Uh oh…
The Ontario government is dropping its short-lived and controversial eco fee in the face of growing consumer and retailer malcontent.
Environment Minister John Gerretsen will announce on Tuesday that fees attached to thousands of household items will be eliminated, according to government sources. The fees went into effect on July 1, the same day as the Harmonized Sales Tax, without the knowledge of most Ontarians. They were attacked by politicians of all stripes, along with retailers, including Canadian Tire, which announced on Monday it was refusing to collect the fee.
More of this please.
Previous – Nova Scotia emissions climb down.
And Suzookie’s, Gores, and their supporting cast of media sychophants scphincter muscles tighten a little more. Environment ministers across Canada should be sweating more than Rita McNeil in sauna.
Like Special Ed in Alberta and his royalty scheme, McSquinty is backpeddling faster than a clown on a unicycle
Yup…McSquinty and Red Ed are back pedalling…BUT us voters must remember…they went for it once..they will go for it again when they think the stink has died down. Vote them out NOW. The only good socialist/commie/ecogreenie is a dead one.Or turn them into compost!
They don’t even make good compost, the plants come up red.
The big climbdown would be BC abandoning its carbon tax.
http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/article/837559–liberals-hear-consumers-cry-vow-to-retool-eco-fee?bn=1
Star readers have also written about confusion with the new fees, such as C. Powell of West Hill, who pleaded in a letter to the editor on Saturday: “Mr. McGuinty, if as you say eco fees are to encourage recycling, please advise me how do I recycle fertilizer after spreading it on the lawn?”
Just about says it all.
Yeah, now if NS would abandon its asinine wind power goals. Dear Lord…..
‘Nice to know that I wasn’t needed at the anti-eco tax rally in Ottawa this past weekend!
Finally, the McGuilty government’s done something that makes sense: withdrawn a hidden and illegitimate tax, imposed by stealth.
Isn’t it just like Duh-lton to do the right thing only AFTER he’s done something so utterly wrong? ‘Hardly any kind of victory. (Now I’m wondering what he’s going to do, to “recoup” the lost revenues his profligate government so desperately needs? High alert …)
And here in Saskatchewan, Brad Wall and his so called free enterprise government still do allow free market recyclers like Second Time Office Equipment to participate in the publicly funded SWEEP program.
Wrote letters to Dalton, MPPs and Ontario Ombudsman. I guess we CAN make a difference.
OK Ontarians, what’s the next target?
batb @7:49
You’ve got that right with be on high alert.
The McGuinty liberals will be out to rob us some more to fill that 25 billion dollar deficit hole somehow.
A friend of mine told me that the price of cement all but doubled with the nex eco-fee attached to it. The fee was 90-some percent of the price of the cement…a simple 20 to 25 thousand dollar new home foundation skyrocketed to the 40 to 45 thousand dollar mark.
One tax gone, and one more to go. On the same day these eco-fees kicked in, McGuinty and his band of merry thieves implemented the Harmonized Sales Tax. Now fuel, home heating oil, electricity etc., are included among the dual-taxed items. We want the HST to be rescinded from those items that did not have both taxes applied before July 1st. Let’s consider the victory ( I surmise that it’s a temporary one) of the scrapping of the eco-fees a warm-up battle. Congratulations to all who attended protests, wrote letters and e-mails, and made phone calls protesting the eco-fees. Let’s apply our skills once again to give McGuinty another richly deserved slap down.
We all have to begin thinking of the McGuinty government as a doomed government, one that represents a tired and shopworn Canadian mindset to be swept away by the tides of history in the same manner as the federal Liberals.
It’s a lovely image, don’t you think?
Well now. It would appear they warmed the water a bit too fast and now the frog is jumping.
When people say Dalton McGuinty is an incompetent politician, this is the sort of thing they mean. He can’t even sneak a tax past the snoring masses of @sses in Dumbtario, home of “Tax me, I’m Canadian!” socialism.
When I say Dalton McGuinty is a destructive maniac, bent on killing every last vestige of private enterprise in the province, I just point at the new HST/eco-tax being levied during the greatest global depression since the 1930’s. And then I point at a windmill. And then at the OPP’s behaviour in Caledonia and at the G-20. I ask you, what rational human being would even think of starting a new business in Ontario?
Oh by the way, on July 1st the price of gas went from $0.95 a quart to $1.00 a quart. Liter for y’all who drank the Trudeau bong water.
My prescription for a cure of government?
1)10% tax cut every year for twenty years.
2)Imperial measures, f- the utopian French BS of metric, its fine for science but it sucks for carpentry.
3)Red Ensign, to hell with Pearson’s maple leaf dishrag.
That’s it. All else to be handled by individuals in the private sector, as, if and when they feel like it.
I’d like to see them bring back the Arrow in some form, even if only a display squadron for air shows, but that’s just CRAZY talk. Maybe if everybody in the country wasn’t TAXED so obscenely some private concerns could make a few Arrows just for the hell of it.
CPC, take note boys. I know you read this blog.
Anne (not from cornwall) Oh BOY do I understand your moniker. CFRA much?
Sorry guys, the eco tax is not going away – it’s going underground. Manufacturers will still be charged a total of more than 100 million dollars a year. Think they will suck it up?? not likely.
Squinty will still impose it and we will pay it. And on top of that there will be an eco tax rolled out…double dipping so to speak.
Once a month trip to Buffalo should fix it….
N Paul has it right: NOW is the time to be extra-vigilant. If you think that the Liberals are going to risk their cushy sinecures at Stewardship Ontario by diverting away the funds that support it – you’re obviously a “denier” and don’t understand what sustainability is all about.
Hide that tax (sorry, fee), and if it becomes public knowledge, make clucking sounds about the evil capitalists who use it as an excuse to mark up costs.
It’s all about the Green.
I was reading the comments on the CBC site. One poster stated how wonderful it was when he went for a drive and saw acre after acre of solar panels. They were winning the war against Big Oil. How do you change the mindset. No food will be grown on that land. No inputs go into that land except maybe Round-Up. All that represents is a huge fricken’ subsidy for it’s lifetime.
The posters that say they will find another way are sadly right. Once you have the debt and obligation, payment follows. Free enterprise isn’t going there.
“The Ontario government is dropping its short-lived and controversial eco fee in the face of growing consumer and retailer malcontent”
Translation from McGuinty speek to common English:
“We got caught in another mafia-like racketeering scheme disguised as a “progressive policy” and we fear the thought of losing access to the treasury due to an electoral turn over because of the matter. We’ll give them this one because we have several other skimming rackets working well”
Kudos to Canadian Tire! Write head office and tell them their refusal to participate in an illegal public shake down by a dissolute government, is the reason you are getting a CT credit card and making purchases there.
Condition public responsibility in corporations who resist eco/climate fraud.
Vote with your consumer dollars against eco- extortion.
re: Speedy’s comment. How do you change the mind-set of people, who have been conditioned into reflexive anti “Big Oil” displays just like Pavlov’s dogs?
Two solutions come to mind, depending upon the severity of the affliction:
1) basic, high school level math, like: a)calculate the surface area of solar panels required to replace one coal-fired plant, assuming a capacity factor of 20%
b)calculate how long it would take you to clean it.
2) give them the option to go all renewable, off the grid sustainable – and see if they’ll finally understand the costs, inconvenience and intermittency when they can no longer watch “The Nature of Things” whenever they want.
It appears that the Ontario government is using California as the model to follow. We know how “well” that is working out, don’t we?
Ontario will still collect eco fee on electronics, while my city stopped collecting electronic waste at the curb. How can they have it both ways?
“please advise me how do I recycle fertilizer after spreading it on the lawn”
That’s what I was wondering about the paint recycling fee. It went on the walls so there’s nothing to recycle.
paint, a substance so toxic that you are supposed to take the dribbles in the bottom of the paint can to the fire department for disposal after you have smeared 90% of it on the inside of your house.
You actually get 90% on the walls? I get that much in my hair, on the floor, under the drop-cloth and all over that green tape.
Actually most paints are latex as in water soluble so are we paying for that too?
Latex paint is considered as toxic as metal flake automobile paint under current regulations.
One can almost -eat- latex paint.
Speedy (I was reading the comments on the CBC site. One poster stated how wonderful it was when he went for a drive and saw acre after acre of solar panels. They were winning the war against Big Oil. How do you change the mindset. No food will be grown on that land. No inputs go into that land except maybe Round-Up. All that represents is a huge fricken’ subsidy for it’s lifetime.) if it were possible to give you a thumbs up I would. As it is, I will have to settle for saluting you with my glass of scotch.
Not so fast Pilgrims.
The cancellation is only for 90 days.
We are still gonna get screwed, trust me.