UK leader seeks EU lifeline after surviving confidence vote

BRUSSELS — British Prime Minister Theresa May was seeking a lifeline from European Union leaders Thursday after winning a no-confidence vote among her own Conservative lawmakers — but only after putting a time limit on her leadership.

May won the vote after promising lawmakers at a private meeting that she would quit before Britain’s next national election, scheduled for 2022.

Arriving in Brussels for an EU summit, May said that “in my heart I would love to be able to lead the Conservative Party into the next general election.”

“But I think it is right that the party feels that it would prefer to go into that election with a new leader,” May said. She didn’t specify a date for her departure.

May was meeting Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar and European Council President Donald Tusk Thursday before the summit, where she will seek reassurances about the deal that she can use to win over a skeptical British Parliament, particularly pro-Brexit lawmakers whose loathing of the deal triggered Wednesday’s challenge to her leadership.

May caused an uproar in Parliament this week when she scrapped a planned vote on the deal at the last minute to avoid a heavy defeat. Two days later she won a leadership vote among 317 Conservative lawmakers by 200 votes to 117.

The victory gives May a reprieve — the party can’t challenge her again for a year. But the size of the rebellion underscores the unpopularity of her Brexit plan.

The EU is adamant there can be no substantive changes to the legally-binding withdrawal agreement but have suggested that there could be some “clarifications.”

“The deal itself is non-negotiable,” Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said as he arrived in Brussels. “So today is about clarification.”

Rutte said EU leaders were willing to listen to May, who will address them before a summit dinner on Thursday.

May said her focus “is on ensuring that I can get those assurances that we need to get this deal over the line.”

“I don’t expect an immediate breakthrough, but what I do hope is that we can start work as quickly as possible on the assurances that are necessary,” she said.

U.K. Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay told the BBC that there were signs of “positive” movement from the EU on the most intractable issue — a legal guarantee designed to prevent the re-implementation of physical border controls between Northern Ireland, which is part of the U.K., and the Republic of Ireland, a member of the EU.

The provision, known as the backstop, would keep the U.K. part of the EU customs union if the two sides couldn’t agree on another way to avoid a hard border.

Pro-Brexit lawmakers strongly oppose the backstop, because it keeps Britain bound to EU trade rules, and unable to leave without the bloc’s consent. Pro-EU politicians consider it an unwieldy and inferior alternative to staying in the bloc.

“There is movement, but the question is how do we ensure that that movement is sufficient for colleagues?” Barclay said. “But colleagues also need to focus on the fact that alternative deals also need a backstop.”

Re-opening the negotiations to address the border problem also raises the risk that May could lose concessions on other parts of the deal, Barclay said.

Among EU leaders there is sympathy for May’s predicament — but also exasperation at Britain’s political mess and little appetite to reopen the negotiations. On Thursday, the German parliament has approved a motion stating that the Brexit deal can’t be renegotiated, underlining the stance of the government and EU allies.

The largely symbolic motion states that “there will not be an agreement that is better and fairer for both sides. Any hope that a rejection of the agreement could lead to its renegotiation must prove to be illusory.”

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking down to Britain’s departure from the bloc, which is due to take place on March 29 — deal or no deal. A parliamentary schedule published Thursday shows the Brexit deal won’t be debated or voted on before the House of Commons adjourns for a two-week Christmas break on Dec. 20.

The no-confidence vote has left lawmakers from the governing Conservative Party at loggerheads over the way ahead.

Prominent pro-Brexit legislator Jacob Rees-Mogg said that May should resign even though she won the vote.

He said Britain needed “somebody who can unite the country and the Conservative Party, and she has to ask herself is she realistically that person?”

Foreign Minister Alistair Burt said in a tweet that Conservative Brexiteers would never be satisfied.

“They never, ever stop. … After the apocalypse, all that will be left will be ants and Tory MPs complaining about Europe and their leader,” he wrote.

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Danica Kirka reported from London. Geir Moulson in Berlin and Lorne Cook in Brussels contributed to this story.

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Follow AP’s full coverage of Brexit at: https://www.apnews.com/Brexit

Jill Lawless And Danica Kirka, The Associated Press

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Taxpayers Federation calling on BC Government to scrap failed Carbon Tax

Published on January 16, 2025

Todayville

From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Carson Binda

BC Government promised carbon tax would reduce CO2 by 33%. It has done nothing.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling on the British Columbia government to scrap the carbon tax as new data shows the province’s carbon emissions have continued to rise, despite the oldest carbon tax in the country.

“The carbon tax isn’t reducing carbon emissions like the politicians promised,” said Carson Binda, B.C. Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. “Premier David Eby needs to axe the tax now to save British Columbians money.”

Emissions data from the provincial government shows that British Columbia’s emissions have risen since the introduction of a carbon tax.

Total emissions in 2007, the last year without a provincial carbon tax, stood at 65.5 MtCO2e, while 2022 emissions data shows an increase to 65.6 MtCO2e.

When the carbon tax was introduced, the B.C. government pledged that it would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 33 per cent.

The Eby government plans to increase the B.C. carbon tax again on April 1, 2025. After that increase, the carbon tax will add 21 cents to the cost of a litre of natural gas, 25 cents per litre of diesel and 18 cents per cubic meter of natural gas.

“The carbon tax has cost British Columbians a lot of money, but it hasn’t helped the environment as promised,” Binda said. “Eby has a simple choice: scrap the carbon tax before April 1, or force British Columbians to pay even more to heat our homes and drive to work.”

If a family fills up the minivan once per week for a year, the carbon tax will cost them $728. The carbon tax on natural gas will add $435 to the average family’s home heating bills in the 12 months after the April 1 carbon tax hike.

Other provinces, like Saskatchewan, have unilaterally stopped collecting the carbon tax on essentials like home heating and have not faced consequences from Ottawa.

“British Columbians need real relief from the costs of the provincial carbon tax,” Binda said. “Eby needs to stop waiting for permission from the leaderless federal government and scrap the tax on British Columbians.”

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The problem with deficits and debt

Published on January 13, 2025

Todayville

From the Fraser Institute

By Tegan Hill and Jake Fuss

This fiscal year (2024/25), the federal government and eight out of 10 provinces project a budget deficit, meaning they’re spending more than collecting in revenues. Unfortunately, this trend isn’t new. Many Canadian governments—including the federal government—have routinely ran deficits over the last decade.

But why should Canadians care? If you listen to some politicians (and even some economists), they say deficits—and the debt they produce—are no big deal. But in reality, the consequences of government debt are real and land squarely on everyday Canadians.

Budget deficits, which occur when the government spends more than it collects in revenue over the fiscal year, fuel debt accumulation. For example, since 2015, the federal government’s large and persistent deficits have more than doubled total federal debt, which will reach a projected $2.2 trillion this fiscal year. That has real world consequences. Here are a few of them:

Diverted Program Spending: Just as Canadians must pay interest on their own mortgages or car loans, taxpayers must pay interest on government debt. Each dollar spent paying interest is a dollar diverted from public programs such as health care and education, or potential tax relief. This fiscal year, federal debt interest costs will reach $53.7 billion or $1,301 per Canadian. And that number doesn’t include provincial government debt interest, which varies by province. In Ontario, for example, debt interest costs are projected to be $12.7 billion or $789 per Ontarian.

Higher Taxes in the Future: When governments run deficits, they’re borrowing to pay for today’s spending. But eventually someone (i.e. future generations of Canadians) must pay for this borrowing in the form of higher taxes. For example, if you’re a 16-year-old Canadian in 2025, you’ll pay an estimated $29,663 over your lifetime in additional personal income taxes (that you would otherwise not pay) due to Canada’s ballooning federal debt. By comparison, a 65-year-old will pay an estimated $2,433. Younger Canadians clearly bear a disproportionately large share of the government debt being accumulated currently.

Risks of rising interest rates: When governments run deficits, they increase demand for borrowing. In other words, governments compete with individuals, families and businesses for the savings available for borrowing. In response, interest rates rise, and subsequently, so does the cost of servicing government debt. Of course, the private sector also must pay these higher interest rates, which can reduce the level of private investment in the economy. In other words, private investment that would have occurred no longer does because of higher interest rates, which reduces overall economic growth—the foundation for job-creation and prosperity. Not surprisingly, as government debt has increased, business investment has declined—specifically, business investment per worker fell from $18,363 in 2014 to $14,687 in 2021 (inflation-adjusted).

Risk of Inflation: When governments increase spending, particularly with borrowed money, they add more money to the economy, which can fuel inflation. According to a 2023 report from Scotiabank, government spending contributed significantly to higher interest rates in Canada, accounting for an estimated 42 per cent of the increase in the Bank of Canada’s rate since the first quarter of 2022. As a result, many Canadians have seen the costs of their borrowing—mortgages, car loans, lines of credit—soar in recent years.

Recession Risks: The accumulation of deficits and debt, which do not enhance productivity in the economy, weaken the government’s ability to deal with future challenges including economic downturns because the government has less fiscal capacity available to take on more debt. That’s because during a recession, government spending automatically increases and government revenues decrease, even before policymakers react with any specific measures. For example, as unemployment rises, employment insurance (EI) payments automatically increase, while revenues for EI decrease. Therefore, when a downturn or recession hits, and the government wants to spend even more money beyond these automatic programs, it must go further into debt.

Government debt comes with major consequences for Canadians. To alleviate the pain of government debt on Canadians, our policymakers should work to balance their budgets in 2025.