SLOBODIAN: Trudeau's carbon tax hike will hit you from ‘farm to truck to table’

The dreaded carbon tax hike that kicks in April 1, will deal a severe blow to Manitoba’s pork industry that injects $2.3 billion a year into the provincial economy.The sting of increased costs will be felt by every household and industry, warns the province’s Conservative agriculture critic MLA Jeff Bereza. And he wonders if customers “can stomach” the 23% increase in prices producers must levy to break even.“Or will they just find another supplier who doesn’t have to pay the carbon tax instead?” said Bereza in a news release.“The carbon tax hike will cost Manitoba a lot of bacon and the same equation can be applied to beef, poultry and just about any products from Manitoba’s agriculture industry.”And everywhere else.Yet, as worried Canadians brace for even tougher times, the Liberals ignored requests by provincial premiers opposing the hike to be heard. Only Saskatchewan and Alberta premiers Scott Moe and Danielle Smith appeared by teleconference at the Commons government operations committee, Moe on Wednesday and Smith on Thursday.Liberal MP Irek Kusmierczyk flippantly dismissed Moe’s appeal to kill the April 1 hike as “political stunt and theatre.”The Liberals and NDP could not care less about the hike’s impact that will be felt from ‘farm to truck to dinner table'.Manitoba is Canada’s largest hog supplier. With 624 farms exporting to 30 countries, the industry employs 22,000 people. Are future layoffs pending? Count on negative ripple effects.Despite a recent poll showing 83% of Manitobans demand he stand up to Ottawa, Premier Wab Kinew props up the Trudeau/NDP government’s painful, senseless carbon tax hike used to justify excruciating costs attached to the senseless climate change hoax they champion.Like most Canadians, Manitobans don’t want to accept the carbon tax.But it wasn’t Kinew, it was Saskatchewan's Moe who said Canadians don’t have to.“We don’t need to accept this moving forward. We can make changes,” Moe told the committee.He urged Cabinet to cancel the crippling tax, according to Blacklock’s Reporter.“Next Monday we are going to see the carbon tax measure increase to a level that was previously never committed to achieve at its introduction,” said Moe, who on February 29 cancelled carbon tax collection on homeowners by SaskEnergy, Saskatchewan’s Crown-owned natural gas distributor.“Our overreaching goal is to keep taxes as low as possible, in particular taxes that are ineffective like the carbon tax,” said Moe.Kinew refuses to join premiers of all party stripes demanding the tax be scrapped.“Kinew instead deflects the topic by evoking the temporary gas tax ‘holiday'. However, the fact is that the 23% hike will bring the carbon tax to $0.17/litre at the pump. Not only does the carbon tax cost more than the provincial gas tax, but unlike the NDP’s temporary stunt, the carbon tax is here to stay,” said Bereza.Kinew paused the gas tax in January for six months. He later indicated it could remain in effect all year.He claimed the fuel tax pause would drive food prices down, but Bereza pointed to statistics that show Manitoba food prices will rise another 4.5% this year.A Leger poll commissioned by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation found 83% of Manitobans oppose what will be a 17-cents-per-litre hike on regular gasoline, 21-cents-per-litre on diesel fuel and 15-cents-per-cubic-metre on natural gas.The 23% hike passed on to consumers by food producers doesn’t end there.“Manitoba truckers, who bring most of our goods from the farms and factories to our tables, will bear the burden of the carbon tax hike. Local companies not only haul in Manitoba, but across North America,” said Bereza.“How can they possibly sustain themselves without passing cost hikes on to customers? In short, they can’t.”Farmers, industry and all Manitobans face higher food prices, fuel costs and heating costs.Yet Trudeau plans to increase the carbon tax until 2030.Meanwhile, as of April 1, it’ll cost substantially more to raise a hog. Producers heat barns with natural gas or propane and mainly feed hogs soybean meal and corn.“From buying their feed to keeping on the heat, pork producers will be impacted by the 23% carbon tax hike in their barns and at the farm where they grow the crops, as will the companies that dry the grain using natural gas or propane,” said Bereza.Soybean crushers alone will pass on increased carbon tax costs — from $150,000 a year to $185,000.Last November, Kinew threatened “action” if grocery chains didn’t pass the pause savings on to consumers who since “haven’t heard a peep” about that.“Manitobans need to know what this premier is doing for long-term affordability, because so far Kinew has proven to be more of a showman making idle promises than a statesman who has plans to take action,” said Bereza.Conservatives urged Kinew to join fellow premiers in the fight and “stand up to Ottawa” and ensure “real relief for Manitobans.”Moe, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs and Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston petitioned the Commons finance committee to testify against the carbon tax hike.Committee chair Liberal MP Peter Fonseca didn’t bother to reply.“The Liberal Chair, maybe under political pressure from his own party, refused,” said Conservative MP Kelly McCauley.“As the premiers are the highest office holders in their provinces representing millions and millions of Canadians, I thought we should respect the provinces and invite the premiers to participate in our study of the budget Estimates which includes the government’s spending which includes the carbon tax.”Liberal MPs protested Moe testifying at McCauley request.“A meeting was called without consultation,” huffed Kusmierczyk.Well, maybe this uppity, out-of-touch MP now has an inkling about how Canadians feel after not being consulted about the carbon tax his party, supported by the NDP, foists on them.The Liberals excel at “stunts and political theatre” he accused Conservatives of pulling.Moe’s tax strike came on the heels of cabinet’s unilateral decision to cancel $1 billion in yearly tax collections on home heating oil. Who did that pork benefit? Mainly Atlantic Canada where 24 Liberal MPs are up for election.How about the slick move recently by the Liberals to shift the election date forward a week to allow rookie MPs to meet the six-years-in-office requirement to collect handsome pensions?That ensures the despised climate obsessed, carbon tax gung-ho Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, a key force behind our misery, will get his pension if booted out.Between now and the election to be held October 27, 2025, at the latest, Trudeau and the gang will have to get creative in deflecting blame. Increasingly intolerant Canadians won’t buy their lame tax grab excuses anymore.Don’t expect empathy or a reversal. Expect haughty preaching lame promises — and higher living costs. Expect Liberals and NDPs to ramp up rolling around in pork-barrelling mud to buy votes with money they steal from Canadians.

SLOBODIAN: Trudeau's carbon tax hike will hit you from ‘farm to truck to table’

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