SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

Hon. Todd Smith

  • MPP
  • Member of Provincial Parliament
  • Bay of Quinte
  • Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario
  • Ontario
  • Unit 8 5503 Hwy. 62 S Belleville, ON K8N 0L5 Todd.Smithco@pc.ola.org
  • tel: 613-962-1144
  • fax: 613-969-6381
  • Todd.Smithco@pc.ola.org

  • Government Page
  • Apr/24/24 10:50:00 a.m.

Mr. Speaker, the federal Liberals seem like they’re unwilling to listen to farmers across Ontario or across Canada. The current queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, the leader of the Liberal Party here in Ontario, is happy to have the federal carbon tax in place.

If the NDP really wanted to stand up for farmers, like our dairy farmers who are here today, they would join us—Premier Ford and our team—in fighting the carbon tax all the way to the Supreme Court. It’s just activities here in the Legislature to get attention. They’re not actually standing up for farmers in Ontario, while our Minister of Agriculture is and our Premier is by fighting the federal carbon tax, Mr. Speaker.

Now, if you don’t think the carbon tax is having an impact on our dairy farmers, you’re crazy, because everything they do requires natural gas or propane or some other type of heating oil, Mr. Speaker, and the cost is enormous to heat the barns. The cost is enormous to transport the milk to the processing facility and then onto the distributors. It’s a huge, huge impediment. I’ll tell you more—

Interjection.

We saw what the Green Energy Act did when the Liberals were in charge of our energy sector here in Ontario. It drove people into energy poverty. And the federal carbon tax, which the queen of the carbon tax, Bonnie Crombie, supports, is doing the same to farmers like the Dairy Farmers of Ontario today. And not just the dairy farmers, Mr. Speaker. What our agriculture minister wanted to get in was the impact on just the grain farmers alone. The carbon tax is going to increase costs to just the grain farmers by $2.7 billion by 2030.

That’s what the NDP stands for. That’s what the Liberals stand for. We don’t. It’s time to scrap the tax.

Interjections.

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