Battle lines drawn over whether carbon tax will increase after 2022

OTTAWA — As the fall election campaign fast approaches, the Liberals and Conservatives went to battle on Monday over whether the carbon tax will keep rising after 2022 — a fight prompted by confusing language from Environment Minister Catherine Mckenna over the past few months.

The current plan sees a gradual increase from $20 per tonne of greenhouse-gas emissions in 2019 to $50 per tonne in 2022. The tax — which is only implemented in provinces without an equivalent carbon pricing plan — comes with a rebate that the government says will more than offset the cost for most families.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer has previously estimated the carbon tax would need to rise to $102 per tonne by 2030 to meet the government’s emissions reduction target, unless other measures are used.

In a news conference Monday morning, Mckenna used careful phrasing to say that the current plan has no “intention” of going past $50 per tonne since it ends in 2022, but then added that decisions about future price increases will be made after discussing it with provincial governments.

“In 2016, we negotiated for a year with provinces and territories that included a price on pollution until 2022,” she said. “So there’s no intention to go up beyond that, any decision would be made in discussions with provinces and territories and stakeholders.”

She was asked specifically if she’s ruling out price increases beyond 2022, but didn’t respond directly. “All we’ve done is we’ve negotiated until 2022, so I’m not in a position to negotiate anything past that,” she said. “I think that there’ll be an election in 2023 and I think that might be a discussion for that election.”

In June, however, Mckenna repeatedly phrased it differently when speaking to reporters: “The plan is not to increase the price post-2022,” she said then.

She insisted on Monday that she was not changing her position, and bristled at Conservative accusations the Liberals are trying to hide plans for future carbon tax increases.