Canadian Convulsions > Trudeau knew the Carbon Tax would trash the economy but hid the fact and did it anyway

 

Docs show Trudeau knew carbon tax would hurt economy

Government's own data shows a big hit to the Canadian economy due to carbon tax.

Brian Lilley    Published Jun 13, 2024  •  Last updated 23 hours ago  •  3 minute read

Data from Environment and Climate Change Canada that the Trudeau government kept secret for years details the hit to the Canadian economy.

The data was only released Thursday after its existence was revealed by Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux.

Giroux was speaking at the House of Commons Finance Committee earlier this month when he revealed that the government had data showing the economic impact of the carbon tax was negative. Liberal MP Ryan Turnbull was pushing Giroux on how he was so certain that his report on the economic impact was accurate given a recently discovered error.

Giroux’s answer was that his work was very similar to what he had seen from the federal government’s own work.

“The government has these numbers on the economic impact of carbon pricing,” Giroux said. “And that’s your government, sir. They have not published anything.”

*Turnbull must have been ducking under his desk by then. Yikes!

Giroux went on to say the Trudeau government had put a gag order on him, told him he couldn’t share the information publicly. That statement set off the Conservatives who rightly accused the government of trying to muzzle an officer of Parliament and hide information from the public.

The data released Thursday morning says that without the carbon tax, emissions would be 11% higher by 2030. It also shows that the carbon tax will be responsible for a multi-billion hit to Canada’s economy.

The data shows that without the carbon tax, Canada’s GDP would hit $2.68 trillion by 2030, about $25 billion higher than what it will be due to the impact on the carbon tax. The Conservatives say the impact is even worse due to inflation since the report was done in 2017.

“Trudeau has been hiding the fact that the carbon tax will cost Canadians $30.5 billion by 2030. This works out to $1,824 per family in extra annual costs,” the Conservatives said in a statement.

*And considerably more than that in provinces like BC which don't get the carbon tax rebate.

Speaking in the House, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said the government has been covering up what they knew to be the truth for years and it had to be pulled out of the government like a rotten tooth.

“Because of our relentless questioning and the pressure that is weighing heavily on Liberal MPs, the government has finally relented and released part of the information,” Poilievre said.

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The Trudeau government has been trying to deny or downplay any negative impacts of the carbon tax, or the “price on pollution” as they like to call it. Now their own report shows a significant drop in GCP, meaning we will all be poorer, from this tax.

Of course, that’s the impact on the economy overall but doesn’t reflect your extra costs that you pay at the pump, the grocery store, or for anything shipped by truck, train or boat.

The Liberals will now try to claim that while this economic price can be measured, we can’t know the cost of inaction on climate change. 

Why not? Can't we measure the difference in Canada's temperature to see how much of an effect the carbon tax has had? Of course not! Because there is almost nothing we can do in Canada to effectively change our climate to a measureable degree. 

Most air masses that cover Canada originate in Asia or the Pacific Ocean. The best thing we can do to affect our climate is to sell LNG to China to replace the hundreds of coal-fed power plants they operate. That would have an almost immediate effect on our temperature and precipitation patterns. 

The second best thing we can do is to improve our forestry practices in such a way as to reduce the spread of forest fires and make them easier to fight. This will improve air quality in North America but have little effect on its temperature because it's not really CO2 that is driving the rise in temperature. Historically, the opposite has always been true.

That argument presumes the only action that could be taken was to impose a carbon tax, which drives up costs for average citizens.

First off, a carbon tax isn’t the only option – the Biden administration in Washington hasn’t brought in a carbon tax, neither did the Trump or Obama administrations before him, and they’ve still had success at lowering emissions.

Secondly, Canada accounts for a minuscule amount of global GHGs – erase them all tomorrow and we would cover China’s annual increase and a little bit more.

What this now released data shows is the Trudeau government knew their carbon tax would hurt the Canadian economy. They knew that their plan would make life more expensive and that we would all be worse off due to their plan.

They did it anyway.

Their plan, your pain.

blilley@postmedia.com

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Trudeau's Astonishing Cover-up of the WE Scandal Mocks Parliament

Commons law clerk says government went too far in redacting WE Charity documents

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Public servants pre-redacted documents; top Tory says Trudeau is engaged in a 'cover up'

Remarkable story in that it comes from CBC, which is Justin Trudeau's biggest fan club.

Don't be surprised if Tasker is looking for a new job next week.

John Paul Tasker · CBC News 

Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre holds up redacted documents during a press conference on

Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2020. The documents were tabled by the

government at the House of Commons finance committee. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

The House of Commons law clerk says public servants went too far in redacting the WE Charity documents released to MPs last week — and warns the cuts may have violated a production order from the finance committee to hand over all internal correspondence related to the summer student grants program.

The government released thousands of pages of documents related to the WE matter, as the committee requested last month. But rather than have the independent law clerk redact certain information, such as cabinet confidences and personal information, the various departments responsible for this aborted program did the blackouts themselves — an apparent contravention of the committee's request.

The end result was hundreds of blank pages and blacked-out content — information only known to the public servants who red-penciled the material.

They deliberately ignored the committee's will in order to cover up the truth

and protect Justin Trudeau's reputation.

- Conservative finance critic Pierre Poilievre

The finance committee requested all memos related to the WE Charity contribution agreement and clearly stipulated that any redactions should be "made by the Office of the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel of the House of Commons" — not government censors.

Last week, a spokesperson for the Prime Minister's Office told CBC News that the redactions were done by the parliamentary law clerk, who was following the committee's direction to remove documents covered by cabinet confidentiality and personal information about Canadian citizens.

But that law clerk, Philippe Dufresne, said in a confidential August 18 letter to the clerk of the finance committee that the vast majority of the blackouts had been done by government bureaucrats — and some relevant information relating to the $912 million deal with WE may have been withheld, something which could constitute a breach of parliamentary privilege.

Ottawa-based news outlet iPolitics first reported on Dufresne's letter.

Dufresne raised red flags about the redaction process, saying his office did not have a chance to review the written material in its original form as the committee had intended. He also said the redactions his office did were limited to the personal information of public servants working on this file.

"The documents had already been redacted by the departments to protect personal information and on other grounds. As my office has not been given the opportunity to see the unredacted documents, we are not able to confirm whether those redactions are consistent with the order of the Committee," Dufresne said in his correspondence with David Gagnon, the finance committee clerk.

"The departments made certain redactions to the documents on grounds that were not contemplated in the order of the committee. We note that the House's and its committees' power to order the production of records is absolute and unfettered as it constitutes a constitutional parliamentary privilege that supersedes statutory obligations, such as the exemptions found in the Access to Information Act."

(Provisions of the Access to Information Act are commonly used to justify releasing censored material to journalists and the general public.)

"The House and its committees are the appropriate authority to determine whether any reasons for withholding the documents should be accepted or not," Dufresne added.

The opposition parties have said that the documents that have been released so far call into question Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's claim that he first learned that public servants were recommending that WE Charity administer the grants program ahead of a cabinet meeting on May 8.

Emails released show that senior members of his office — including Rick Theis, the director of policy and cabinet affairs — had meetings with the charity about its proposal to administer the program before that date.

An April 20 email from Michelle Kovacevic, a senior Finance official, said the "PMO was weighing in" on WE's pitch to dole out student support.

That same official called senior members of former finance minister Bill Morneau's staff "besties" with WE Charity administrators in a May 7 email. Members of Morneau's team were working with WE in April on how best to craft the grants program.

Craig Kielburger, the co-founder of WE, later thanked Ben Chin, one of Trudeau's senior advisers, in a June LinkedIn message for his "kindness in helping shape our latest program with the government."

WE Charity co-founders Craig (left) and Marc Kielburger introduce Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife

Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau as they appear at the WE Day celebrations in Ottawa, Tuesday November 10, 2015.

(Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

Pierre Poilievre, the Conservative finance critic, said today he believes the government directed bureaucrats to hide key information related to this scandal to shield the prime minister from further scrutiny.

"They deliberately ignored the committee's will in order to cover up the truth and protect Justin Trudeau's reputation," Poilievre said in an interview with CBC. "The law clerk was tasked with combing through all the material and redacting any cabinet confidence or other information that needed to be kept from public view. Instead, the Trudeau government did its own redacting.

"I think the plan, Trudeau's plan, is to try and cover up the facts in this scandal until the fall when he will force an early election, in the hopes that none of this, none of the truth comes to light before Canadians go to the polls. This government, under his direction, is going to such lengths to bury it all until after Canadians vote."

After Morneau's abrupt resignation on August 17, Trudeau prorogued Parliament until the end of September, shutting down the Commons committees studying the WE matter. The prorogation means the committees are powerless to challenge redactions to the WE documents.

The opposition parties will have a chance to vote down the government — and force an election — after a Sept. 23 speech from the throne by Gov. Gen. Julie Payette.

Poilievre said the government should immediately hand over the original documents in question to the law clerk so he can decide what can or cannot be released to parliamentarians.

A senior government official, speaking on background Thursday, conceded both bureaucrats and the law clerk made amendments to the documents delivered to MPs.

But the official said the government released a number of memos to cabinet related to the WE matter — even though the committee explicitly called for the exclusion of such documents — as a show of good faith.

Good faith! Right! Hilarious!

The PMO referred all questions on the matter to the Privy Council Office (PCO), the arm of government that serves the prime minister and cabinet and coordinates the work of the various federal departments.

Pierre-Alain Bujold, spokesperson for the PCO, side-stepped a question about whether the government would hand over the documents — in their original state — for review by the law clerk.

He did not say why bureaucrats assumed responsibility for the redactions, despite the committee's order.

"Every effort was made to release as much information as possible to the committee, and indeed cabinet confidences pertaining to the Canadian Summer Student Grant program were disclosed," Bujold said in a statement. A limited amount of information was protected."

In fact, more than a quarter of all the documents provided to the finance committee were redacted in whole or in part.

And considering they provided many memos that the committee asked to be excluded, it's a good bet that if the committee had received only the documents they asked for, close to half would have been redacted.

Trudeau, like his father before him, has utterly no respect for Parliament and hence, democracy.