Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my colleague, the hon. member for Calgary Rocky Ridge.
It was about a year ago that the Prime Minister was criss-crossing Canada, talking about ushering in a new era of collaborative federalism. Not only was the Prime Minister talking about ushering in a new era of collaborative federalism, he was talking about sunny ways, consultation, co-operation, and collaboration. Yesterday, Canadians found out what the Prime Minister really meant when he spoke of collaborative federalism, when he spoke about sunny ways, consultation, co-operation, and collaboration when he unilaterally announced the imposition of a massive federal tax grab on the provinces.
The Prime Minister told the provinces that they shall impose a carbon tax or a price on carbon, they shall do it by 2018, and if they do not do it, the federal government will do it for them by imposing a price on carbon at $10 a tonne in 2018, escalating to $50 a tonne in 2022. There was no consultation or collaboration, just a unilateral imposition of a massive tax grab from the Prime Minister. Talk about sunny ways and collaborative federalism.
How did the provinces and territories respond to the Prime Minister's collaborative federalism? Premier Wall said yesterday that he was stunned by the Prime Minister's disrespect toward the provinces and territories. Premier Wall's environment minister said that Saskatchewan had been, effectively, railroaded. He called it a bad day for federal-provincial relations.
The environment minister from the Yukon was so surprised by the Prime Minister's unilateral announcement that he said it literally sucked the air out of the room. Then, later in the day, the environment minister for Nova Scotia walked out of the room on the federal environment minister and was joined by the environment ministers for Newfoundland and Labrador, and Saskatchewan. That illustrates just how the provinces are responding to the Prime Minister's so-called new era of collaborative federalism.
Speaking of the federal environment minister, who had three provincial environment ministers walk out on her yesterday, she had the audacity over the weekend, I think it was, to characterize the sensible measures brought forward by the previous Conservative government and the Conservative government's targets as fake. I will tell the House what is fake. The Liberal government's commitment to sunny ways is fake. The Liberal government's commitment to collaboration, co-operation, and consultation is fake. The Liberal government's commitment to ushering in a new era of collaborative federalism is fake. I will say what else is fake, and that is the Liberal government's commitment and the Liberal Party's commitment to reducing GHGs. That is also fake.
Canadians will not forget that this is the same Liberal Party that, in 1993, campaigned on reducing GHGs by 20% from 1988 levels by 2005. What happened between 1993 and 2005? GHG levels increased exponentially. What about Kyoto? That was the Liberal commitment to reduce GHGs 6% below 1990 levels. What happened to Kyoto? It was a promise made, a promise broken. It was another fake Liberal commitment.
However, what is not fake is the cost that this massive Liberal tax grab would have on hard-working Canadians. The average Canadian family would end up paying as much as $2,600 annually by 2022. That would be $38 billion out of the wallets of hard-working Canadians. Premier Wall characterized this Liberal massive tax grab as one of the largest tax increases in Canadian history, and he is right.
Looking across Canada, let us face it, the economy is slowing but in my province of Alberta things are particularly difficult right now. We have seen in the last year some 200,000 Albertans laid off. Unemployment is reaching near double digits. It is the worst it has been in 30 years. Youth unemployment certainly has reached double digits. I think it is around 16%. In city centres such as Calgary, the office vacancy rate is approaching 25%. Things are tough. People are hurting.
What has the current government's approach been to deal with the particularly difficult situation in the province of Alberta? One of the first things the government did upon coming to office was to kill the northern gateway pipeline, which would have helped get Alberta energy to market, which would have helped Alberta become less reliant on exporting energy to the U.S. Then the government proceeded to add new layers of red tape to the pipeline approval process to make it more difficult to get pipeline projects approved and ultimately built. Now this massive tax hike would be imposed on the people of the province of Alberta and all Canadians. I cannot help but simply conclude that the current government likes to kick Albertans when we are down.
However, it did not have to be this way. The Prime Minister could have kept his word. He could have worked in a collaborative way with the provinces to come together with a truly pan-Canadian solution. He could have worked with industry leaders to undertake a true sector-by-sector approach to reduce GHGs. However, he did not do that. He simply said it was his way or the highway with a massive, unilateral, federal tax grab.
We know that the result of this would be unfortunately not good. Hard-working, tax-paying Canadians would be worse off, they would be poorer, and Canada would be no closer to achieving its Paris targets.