EDITORIAL: It’s time to kill EV mandates

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With electric vehicle sales tanking, it’s time for the federal government to remove mandates requiring that 20% of all new vehicle sales starting next year must be EVs, rising to 60% in 2030 and 100% in 2035.

According to the latest data from Statistics Canada, 195,659 new motor vehicles were sold in Canada in April, up 11.3% from a year ago.

But sales of EVs fell by 28.5%, with the 14,725 new vehicles sold representing only 7.5% of the market.

Federal and provincial governments — mainly Ontario and Quebec — have already earmarked up to $52.5 billion of taxpayers’ money for Canada’s EV sector on 13 major projects, according to parliamentary budget officer Yves Giroux.

That’s $6.3 billion, or 14%, more than the $46.1 billion Canada’s EV industry is investing in itself, with some projects now on hold because of poor sales.

The only way to boost EV sales rapidly, given their higher costs compared to gas-powered vehicles, is to give additional taxpayer-funded subsidies to buyers whose incomes are already above average.

Between 2019 and January 2025, when it suspended the program, the federal government doled out $3 billion in subsidies to EV buyers.

It plans to revive that subsidy — previously up to $5,000 per vehicle — at a time when sales are falling. Some provinces, with their own subsidy programs, are downsizing or ending them because of high costs.

As Brian Kingston, president and CEO of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers Association, told the National Post about the federal mandates: “At a time when companies are already facing tariff pressure, they are now going to face challenges selling vehicles in the Canadian market. Very difficult to make the case for Canada with this policy in place.”

The Fraser Institute reported in 2023 that federal and provincial subsidies raise the cost of reducing one tonne of industrial greenhouse gas emissions to as high as $857 per tonne, which is enormously inefficient.

Studies by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute in 2022 and the Montreal Economic Institute in 2017 came to similar conclusions.

“If the governments absolutely want to get to their (emissions) goals faster, the worst way of doing that is a subsidy to electric cars,” said the MEI report’s co-author, Germain Belzile, who passed in 2021. “It’s just a waste.”