Canadian Taxpayer Federation calls on Ottawa to rescind recent Carbon Tax hike

From the Canadian Taxpayer Federation

Ottawa’s carbon tax hike out of step with global reality

by Aaron Wudrick, Federal Director and Franco Terrazzano, Alberta Director

(This column originally appeared in the Financial Post)

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has chosen to make life more expensive by increasing the federal carbon tax by 50 per cent amidst the COVID-19 economic and health crisis. Meanwhile, governments around the world are moving in the opposite direction because hiking taxes during a global pandemic is a bad idea.

Provinces have already tapped the breaks on their own carbon tax hikes. British Columbia Premier John Horgan announced that he would not be going forward with his planned April 1 carbon tax hike. Instead of mirroring the federal carbon tax hike, Newfoundland and Labrador is maintaining its tax at $20 per tonne. The price of carbon allowances in the Quebec-California cap and trade system have also fallen due to COVID-19 and the current macroeconomic realities.

The European Union’s cap and trade scheme, which applies to 30 countries, has also seen its carbon tax rate drop significantly. For most of 2019 and early 2020, EU carbon prices traded around €25 per tonne before nosediving to around €15 per tonne in March. The EU’s cap and trade carbon tax rate has fallen 32 per cent below its 2020 peak, according to the most recent data available on the ICAP Allowance Price Explorer. While the tax rate has increased since bottoming out, S&P Global Platts Analytics forecasts the COVID-19 shock keeping downward pressure on the cap and trade market.

Other counties are providing further carbon tax relief. The Norwegian government reduced its carbon tax rate on natural gas and liquified petroleum gas to zeroand will keep the rates below the pre-coronavirus level until 2024. Norway also deferred payments on various fuel taxes until June 18.

Estonia Finance Minister Martin Helme formally called for his country to consider leaving the EU’s cap and trade carbon tax system to provide relief. The prime minister later announced that Estonia would not seek to leave the EU’s carbon tax system, but the Estonian government lowered the excise tax on electricity to the minimum allowed by the EU and lowered its excise tax on diesel, light and heavy fuel oil, shale oil and natural gas.

“Due to the economic downturn, both people’s incomes and the revenue of companies are declining, but daily household expenses such as electricity or gas bills still need to be paid. To better cope with them, we are reducing excise duty rates on gas and electricity for two years,” Helme explained.

Outside of the EU, the United Kingdom is saving its taxpayers between £15 and £20 million per year by walking back its plan to increase its carbon tax top-up, New Zealand’s cap and trade tax rate has fallen by more than 20 per cent this year and South Africa pushed back carbon tax payments by three months.

It’s worth noting that it’s unlikely Canada’s carbon tax will have any meaningful impact on global emissions. Only 45 countries (out of 195 countries worldwide) are covered by a carbon tax, and only 15.6 per cent of total emissions are covered by these carbon taxes, according to the World Bank. Furthermore, about half of the emissions covered by carbon taxes are priced below US$10/tCO2e – significantly lower than Canada’s federal rate and too low to make a difference.

With Canada only accounting for 1.5 per cent of global emissions, it’s easy to understand Trudeau’s acknowledgement that, “even if Canada stopped everything tomorrow, and the other countries didn’t have any solutions, it wouldn’t make a big difference.”

Now more than ever, Canadian taxpayers need relief. With carbon tax burdens declining around the globe during the COVID-19 crisis, walking back the recent carbon tax hike should be a no-brainer for our federal government.

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Duane Rolheiser

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

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Google Dumps EU’s Anti-“Disinformation” Code, Defying Digital Services Act

Published on January 22, 2025

Todayville

By Didi Rankovic

Does Google’s bold rejection of EU mandates signal a shifting balance of power between tech giants and censors?

It’s as good a time as any to effectively pull out of the EU’s “voluntary anti-disinformation” deal, which social media companies were previously strong-armed into accepting. And Google has now done just that.

The “strengthened” Code of Practice on Disinformation was introduced during the heyday of online censorship and government pressure on social platforms on both sides of the Atlantic – in June 2022, and at one point included 44 signatories.

One of those who in the meanwhile dropped out is X, and this happened shortly after Twitter was acquired by Elon Musk.

Now, as the “voluntary” code is formally becoming part of EU’s censorship law, the Digital Services Act (DSA), Google took the opportunity to notify Brussels it will not comply with the law’s requirement to include fact-checkers’ opinions in the search results, or rely on those to delete or algorithmically rank YouTube content.

Accepting these DSA requirements “simply isn’t appropriate or effective for our services,” Google’s Global Affairs President Kent Walker stated in a letter sent to European Commission’s Deputy Director-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology, Renate Nikolay, reports said.

At the same time, Google is withdrawing from “all fact-checking commitments in the Code” – this refers to the signatories working with “fact-checkers” across EU member-countries. The code also requires tech companies to flag content, label political ads, demonetizing users found to be “spreading disinformation,” etc.

Even though Google’s censorship apparatus does not use third-party “fact-checkers” as it is, the news that the company has decided to defy the EU on this issue is interpreted as yet more proof that social media giants are breaking free from some of the constraints imposed on them by the authorities over the past years.

Meta recently announced that its fact-checking scheme in the US was ending in order to make room for more free speech on Facebook and Instagram, but it remains a signatory of the Code in the EU.

It remains to be seen what decision Meta will make once that agreement becomes part of the DSA – the deadline for which is currently unknown.

If you’re tired of censorship and surveillance, subscribe to Reclaim The Net.

Banks

Four of Canada’s top banks ditch UN-backed ‘net zero’ climate alliance

Published on January 22, 2025

Todayville

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Among the banks that have withdrawn from the UN-backed Net-Zero Banking Alliance are TD Bank, the Bank of Montreal and CIBC.

In a stunning reversal, four of Canada’s top banks have withdrawn themselves from a United Nations “net zero” alliance that supports the eventual elimination of the nation’s oil and gas industry in the name of “climate change.”

Last Friday, Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD), Bank of Montreal (BMO), National Bank of Canada and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) said they were all withdrawing from the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA), which calls for banks to come in line with the push for “Net Zero” emissions by 2050. The NZBA is a subgroup of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), which was founded and backed by the United Nations.

Interestingly, the GFANZ was formed in 2021, while Liberal Party leadership candidate Mark Carney was its co-chair. He resigned from his role in the alliance right before he announced he would run for Liberal leadership to replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last week.

The sudden decision from Canadian banks to ditch the alliance comes despite Trudeau’s government still being committed to so-called “net zero” policies and only a few days before pro-oil and gas U.S. President Donald Trump was sworn into office.

According to a statement from BMO, it is no longer a “member of the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA),” but it is still “committed” to the idea of an eventual “net zero” world.

“We are fully committed to our climate strategy and supporting our clients as their lead partner in the transition to a net-zero world. We have robust internal capabilities to implement relevant international standards, supporting our climate strategy and meeting our regulatory requirements,” it said.

In a statement regarding its exit from the NZBA, TD Bank said that it has the “resources, relationships and capabilities to continue to advance our strategy, deliver for our shareholders and advise our clients as they adapt their businesses and seize new opportunities.”

Large U.S. banks such as Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Wells Fargo and Bank of America have all withdrawn from the group as well.

Since taking office in 2015, the Trudeau government has continued to push a radical environmental agenda like the agendas being pushed by the World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset” and the United Nations’ “Sustainable Development Goals.” Part of this push includes the promotion of so called “Net Zero” energy by as early as 2035 nationwide.