NDP, PCs to reject hydro cuts bill

Opposition leaders criticize Liberal legislation for only providing short term relief

The NDP and Progressive Conservatives are banding together in a bid to stop legislation paving the way for a 25-per-cent hydro rate cut, saying the Liberal government plan is too expensive.

Both parties said Monday they would vote against the bill because the $25 billion in interest costs over the next 30 years is, in NDP Leader Andrea Horwath’s words, “truly disgusting.”

“It’s a shell game, it’s a farce,” said Conservative Leader Patrick Brown, whose party revealed confidential cabinet documents last week showing prices rising sharply again in the next five to 10 years and beyond.

“We can never support a plan that’s going to result in more debt and higher hydro rates.”

While the Liberals intend to use their majority to pass the bill before the Legislature rises for its summer recess on June 1, Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault accused the opposition parties of standing in the way of rate relief for homeowners, farmers and small businesses.

“There are significant savings happening for families,” he told reporters.

The legislation, introduced last Thursday, would enable the final chunk of the 25-per-cent rate cut, cut delivery charges for rural customers and expand the Ontario Electricity Support Program to cover more lowincome seniors with a 50-per-cent increase in subsidies, for example.

“They’re not supporting that,” Thibeault said of the opposition parties.

Horwath accused the Liberals, who are hoping to improve their fortunes in the polls with a year until the next election campaign, of trying to buy people’s votes with their own money and disguise further rate increases.

“People know, one way or another, they would pay the price,” Horwath said, describing the Liberal plan as “relief for a couple of years, then, boom!”

The first part of the 25 per cent, an 8-per-cent instant rebate of the provincial portion of the HST, is already in place, having taken effect in January. The second part, a 9-per-cent reduction imposed by the price-setting Ontario Energy Board, kicked in May 1.

The final 8 per cent would take effect after the legislation is passed, giving the energy board 15 days to order the reduction in rates.

Thibeault said the government is aiming to have the full 25 per cent in place by July 1.

“It technically could be sooner . . . I can’t pre-judge how we’re going to get this legislation through the house.”

Thibeault tabled the legislation last Thursday to set up the borrowing of billions to amortize the cost of improvements to the hydro system over the last decade — including the closure of coal-fired plants and a shift to more expensive renewable energy — over the next 30 years to give people a break on rates now. The government has compared it to extending a mortgage to have lower payments.

Both the NDP and Progressive Conservatives have charged the Liberal plan does nothing to lower the structural causes of high electricity prices.

Horwath said she’s not worried about the government painting her New Democrats as opposed to the rate cut, saying, “The Liberals can play whatever political games they want.”

The energy minister has dismissed the leaked cabinet documents, obtained by the Conservatives and first reported here, as “outdated” and denied the government plans to raise hydro rates 10.5 per cent in 2028, when average monthly bills are forecast to hit $215.`

When both Thibeault and Premier Kathleen Wynne said their plan wasn’t based on those documents, Brown challenged the Liberals to show “a new document with rates going down.”

The energy minister said more detailed forecasts on rates will come in a few months with the release of the government’s long-term energy plan, as officials work to cut more and more costs in the electricity system.

According to the leaked documents, after rates fall this year, they will rise by no more than 2 per cent in the four following years before starting to rise at a rate of 6.5 per cent annually.

Horwath has promised to cut hydro rates between 17 and 30 per cent if she wins the June 7, 2018, provincial election.

The Conservatives have not unveiled a plan for hydro costs.

“The party opposite has no idea what to do with the energy file,” Thibeault shot at Brown during question period.

The Conservatives are having a preelection policy convention in November.

“People know, one way or another, they would pay the price.” ANDREA HORWATH ONTARIO NDP LEADER