The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - June 18, 2018


Fighting Trudeau’s Carbon Tax Cover-Up


Episode Stats

Length

16 minutes

Words per Minute

164.00842

Word Count

2,701

Sentence Count

160


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.240 Welcome to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative Podcast.
00:00:03.280 On the show today will be Pierre Polyev, the Shadow Minister of Finance,
00:00:07.100 and also the MP for Barry Innisfil, John Broussard,
00:00:11.440 as we talk about the carbon tax cover-up.
00:00:14.320 Stay tuned.
00:00:15.120 You're listening to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative Podcast.
00:00:20.140 Is the Prime Minister actually saying that taxpayers should be on the hook
00:00:24.560 when he breaks the law?
00:00:25.940 Yeah!
00:00:30.000 What is it going to take for the Prime Minister to have any respect
00:00:36.020 for any laws in this country that may curb his out-of-control behaviour?
00:00:41.660 All these deficits leading to nothing but burying Canadians in taxes.
00:00:45.560 That's a decision.
00:00:47.840 And now, here's your host, Tony Clement.
00:00:54.440 Welcome to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative Podcast.
00:00:57.220 I'm your host, Tony Clement, the Member of Parliament for Paris-San Muskoka.
00:01:01.260 And with me today are two fellow Conservative MPs,
00:01:04.480 the Member of Parliament for Carleton and the Shadow Minister of Finance.
00:01:08.340 Mr. Pierre Polyev, welcome to the program.
00:01:10.520 Thank you, Tony.
00:01:11.280 And also joining us is John Broussard, the Member of Parliament for Barry Innisfil.
00:01:15.920 John, welcome to the program as well.
00:01:17.760 Great to be here.
00:01:18.660 We're talking about the Liberals' carbon tax cover-up today.
00:01:22.000 And we know that this started with the budget that was released earlier this year
00:01:27.920 and has continued and has been an ongoing issue.
00:01:30.960 Pierre, walk us through, starting with the budget,
00:01:34.280 what were the provisions that concerned you
00:01:37.140 and your attempts to get more information
00:01:40.180 so we can better represent the Canadian people and the results of that?
00:01:43.740 Tony, the government introduced a budget bill in the spring
00:01:49.940 which empowered Ottawa to collect a carbon tax in any province that does not have its own.
00:01:58.080 This carbon tax, according to the Finance Department,
00:02:01.580 will raise the price of gasoline by at least 11 cents a liter,
00:02:05.920 will raise the cost of home heating for the average family by at least $200 to $250.
00:02:10.860 We know it will raise the price of almost everything else,
00:02:16.180 everything that has to be transported to your home or to where you work
00:02:20.820 because a carbon tax raises the price of energy.
00:02:24.560 It raises the price of anything that requires energy for the production and transport of the good.
00:02:30.740 Which is pretty well almost everything,
00:02:33.160 certainly with respect to goods and many services as well.
00:02:37.140 That's right.
00:02:37.560 Now, as Parliament, we have to authorize any tax governments impose.
00:02:44.020 There, it's the old principle of no taxation without representation.
00:02:47.480 Many people think that's an American idea.
00:02:49.400 It actually predates the Boston Tea Party
00:02:51.520 and goes back to our British parliamentary roots.
00:02:54.760 I even trace it right back to our 800-year-old Magna Carta
00:02:58.120 where the landed taxpayer demanded that they approve any increases in taxes
00:03:06.340 that King John imposed upon them.
00:03:09.000 And that principle has been part of our parliamentary system ever since.
00:03:12.600 So, we, government cannot tax what Parliament does not approve.
00:03:18.060 But Parliament cannot approve what it does not know.
00:03:21.600 And right now, we don't know what the carbon tax will cost the average Canadian family.
00:03:27.260 The government knows.
00:03:28.560 I've obtained documents in which they have calculated the estimated cost
00:03:32.660 to families at various income levels of this carbon tax,
00:03:36.640 how much it will increase their groceries, their gas, their home heating, etc.,
00:03:40.020 and how it will be the total cost to each of those families.
00:03:44.860 Unfortunately, the documents I obtained had no numbers.
00:03:48.980 They were all blacked out.
00:03:50.600 And the government released them, but released the calculations without numbers.
00:03:55.000 So, let's wind this back a bit.
00:03:56.500 So, you're in Parliament.
00:03:58.480 You ask for this information.
00:04:00.020 How much is it going to cost the average individual
00:04:03.280 or every individual in the country for this tax to be imposed?
00:04:07.820 You get no satisfactory answer.
00:04:09.760 You seek the documentation, and the answer is blacked out.
00:04:14.840 That's right.
00:04:15.840 So, I have documents in my possession back at my office
00:04:18.400 which show that the government has calculated what the cost will be to the average family,
00:04:24.000 but that the numbers are blacked out in those same documents.
00:04:26.880 So, I have said to the government,
00:04:28.380 look, if you want Parliament to authorize you to raise this tax,
00:04:32.760 the very least you can do is tell us what it will cost taxpayers.
00:04:37.280 There's no taxation without representation,
00:04:39.360 and there must be no taxation without information.
00:04:42.860 I'm asking them to end the carbon tax cover-up
00:04:45.820 and tell Canadians what this tax will cost the average family.
00:04:50.820 I'm going to bring John Broussard into the conversation as well,
00:04:53.560 the member of Parliament for Barrie-Innisville.
00:04:55.660 John, well, all three of us are MPs from Ontario.
00:04:59.540 We've just gone through an Ontario election.
00:05:02.540 This carbon tax was an issue in the election too, wasn't it?
00:05:05.420 It was a big issue.
00:05:06.760 And, you know, before I start, I just want to, you know, compliment Pierre
00:05:11.220 and the work that he's done to expose the fact that this is a carbon tax cover-up.
00:05:16.820 We've asked hundreds, literally hundreds of questions in the House of Commons and that committee,
00:05:21.780 and still we get no answer from Catherine McKenna or the Prime Minister
00:05:27.200 on just how much the carbon tax is going to cost the average Canadian family,
00:05:30.460 but they know how much it's going to cost.
00:05:31.980 But I think they fear what that number is, and Canadians aren't going to buy into it,
00:05:36.120 certainly not to the degree that it exposes it to costs.
00:05:40.140 But in Ontario, for sure, and, you know, just before the election, Tony,
00:05:44.820 there was an Ipsos poll that showed that 72% of Ontarians see a carbon tax as a tax grab.
00:05:53.420 In fact, 68% saw it as simply a symbolic gesture.
00:05:59.620 It's a way for government to pick your pocket one more way.
00:06:02.160 Just to extract money out of your pocket for their own purposes
00:06:06.880 under the guise of a cleaner economy.
00:06:10.140 So they weren't buying that it was actually going to have a positive impact on the environment, rather?
00:06:14.860 I think in the only poll that mattered, and that was last Thursday,
00:06:18.660 Ontarians sent a clear message to Justin Trudeau
00:06:23.140 and to his environment and carbon tax champion, Catherine McKenna,
00:06:28.380 that they weren't buying it.
00:06:29.440 Because Doug Ford and the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
00:06:32.700 campaigned on the fact that they weren't going to impose
00:06:36.660 or implement a carbon tax in Ontario,
00:06:39.160 and that they were going to fight it every step of the way.
00:06:41.560 And so we saw that mandate being given last week,
00:06:45.060 and I think it should, again, send a clear message to Justin Trudeau and Catherine McKenna.
00:06:48.980 Pierre Polyev, despite your worthy efforts to try to find this information,
00:06:55.020 we do have some macro numbers about the costs
00:06:57.880 to the economy of the carbon tax.
00:07:01.220 Why don't you go into that a little bit?
00:07:03.160 Well, the Parliamentary Budget Officer has calculated that the carbon tax
00:07:07.400 will subtract $10 billion from our economy.
00:07:11.120 Now, that's not the amount of money the government will collect.
00:07:13.540 It is the amount of GDP that will vanish
00:07:16.140 because the impact of the carbon tax on the economy will be so devastating.
00:07:23.900 Now, he did say that if the government were to use all of the proceeds of the carbon tax
00:07:29.480 to reduce income and business taxes, the damage might not be as severe.
00:07:35.780 But based on the design that he has discerned from the Liberal plans,
00:07:41.600 he said it's a $10 billion cost to our economy.
00:07:46.900 Because it's not as if the Liberals are saying,
00:07:49.360 well, we'll raise this tax here or create this new tax and we'll be reducing taxes there.
00:07:53.860 In fact, all of the taxes are going up.
00:07:55.880 That's right.
00:07:56.280 They've raised income taxes on 81% of middle-class families.
00:08:00.720 They're raising payroll taxes.
00:08:02.920 They brought in changes that will effectively raise taxes on small businesses.
00:08:07.220 So everybody's taxes are going up.
00:08:09.020 So, you know, we've always been told that these carbon taxes are going to be revenue neutral.
00:08:14.800 That is, that the government would lower other taxes as much as it raises carbon taxes.
00:08:20.800 But the government has been very clear they're not going to do that.
00:08:23.720 They are going to raise the money and spend the money.
00:08:26.460 We've seen in the Ontario election campaign, John Broussard,
00:08:30.560 and also what's been happening around the country.
00:08:34.360 British Columbia is a case in point where British Columbians are paying more for their gas
00:08:38.620 than pretty well anywhere else, and yet emissions, carbon emissions,
00:08:43.820 have continued to rise in that province.
00:08:46.900 Gas prices in Ontario have gone up.
00:08:49.500 They are high, and that can be attributed to government action.
00:08:53.960 So what's the feeling on the street about this?
00:08:57.100 How are people reacting to this?
00:08:58.760 Well, I think Pierre said it earlier.
00:09:00.660 They're going to start seeing if the government does decide to impose this carbon tax.
00:09:05.620 For example, in British Columbia, the price of fuel went up.
00:09:09.980 Emissions went down initially, but then emissions are back up.
00:09:13.040 So it hasn't changed people's habits the way the government wants to change their habits.
00:09:18.460 And in Ontario, as Pierre said, we could see the potential of 11 cent per litre increases
00:09:23.720 in the price of gasoline, the cost of home heating going up.
00:09:27.960 But the ancillary effect or the cascading effect of that, Tony, on the entire economy
00:09:32.680 because as people ship goods, those goods become more expensive to ship
00:09:37.080 and those prices are passed on to consumers.
00:09:39.800 And so in Ontario, again, last week, thankfully, we elected a government
00:09:46.400 that is going to fight the carbon tax.
00:09:49.000 And I think what's important here is we're starting to fire warning shots
00:09:53.020 across Justin Trudeau and Catherine McKenna's bow to say,
00:09:56.840 like, the people of Canada aren't going to stand for this.
00:09:59.040 We're seeing this in Ontario.
00:10:00.880 We've certainly got, in Saskatchewan, we've got a pushback there with Scott Moe,
00:10:06.700 Jason Kenney, the potential of a Quebec Conservative government.
00:10:10.700 So that pushback is important to make sure that Canadians don't suffer
00:10:15.500 the consequences of a very regressive, very costly carbon tax on them.
00:10:20.560 Let's talk a little bit about how we're making this case, Pierre Polyev.
00:10:26.800 Obviously, we've got an Opposition Day motion.
00:10:31.140 That is to say, something we want to debate in Parliament that's coming up.
00:10:35.380 Talk a little bit about that and how we're trying to put this issue
00:10:39.340 in front of Canadians as well as in front of the government.
00:10:41.680 We have another vote before Parliament, before the summer recess,
00:10:45.460 asking the government to end the carbon tax cover-up and reveal all of the censored information
00:10:51.540 in its previous briefing notes that I mentioned.
00:10:54.680 Tell us what the carbon tax will cost the average Canadian family
00:10:57.620 so that Canadians know what they're going to have to pay.
00:11:01.120 You know, this is a government that uses the verbiage of being open and transparent.
00:11:06.760 It's one of the first things that they promised in their party platform,
00:11:11.640 and then they definitely ratcheted up the rhetoric on it about being open and transparent.
00:11:17.660 But here's yet another case where they're doing exactly the opposite.
00:11:21.260 It is indeed, and this is unlike other taxes, which are itemized one way or another.
00:11:26.120 If you pay sales tax, you see it on your receipt when you make a purchase.
00:11:29.540 When you pay income tax, you know what total you've committed to the government,
00:11:35.700 what you get back in a refund.
00:11:37.480 But when you pay a carbon tax, you have no idea what it costs you
00:11:41.360 because its costs are embedded in consumer goods.
00:11:46.520 So the price of fruit and vegetables will go up,
00:11:49.820 but you might just assume that your grocer has gotten greedy
00:11:52.620 because he's charging you more for your goods.
00:11:57.140 The price of furniture might go up because that furniture was transported by truck.
00:12:04.820 You might just assume that the local furniture store is making more profit.
00:12:09.540 And in fact, all of those costs are due to the government imposing this tax,
00:12:14.020 and you don't know it.
00:12:15.220 So it is surreptitious and sneaky,
00:12:18.660 and it's designed to take money out of people's pockets without them even knowing it.
00:12:22.460 This is one of our recurrent themes as Canadian Conservatives about affordability
00:12:27.960 and how Liberal governments have chipped away in some cases much more than chipped away.
00:12:36.060 They've made a substantive difference in the affordability to live, to work, to get to work,
00:12:42.160 to buy the groceries.
00:12:43.660 This is a theme that I've heard time and again from us.
00:12:46.260 Is that your understanding as well?
00:12:48.380 Well, look, governments, plural, compose about 42% of the Canadian economy.
00:12:55.360 So when the cost of government goes up, the cost of everything goes up.
00:12:58.680 Government is an underlying cost driver.
00:13:02.920 If you're raising small businesses' taxes, those businesses have to raise their prices for consumers.
00:13:08.280 If you're raising gas taxes, then everything that is moved by fuel must become necessarily more expensive.
00:13:17.480 And so, again, the biggest cost driver right now in Canada is government.
00:13:23.480 It has been growing at three times, at least federally.
00:13:26.260 Government has been growing at three times the combined rate of inflation and population growth.
00:13:30.900 In other words, we're increasing spending three times faster than we need to to maintain services at the present level.
00:13:39.400 But all the extra costs of those increases have to be paid by someone.
00:13:44.040 Now, it's true.
00:13:44.820 Justin Trudeau is borrowing a lot of the money to pay for it.
00:13:47.600 But, of course, whatever you borrow today, you have to pay interest on tomorrow.
00:13:52.720 And that's one of the reasons your taxes are going up.
00:13:54.960 The other thing that it's doing, by the way, and this is underreported, the more governments borrow, the more they compete with Canadian mortgage borrowers for credit.
00:14:05.620 And they drive up interest rates.
00:14:07.540 So government deficits can have the effect, and there's a lot of economic research to show this, of driving up the cost of borrowing and making mortgage payments higher.
00:14:16.220 I've been told that 47% of Canadian mortgages are up for renewal next year.
00:14:23.040 So this is something where there's a real risk for people and their homes, as well as the Canadian economy, and jobs, really, that's all tied together.
00:14:32.200 John?
00:14:32.540 I just want to add one more thing, too.
00:14:34.480 The other issue that's been underreported on this is the fact that not only are they going to impose a carbon tax or try to impose a carbon tax on the provinces,
00:14:43.900 but they're also going to be charging GST on top of the carbon tax.
00:14:49.180 So what that means is they're actually going to be collecting even more revenue from people.
00:14:53.020 Tax on the tax.
00:14:53.920 The tax on the tax, the double taxation.
00:14:56.760 And, you know, Pierre talks about the fact that the average Canadian family is paying over $800 more a year in taxes.
00:15:03.420 But what have they taken away from families?
00:15:05.740 Like my family, for example, the income splitting opportunity with my wife, the fitness and child tax credit, the transit tax, all of those things have been taken away.
00:15:16.300 And so these are real costs on real Canadian families, and they're feeling impacted by it.
00:15:21.840 I'm here with John Broussard, Member of Parliament for Barrie-Innisville, MP Pierre Polyev, our shadow finance critic.
00:15:28.860 Final word.
00:15:29.620 We've only got a few seconds left.
00:15:31.180 Call to action.
00:15:32.160 What should Canadians do if they are concerned about this?
00:15:35.160 How should they contact the Conservative Party, contact you?
00:15:38.140 What do they do to register their concern?
00:15:40.500 Well, I'm publicizing the carbon tax cover-up on my Facebook page, and I encourage people to go to that page and that of other Conservatives.
00:15:49.360 Share all of our posts so that more Canadians are aware of the cover-up.
00:15:54.460 Let's mount pressure on the government to end the carbon tax cover-up and tell people what this new tax will cost them.
00:16:01.620 Pierre Polyev, John Broussard, thank you for joining us on The Blueprint.
00:16:04.660 Thank you.
00:16:04.960 So good luck with your continued protests against the Liberal carbon tax cover-up.
00:16:10.260 Thanks, Tony.
00:16:10.800 Thanks.
00:16:12.900 Thank you for listening to The Blueprint, Canada's Conservative podcast.
00:16:17.120 To find more episodes, interviews, and in-depth discussions of politics in Canada, search for The Blueprint on iTunes or visit podcast.conservative.ca.