Heating oil reversal for Atlantic Canada welcomed on P.E.I.

News of federal relief for Atlantic Canada home heating oil users made Friday "a day to celebrate" for some on Prince Edward Island, but the looming threat of climate change dampened a bit of the joy.

On Thursday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced heating oil would be exempt from the federal fuel charge for three years, to the satisfaction of Atlantic Canada MPs who had been lobbying within caucus for just that, citing the region's geography and traditional reliance on oil to heat their houses.

• Get the news you need without restrictions. Download our free CBC News App.

"We can't continue down this path without being comprehensive on our decisions we make for climate change," Malpeque Liberal MP Heath MacDonald said Friday. "We're trying to do as much as possible to alleviate some of those upfront costs now, but down the road I'm assuming we're going to get most of that back."

He added that even though "it's a day to celebrate," he thinks it's important to alleviate the pressure posed by climate change. "Fifty per cent of the homes in Prince Edward Island now have a heat pump. So we're getting there."

Until July 1 of this year, heating oil was exempt from any kind of carbon pricing on P.E.I. This had been the case for years, but the federal government said the province's exemption no longer fit into its carbon pricing plan, and a federal fuel charge of 17.38 cents per litre was added to the price for Islanders.

Currently, that 17.38 cents makes up 10.6 per cent of the $1.637 per litre price of heating oil. Looked at another way, it adds $521.40 to the price of a 3,000-litre tank of fuel.

As part of the new system, Islanders began receiving a fuel charge rebate, called the climate action incentive, which delivers $240 every three months for a family of four on P.E.I. As a result of Thursday's announcement, the price per litre won't change, but that quarterly rebate is due to go up substantially.

'A great boon' for Liberal MPs

Don Desserud, a political science professor based at the University of Prince Edward Island, said Trudeau's move was not a great move in terms of the climate, but was a good move from a strategy perspective in the short term.

"It's certainly a great boon for the Atlantic Liberal caucus," he said. "They can rightly or wrongly say that, you know, they're responsible for this."

Desserud thinks any goodwill generated in the region will have dissipated by the time the next election rolls around, though.

"The problem is that this is not going to affect food prices, it's not going to affect the prices at the pump and those are the things that people notice every day."

Carbon tax break on home heating oil for some rural Canadians

11 months ago

Duration 2:09

Rural Canadians paying the federal carbon tax will be exempt from paying it on home heating oil starting in April, the prime minister announced Thursday. The government will also double the federal carbon tax rebate and help rural Canadians switch to electric heat pumps.

P.E.I. Premier Dennis King said he was pleased to hear Trudeau's announcement on Thursday, after he and his fellow Atlantic premiers had lobbied for months.

"I think this will make a positive difference. I hope Islanders will see a benefit from this. Our efforts to get the federal government to pay attention to this have paid off," said King.

"I think we're living in a time where Islanders are having a challenge, like Canadians are, with the cost of living and the affordability of many things that we take for granted."

Affordability has been a big issue for Christine MacCallum, who lives in Marshfield, north of Charlottetown.

She said the introduction of a new tax on heating oil was particularly unpleasant at a time of high inflation.

It's easy for them to make these decisions because there's very few of them there that's ever had to make choices. Christine MacCallum

"It's easy for them to make these decisions because there's very few of them there that's ever had to make choices," said MacCallum.

"We're not poor by any means. There's people who have a lot less than we do. We get by fine with the necessities. But there's a lot of things we don't buy or do that we used to do."

MacCallum has a heat pump in her home, but there are still areas that are heated by oil, and keeping the pipes from freezing is not something she can cut back on.

King said governments can't add to the cost of basics in the name of fighting climate change when there is no alternative for people to turn to.

P.E.I. has been working to make those alternatives available, he pointed out.

"We have to do our part to reduce our carbon footprint and we have been doing that," said King. "We have been very innovative with the initiatives that we have undertaken."

King listed heat pump subsidies, low-cost rural transit, and rebates for electric vehicles and e-bikes among those initiatives.