Manitoba joins carbon tax exemption fray, seeks 'greater fairness' from Ottawa
CBC
Manitoba's new NDP finance minister is looking for "greater fairness" in the application of the federal carbon tax — but promises to work collaboratively with Justin Trudeau's Liberal government to make that happen.
Finance Minister Adrien Sala says he wants to know whether the prime minister will extend the same carbon-tax breaks to Manitobans as he effectively did for residents of Atlantic Canada when he announced a three-year carbon-tax exemption on home heating oil.
Last week, Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith called on Ottawa to apply the same exemption to natural gas, used by a majority of residents in their provinces for heating.
On Monday, Moe upped the ante by declaring that SaskEnergy — the provincial Crown corporation responsible for natural gas distribution — wouldn't collect the carbon tax starting in January if an exemption wasn't extended to other heating fuels.
Sala said he wants to have positive talks with Ottawa and pledged not to resume what he called the "posturing" of the former PC government, which threatened another court fight over the carbon tax.
"We're seeing other provinces that are asking for some changes and we did see that the prime minister committed to some changes in eastern Canada. That's definitely of interest to us here in Manitoba. We want to know how that might extend to greater fairness for Manitobans," Sala said Tuesday in an interview in his office.
"We're going to start by having conversations with the federal government around this question to understand how those types of benefits that are being provided to folks in eastern Canada might be extended to folks in Manitoba. No idea what that looks like right now, but we want to start from a position of collaboration and co-operation."
Sala pointed to the carbon-tax exemption on heating oil as well as Ottawa's offer to pay for geothermal heating in eastern Canada as potential benefits.
"Those are good offers that are being made to folks in those provinces to help reduce their cost of living," Sala said.
A spokesperson for federal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland was unable to comment Tuesday.
Earlier, Trudeau said his government will not make any further exemptions to the carbon tax.
"There will absolutely not be any other carve-outs or suspensions of the price on pollution," he told reporters on his way into question period in Ottawa.
Manitoba has a carve-out of its own on the way. Sala said Tuesday the his government will begin a promised six-month suspension of its 14-cents-a-litre gasoline tax on Jan. 1.
He and Premier Wab Kinew have characterized this as a temporary affordability measure.
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