Saskatchewan government says tax agency recognizes it as sole distributor of natural gas

The Canada Revenue Agency has agreed to a request from the Saskatchewan government, naming the government as the province's natural gas distributor rather than SaskEnergy, a provincial Crown Corporation. 

The decision comes as Saskatchewan continues to resist the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act (GGPPA), a federal law that requires the collection of the federal carbon tax. 

Sam Sasse, a spokesperson for the Government of Saskatchewan says the province has not yet decided whether it will remit the carbon tax charges for the month of January. 

Those payments are due later this month. 

A request for a comment from the Canada Revenue Agency was not immediately returned on Tuesday. 

The decision is the latest update in a dispute that began when Ottawa decided to pause the carbon tax on home heating oil.

The provincial government said it believed the decision to not similarly exempt natural gas was unfair.

Under the federal government's Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, a corporation registered as a distributor is required to remit the carbon tax it collects. 

If it fails to do so the corporation could face steep fines and executives could potentially face jail time.

Until now, SaskEnergy was registered with the federal government as the province's sole distributor of natural gas.

Last year, the provincial government passed legislation which it said designated the province as the sole distributor. 

However, it still required the federal government to agree to register the province.

On Tuesday, Sasse confirmed that the province received confirmation SaskEnergy had been deregistered under the GGPPA and that the provincial government would be registered instead. 

Sasse said the changes are made in accordance with the legislation passed by the province in last year.