Feds spend $1.7 million promoting carbon tax abroad
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Summary
On today's show, Andrew Lawton is joined by the head of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, Chris Simms, to discuss the government's carbon tax and why it's costing us a lot of money.
Transcript
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speaking of alberta let's go to our friend chris sims here for a rare tuesday check-in given the
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holiday yesterday she is the alberta director for the canadian taxpayers federation chris
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good to talk to you thanks for coming on today likewise i didn't hear that so he's skipping the
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calgary stampede can you hear that's according to the western standard anyway uh confirmed by an
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email from the pmo so uh basically they are not interested in well he's not interested in being
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there and i think albertans are probably just as pleased because i don't don't think they were
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ready to give him the white hat welcome by any stretch but uh we've talked a lot you and i over
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the last year about the carbon tax it's become an incredibly unpopular tax it's costing canadians a
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lot of money despite the proclamations that it's not uh what i find interesting here and you drew
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my attention to this the government has spent 1.7 million dollars promoting the carbon tax around
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the world so promoting global carbon taxes so they don't just want uh people in red deer and strathroy
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and halifax to pay the carbon tax they want people in baku and talon and paris to pay a carbon tax as
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well talk to me about this yeah so it's one of those things where i had to take a double take
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at it because i couldn't tell right away if it was 1.7 million or 1.7 billion and the fact that i
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didn't blink at the difference speaks volumes because they just as easily could have been a
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billion but in this case it's 1.7 million dollars with an m and we found this out through freedom of
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information requests uh with the federal government through our investigative journalist ryan thorpe there
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in ottawa he and franco dug this up and yeah turns out they've spent around 800 000 and change or so
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andrew on bureaucrats keeping seats warm and watering house plants there in the national capital region
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trying to promote adopting a carbon tax in other countries and what i find spectacularly sad about this
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is that they fail like they're they're really bad at this so not only are they wasting canadian
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taxpayers money on something silly and frivolous like trying to convince a foreign country to impose
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a tax on its people but they're terrible at it they haven't succeeded in doing so like i'll just point
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out the united states of america it's obviously our closest neighbor biggest trading partner huge ally
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blah blah i just finished driving across three states actually came home yesterday and they number one
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depending on how you slice it it really looks like they reduced their emissions under trump and that
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is largely because they increased their use of natural gas reading they do not have a national
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carbon tax in the united states of america and even though their chirpy little sister up here in
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canada has been urging them to do so they still haven't imposed one on their people so if we can't even
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convince the united states to have a national carbon tax why are we wasting money trying to convince
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countries further afield to do so there are two things that come to mind on this number one is
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that talk about a race to the bottom is that you know we we've been saying to the government you know
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even if canada were to bring its emissions to zero it wouldn't amount to a hill of beans because
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emissions are global so the government says okay uh we'll see you uh that argument and raise you
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everyone has a carbon tax there you can't say we're ignoring the global picture but the other thing and
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this is what i think is so key here the greatest detriment that a carbon well one of the greatest
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detriments a carbon tax poses is that it eliminates any competitive advantage that canada might have
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and investing in canada might have relative to other countries so if you're to say oh why would i
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invest in canada which has a carbon tax when i can invest and open up my factory in oh i don't know
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in czech republic say because they don't have a carbon tax uh the government's trying to make it so
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that everyone is being punitive so that everyone is penalizing industry and as you note other
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countries are saying nope yeah exactly because they know that this is not helping the environment
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they know it's not reducing emissions because if you start punishing people financially for an essential
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okay heating your home in the winter is essential growing and eating food is essential shipping your
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supplies to people who need it and getting to work those are all essential things people aren't flying
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their private jets around the world to you know cop conferences for reducing your emissions right
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they're not this is not a have yacht issue this is a normal working class sort of thing and yet
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they're still financially punishing us and if you take that viewpoint around the world of course they
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have working people and working populations and normal families around the world and canada our
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little academic class there in ottawa trying to say you know what you guys should do you should
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punish people for driving to work and heating their homes they're rightly telling us to go get lost
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the problem here though of course andrew is that this is again costing canadian taxpayers money
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1.7 million dollars and it's not nothing it's also growing the size of our bureaucracy
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and it's the same sort of thing that the former new york city mayor giuliani had when it came to crime
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it's the broken windows theory if you allow for jaywalking and broken windows and graffiti
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you're going to have increasing levels of crime same sort of thing with dumb things like spending
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money on promoting a carbon tax internationally it doesn't work it wastes money and it grows
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government so again i'm really glad that the folks there at the ctf in ottawa's office dug this stuff
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up because it points out how absolutely pointless this is i will point out i just filled up in montana
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on my way back across into alberta that's why my voice is so ratchet because i was screaming at a concert
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for like three hours but i filled up there it's like 30 cents around 30 cents cheaper there per liter
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same octane for gasoline than it is even here across the border in alberta and that's comparing
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montana to alberta i can't imagine what the difference would be going from a really red state
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to a really liberal state or province up here in canada yeah i i think you're right about that and and
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you know i go back to the race to the bottom dimension of this here because we always forget
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that in a well i we don't but the government does or chooses to ignore that in a globalized economy
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you have to be able to sell what you are offering better than other places around the world now
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obviously there are shipping costs that have to be factored in there and maybe canada can say okay
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we have a bit of a comparative advantage to say the u.s market because of our proximity to it
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but the fact that in canada it's so expensive to manufacture things labor is a part of that yes
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the carbon tax adds to it and we have to stop looking at these things in isolation the left
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loves talking about intersectionality well let's talk about intersectionality of taxes and regulations
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and all of these things here i might steal that from you it's all yours it's all yours really good
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analysis and spot on and to your point exactly so people might remember this big foo for a that was
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happening between the the prime minister's office pmo and parliamentary budget office pbo ottawa loves their
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acronyms just like the armed forces so what was happening was the pbo parliamentary budget officer
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had figured out spoiler alert that the carbon tax costs people money even with their precious rebates
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factored in every common sense person already knew this of course but they did the math there
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and what's really startling is that you take a look exactly to your point andrew the gdp cost okay
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so we're not talking just generally people filling up their minivans or their pickup trucks directly
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or even paying you know the carbon tax on their on their heat bill which is insane but if you just
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look at apples to apples the gdp cost so the difference between bill jones starting a manufacturing
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plant in montana with no carbon tax versus starting a manufacturing plant in alberta with a carbon tax
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that difference is costing the canadian economy billions of dollars per year and again that's just the
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economic cost that the pbo was factoring in there and that of course is why the prime minister's
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office was kicking and screaming for weeks andrew and they didn't want to release this information
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but they finally had to cough it up last week and it's really damaging
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yeah and we found that all of the arguments used to justify the carbon tax have not held water we know
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it does uh penalize canadians there is a i mean and that's even just based on the government's own
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analysis here so this idea that oh most people are coming out ahead well if so there wouldn't be a point in it
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yeah exactly that's exactly i always like pointing that out because you can flip it around and say
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oh well okay if it makes everybody rich heck make the carbon tax 500 a ton we'll all be rich right
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that's idiotic thinking that's childish thinking i would only insult children that's really silly
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to think that because of course taxes don't make you richer and number two exactly to your point
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if it's not financially punitive to use a substance
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then how do they expect the use of that substance to be reduced
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if it's not hurting you in your wallet so to speak as they try to say
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what's the point of it right this is the whole argument right
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or having a deposit on your pop can if it's a deterrent
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to throw it in the garbage versus recycling it and getting your money back
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that's how their thinking worked but the problem is is that's not how it worked out
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in theory that's what they were trying to do for years
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spoiler alert people still need to get to work they still need to eat they still need to heat their homes
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and that is why even though canada has a carbon tax
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even though british columbia has been the oldest jurisdiction with the carbon tax
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for the longest time since 2008 their emissions nonetheless continue to rise steadily
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and so yeah it's not working because it's not reducing emissions
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it's not working because now they're trying to spin this and saying
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oh well it was only ever meant to make you richer anyway and here's a rebate
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why did the trudeau government blink when it comes to atlantic canada
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right they came out and admitted yes this is a financial burden
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for people to pay a carbon tax on their home heating oil
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especially in places like nova scotia and prince edward island
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why did they then come forward and say you know what
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we're suspending the carbon tax but just on this fuel
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like any way you slice it this is not working out for them
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so explain to me where you think this is headed
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because we we know that i mean correlation is not causation
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but we know that poly other conservatives have been surging in the polls for months now
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we know that if you could really attribute one policy to him
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even if you're only a casual political observer
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so the conservatives have taken up getting rid of the carbon tax
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as i'd say at this point anyway their flagship policy
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that might not be the reason they're doing so well in the polls
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and i i think that again even people that were kind of okay with the carbon tax
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it's okay maybe we maybe we could afford it in 2015
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now again i have not gone in a deep dive and checked his math
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around 100 i'm guessing around 180 dollars or so
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trying to point out what inflation is like here in canada
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is going to continue to be a main driving force
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and i think it will continue to be a major issue
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so yeah i do think that's going to be a centerpiece
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now you might just be stuck with a view of chris right now
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because my producer sean just told me his power went out
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so you might have had to just like pick up the show from there
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because we couldn't switch cameras one way or another
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yes that uh is the book that's over my shoulder there
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