Sask. residents will receive a reduced carbon tax rebate, federal minister says | Power & Politics

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Mo says he expects Ottawa to still give his residents some rebates even though he stopped collecting and paying the tax on home heating I would expect it to mirror whatever is happening and the federal government is doing in Atlantic Canada where they made identical decision on

Home heating fuel so if it if it’s a proportional reduction in Atlantic Canada we would expect it to be a proportional reduction here so uh pay less tax uh you get smaller rebate that’s that’s fine our goal would be to pay zero of the carbon tax for the

Federal response to that I’m joined Now by minister of energy and natural resources Jonathan Wilkinson Minister thanks for taking the time thanks for having me you you heard Scott Mo’s view there that he thinks a proportional reduction in the rebates based on what they’re withholding from you seems like a reasonable compromise

Is is that something you’re willing to accept even though Saskatchewan is defying federal law well it’s certainly not a reasonable compromise when a provincial Premier decides that they are going to willfully break the laws in this country um it’s pretty historic and uh I don’t think

Anybody has ever seen the likes of it before certainly not a province like Saskatchewan that has given such great leadership to Canada through Tommy Douglas alen Blakey Ross Thatcher and Roy Romano so I find it pretty shocking I think most Canadians would find it pretty shocking but in terms of the

Rebate itself um we will obviously the rebate is based on how much is actually paid all of that money goes back if uh the province is not going to rebate the money associated with home heating um then there will be a reduction ction in the rebate accordingly unfortunately

That will hit people who actually live on Modest incomes all of the research shows and Scott Mo can make up whatever he wants to in terms of his opinion but the data is clear go talk to Brent uh Brent doter at the University of Regina or Trevor tombs at the University of

Calgary it’s people who live on Modest incomes that get the most money back much more than they pay and so he is going after and attacking the most vulnerable people who live in Saskatchewan so but but Minister I I mean the rebate is one thing the fact that is blatantly defying and breaking

The law is another I I I mean what is the government going to do about that well as I say I think it’s shocking and I think Canadians should be shocked I mean that that a an elected premier of a province is saying that he can choose

Which laws he will actually abide by in which he will not I mean if if his citizens take the same view with respect to provincial laws you will have Anarchy in the province of saskatchwan it’s it’s shocking um and uh and I think that people in saskatchwan Ross the country

Should be appalled at at Behavior such irresponsible behavior on the part of a provincial Premier um we are going to look at at what they have done and obviously we’re going to have conversations about what the consequences are going forward um we have not come to any determination of

That I still hope that they will step back from the brink and actually behave like law-abiding citizens but you know I guess at the end of the day that’s up to Premier M the the legislation says people can go to jail for up to a year

They can be fined a set amount based on the what they were supposed to remit if they refuse to pay I I mean will you look at criminal actions against the government and how does that work when it’s a federal government against a provincial government well as I say we’re we’re

Going to S sit down and and uh have the conversations about the different options and try to be thoughtful about that I don’t think anybody’s talking about putting people in jail um but at the end of the day the expectation is that provincial premieres will abide by

The law just like every other citizen in this country that is not a novel sort of concept it’s something that we just expect as a matter of course and we live in a Democratic Society at the end of the day if Scott doesn’t mow like a particular law he can either run for

Office provincially if it’s a provincial law and change it um or he can actually work with the opposition which I know he does on an ongoing basis and try to change the law by by changing the federal government that’s what a democracy is but you don’t get to pick

And choose which laws you actually decide you’re going to abide by and which you don’t right so I get to vote in an election so if I don’t like what you’re doing I can vote but if I break the law between now and election day I expect to have consequences so we heard

From Minister Gilbo saying that that there would be measures taken like what are we talking talking about here because I I I can never recall in my time I’ve seen a lot of federal provincial battles I’ve never seen a premier and a government simply refuse to follow the law of the

Land well I I have never seen that either and believe me I mean I used to work for the government of saskat and I spent several years there working as a constitutional negotiator and a federal provincial relations expert um I I I uh I love that Province it it is where I

Grew up I it has always produced enormously thoughtful Premier up until this point I I just think it’s shocking and and appalling that a provincial Premier would behave in this way and and it really is not becoming of somebody in that role okay but you know the argument

Is that Scott MO is doing this for political reasons he’s got an election this year but so does Blaine higs so does Andrew Fury so does David eie I I mean clearly the federal government needs to do something to suggest that its laws need to be upheld other than

Denounce it um because a government can’t get away with something a citizen can’t get away with for sure uh at the end of the day the government is going to have to do something there’s no question you can’t allow provinces to Simply thumb their nose at laws that

Have been upheld in the Supreme Court of Canada um again if you get to pick and choose which laws you actually get to abide by and which ones you can decide not to you have Anarchy in this country like that just doesn’t work so there will have to be consequences all I’m

Saying is we need to be thoughtful about how we do this we need to make sure that we’ve you know looked at all of the different options and before we make a decision and that’s certainly something that the government of Canada is going to do well but we’ve known for months

That they were contemplating this minister so surely some sort of contingency planning must have been going on in terms of getting ready for this so when will we know uh what the federal government is going to do about this like what is the timeline before we know how you’re officially going to

Respond to what Premier MO is doing here well I would say first of all I don’t think any of us certainly I uh didn’t actually believe the province would willfully flout uh the law like I just didn’t believe that a provincial Premier would get it get himself into

That situation it is um it is historic it is historic in the history of this country where a provincial Premier can simply say we’re just going to choose not to abide by a law like that’s just it’s crazy it’s like a tinpot dictatorship um so you know at the end

Of the day uh I don’t think any of us believe that that he would actually go through with it because it just didn’t make any sense so we are in the process of looking at the different options and we will be bringing something uh forward

In the near term but all I would say is is we want to make sure it’s thoughtful that we actually are able to communicate it effectively and and communicate with Canadians about what you know what the options were and why we actually chose one versus another um I think Canadians

Across the country are probably pretty shocked about the behavior of the pro the premier ofus scaton as well yeah I mean reducing the rebate is one thing but for a government doesn’t support carbon pricing doesn’t support the rebates uh and for a province as seemingly doesn’t support it either I’m

Not sure what kind of consequences there are in taking that step though I understand why you have to do it because it’s meant to be a revenue neutral measure um do you look at other transfers to the province I mean they get infrastructure money they get health

Money they got all kinds of of of federal cash if they’re not going to follow federal law do you start looking at those other revenue streams as I say um there are a number of different options that we can consider we’re going to have to be sitting down and having all of those

Conversations before we actually start to Aline publicly but I would say look I mean this comes from a provincial Prem who has no climate plan who says that he believes in Net Zero by 2030 but has no in from targets has no real um uh initiatives to actually focus on this he

Has decided that the price on pollution is something that he doesn’t like even though uh it actually is demonstrably effective in reducing carbon emissions and it’s an affordability measure and it actually helps people in saskat and who live on the most modest incomes to actually pay their grocery bills um so

You know I I throw up my hands a little bit with with this guy like uh he he he operates without any data without any facts um and uh and he goes after the most vulnerable people that live in in in sason and Regina and the rest of the

Province like it’s just it’s just silly the fact that he is seizing upon though is that this government uh Exempted one particular type of heating oil that being home heating oil from paying the carbon tax primarily because of the economic and political concerns uh in Atlant Canada and that his argument and

Daniel Smith has made a similar argument that they’re living with the Supreme Court decision on on the carbon pricing that they don’t agree with because it was their expectation that it would be applied equally and by doing carve outs you’re no longer applying it equally and

Fairly as a government so so what is your response to that political argument from Premier Mo well I’ve heard him say that obviously I don’t agree with it I mean it is very different home heating oil is three to four times more expensive it is escalated far more quickly than any

Other home heating fuel and uh if you actually Implement a heat pump uh you can actually save enormous amount amounts of money with respect to heating oil it’s also the dirtiest from a ghg perspective it’s not the same as natural gas where the the savings associated with implementing heat pump are actually

Pretty neutral um so this is a program that we actually focused on the people and again people who have heating oil are generally the most energy poor so we focused on ensuring that we were addressing that key affordability issue for people who were paying far too much

For energy putting in place a program to give people on Modest incomes free heat pumps so they can save money going forward um and uh and that is uh applied across the country and you know people focus on Atlantic Canada but there are more heat pumps or more heating oil

Homes in Quebec than there are in Atlanta Canada and there are the same amount in Ontario as there are in all Atlanta Canada so this was a Canada wide program it wasn’t just about Atlantic Canada no matter what Scott wants to say well look I understand that as an

Atlantic Canadian but it was the Prime Minister and the Atlantic caucus who announced it with Cody blo the chair of the Atlantic caucus hosting the news conference and the language of the day said it made it very clearly it was about Atlantic Canada so I wonder just

As a final Point Minister are you concerned that this is more than just the maiden Saskatchewan challenge for you today that other provinces may follow suit on this well look I first of all I mean the the Atlantic Canadian part of the announcement was because the people with

The greatest degree of energy poverty live in Atlantic Canada not in the rest of the country so let’s just be clear about that um but in terms of spreading to the rest of the country I mean I have faith in in provincial premieres across the country that they actually believe

In abiding by the law too they expect that the federal government will respect provincial laws we expect that they will respect federal laws and we expect Canadians will actually abide by the laws of the land both Federal and provincial I don’t think that other Premier I could be wrong but I really

Doubt that other Premier are really of the view that they should be able to selectively break the law Federal Energy Minister Jonathan Wilkinson thank you for your time today sir thank you okay so how unprecedented is this situation sujit chodri is a lawyer and constitutional expert he’s also the managing partner with hockey

Chambers law uh it’s good to speak with you sir thanks for joining me nice to meet you too and good to speak with you about this okay so you heard there the federal environment Minister Sten Gobo says that saskat is breaking the law and that measures will be taken what

Measures can the federal government take when a province just refuses to to to follow the rules here right so there is you know the the greenhouse gas uh you know pollution pricing Act was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2021 and it has a number of kind of enforcement mechanisms

And those include uh criminal penalties uh including the payment of fines and also um the um a prison time so there is kind of criminal exposure for individuals who don’t pay the charges including directors and officers as well so that was when they contemplated this being a utility or an energy company but

Not necessarily A subnational government is is my guess because Saskatchewan had to move the responsibility away from its utility Sask energy to protect the directors and move it to the government to put the liability there which the Canada Revenue Agency agreed to so does this mean we’re potentially headed for

His majesty the king versus his majesty the king like how does this work yeah yeah so it’s I think it’s a little bit so I I think it’s important to kind of step back a bit and think about what saskat might be doing uh so the in in November the saskatchwan

Legislature passed a statute that um changed the the um the remitter of the federal carbon Levy from Sask power which is a crown Corporation to the province and then the province uh filed an application with CRA to be designated as the leader of the carbon Levy and as

You know that came through in the last couple of weeks and so the question is what difference does it make uh to the province being the remitter as opposed to the to SAS power and the answer is um there’s a provision of the Constitution called section 125 uh which basically says that

Provincial property can’t be taxed by the federal government and so they might be thinking that because this is now uh provincial uh the carbon tax as it’s colloquially called um doesn’t apply to them the the problem with that argument uh is that in uh 2021 um onio uh tried

To argue that the carbon Levy was a tax and the Supreme Court uh which was otherwise divided on the greenhouse um gas tax or pardon me Levy um unanimously held that it wasn’t a tax it was a regulatory charge and so so Saskatchewan still Bound by that regulatory charge

And as far as I can tell they’re still legally obliged to pay it okay so it’s a regulatory charge under law it’s a tax in the vernacular and in the the political debates but so where does this go then if the federal government takes action does this go to Criminal Court

Does this go to Federal Court does this go to the Supreme Court like where does something like this get litigated outside of a Ballot Box because this is a legal question is more than a political question at this point in time right so I got to say I’m quite taken

Back by all this and and I’m quite frankly puzzled by it and I I saw a a clip of a provincial Minister saying he had retained um personal legal counsil and I suspect that’s because they don’t think they’re in the free and clear and um I think they’re hoping to engage in a

Political negotiation over the carbon tax so I was going to say a couple of things about this the first is that this type of an issue um could spread right so you know soas Scotland’s not the only province in which the the carbon Levy is ferally imposed uh there’s Alberta Manitoba

Ontario um there’s also New Brunswick Nova Scotia Pei New Finland uh and as well mucon and Nuna okay so everyone except for BC um nor Northwest Territories in Quebec and so if if Saskatchewan can make this move then you can imagine there are discussions happening um elsewhere about whether

This move could be made and um it would be very regrettable and quite serious if this generated criminal prosecutions and um it would be wise for everyone to step back a bit I I I will say that um I I’ve always maintained that as the price of

Carbon went up this would be probably the most difficult thing we’ve ever had to deal with as a country and I I think we’re seeing that now but it’s going to be very challenging politically to manage this and we’re beginning to see friction around this already well

There’s no question about that and it is an election year in Saskatchewan so so that is potentially playing a role in all of the calculations here but look our audience May recognize you from from working at the emergencies act inquiry the relo inquiry and your arguments there and and whatever you thought of

What the federal government did there and the federal court has has weighed in on that um they believed they were arguing in good faith in accordance with the law at least this is what they say based on the legal opinion and advice they had available to them which that he

Did not make public for solicitor client privilege Scott Mo knows he’s breaking the law you know what I mean when when he was sworn in as Premier he put his hand on some kind of book and took an oath to uphold the law so like how do

You deal with this when a first minister at the provincial level just is absolutely refusing to to live up to that oath and live up to the law of the land look so I I can’t you know speak to what um Mr Mo has or has not been advised

Legally I know they have an excellent Department of Justice and SAS Scotch want to work with them and they’re terrific lawyers so I I don’t want to kind of cast disparagement on his assessment of the situation I I do think it’s it’s hard for me to see a pathway

To Legal success here that for saskat one that isn’t fraught with all sorts of risk uh including for um political leadership and so I I think it would be wise to step back and reflect because this is a dangerous road to go down and

It and it and it could um spread uh to other jurisdictions and so I I hope people take a step back and reflect uh because it’s quite a serious move to make have you ever seen anything like this I I have seen political battles over my quarter of a century in

Journalism I have never seen a premier just out say we are not going to comply with the law no I I can’t say look I’ve been doing constitutional law for 30 years um and I can’t think of a precedent like this to be honest you know we have a we’re a country governed

By the rule of law and we settle our disagreements over what the law uh requires uh through uh litigation and the courts and then we accept the judgments of Courts when they’re handed down so it it might be that there is a legal Plan B here it might be that

Saskatchwan wants to go back to court and argue that the carbon Levy imposed by federal statute is in fact a tax not a regulatory charge maybe it has arguments it wants to make based on the home heating oil exemption but they haven’t shared that with the public yet

And so I I I do think it’s incumbent upon political leaders always uh when they exercise executive power uh to to ma make manifestly clear to the public the legal basis for their Authority and and so I understand that that the leadership in the Saskatchewan has taken

The view that they’re acting within the law I do think they need to reassure the public that they have a legal case yes uh right now it has largely been a political argument that it’s not fair so we’re not complying and and that’s what it’s come down to so like

You sir uh we await the legal arguments I I want to thank you for for walking through the uncertainty on all of this with us chadri managing partner with hockey Chambers Global thank you sir good to speak with you thank you

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said Monday that he expects people in his province will receive a ‘proportional reduction’ of the carbon tax rebate after his government decided to defy federal law and not remit the tax on natural gas. Federal Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson reacts to the premier’s comments and says rebates for Sask. residents will be adjusted ‘accordingly.’

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