ahead and filed a trademark for a digital currency, as LifeSiteNews previously reported. 

Officials from Canada’s central bank said that a digital currency, or electronic “loonie,” will no longer be considered after years of investigating bringing one to market.  

However, that does not mean the BOC is still not researching or exploring other options when it comes to digital money. As noted by researchers, despite there being some “interest” in a “hypothetical digital Canadian dollar,” that “interest does not necessarily translate to adoption.” 

“Most participants felt well served by current means of payment,” noted the study, adding, “Individuals who support the issuance of a hypothetical digital Canadian dollar did not imagine themselves using it regularly.” 

“They were skeptical of the need for this new form of money and of its reliability,” read the report, which also noted, “They did not trust that concepts were secure or that their personal information would be kept private.” 

Given the results from the report, the bank concluded that “[b]road early adoption” of a digital dollar “is unlikely given that available payment methods meet the needs of most users.” 

“Financially vulnerable segments often have the most to gain from this payment method but are most resistant to adoption. Important considerations for appeal and adoption potential include universal merchant acceptance, low costs, easy access, simplified online payments, shared payment features, budgeting tools and customizable security and privacy settings,” it noted.  

Digital currencies have been touted as the future by some government officials, but, as LifeSiteNews has reported before, many experts warn that such technology would restrict freedom and could be used as a “control tool” against citizens, similar to China’s pervasive social credit system.  

Most Canadians do not want a digital dollar, as previously reported by LifeSiteNews. A public survey launched by the BOC to gauge Canadians’ taste for a digital dollar revealed that an overwhelming majority of citizens want to “leave cash alone” and not proceed with a digital iteration of the national currency.  

The BOC last August admitted that the creation of a CBDC is not even necessary, as many people rely on cash to pay for things. The bank concluded that the introduction of a digital currency would only be feasible if consumers demanded its release.  

In August, LifeSiteNews also reported that the Conservative Party is looking to gather support for a bill that would outright ban the federal government from ever creating a digital currency and make it so that cash is kept as the preferred means of settling debts.    

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre promised that if he is elected prime minister, he would stop any  implementation of a “digital currency” or a compulsory “digital ID” system.  

Prominent opponents of CBDCs have been strongly advocating that citizens use cash whenever possible and boycott businesses that do not accept cash payments as a means of slowing down the imposition of CBDCs.  

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