Economy
Trudeau accused of lacking leadership after refusing to meet with premiers about carbon tax
From LifeSiteNews
Ontario Premier Doug Ford called the prime minister’s answer ‘snarky.’
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s refusal to meet with five Canadian premiers, who have demanded a meeting with him to discuss the ever-escalating carbon tax that shot up 23 percent on April 1, shows he lacks any true “leadership,” quipped Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe.
Last Thursday during an interview with the CBC’s Matt Galloway for an episode that aired-on April 4, Trudeau said he already “had” a meeting with the premiers in 2016 and will “continue to talk with premiers” about the carbon tax but will not meet with them soon.
Moe said Trudeau’s refusal to meet with the premiers is “not leadership.”
“Premiers have respectfully asked the Prime Minister for a meeting to discuss the carbon tax. Here is the snarky answer that we got,” Moe wrote Monday on X, with a link to a CBC report regarding Trudeau dismissing a full-out meeting with the premiers.
“That’s not leadership,” he added.
Shortly after the Trudeau government raised the carbon tax by 23 percent on April 1, the premiers of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, and New Brunswick all wrote letters to Trudeau asking him to convene an emergency first ministers meeting, to discuss the carbon tax’s detrimental effect on Canadians finances.
The first premier to write to Trudeau was Newfoundland and Labrador’s Andrew Furey, who wrote to him before April 1 demanding a meeting.
Last Thursday, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith in her letter to Trudeau wrote, “Albertans and Canadians are facing a cost-of-living crisis not seen in decades.”
“In March, natural gas was selling at less than $1.80 a gigajoule. Now that the carbon tax has increased to $4.09 per gigajoule, the tax alone is more than double what it costs Albertans to heat their homes. This is not just reckless, it is immoral and inhumane,” she wrote.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford in his letter to Trudeau said, “This carbon tax has to go, or in a year and a half, the prime minister’s going. It’s as simple as that. He will be going. I’ll guarantee you.”
Last Friday at a press conference, Ford said, “Taxing people doesn’t reduce emissions, and that’s what they’re doing. They’re hurting the economy. They’re hurting people. Unacceptable.”
Protests against Trudeau have been increasing in recent months due to the unpopularity of higher carbon taxes as well as other governmental policies.
LifeSiteNews reported last week that protesters let Trudeau know their true feelings about his tanking in the polls by heckling him with loud drum beats and screams during a press conference.
On April 1, Canada’s carbon tax, which was introduced by the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2019, increased from $65 to $85 per tonne despite seven of 10 provincial premiers objecting to the increase and 70% of Canadians saying they are against it.
Trudeau has remained adamant that he will not pause the hikes.
As it stands, Canadians living in provinces under the federal carbon pricing scheme pay $65 per tonne, but the Trudeau government wants to increase this to $170 per tonne by 2030.
Recent polls show that the scandal-plagued government has sent the Liberals into a nosedive with no end in sight. Per a recent LifeSiteNews report, according to polls, in a Canadian federal election held today, Conservatives under leader Pierre Poilievre would win a majority in the House of Commons over Trudeau’s Liberals.
Trudeau’s government is trying to force net-zero regulations on all Canadian provinces, notably on electricity generation, as early as 2035. The provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan are adamantly opposed to Trudeau’s 2035 goals.
The Trudeau government’s current environmental goals, which are in lockstep with the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, include phasing out coal-fired power plants, reducing fertilizer usage, and curbing natural gas use over the coming decades.
The reduction and eventual elimination of the use of so-called “fossil fuels” and a transition to unreliable “green” energy has been pushed by the World Economic Forum (WEF) – the globalist group behind the socialist “Great Reset” agenda in which Trudeau and some of his cabinet are involved.
The population drops for the first time in years, exposing an economy built on temporary residents, tuition cash, and government debt rather than real productivity
Canadians have been told for years that population decline was unthinkable, that it was an economic death spiral, that only mass immigration could save us. That was the line. Now the numbers are in, and suddenly the people who said that are very quiet.
Statistics Canada reports that between July 1 and October 1, 2025, Canada’s population fell by 76,068 people, a decline of 0.2 percent, bringing the total population to 41,575,585. This is not a rounding error. It is not a model projection. It is an official quarterly population loss, outside the COVID period, confirmed by the federal government’s own data
The reason matters. This did not happen because Canadians suddenly stopped having children or because of a natural disaster. It happened because the number of non‑permanent residents dropped by 176,479 people in a single quarter, the largest quarterly decline since comparable records began in 1971. Permit expirations outpaced new permits by more than two to one. Outflows totaled 339,505, while inflows were just 163,026
That is the so‑called growth engine shutting down.
Permanent immigration continued at roughly the same pace as before. Canada admitted 102,867 permanent immigrants in the quarter, consistent with recent levels. Births minus deaths added another 17,600 people. None of that was enough to offset the collapse in temporary residency. Net international migration overall was negative, at minus 93,668
And here’s the part you’re not supposed to say out loud. For the Liberal‑NDP government, this is bad news. Their entire economic story has rested on population‑driven GDP growth, not productivity. Add more people, claim the economy is growing, borrow more money, and run the national credit card a little harder. When population growth reverses, that illusion collapses. GDP per capita does not magically improve. Housing shortages do not disappear. The math just stops working.
The regional numbers make that clear. Ontario’s population fell by 0.4 percent in the quarter. British Columbia fell by 0.3 percent. Every province and territory lost population except Alberta and Nunavut, and even Alberta’s growth was just 0.2 percent, its weakest since the border‑closure period of 2021
Now watch who starts complaining first. Universities are already bracing for it. Study permit holders alone fell by 73,682 people in three months, with Ontario losing 47,511 and British Columbia losing 14,291. These are the provinces with the largest university systems and the highest dependence on international tuition revenue
You’re going to hear administrators and activists say this is a crisis. What they mean is that fewer students are paying international tuition to subsidize bloated campuses and programs that produce no measurable economic value. When the pool of non‑permanent residents shrinks, departments that exist purely because enrollment was artificially inflated start to disappear. That’s not mysterious. That’s arithmetic.
For years, Canadians were told that any slowdown in population growth was dangerous. The truth is more uncomfortable. What’s dangerous is building a national economic model on temporary residents, borrowed money, and headline GDP numbers while productivity stagnates. The latest StatsCan release doesn’t just show a population decline. It shows how fragile the story really was, and how quickly it unravels when the numbers stop being padded.
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The White House on Thursday declared a decisive turn in the inflation fight, pointing to new data showing core inflation has fallen to its lowest level in nearly five years — a milestone the administration says validates President Donald Trump’s economic reset after inheriting what it calls a historic cost-of-living crisis from the Biden era. In a statement accompanying the report, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said inflation “came in far lower than market expectations,” drawing a sharp contrast with the 9 percent peak under President Joe Biden and arguing the numbers reflect sustained relief for American households. “Core inflation is at a new multi-year low, as prices for groceries, medicine, gas, airfare, car rentals, and hotels keep falling,” Leavitt said, adding that lower prices and rising paychecks are expected to continue into the new year.
According to the White House, core inflation — widely viewed by economists as the most reliable gauge because it strips out volatile food and energy costs — is now down roughly 70 percent from its Biden-era high. Officials noted that if inflation continues at the pace of the last two months, it would be running at an annualized rate of about 1.2 percent, well below the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent target. The report also highlighted broad-based price moderation across consumer staples and services, with declines in groceries, dairy, fruits and vegetables, prescription drugs, clothing, airfares, natural gas, car and truck rentals, and hotel prices. Average gas prices have fallen to multi-year lows, while rent inflation has dropped to its lowest level since October 2021, a shift the administration attributes in part to tougher enforcement against illegal immigration and reduced pressure on housing demand.
Wages, the White House says, are rising alongside easing prices. Private-sector workers are on track to see real wages increase by about $1,300 in President Trump’s first full year back in office, clawing back purchasing power lost during the inflation surge of the previous administration. Gains are strongest among blue-collar workers, with annualized real earnings up roughly $1,800 for construction workers and $1,600 for manufacturing employees. Administration officials also took aim at critics who warned Trump’s tariff policies would reignite inflation, arguing the data shows no demonstrable inflationary impact despite repeated predictions from Wall Street and academic economists.
NEC Director Kevin Hassett on the latest inflation report: "It was just an absolute blockbuster report… We looked at 61 forecasts, and this number came in better than every single one of them." 🔥 pic.twitter.com/rBJpkmjuNa
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) December 18, 2025
Even commentators across the media spectrum acknowledged the strength of the report. CNBC’s Steve Liesman called it “a very good number,” while CNN’s Matt Egan said it was “another step in the right direction.” Harvard economist Ken Rogoff described the reading as “a better number than anyone was expecting,” adding, “There’s no other way to spin it.” Bloomberg’s Chris Anstey noted the figure came in two-tenths below the lowest estimate in a survey of 62 economists, calling it “remarkable,” while The Washington Post’s Andrew Ackerman wrote that inflation “cooled unexpectedly,” easing pressure on household budgets.
For the White House, the message was blunt: the inflation era is over. Officials framed Thursday’s report as proof that Trump has followed through on his promise to defeat the cost-of-living crisis he inherited, laying what they called the groundwork for a strong year ahead. As the president told the nation this week, the administration insists the progress is real — and that, in his words, the best is yet to come.
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