Get ready to pay more to gas up as carbon tax is soon introduced

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – It looks like owning a car in the Lower Mainland is going from bad to worse as an increase in the carbon tax in just a couple of months will mean a bump in gas prices. And the timing of the levy will be inconvenient for those hoping to save some money.

The $5/t increase by the provincial government goes into effect on April 1st, right before the summer driving season when prices go up anyway.

That’s also around the time when Dan McTeague with GasBuddy.com, thinks we’ll begin approaching the $1.52/L regular range.

The increase will be roughly 1.2 cents a litre a year, which may not sound like a lot, but it is, especially because BC gets most of its supply from the US. “And that is costing us an additional 13 to 14 cents a litre, so all of this is death by a 1,000 cuts. It means, cumulatively over the next few years, it’s going to become even more expensive to get to and fro.”

He adds the domino effect of the carbon tax will not only run deep but it your wallet even harder. “This doesn’t just mean gasoline, it also means diesel which drives every economy globally and affects pretty much every point of economic activity from your grocery store, to the kind of work you’re doing to the kind of economic activity that drives the BC economy.”

McTeague says the money is not revenue neutral, despite previous reports, saying it’s money that’s being dedicated or earmarked for other purposes. “It is a wealth transfer on a major scale and one would hope that these things are taken into consideration given the totality of the high-cost of living here in Vancouver, which I think is having the unintended effect of pushing people further away and further out. This really just adds another straw to the camel’s back.”

He points out about 50 cents of every litre you pump into your car in Metro Vancouver is taxed — the most of anywhere in all of North America. “I can’t think of too many other places that would look at 51 or 52 cents a litre in taxes for gasoline. So, between municipal, transit, provincial, federal, GST and of course now carbon tax — it is quite a burden for most to have to pay that kind of fee going forward.”

For the sake of comparison, folks in Toronto are paying about $1.22/L for regular, in Winnipeg it’s about $1.11/L for regular, in Calgary it’s $1.15/L for regular and in the Maritimes it’s about $1.20/L for regular. Meantime, we’re still hovering around the $1.40/L for regular mark.

The $5/t increase is a compromise the BC NDP struck with the Green Party, as the Green platform had originally proposed a $10/t annual increase. The carbon tax has stuck around $30/t since 2012 as the previous BC Liberal government showed no inclination to increase it further other than to match the federal carbon price floor in 2021.

The goal is to have BC achieve its 2050 emissions reduction target (80 per cent below 2007 levels by 2050.)

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