Thank you, Chair.
The relevance, to my colleague across the way, is that my subamendment to the main motion is exactly on the carbon tax election. I'm quoting back to him a seasoned politician on the NDP side who is saying that he's facing a carbon tax election in British Columbia, and that's what the public wants. I'm trying to remind my colleague across the way through you, Chair, that we need a carbon tax election, and that's why I have a subamendment on this exact subject before this committee: It's so that we can have a carbon tax election and submit ourselves to accountability from Canadian citizens, who will get to pick who will represent them in the 45th Parliament, in our next Parliament, and I'm more than happy to do that right away.
My residents back home are enthusiastic about having a carbon tax election, and I'll go back to quoting now Premier Eby, who is less enthusiastic about facing the electorate in his home province. That's because they're upset at the carbon tax, and they're specifically, I'd say, more angry at the federal government for forcing British Columbia to keep a carbon tax because of the federal backstop legislation that forces every single province that doesn't have a carbon tax to have a price imposed directly upon them.
Premier Eby has clearly said that should there not be a federal backstop, British Columbia would abandon the punishing carbon tax. It's really convenient for him to say this so late in his term and so close to the provincial election day. I think it's of interest to the committee, and especially, I think, to our chair, who happens to be from the beautiful province of British Columbia through which I backpacked for two weeks over the summer with my kids. That's why this is important.
This is the last quote I have from Premier Eby before I move to other provinces. Premier Eby argued that large increases to the federal tax, now $80 a tonne as of April 1, are, to use another quotation, unsustainable. “Unsustainable” is what I heard at doors when I was door knocking in communities in North Vancouver, in Burnaby, in Delta, Vancouver Granville and Vancouver proper—but not Surrey.
Don't worry, Chair, I didn't make it out to Surrey to door knock, but I did door knock in New Westminster and I visited a lot of different groups as well. I door knocked also in a few spots in Seymour and North Burnaby, just to make sure that I heard directly from British Columbians, and what they were saying at the doors was that many of them wanted just what this subamendment has: a carbon tax election.
Moving on to my home province of Alberta, it's an unusual day, I think my colleagues from Alberta will agree, when we're quoting NDP MLAs, but I'm going to quote some NDP MLAs now.
Alberta NDP MLA and former leadership candidate Rakhi Pancholi spoke against the carbon tax, and this was reported earlier this year, before my subamendment even came to grace this committee to have a carbon tax election. On February 9, 2024, as reported in the Calgary Herald, she said the following: “It may be time to move beyond a consumer carbon price and focus more on the things that do work”, which again is an implication a carbon tax does not work and that we should abandon it.
This is another quote: “I’ve been having many conversations with leading climate activists in our province, experts in this area, and we need to continue those conversations to say, what would that climate plan look like without a consumer carbon price.”
It sounds to me like she was shying away from a retail carbon tax being imposed, which is exactly the point of my subamendment, which is to have a carbon tax election. I think it's perfectly reasonable that we time it for this report going back and its impact on Bill C-71 legislation before it comes to this committee.
I'll note that the government obviously finds no urgency in passing Bill C-71, because it's not up for debate today, as far as I can tell. It wasn't up for debate yesterday. I don't see it on notice for tomorrow's business. In fact, I don't think it's on the business for several more days, and the government saw no great urgency from the moment it tabled it in May to have it debated at any time in May or June before it came here.
I'll also remind members here that this committee was in public in a multi-meeting filibuster from the Liberal side, and I heard many people comment yesterday that the bad Conservatives were delaying Bill C-71. There's no delay happening. Members are debating the merits of the bill and the contents of the bill in the House. Then I also heard the other side of the argument, which is that Conservatives take too much time at committee to do their work. I will continue to do the work the residents of Calgary Shepard expect me to do, which is to represent them.
The content of my subamendment is exactly what residents in my riding want to see. That's every single word in my email inbox. They want to have a non-confidence vote and they want a carbon tax election, which is what my subamendment would deliver for them.
I am going to go back this weekend. I'm going to go to my veterans walk in Glenmore Park. I'm going to go to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for the Calgary food drive that they do for the whole city. When I meet my residents, my constituents and my voters, they're going to ask me, "What did you do for us this week?" I'm going to tell them I moved at committee that we report back to the House that we have a carbon tax election. They'll be like, "Tom, that's great. That's exactly what we sent you to Ottawa for. That's what we sent you to Parliament for. That's what we want. We're tired of the government. We want to see it replaced. We want to have a say."
That's what reporting this back would give them. It places conditions on the main motion. That's exactly what my residents want to see.
I have another quote I want to read you. It's from a different Alberta NDP MLA, one whom I actually met briefly at the Alberta legislature when we were waiting in a line to greet the President of the Republic of Poland. I got a chance to meet, I think, one of her kids. She got a chance to meet my kids, and we were just talking family issues.
Alberta NDP MLA and leadership candidate Sarah Hoffman spoke out against the carbon tax. According to CTV Edmonton, on February 11, 2024, Hoffman said, “I think the consumer carbon tax is dead”, and later, “So we need to find new tools that are successful.”
She went on to say, “Nobody is on board with what [the Prime Minister] did with the federal carbon tax. He absolutely broke trust and broke confidence when he looked at the polls in eastern Canada and decided to exempt them.”
Finally, she said, “There's no way people can be on board with the federal plan when even the prime minister isn't on board, when he's playing games with it.”
Even the Alberta NDP agrees, I think, with my subamendment. The purpose is to have a carbon tax election federally. Let's get this resolved. Let the voting public pick. They can make a decision.
I believe in the wisdom of crowds. I believe that voters always have the best say. They get to choose who represents them. I hope that I can continue to earn their trust, just as we all hope we can continue to earn their trust and continue to represent them in our national Parliament. It is a great privilege to do so.
I think that's exactly what Sarah Hoffman was speaking to here. She was speaking to the fact that even the Prime Minister had abandoned the federal carbon tax. Premier Eby had talked about the fact that if there hadn't been a backstop in law, he would have abandoned it as well. That's what the subamendment proposes to do: move it up to the House and have the House confirm the committee's report to say, “not before a carbon tax election happens,” because that's what the public wants to see. I think it's critically important.
With that, Chair, I'm going to stop my comments. I have more comments. I also want to note that I have a letter from the Public School Boards' Association of Alberta, which represents all the public school boards who wrote to me and other Conservative members of Parliament specifically about the impact of the carbon tax on schools in my home province, but I'll leave it at that, Chair, and I'll cede the floor.
Thank you.