The Manitoba Progressive Conservatives are calling on the NDP government to immediately cancel the federal carbon tax on heating bills for families and businesses.

This week, the Conservatives announced plans to bring forward a private member's resolution this fall that will call for the tax to stop being charged and collected through Manitoba Hydro.

According to the Conservatives, ahead of his meetings with other premiers for the Council of Federation in Halifax this week, NDP Premier Wab Kinew said he would not ask for a carbon tax exemption for Manitobans. 

"It wasn't until peer pressure from the other premiers of Canada earlier this week that he had taken a flip-flop approach to his stance on the carbon tax for home heating," says La Verendrye PC MLA Konrad Narth. 

Obby Khan is the Shadow Minister for Finance. He says it is unfair that Manitobans have to pay Justin Trudeau's carbon tax cash grab while other Canadians do not have to. 

"The Prime Minister once said that a 'Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian,'" says Khan. "It's time that he stops dividing Canadians and gives a break to everyone, including Manitoba. Manitobans can't wait for Ottawa to take action, which is why the NDP government must take the necessary step of immediately removing the carbon tax from hydro bills."

According to Narth, home heating-related carbon tax costs reached $114 million in Manitoba in 2022. He notes those costs will approach $150 million in 2023. 

"Definitely it's a hot topic in rural Manitoba, in my constituency of La Verendrye," adds Narth. "Whether it be home heating, business heating, agriculture heating, no one is immune to the carbon tax and the costs that are associated with that. It's a direct correlation also to the inflation that we've been seeing throughout our economy in the past couple of years."

Meanwhile, Narth says his party will not stand for the divide which the federal government is currently presenting to the rest of Canada. He notes Trudeau has said he will take a two-tiered approach to carbon tax relief in Canada. Narth says currently the relief is for the dirty heating source which is used primarily in eastern Canada. He adds there is no relief for home heating costs with regard to the carbon tax in western Canada. 

 

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