Ottawa has rejected Saskatchewan’s plan to replace the federal carbon tax with its own carbon pricing system.
Premier Scott Moe, in a statement released July 12, said the federal government also indicated it would not accept any further submissions until 2023.
“Saskatchewan’s submission would have protected families, jobs and industries while exceeding the federal minimum standards, in close alignment with other provincial programs previously accepted,” he said in the statement. “The rejection of Saskatchewan’s submission can only be viewed as an arbitrary and political decision from the federal government.”
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The province submitted its own plan after the Supreme Court ruled in March that the federal government could impose a tax on provinces.
Moe had said Saskatchewan wanted approval in four areas, including an offset program for heavy emitters, allowing SaskPower and SaskEnergy to be placed under heavy emitter regulations, development of small modular nuclear reactors, and a carbon price on fuel, some of which would be rebated at the pump.
“While Saskatchewan will be fully evaluating the federal decision and exploring all avenues possible to protect our residents from the federally imposed carbon tax, we hope that the federal government does not take the same arbitrary and political approach to ongoing areas of federal-provincial negotiation, such as the federal child-care funding, which Saskatchewan will continue to pursue,” Moe also said.
He was expected to further address the carbon pricing decision this week.
