Economy
Feds ‘net-zero’ agenda is an anti-growth agenda
From the MacDonald Laurier Institute
By Chris Sankey
Canada’s goal should not be to eliminate fossil fuels, but to carry out a steady and manageable reduction of emissions
The federal government is pushing an aggressive emissions reduction strategy that could devastate the Canadian economy and threaten our way of life. This isn’t just about the oil & gas industry. Port-related industries, transportation, infrastructure, health and education, and countless other sectors will be collateral damage. As will the standard of living of everyday Canadians.
One need only peek behind the curtain to understand the current course of federal policy.
Ottawa’s anti-fossil fuels agenda appears to be rooted in the ideas of two ideologically driven behind-the-scenes entities: Senators for Climate Solutions (SFCS) and Clean Energy Canada (CEC).
A group of 44 Canadian Senators, led by Sens. Mary Coyle and Stan Kutcher (both of Nova Scotia), launched SFCS in the fall of 2022. The Senators also recruited a team of interns from GreenPAC, a Toronto-based environmental lobby group, to help get SFCS up and running. GreenPAC Executive Director Sarah Van Exan told blog The Energy Mix at the time that the group had recently assigned its first-ever Senate intern to the office of Sen. Coyle.
“We saw the chance to lend critical capacity—with communication, coordination, and policy research—to help them get established,” Van Exan told The Energy Mix in an email. “The group’s cross-partisan aim and determination to put a climate lens on legislation, advance climate solutions, and hold the government’s feet to the fire is exciting.”
This team of ‘climate-minded’ Senators draws lightly on expertise from Western Canada, let alone calling on experienced energy experts from Alberta. Of the dozen experts listed on the SFCS website, just two – University of Calgary Geosciences professor Sara Hastings-Simon and Vancouver Island farmer Andrew Rushmere – are based in Western Canada.
12 years earlier, Clean Energy Canada was established as a subsidiary of the Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University (SFU) in Burnaby, BC. The group is the brainchild of Merran Smith, a figure The Province once described as “the spawn of the tendrilous and pervasive eco-activist group Tides Canada and [SFU].” Smith first came to prominence in the early 2000s while campaigning to protect coastal BC’s Great Bear Rainforest, rubbing elbows with the likes of Tzeporah Berman (an anti-pipeline acticist so extreme she was booted from the Alberta NDP’s Oil Sands Advisory Group). Other members of the team include BC Green Party alum Evan Pivnick and Electric Vehicle (EV) evangelist Meena Bibra. According to its own website, CEC’s mission is to “accelerate the transition to a renewably powered economy” via “inform[ing] policy leadership.”
Are these the sorts of people the Trudeau Government should be listening to on climate matters?
Let me give you a few stats and you be the judge. I recently had a chance to listen to Adam Waterous, the CEO of the Waterous Energy Fund and former Global Head of Investment Banking at Scotia Waterous. He is, I may add, an incredibly intelligent businessman who lives and breathes energy.
Adam shared some surprising facts about EVs. For instance, he mentioned that it takes five times the amount of oil to build an EV than it does to build a conventional gas-powered vehicle. In order offset this difference, a person must drive an EV 120,000 kms using the electrical grid. Meaning, every time we build an EV demand for oil goes up, not down. Further, an EV battery does not last the lifetime of the vehicle itself, crapping out in as little as 8 years. This expands the EV’s carbon footprint even further as producing a single EV-grade battery emits over seven tonnes of C02e emissions. All told, an EV has roughly double the production footprint of a conventional vehicle.
Still convinced we are saving the planet?
The BC provincial government is forging ahead with a set of policies that its own modelling shows will make BC’s economy $28 billion smaller in 2030 than it would be absent these policies. (To put this number into context, this is roughly what the province spends on health care each year). This will set prosperity back more than a decade. This remarkable finding emerges from looking beyond the government’s glossy reports to the raw modelling results of the estimated economic impact of CleanBC policies that are studiously ignored in its public communication materials.
Similarly, Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) estimates the cost of achieving a net zero electricity grid by 2050 to be nearly $200 billion, while the AESO Net-Zero Emissions Pathways report estimates that accelerating this timeline to 2035 could add an extra $45 to $52 billion. (That is without factoring in the costs of co-generation or the full distribution system and integration costs). Moving to net zero by 2050 will also eliminate 10,000 direct jobs in the oil and gas sector and an estimated 2.7 million jobs in total.
All provinces, and every Canadian household, will be impacted by the federal emissions reduction strategy. However, no province will be impacted more than Alberta. The currently federal modelling used to develop the clean electricity regulations (CER) does not properly represent Alberta’s Electricity Market and thus is unable to adequately forecast the economics of energy production. Canada’s proposed emissions intensity limit effectively requires natural gas backed power plants to sequester an annual average of 95% of all associated emissions through CCUS or other technologies (CCUS) or other technologies. As of writing, no natural gas generation with CCUS modifications has ever hit this mark.
The CERs create significant investment risk for (CCUS) projects as the physical standard for the technology is unproven. Adding insult to injury, the federal government is proposing a 20-year end-of-life for natural gas facilities built prior to January 2025. This will result in some of the cleanest gas plants in the world being shut down decades before they run their useful life; all while Asia continues to burn coal at a record pace.
Canada is about to enter a world of self-inflicted economic pain at precisely the time that Indigenous communities are finally starting harness their resource wealth. We finally made it to the corporate table where we have a seat, a say and ownership – and now the federal government wants to take it all away. How is that for bad timing?
Without reliable and affordable energy, Canadians will be left choosing between shelter, food and keeping the lights on. I don’t know about you, but I will not follow those politicians and organizations driving our climate policies to extremes, into ankle deep water, but I will listen to and follow serious people like Adam Waterous.
The goal for Canada should not be to eliminate fossil fuels. The goal needs to be a steady and manageable reduction of emissions. We must get our ethical and clean energy out to the world. Our economic future depends on it.
Chris Sankey is a former elected Councilor for Lax Kw’alaams Band, businessman and Senior Fellow for the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.
This article supplied by Troy Media.
Cutting the food tax is one clear way to ease the cost-of-living crisis for Canadians
About a year ago, Canada experimented with something rare in federal policymaking: a temporary GST holiday on prepared foods.
It was short-lived and poorly communicated, yet Canadians noticed it immediately. One of the most unavoidable expenses in daily life—food—became marginally less costly.
Families felt a modest but genuine reprieve. Restaurants saw a bump in customer traffic. For a brief moment, Canadians experienced what it feels like when government steps back from taxing something as basic as eating.
Then the tax returned with opportunistic pricing, restoring a policy that quietly but reliably makes the cost of living more expensive for everyone.
In many ways, the temporary GST cut was worse than doing nothing. It opened the door for industry to adjust prices upward while consumers were distracted by the tax relief. That dynamic helped push our food inflation rate from minus 0.6 per cent in January to almost four per cent later in the year. By tinkering with taxes rather than addressing the structural flaws in the system, policymakers unintentionally fuelled volatility. Instead of experimenting with temporary fixes, it is time to confront the obvious: Canada should stop taxing food altogether.
Start with grocery stores. Many Canadians believe food is not taxed at retail, but that assumption is wrong. While “basic groceries” are zero-rated, a vast range of everyday food products are taxed, and Canadians now pay over a billion dollars a year in GST/HST on food purchased in grocery stores.
That amount is rising steadily, not because Canadians are buying more treats, but because shrinkflation is quietly pulling more products into taxable categories. A box of granola bars with six bars is tax-exempt, but when manufacturers quietly reduce the box to five bars, it becomes taxable. The product hasn’t changed. The nutritional profile hasn’t changed. Only the packaging has changed, yet the tax flips on.
This pattern now permeates the grocery aisle. A 650-gram bag of chips shrinks to 580 grams and becomes taxable. Muffins once sold in six-packs are reformatted into three-packs or individually wrapped portions, instantly becoming taxable single-serve items. Yogurt, traditionally sold in large tax-exempt tubs, increasingly appears in smaller 100-gram units that meet the definition of taxable snacks. Crackers, cookies, trail mixes and cereals have all seen slight weight reductions that push them past GST thresholds created decades ago. Inflation raises food prices; Canada’s outdated tax code amplifies those increases.
At the same time, grocery inflation remains elevated. Prices are rising at 3.4 per cent, nearly double the overall inflation rate. At a moment when food costs are climbing faster than almost everything else, continuing to tax food—whether on the shelf or in restaurants—makes even less economic sense.
The inconsistencies extend further. A steak purchased at the grocery store carries no tax, yet a breakfast wrap made from virtually the same inputs is taxed at five per cent GST plus applicable HST. The nutritional function is not different. The economic function is not different. But the tax treatment is entirely arbitrary, rooted in outdated distinctions that no longer reflect how Canadians live or work.
Lower-income households disproportionately bear the cost. They spend 6.2 per cent of their income eating outside the home, compared with 3.4 per cent for the highest-income households. When government taxes prepared food, it effectively imposes a higher burden on those often juggling two or three jobs with limited time to cook.
But this is not only about the poorest households. Every Canadian pays more because the tax embeds itself in the price of convenience, time and the realities of modern living.
And there is an overlooked economic dimension: restaurants are one of the most effective tools we have for stimulating community-level economic activity. When people dine out, they don’t just buy food. They participate in the economy. They support jobs for young and lower-income workers. They activate foot traffic in commercial areas. They drive spending in adjacent sectors such as transportation, retail, entertainment and tourism.
A healthy restaurant sector is a signal of economic confidence; it is often the first place consumers re-engage when they feel financially secure. Taxing prepared food, therefore, is not simply a tax on convenience—it is a tax on economic participation.
Restaurants Canada has been calling for the permanent removal of GST/HST on all food, and they are right. Eliminating the tax would generate $5.4 billion in consumer savings annually, create more than 64,000 foodservice jobs, add over 15,000 jobs in related sectors and support the opening of more than 2,600 new restaurants across the country. No other affordability measure available to the federal government delivers this combination of economic stimulus and direct relief.
And Canadians overwhelmingly agree. Eighty-four per cent believe food should not be taxed, regardless of where it is purchased. In a polarized political climate, a consensus of that magnitude is rare.
Ending the GST/HST on all food will not solve every affordability issue but it is one of the simplest, fairest and most effective measures the federal government can take immediately.
Food is food. The tax system should finally accept that.
Dr. Sylvain Charlebois is a Canadian professor and researcher in food distribution and policy. He is senior director of the Agri-Food Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University and co-host of The Food Professor Podcast. He is frequently cited in the media for his insights on food prices, agricultural trends, and the global food supply chain.
Troy Media empowers Canadian community news outlets by providing independent, insightful analysis and commentary. Our mission is to support local media in helping Canadians stay informed and engaged by delivering reliable content that strengthens community connections and deepens understanding across the country.
The population drops for the first time in years, exposing an economy built on temporary residents, tuition cash, and government debt rather than real productivity
Canadians have been told for years that population decline was unthinkable, that it was an economic death spiral, that only mass immigration could save us. That was the line. Now the numbers are in, and suddenly the people who said that are very quiet.
Statistics Canada reports that between July 1 and October 1, 2025, Canada’s population fell by 76,068 people, a decline of 0.2 percent, bringing the total population to 41,575,585. This is not a rounding error. It is not a model projection. It is an official quarterly population loss, outside the COVID period, confirmed by the federal government’s own data
The reason matters. This did not happen because Canadians suddenly stopped having children or because of a natural disaster. It happened because the number of non‑permanent residents dropped by 176,479 people in a single quarter, the largest quarterly decline since comparable records began in 1971. Permit expirations outpaced new permits by more than two to one. Outflows totaled 339,505, while inflows were just 163,026
That is the so‑called growth engine shutting down.
Permanent immigration continued at roughly the same pace as before. Canada admitted 102,867 permanent immigrants in the quarter, consistent with recent levels. Births minus deaths added another 17,600 people. None of that was enough to offset the collapse in temporary residency. Net international migration overall was negative, at minus 93,668
And here’s the part you’re not supposed to say out loud. For the Liberal‑NDP government, this is bad news. Their entire economic story has rested on population‑driven GDP growth, not productivity. Add more people, claim the economy is growing, borrow more money, and run the national credit card a little harder. When population growth reverses, that illusion collapses. GDP per capita does not magically improve. Housing shortages do not disappear. The math just stops working.
The regional numbers make that clear. Ontario’s population fell by 0.4 percent in the quarter. British Columbia fell by 0.3 percent. Every province and territory lost population except Alberta and Nunavut, and even Alberta’s growth was just 0.2 percent, its weakest since the border‑closure period of 2021
Now watch who starts complaining first. Universities are already bracing for it. Study permit holders alone fell by 73,682 people in three months, with Ontario losing 47,511 and British Columbia losing 14,291. These are the provinces with the largest university systems and the highest dependence on international tuition revenue
You’re going to hear administrators and activists say this is a crisis. What they mean is that fewer students are paying international tuition to subsidize bloated campuses and programs that produce no measurable economic value. When the pool of non‑permanent residents shrinks, departments that exist purely because enrollment was artificially inflated start to disappear. That’s not mysterious. That’s arithmetic.
For years, Canadians were told that any slowdown in population growth was dangerous. The truth is more uncomfortable. What’s dangerous is building a national economic model on temporary residents, borrowed money, and headline GDP numbers while productivity stagnates. The latest StatsCan release doesn’t just show a population decline. It shows how fragile the story really was, and how quickly it unravels when the numbers stop being padded.
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