In November 2015, on the heels of a federal-provincial meeting and as a federal government delegation prepared for the COP 21 Climate Change Conference, Prime Minister Trudeau commented, “We’ll demonstrate that we are serious about climate change…making decisions based on science…reducing carbon emissions, including through carbon pricing…” 

A price on carbon was a key plank of the Liberal election platform in 2015, and again in 2019 and 2021. With the Liberals forming a government following all three contests, the policy’s existence seemed all but cemented into the Canadian economic landscape.

The logic seemed clear. A price on carbon for consumers is one of the most efficient ways to reduce carbon emissions according to both economists and environmentalists. The carbon price would be revenue-neutral. The science behind carbon pricing supported by the voices of experts was supposed to carry the day. Citizens would understand how the tax works, adapt their behaviours to minimize their carbon footprint, and ultimately support not only the carbon tax itself but also the transition to a greener economy that it would facilitate. All this while crediting the government that had the foresight to introduce it.

It was a simple and overly optimistic view of behaviour change. A view that lacked an effective educational campaign explaining how the tax would work or sufficient external supports to assist Canadians in making the changes they needed to make. Chief among them is the widespread availability of affordable alternatives.

Progress on climate change became secondary to scoring political points

The carbon tax was an effective wedge issue in the 2019 federal election campaign. But it never seemed to evolve from wedge issue to effective, supported policy. Since 2019, instead of focusing on persuading the majority of Canadians who are concerned about climate change of the merits and practical benefits of carbon pricing, pro-carbon price supporters devoted much of their energy to criticizing (and marginalizing) the small minority of climate change deniers. This divisive approach coupled with rising concerns over affordability opened the door for Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s promise to “axe the tax.” Canadians have rewarded this message with commanding polling leads for the Conservatives.

The price on carbon and the top values of Canadians today 

Ipsos’ 10th Global Trends Study covering 50 countries and 90 percent of the world’s GDP shows that the values of autonomy, health, self-reliance, and informed consumerism are the top values across the globe and for Canadians. The common link between these values is a desire for people to make informed decisions for themselves.

At its core, the carbon tax is about encouraging choice. Had the federal government communicated this purpose more effectively, perhaps people would be making those informed choices today. Instead, the launch of the carbon tax was first left to the provinces to implement, but with looming federal government penalties for any province that did not meet the federal standards. The ensuing federal-provincial discussions ensured that the public in many provinces came to perceive the carbon price as a top-down dictate rather than a collaborative effort to combat climate change.

When finally introduced, its low price per ton of carbon starting point and gradual, annual increases likely seemed like the easiest positioning for day one. Instead, the annual April 1st increase has become an ongoing reminder that the government is collecting more tax each year. At a time when 72 percent of Canadians assume that the government will do little for them in the future. It begs the question: “Why are my taxes increasing?” Follow-up attempts have been made to explain how the price/tax is revenue neutral, but they have fallen on deaf ears, enforcing the adage, “If you are explaining, you’re losing.”

The government’s popularity and the demise of the carbon tax

There have always been some concerns about the carbon tax. According to an August 2021 Ipsos poll for Global News, three-quarters (74 percent) of Canadians agreed that they would be more supportive of a carbon tax if they knew the money collected was going directly to initiatives to combat climate change. But the price on carbon has always been closely tied to the governing Liberal Party. Support for the carbon tax is influenced greatly by support for the federal government overall.

A recent study conducted by Ipsos for the Montreal Economic Institute shows that Canadians are generally dissatisfied with the federal government’s management of public spending with 70 percent indicating that the government is not doing a good job of ensuring that funds are allocated to priority issues. The study also shows that three-quarters (77 percent) say their taxes are too high for the services they receive. Recent polling and byelection results show the government’s low popularity and this is a contributing factor to the “axe the tax” momentum.

Ignore climate change and the environment at your peril

If Poilievre wins a carbon tax election and follows through on his “axe the tax” promise, will we all breathe a sigh of relief? Some of us might. It remains to be seen how those of us experiencing a heat wave, dealing with urban air pollution, or looking out at the smoke from the forest fires will react. They may well say to Poilievre, “We agree the carbon tax wasn’t making a difference, now what is your plan?”

Climate change and the environment are still a big concern for Canadians. Seven in ten (73 percent) agree that “we are heading for environmental disaster unless we change our habits quickly.” When asked about top environmental priorities, the public places climate change alongside several other pressing concerns, such as recycling, reducing waste, reducing the use of plastics, and improving air and water quality.^{1See here, here, and here.}

Canadians still want climate change addressed and are more likely to see it as a problem that governments and businesses must solve (versus themselves). As individuals, we fool ourselves into believing that we are doing everything within our personal power to limit our carbon footprint. Almost six in 10 (57 percent) of Canadians say that they are already doing everything they can to save the environment.

Assuming the world unfolds according to today’s polls and the tax does indeed get axed. Look for Canadians to support what they see as more concrete actions from governments and businesses. They are also likely to call for stricter regulations and penalties on companies that do not meet their expectations.

For businesses, the choice will be to act to address climate change and other environmental concerns and report on their progress or respond to ever-stricter legislation and reporting requirements. Half of Canadians say they try to buy from brands that act responsibly even if it costs them more. Thanks to planned environmental, social, and governance reporting, Canadians will soon have ample information to judge businesses’ efforts and will gravitate their spending toward products that fulfill their needs while making them feel good about their own sustainability actions.

For governments, Canadians will look for tangible, concrete changes. Things like protecting and restoring forests and wetlands. Focusing on key sectors like agriculture and transportation, making companies report on their efforts to reduce their carbon emissions, and mitigation efforts to help communities manage through extreme heat and floods. The big challenge for governments will be paying for the climate and environmental initiatives that people want.

Don’t be surprised if a few years from now, Canadians look back and say “It is too bad we do not have a tax connected to carbon to raise the funds required to make real changes to the environment we live in.”

An old man at the back of the streetcar sitting in a pool of his own urine stares into middle space clearly unaware of where he is or what’s happening around him. He is lost. But for his silence, he himself is a cry for help. Yet those around him are more focused on ignoring him than helping. It might be easy to blame them but it’s a weekday morning in Toronto and people are in a rush to get where they’re going. Besides, what can they do? This is a situation for professionals, who, needless to say, are nowhere to be found.

Similar scenarios are also playing out in public libraries across Canada. Our “cities’ living rooms” now find themselves overwhelmed by our struggle to cope with the addicted, the mentally ill, and the plain down-and-out looking for a place to get out of the cold or the heat. This was never the intended purpose of libraries, but it’s one they now must serve.

And it’s not an easy task. Librarians report being punched and spat on. Between 2022 and 2023, security and safety incidents at the Winnipeg Public Library increased by 21 percent. Suspected overdoses in Toronto public libraries increased 529 percent. In Edmonton, staff say that no fewer than 99 opioid overdoses occurred in 2022. Little wonder librarians are learning how to administer naloxone as their jobs more and more resemble those of social workers.

Meanwhile, public parks in Canadian communities large and small have been taken over by makeshift tent cities that leave locals feeling like intruders. In Toronto alone, there were at least 202 tents this spring, up from 82 at the same time last year. It is a situation that has led to severely strained relations, even violence, between regular park users and these unwanted occupiers, not to mention brutal confrontations with police. Given the critical need for green space in a country urbanizing faster than ever, the loss of parks impacts literally millions of Canadians.

As sympathetic as we might be—or want to be—these incursions into the public realm and shared urban, suburban, and rural spaces are changing our relationship to the places we call home. Once safe arenas where our communal lives play out are now contested real estate, a no-man’s land, ground zero in the struggle between the haves and the have-nots, healthy and diseased, the secure and the desperate. All claim the space as their own as the civic sense of cooperation, order, and safety breaks down.

Even our sidewalks are becoming a locus of this random violence. In Vancouver, one victim was recently left dead and another with a severed hand. Early reports of the incident paint a picture of a deeply disturbed man attacking complete strangers with a knife. It doesn’t help that the accused, who has more than 60 “interactions” with police, was out on parole. Similar indiscriminate encounters on the Toronto transit system have left passengers shaken and leery about riding the “Red Rocket.”

As Canada’s much-celebrated social safety net erodes, the public realm is pressed into service to fill in the gaps and provide makeshift shelter for those who have nowhere else to go. The institutions created to help the needy have been closed or rendered impotent by decades of austerity budgets. Ontario Premier Doug Ford likes to boast that his is the only provincial regime that has never raised taxes. Ontarians pay, instead, through badly compromised living conditions and ballooning deficits.

The result is a worsening quality of life for all Canadians. This encompasses everything from increased congestion as commuters avoid increasingly dangerous public transit, to fewer opportunities for kids (and adults) to get out into the natural world to play, exercise, or walk the dog.

Some argue these developments are merely inconvenient, occasionally irritating, but not significant. Not so. The cumulative impact of the continued erosion of public spaces leads to an increased sense of disconnection between people and the places they live and work. Without access to safe transport, libraries that offer opportunities for study and contemplation, and the open spaces of our parks and the like, life is diminished for all.

Despite what they like to believe, not even the richest can escape the corrosive consequences of a culture that grows ever more stressful. Not even the most closely gated community can avoid an ever more dysfunctional environment. As the poet reminded us, “No man is an island.” Indeed, the global village is a reality. Everything (and everyone) is linked to everything (and everyone). No one is immune to the precarity and the siege mentality that are both causes and consequences of the collapse of the safety net that long helped underpin confidence in the country’s future. We used to believe the 20th century belonged to Canada; no one’s saying that about the 21st.

Though our prime minister-in-waiting, Pierre Poilievre, has yet to commit to supporting social programs such as child care and dental care, he is adamant he will “fix the budget.” Whatever that means. As things stand, Canada needs cutbacks like a hole in the head. That’s one of the main reasons we got into this mess in the first place.

After the Second World War, social housing was one of the federal government’s more successful programs. But in the early 1990s, the governments of Brian Mulroney and Jean Chretien downloaded the file to the provinces, which downloaded it to the municipalities, minus the required funding, of course. Today, Finland is the only country that has successfully managed the problem of homelessness. The Finns don’t see housing as a reward for good behaviour, but rather a crucial first step to getting lives back on track and treating the usual causes of homelessness, mental illness, addiction, and poverty. The virtual elimination of homelessness in that country confirms the soundness of that approach.

Canada is nowhere near solving the problem here. As the wider housing crisis reminds us, you don’t have to be homeless here to be in need of a place to live.