CAQ closes door on gas tax cut

The Legault government is closing the door on a gas tax cut to harmonize with Ontario, something the Parti Québécois (PQ) has been asking for.

Finance Minister Eric Girard said Wednesday that such a cut would be “incompatible with the objectives of fighting climate change.” Premier François Legault feels the PQ is simply aligning itself with Éric Duhaime’s Conservative Party.

This controversy follows a Léger poll released on Tuesday, which revealed that more than half of Quebecers want the carbon pricing system in Quebec to be abolished, as the federal government has just done for the other provinces.

PQ leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon tabled a motion on Tuesday to propose several options for reducing gasoline prices, but the CAQ refused.

The PQ leader found himself responding to the poll and to Duhaime, who is also proposing the abolition of carbon pricing.

Duhaime is currently campaigning in Arthabaska for election in an upcoming by-election, and his main opponent, according to the polls, would be the PQ candidate Alex Boissonneault.

“Because Mr. St-Pierre Plamondon is afraid of Éric Duhaime in Arthabaska, he says, ‘I promise the same thing as Éric Duhaime,’” Legault denounced in a statement to reporters Wednesday morning.

In a press scrum, Girard pointed out that a cut in the gasoline tax would deprive the Quebec treasury of $130 million a year per one cent, so a 10-cent cut would be equivalent to $1.3 billion.

“We’ve always said no, because it’s inconsistent with our objectives to fight climate change” and reduce greenhouse gases, he argued.

“It’s good to reduce the tax burden, it’s good to reduce personal taxation. There’s no question of lowering the gas tax.”

He pointed out that Ontario had chosen to reduce its gas tax, but not taxes, unlike Quebec.

It should be remembered that under its international commitments, notably the 2015 Paris Agreement, Quebec has pledged to reduce its GHG emissions by 37.5 per cent from their 1990 level by 2030.

Quebec is also committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050.

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews