B.C Premier and NDP leader David Eby walks around the Quay in North Vancouver, B.C, on Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024.Tijana Martin /The Globe and Mail
British Columbia’s NDP Premier, David Eby, the last premier in the country to defend carbon pricing and whose province was the first in Canada to have a broad-based system, says he would eliminate the levy if the federal government drops legislation requiring it.
“Our commitment is that, if the federal government decides to remove the legal backstop requiring us to have a consumer carbon tax in British Columbia, we will end the consumer carbon tax in British Columbia,” he told a news conference in Vancouver on Thursday.
The Premier announced the major policy reversal just over a week before the official start of a provincial election campaign in which the carbon price was expected to feature prominently. Mr. Eby joins a growing chorus of critics – both on the left and the right of the political spectrum.
Mr. Eby blamed the federal Liberal government for raising carbon pricing rates at a time when Canadians are struggling with affordability.
In 2008, British Columbia was the first jurisdiction in North America to implement its carbon levy, one that Ottawa did not mirror for the rest of the country until 11 years later. The policy, intended to curb emissions that are accelerating climate change, was introduced by a BC Liberal government through its Carbon Tax Act and defended by Mr. Eby until Thursday.
“When the federal government got involved and provided additional increases that were mandated in the face of increasing affordability stresses, that didn’t do us any favours here in British Columbia in terms of our long-standing record on the carbon tax,” Mr. Eby said in an interview earlier in the day. “I think it’s really compromised the political licence that was there for carbon taxes.”
A spokesperson for Jonathan Wilkinson, the federal minister of Energy and Natural Resources, said Mr. Eby can change the carbon price in any way he pleases – so long as it meets the minimum rates set by Ottawa.
“B.C. has been and is free to develop its own climate plan and its own approach to carbon pricing, so long as it meets the federal benchmark,” said Joanna Sivasankaran in a written statement.
The federal government imposed a nation-wide carbon price of $20 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions in 2019, which climbed to to $80 per tonne in April. Mr. Eby said B.C. cannot scrap his province’s tax on its own because of the federal requirement – so any change would require a concession by the federal Liberal government, or a change in government after the next federal election. Federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, whose party has been consistently polling ahead of the governing Liberals, has made scrapping carbon pricing one of his signature promises.
Mr. Eby’s shift reflects a tough campaign ahead of the Oct. 19 provincial election in which both his political rivals, the Conservatives and the Greens, are promising voters relief on the carbon tax.
Conservative Leader John Rustad, in a statement, said the Premier’s change of heart on the carbon tax shows the NDP are worried about losing the next election.
“David Eby’s sudden reversal on the carbon tax is a desperate attempt to salvage his sinking political ship,” he said. “Eby has spent years championing this disastrous tax that punishes families and businesses. Now, faced with growing opposition, he’s pretending to care.”
Mr. Eby said he still supports a carbon tax on industry, and distanced himself from Mr. Rustad’s dismissal of the need for climate action.
“I think that carbon tax is a critical tool, especially around big polluters, industrial polluters. So it’s a more nuanced view, because I believe that climate change is real,” Mr. Eby said. He was responding Thursday to remarks from federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, who signalled his party is planning to oppose the current carbon pricing regime for Canadian consumers.
Mr. Singh’s remarks earned a rare endorsement from Mr. Rustad, whose axe-the-tax promise echoes the position of Mr. Poilievre. Mr. Rustad maintains that climate change is not a crisis, and that the carbon tax does nothing to lower emissions.
The BC Green Party is also calling for a major overhaul of the tax, saying the province’s industrial polluters should bear the tax, not consumers.
“Industry gets a break on the carbon tax and the most polluting industries pay the lowest, and people are having to take the brunt of it,” Green Leader Sonia Furstenau said in August during an interview with Kelowna Now. “We need a complete overhaul of this so the price on carbon pollution is at the right place, the source of the pollution, and the people are benefiting from it, not paying it.”