The House of Commons Finance Committee
has voted to call former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney to testify on whether he would support a carbon tax if elected as the next Liberal leader.
“The Liberals’ tax and spend agenda has driven up the cost of everything, forcing the Bank of Canada to increase interest rates at the fastest pace in its history,” Conservative MP and shadow finance minister Jasraj Singh Hallan said in
a May 28 press release. “As a result of this, Canadians deserve to know whether the next Liberal leader will continue Trudeau’s failed policies.”
He said Mr. Carney had criticized the Liberal government’s carbon tax policies in recent months, while previously supporting them.
During an appearance before the Senate Finance Committee on May 8, Mr. Carney said the federal carbon tax had “served a purpose up until now” and that there needed to be a “credible and predictable” alternative.
In his letter, Mr. Singh Hallan said Mr. Carney also had a history of making money off oil and gas from other countries while “trying to destroy Canada’s energy industry at home.” The Canadian investment firm Brookfield, of which Mr. Carney has been vice-chair since 2020, was found to have
made investments in five fossil fuel infrastructure projects.
“Carney has been willing to appear at elite Liberal-friendly think tanks. He must now have the same courage to testify at a House of Commons committee,” he said.
Conservative MPs have repeatedly called for the Liberal government to “axe” its carbon tax, blaming it for raising the cost of groceries, fuel, and home heating. On May 16, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre
called for a summer “tax holiday,” exempting Canadians from federal fuel charges between Victoria Day and Labour Day.
Mr. Carney has been critical of the Tories’ call to get rid of the carbon tax, claiming during a keynote address at Canada 2020’s Economic Lookahead dinner in Toronto on April 22 that Mr. Poilievre’s approach was “misguided.”
“Remember that when he shouts ‘axe the tax,’ he’s really whispering ‘can the plan’ and leaving us with nothing,” Mr. Carney said of the Conservative Party’s proposal to get rid of the carbon tax.
While Mr. Carney has not officially begun running for leadership of the Liberal Party,
he did not rule out eventually doing so back in November 2023. “It’s not a decision that I need to take now,” Mr. Carney said during an interview with the Globe and Mail, adding that a future leadership run was a possibility.
An Ipsos poll from November 2023 found that Mr. Carney was among the favourites to replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who has been trailing in the polls compared to Mr. Poilievre in recent months.
The Nov. 29 poll found that 16 percent of Canadians would consider voting for Mr. Carney if he was the Liberal leader, compared with 18 percent for Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly and 25 percent for Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland.
