Just nine months ago Ontario scrapped the Clean Energy Benefit, which provided a 10-per-cent reduction on all parts of electricity bills, including the HST.
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The opposition parties want the government to immediately halt any more sales of shares in Hydro One, the transmission utility, warning privatization will mean even higher electricity rates.
So, to ease people’s financial burden, the government will reduce hydro bills by eight per cent, which is equivalent to removing the provincial portion of the HST charged on hydro bills.
“We have hospitals and schools that are crumbling, we have an electricity system that is costing people far more than they can afford and in fact is damaging economic opportunity, and we have a situation where kids are anxious about their future because young people can’t find a decent job”, said Horwath.
Rising electricity bills have hurt the Liberals’ popularity with voters. “That raises a lot of questions about how long this rebate’s going to last and how it will work”.
Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown called the tax cut “merely a Band-Aid solution”.
The Wynne government is pressing the reset button.
Meantime, the Progressive Conservatives are returning to the legislature with newly elected MPP Raymond Cho, who took the Scarborough-Rouge River seat in the September 1st byelection; a riding that has always been a Liberal stronghold. “The problems of everyday Ontarians are never a problem until it’s Premier (Kathleen) Wynne’s problem”. The only PC member of the legislature from Toronto took his seat for the first time after the throne speech.
Building upon the 56,000 new daycare spaces in the past three years, the Liberals pledged Monday to fund an additional 100,000 licensed spaces over the next five years.
In a speech that outlined the government’s priorities as it attempts to galvanize support about two years into its rule, the provincial Liberals said they will introduce legislation that would provide an 8% rebate on electricity bills for consumers and small businesses.
Wynne, who was not available to the media Monday, had indicated the government would use the throne speech to offer some way to mitigate hydro costs for consumers. “They’re going to be saving about 20 per cent on all of their bills”.
Sousa said hydro rates increased because Ontario stopped burning coal to generate power and because the Liberals invested heavily in transmission grid upgrades after years of neglect.
“One of the things that we heard most consistently was hydro rates”.
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The title of the throne speech will be “A Balanced Plan to Build Ontario Up for Everyone”.
