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Mark Carney is Planning to Hide His Revised, Sneaky Carbon Tax and This Time, No Rebates

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Liberal leadership candidate Mark Carney seems to think giving you a discount code on a new furnace or some extra insulation is the best way to help you with affordability.

And he’s going to pay for the discounts by hitting businesses like fuel refineries and power plants with a hidden carbon tax. Of course, those businesses will just pass on the cost.

Bottom line: You still get hit with that hidden carbon tax when you buy gas or pay your bills.

But it gets worse.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at least attempted to give you some of the carbon tax money back through rebates. The Parliamentary Budget Officer consistently made it clear the rebates don’t cover all of the costs. But at least you could spend the money on the things you need most.

But under Carney’s “affordability” plan, you don’t get cash to pay down your credit card or buy groceries. You can only use the credits to buy things like e-bikes and heat pumps.

Here’s how Carney explained it.

“We will have the big polluters pay for climate incentives by developing and integrating a new consumer carbon credit market into the industrial pricing system,” Carney told a Halifax crowd. “While we still provide price certainty for households when they make climate smart choices.”

Translation: Carney would still make Canadians pay, but he’ll only help them with affordability if they’re making “smart” choices.

Sound familiar? This is a lot like the scheme former opposition leader Erin O’Toole ran on. And it ended his political career.

Carney’s carbon tax plan is terrible for two reasons.

First: it’s sneaky. Carney wants to hide the cost of the carbon tax. A powerplant running on natural gas is not going to eat the cost of Carney’s carbon tax; it will pass that expense down to ordinary people who paying the bills.

Second: as anemic as the Trudeau government rebates are, at least Canadians could use the money for the things they need most. It’s cash they can put it towards the next heating bill, or buy a pair of winter boots, or pay for birthday party decorations.

That kind of messy freedom makes some central planning politicians twitchy.

Here’s the thing: half of Canadians are broke and a discount on a new Tesla probably won’t solve their problems.

About 50 per cent are within $200 each month of not being able to make the minimum payments on their bills.

With the cost of groceries up $800 this year for a family of four, people are watching flyers for peanut butter. Food banks have record demand.

Yet, Carney wants Canadians to keep paying the carbon tax while blindfolded and then send thank-you cards when they get a few bucks off on a solar panel they can’t afford.

Clearly the architects of Carney’s plan haven’t spent many sleepless nights worrying about paying rent.

One of Carney’s recent gigs was governor of the Bank of England where he was paid $862,000 per year plus a $449,000 housing allowance.

With ermine earmuffs that thick, it’s hard to hear people’s worries.

About a thousand Canadians recently posted home heating bills online.

Kelly’s family in Northern Ontario paid $134 in the carbon tax for December’s home heating. Lilly’s household bill near Winnipeg was $140 in the carbon tax.

The average Alberta household will pay about $440 extra in the carbon tax on home heating this year.

After the carbon tax is hiked April 1, it will add an extra 21 cents to a litre of gasoline and 25 cents per litre of diesel. Filling a minivan will cost about $15 extra, filling a pickup truck will cost about $25 extra, and a trucker filling a big rig will have to pay about $250 extra in the carbon tax.

Trudeau’s carbon tax data is posted online.

Carney’s carbon tax would be hidden.

Carney isn’t saying the carbon tax is an unfair punishment for Canadians who are trying to drive to work and heat their homes.

He says the problem is “perception.”

“It has become very divisive for Canadians,” Carney told his Halifax crowd about the carbon tax. “It’s the perceptions of the negative impacts of the carbon tax on households, without fully recognizing the positive impacts of the rebate.”

Carney isn’t trying to fix the problem. He’s trying to hide it. And he wants Canadians to be happy with discount codes on “smart” purchases instead of cash.

Kris Sims is the Alberta Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

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Natural gas pipeline ownership spreads across 36 First Nations in B.C.

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Chief David Jimmie is president of Stonlasec8 and Chief of Squiala First Nation in B.C. He also chairs the Western Indigenous Pipeline Group. Photo courtesy Western Indigenous Pipeline Group

From the Canadian Energy Centre

Stonlasec8 agreement is Canada’s first federal Indigenous loan guarantee

The first federally backed Indigenous loan guarantee paves the way for increased prosperity for 36 First Nations communities in British Columbia.

In May, Canada Development Investment Corporation (CDEV) announced a $400 million backstop for the consortium to jointly purchase 12.5 per cent ownership of Enbridge’s Westcoast natural gas pipeline system for $712 million.

In the works for two years, the deal redefines long-standing relationships around a pipeline that has been in operation for generations.

“For 65 years, there’s never been an opportunity or a conversation about participating in an asset that’s come through the territory,” said Chief David Jimmie of the Squiala First Nation near Vancouver, B.C.

“We now have an opportunity to have our Nation’s voices heard directly when we have concerns and our partners are willing to listen.”

Jimmie chairs the Stonlasec8 Indigenous Alliance, which represents the communities buying into the Enbridge system.

The name Stonlasec8 reflects the different regions represented in the agreement, he said.

The Westcoast pipeline stretches more than 2,900 kilometres from northeast B.C. near the Alberta border to the Canada-U.S. border near Bellingham, Wash., running through the middle of the province.

Map courtesy Enbridge

It delivers up to 3.6 billion cubic feet per day of natural gas throughout B.C. and the Lower Mainland, Alberta and the U.S. Pacific Northwest.

“While we see the benefits back to communities, we are still reminded of our responsibility to the land, air and water so it is important to think of reinvestment opportunities in alternative energy sources and how we can offset the carbon footprint,” Jimmie said.

He also chairs the Western Indigenous Pipeline Group (WIPG), a coalition of First Nations communities working in partnership with Pembina Pipeline to secure an ownership stake in the newly expanded Trans Mountain pipeline system.

There is overlap between the communities in the two groups, he said.

CDEV vice-president Sébastien Labelle said provincial models such as the Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation (AIOC) and Ontario’s Indigenous Opportunities Financing Program helped bring the federal government’s version of the loan guarantee to life.

“It’s not a new idea. Alberta started it before us, and Ontario,” Labelle said.

“We hired some of the same advisors AIOC hired because we want to make sure we are aligned with the market. We didn’t want to start something completely new.”

Broadly, Jimmie said the Stonlasec8 agreement will provide sustained funding for investments like housing, infrastructure, environmental stewardship and cultural preservation. But it’s up to the individual communities how to spend the ongoing proceeds.

The long-term cash injections from owning equity stakes of major projects can provide benefits that traditional funding agreements with the federal government do not, he said.

Labelle said the goal is to ensure Indigenous communities benefit from projects on their traditional territories.

“There’s a lot of intangible, indirect things that I think are hugely important from an economic perspective,” he said.

“You are improving the relationship with pipeline companies, you are improving social license to do projects like this.”

Jimmie stressed the impact the collaborative atmosphere of the negotiations had on the success of the Stonlasec8 agreement.

“It takes true collaboration to reach a successful partnership, which doesn’t always happen. And from the Nation representation, the sophistication of the group was one of the best I’ve ever worked with.”

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Trump: ‘Changes are coming’ to aggressive immigration policy after business complaints

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From The Center Square

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“So we’re going to have an order on that pretty soon – we can’t do that to our farmers and leisure too, hotels, we’re going to have to use a lot of common sense on that.”

President Donald Trump said Thursday that changes are coming to his aggressive immigration policies after complaints from farmers and business owners.

“Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” Trump wrote in a social media post Thursday morning. “In many cases the Criminals allowed into our Country by the VERY Stupid Biden Open Borders Policy are applying for those jobs. This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!”

Later Thursday, Trump made it clear that businesses need workers.

“Our farmers are being hurt badly. They have very good workers – they’re not citizens, but they’ve turned out to be great. And we’re going to have to do something about that,” the president said.

He added: “We can’t take farmers and take all their people and send them back because they don’t have, maybe, what they’re supposed to have.”

Just how Trump may change his approach to immigration enforcement remains unclear, but he said he wants to help farmers and business owners.

“You go into a farm and you look and people, they’ve been there for 20 or 25 years and they work great and the owner of the farm loves them and you’re supposed to throw them out. You know what happens? They end up hiring the criminals that have come in, the murderers from prisons and everything else,” Trump said.

Trump said changes would be coming soon, but gave little detail on how policies could change.

“So we’re going to have an order on that pretty soon – we can’t do that to our farmers and leisure too, hotels, we’re going to have to use a lot of common sense on that.”

In a later post on Truth Social, Trump said illegal immigration had destroyed American institutions.

“Biden let 21 Million Unvetted, Illegal Aliens flood into the Country from some of the most dangerous and dysfunctional Nations on Earth — Many of them Rapists, Murderers, and Terrorists. This tsunami of Illegals has destroyed Americans’ Public Schools, Hospitals, Parks, Community Resources, and Living Conditions,” the president wrote. “They have stolen American Jobs, consumed BILLIONS OF DOLLARS in Free Welfare, and turned once idyllic Communities, like Springfield, Ohio, into Third World Nightmares.”

He added that deportations would continue: “I campaigned on, and received a Historic Mandate for, the largest Mass Deportation Program in American History. Polling shows overwhelming Public Support for getting the Illegals out, and that is exactly what we will do. As Commander-in-Chief, I will always protect and defend the Heroes of ICE and Border Patrol, whose work has already resulted in the Most Secure Border in American History. Anyone who assaults or attacks an ICE or Border Agent will do hard time in jail. Those who are here illegally should either self deport using the CBP Home App or, ICE will find you and remove you. Saving America is not negotiable!”

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