Tories battling back against Carney Liberals' 'Carbon Tax 2.0'

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OTTAWA — Fresh from his byelection win returning him to the House of Commons, Canada’s Conservative leader is taking aim at “Carbon Tax 2.0.”

Speaking to reporters from a gas station in P.E.I.’s capital of Charlottetown, Pierre Poilievre said Wednesday morning that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s axing of the consumer carbon tax wasn’t what it seemed — claiming the government’s Clean Fuel Regulations (CFR) will force Canadians to pay at the pumps what they would have saved through the elimination of the carbon tax.

“According to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, it will add 17 cents per litre to gas,” Poilievre said. “What did the last carbon tax add to your gas? Seventeen cents per litre. The new tax is starting to look a lot like the old tax, and Mark Carney thinks no one will notice.”

Poilievre said his party will fight back against what he dubbed “Carbon Tax 2.0.,” describing it as yet another Liberal measure meant to drive up Canadians’ cost of living.

“Mark Carney said he would be different, instead he has been worse,” Poilievre said. “He said he would be judged by grocery prices — since he took office, grocery prices have been among the worst offenders for inflation, rising faster by far than the two per cent target.”

Canada’s deficit has also ballooned since Carney came to office, Poilievre alleges — saying the $40-billion deficit left behind by former PM Justin Trudeau is on track to double.

“This is almost hard to say out loud, because it sounds so unbelievable, but Mark Carney is even more expensive than Justin Trudeau was,” Poilievre said.

He also said Canada’s purchasing power is taking a hit — with $60 billion of investments fleeing Canada for greener pastures.

“That is a net exodus of investment, that means our money will be creating jobs for American and other foreign workers instead of workers here in Canada because of the high taxes and bad economic management of Mark Carney,” he said.

Poilievre also pointed out the government’s broken promises to reign in immigration, with Canada expected to welcome a record number of temporary foreign workers to a job market already choked with inexpensive foreign labour and elbowing-out Canadians looking for work.

“While he drives up the cost of housing, preventing (Canadians) from owning homes, he drives down their wages by allowing greedy multinational corporations to bring in low-wage foreign workers that take away Canadian jobs, including in high unemployment regions of this country,” he said.

bpassifiume@postmedia.com
X: @bryanpassifiume

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