Canadian Federal Politics Thread v5

[Regorium]

Originally Posted by opendoor

Even completely ignoring carbon, anyone paying $5K a year to heat their house in the Maritimes who doesn't install a heat pump is just flushing their money down the toilet. At a COP of 2.5, they'd be saving about $2.5-3.5K a year in heating costs based on the average Atlantic Canada electricity prices.

Yeah, I get that not everyone has cash kicking around, but if you can afford to pay $5K (or $4.55K without the carbon tax) for heating, surely you can take advantage of the many government programs and get a heat pump with a 2-3 year payback, after which point you're saving thousands of dollars per year. You could even put the heat pump on a credit card at 20% interest and still pay it off within 5 years just on the energy savings.

I think this is what blows my mind. The government also has their oil to heat pump conversion program that gives money up front to convert from oil heating to heat pump heating. If you are low income, they basically give you $10k for free.

It's already the best possible scenario and also a very obvious example where the carbon tax clearly works to fund these conversions.

But no, we just decide to blow up the entire carbon tax framework for a bunch of votes.

[calgarygeologist]

I'm not a Twitter user so I can't get to the posts but Alberta's favorite economist had a lot to say about the carbon tax decision and he was CBC Power and Politics this afternoon making a lot of excellent points.

The carbon tax is now effectively dead. And the federal government killed it in the dumbest way possible. Trudeau has provided a carbon tax exemption on home heating for families in one part of the country, but not here. It's unfair, it's unacceptable

[edslunch]

Who is advising the PM these days? Anyone? The Liberal machine used to be unstoppable. Now???

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Regorium

I think this is what blows my mind. The government also has their oil to heat pump conversion program that gives money up front to convert from oil heating to heat pump heating. If you are low income, they basically give you $10k for free.

It's already the best possible scenario and also a very obvious example where the carbon tax clearly works to fund these conversions.

But no, we just decide to blow up the entire carbon tax framework for a bunch of votes.

I think if I read right that your house has to be worth less then 360k, your income 30k per year, and you can't keep your secondary heating furnace.



So it eliminates a lot of houses anyways.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by edslunch

Who is advising the PM these days? Anyone? The Liberal machine used to be unstoppable. Now???

Katy and Gerald are slipping on the messaging.



Eventually parties and leader messaging becomes tiring. Also the Liberals have a reputation of dishonesty now, so when they post their messages, most people are like whatever.


Its the same with Singh, he spends his day on social media blaming Trudeau for everything from supporting billionaires, to not caring about the middle tax, and he's just getting assaulted because he blames Trudeau for the ills of the world on one side, but he supports the Liberals by killing committees and voting for everything that Trudeau wants voted for. The NDP messaging is working against them.

[chemgear]

https://edmontonjournal.com/opinion/...c-89b8a8d42c85

For one shining moment, a Liberal minister named Gudie Hutchings was Canada’s most honest politician.

She admitted, with no apparent sense of the cow pie underfoot, that provinces with Liberal MLAs can get a carbon tax break. Those without Liberals should just get busy and elect more.

No single remark has done more to blow the doors off Liberal claims of regional fairness in climate measures.

“I can tell you the (Liberal) Atlantic caucus was vocal with what they’ve heard from their constituents,” Hutchings said. “And perhaps they need to elect more Liberals on the Prairies so that we can have that conversation as well.”

You can see them gathered around, Liberal MPs in big trouble, begging for a local exemption from their own government’s policy, even directly to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

EDIT:

[Fuzz]

How can he do that, you might be asking? Short answer: he really can’t. As U of A economist Andrew Leach has pointed out, Moe’s essentially directing the executives of SaskEnergy to break federal law and possibly land themselves in jail. And Moe doesn’t even have the legal fig leaf that the Alberta Sovereignty Act would give the Alberta premier if she decided to issue a similar order. He’s apparently just ordering some folks to ignore federal law because he says so, or so it seems. (Is this better than giving the order under the authority of the probably-unconstitutional Sovereignty Act? Not really.)

Ironically, the Alberta premier can’t issue a similar order because there’s no crown corporation responsible for selling natural gas to customers in Alberta. It’s not every day a conservative premier is secretly jealous that she doesn’t have a crown corporation handy!

https://lisayoung.substack.com/p/the...overeignty-act

[Fuzz]

Now would be a great time for Trudeau to fire Steven Guilbeault. I think most Canadians recognize he's been driving a lot of the Liberal climate strategy and he's not really interested in the balance during the transition, and need for O&G after. It'd be good for Trudeau, but even better for the country to have this wiener gone.

[Harry Lime]

Alberta and Calgary selling utilities were some of the stupidest political moves ever, then and now.

[bizaro86]

The law requires each province implement something equivalent to the Federal version. Couldn't the western provinces say "we're doing the exact Federal version with an exemption on home heating fuel". I think a court would rule that an exemption on home heating fuel in Atlantic Canada is equivalent to an exemption on home heating fuel everywhere else.

And to be honest, if they don't I think a bunch of people driving to Trudeau's house and honking their horns is starting to look justified. There's no way taxes should be different based on what party you vote for.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

The law requires each province implement something equivalent to the Federal version. Couldn't the western provinces say "we're doing the exact Federal version with an exemption on home heating fuel". I think a court would rule that an exemption on home heating fuel in Atlantic Canada is equivalent to an exemption on home heating fuel everywhere else.

And to be honest, if they don't I think a bunch of people driving to Trudeau's house and honking their horns is starting to look justified. There's no way taxes should be different based on what party you vote for.

They could, and that would probably stand up in court now, pretty easily. But it would also require them to create their own program, which would still have to match the feds in other areas, and that would then mean they would own a carbon tax, and their is no way they would do that.

[Firebot]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Now would be a great time for Trudeau to fire Steven Guilbeault. I think most Canadians recognize he's been driving a lot of the Liberal climate strategy and he's not really interested in the balance during the transition, and need for O&G after. It'd be good for Trudeau, but even better for the country to have this wiener gone.

Trudeau is who put him there on purpose...to antagonize the west. It just happens that heavy handed carbon taxes also antagonizes people that vote Liberals.

Let's not forget he was heritage minister prior and he was a disaster back then. And he also survived the summer's cabinet shuffle that took out the likes of Marco Mendicino and David Lametti and Mona Fortier. Lametti in particular was an odd exclusion.

You are also quite delusional if you think that Trudeau does not back the current carbon tax, 170$ per tonne by 2023 approach which was implemented in 2020 prior to Guilbeault taking the job.

https://www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/news-re...e-plan-protect

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/car...plan-1.5837709

It's the polls and the people that are the problem, not the Liberal ideology.

Guilbeault isn't going anywhere. I agree with you on principle that he is a disaster for them, but this is the Liberals we are talking about. Guilbeault is considered one of their most prized assets.

[Doctorfever]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Now would be a great time for Trudeau to fire Steven Guilbeault. I think most Canadians recognize he's been driving a lot of the Liberal climate strategy and he's not really interested in the balance during the transition, and need for O&G after. It'd be good for Trudeau, but even better for the country to have this wiener gone.

Getting rid of him wouldn’t accomplish anything when you replace with more of the same. The carbon tax is a Liberal government thing, I don’t think they can pin all their problems on one guy, then fire him and tell everyone it is now fixed. Although, they have done that in the past.

[Yoho]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

Getting rid of him wouldn’t accomplish anything when you replace with more of the same. The carbon tax is a Liberal government thing, I don’t think they can pin all their problems on one guy, then fire him and tell everyone it is now fixed. Although, they have done that in the past.

I would have loved to see Guilbeault‘a face when Trudeau announced the pause out East.

[Fuzz]

I was just saying if Trudeau wants to dump some negative press and change course to salvage some votes, it would be an easy move.

[Firebot]

So would dumping the carbon tax in its entirety.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Doctorfever

Getting rid of him wouldn’t accomplish anything when you replace with more of the same. The carbon tax is a Liberal government thing, I don’t think they can pin all their problems on one guy, then fire him and tell everyone it is now fixed. Although, they have done that in the past.

Would getting rid of the carbon tax encourage you to vote Liberal?

Who have you voted for in the past?

[Firebot]

Liberals dumped Mendicino because he was a liability with no redeeming factors.

Liberals clearly see Guilbault as a shining revolutionary for climate change within the same ranks as Greta Thunberg. Removing him means the carbon tax and climate change message is effectively neutered.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/poli...burnish-their/

Removing him would significantly hurt their image with environmentalists.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I came to the conclusion that this particular iteration of the LPC was unfit to govern since the SNC Lavalin issue, so the carbon tax was never going to be a vote-determining issue for me... but even if I hadn't come to that conclusion, the problem here would be less about whether the carbon tax itself is worth changing your vote over. It's the unequivocal statement that the government is not the Government of Canada, but only the government of the ridings that vote for the Liberals. It's not there to make life better for Canadians, it's there to make life better for Liberal supporters.

And as for Cliff asking whether that's anything new, or surprising to hear from your country's government, first of all, yes. Second, even to the extent that transactional politics is a thing and policies favour specific regions (largely Quebec) for political gain, I have never heard of a situation where your tax rate depends on which party controls the riding you're in. That's not a precedent that can be allowed to be set.

[Yoho]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1719381929168916848