Taxpayer lobby group slams feds for wanting global carbon taxes

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) is slamming the federal government over efforts to convince other countries to introduce carbon taxes.

CTF federal director Franco Terrazzano spoke on The Evan Bray Show Friday about what he termed a “failed” bid by Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government to get other countries to impose carbon taxes on their citizens.

“And the reason I say it’s a failed bid is because the vast majority of other countries are saying ‘no way, we’re not going to do it,’” said Terrazzano.

READ MORE

• Sask. carbon tax injunction hearing cancelled
• Statistics Canada says removing carbon tax helped drop Sask. inflation rate

Terrazzano was referring to the Global Carbon Pricing Challenge launched by the government at COP26 in 2021. According to a CTF news release in June, the program “aims to see 60 per cent of global GHG emissions covered by carbon pricing policies by 2030.”

The CTF release also pointed to results being “dismal,” with only 24 per cent of global emissions currently covered by a carbon tax.

On The Evan Bray Show, Terrazzano said there was $1.7 million being taken from taxpayers for the initiative.

“I think this is a complete waste of money and I just think it was a bad idea in the first place if the idea was to actually get something done.”

But Terrazzano does not believe that was the real objective for the Canadian government.

“The real objective for them … was more about virtue signalling. More about saying ‘oh look, we’re doing something’ rather than taking on real leadership to get something done.”

Terrazzano said that the solution to reducing emissions on a global scale is “tackling the big end of the arithmetic,” adding Canada only contributes 1.5 per cent of global emissions.

Terrazzano, who told listeners that the carbon tax was making life more expensive to fuel up, keep the heat on and buy groceries, said that according to data from the World Bank, more than 70 per cent of countries don’t have a national carbon tax. That includes the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters like the United States, Russia and India.

Terrazzano said in his opinion a carbon tax isn’t coming to the U.S. anytime soon.

“If Canada can’t even convince our largest ally, our largest trading partner (the U.S.) to impose a carbon tax, then what are we doing wasting this money trying to get other countries to do it?”

Terrazzano also had praise for the Saskatchewan premier for challenging the federal government over the carbon tax.

” … Scott Moe, he’s in the right. His heart is in the right place and its good to see a Premier actually stand up for his taxpayers in Saskatchewan,” Terrazzano said.