Madam Speaker, it is a real honour to speak on this important issue. I will be splitting my time with the amazing member for Durham.
It is important we have this debate, and I will read the motion before the House:
That, given the government's carbon tax will impose higher gas prices, and making “better choices”, as the Prime Minister suggested, will not help most Canadians heat their homes and buy groceries, the House call on the government to cancel plans for new taxes that would further raise prices on consumers.
The focus of the motion today is that Canadians are complaining about the high taxes that have been imposed by the Liberal government, and part of that is a carbon tax.
The introduction of carbon tax and new taxes that the government has imposed on Canadians have been carefully crafted and wordsmithed to make them sound good for Canadians. It is like a snake oil salesman saying that what is being offered will heal all our ills.
I carefully have made note of how the government and the NDP today are presenting putting a price on carbon. They say that it is important to have a market mechanism that will improve the environment, that will help business, that will build a new economy, that will be revenue neutral. It is going to do none of that, but that is what they are saying it will do.
Before I elaborate on that, I will reflect on past years.
I have have been honoured to represent Langley—Aldergrove in the House for the last 14 years. Before that, I was a councillor for 14 years. Every year, we would have our balanced budget. We were required by law to balance our budgets. Often there were opportunities to provide tax exempt status for different community groups. As this was discussed with the community, we would ask if a particular group should be tax exempt. Of course, everybody would say, yes, that it was a good group, that we should give it tax exempt status. The next question would be whether people would then support their taxes being raised a little, because that $30,000 or $10,000 collected in tax from that group would now be exempt, and the money had to come from somewhere. Canadians, British Columbians, constituents, would say that they supported the tax exempt status, but they were already paying enough taxes. If it meant their taxes would go up, then they would not support it.
From that paradigm, this is where we find ourselves now. If we ask Canadians if they support providing a good, clean environment for our children, our grandchildren, etc., then, absolutely, Canadians are willing to pay their fair share of taxes and do what is good for the environment. We all do, but how do we get there? Will putting a price on carbon achieve that?
What is putting a price on carbon? What does that mean? It means increase the price of energy fuel, such as gas to refill our cars, and make it more expensive to the point where a behavioural change is forced. It is also known as social engineering, when we force behavioural change. Changing to what? To a new energy-efficient economy.
The previous government made it a priority to create energy efficiency, and it did a lot in that way. The standards for motor vehicles were greatly improved. As of 2011, all vehicles came under totally new standards. Fridges, stoves, other appliances, and homes were improved. Home improvement grants were provided. The amount of energy that we used as Canadians was greatly reduced because we invested in Canadians to do a better job and use our energy more efficiently. However, a carbon tax would not do that.
A carbon tax will put the price of natural gas to heat our homes way higher, so people will use electricity instead of natural gas. That is a possibility, but it is a different challenge. In British Columbia, we create hydroelectric. Those calling for a transformation to new economies would then oppose hydroelectric. However, we need to create that new electricity in a new economy. We cannot have it both ways. It is ironic that those who say we need to have a new economy also oppose electricity. Hydroelectricity is a blessing to British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec, and other provinces.
If we put a price on carbon, how high does it have to go to force a change of behaviour? When we ask Canadians how high would they support gasoline prices going, they say prices are high enough now. When we ask them how much they would they pay to heat their home, they say they are high enough now. That is not what the government is supporting. That is not what the NDP is supporting. They want the energy prices to continue to rise until people stop using oil and gas.
The Liberals are using the taxes they collect from Canadians to fund protesters to oppose pipelines to move energy within Canada. They are wordsmithing when they say carbon pricing will improve the environment. It is not true. They say that carbon pricing will help new business. That is not true. It actually makes Canadian business less competitive when it costs more to manufacture in Canada. That is why, unfortunately, we see some of our jobs in Canada move to the United States where there is no carbon pricing.
The Liberals have said that carbon pricing will build a new economy. That takes time. Technological change in Canada and the world is good. Doing things more efficiently is good, but forcing the change through disruptive ways of enforcement and not letting it happen as it should is not. Again, Liberals have misled Canadians.
Carbon pricing being revenue neutral is not true. The government knows very well that it will be making billions of dollars of new taxes on the backs of Canadians.
When the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment, which I had the honour of being that position, is given talking points, sadly, the talking points are misleading. The carbon tax is not revenue neutral. The government is charging a tax on a tax, which Canadians have told me is very unfair. They asked me to introduce a bill, which I did, that would give the government an opportunity to truly make the carbon tax revenue neutral. The government voted against that.
What the government says and what it does are very different. There is proverb “A tree is known by its fruit”. We are known by what we do as parliamentarians, not by what we say. We can wordsmith and say things that are misleading, but we will be known for our actions. The previous government made a commitment for efficiency and we achieved that. We made promises and we kept those promises.
As we did in previous Parliaments, we took action on the environment, providing a trajectory of moving forward to a clean environment. We set the targets which the Liberal government adopted as the Paris targets for 2030. We were on target. and when we form government in 2019, we will be back on target, keeping our promises and improving the economy for future generations.