Make Polluters Pay
Wildfire near Lodgepole, Alberta, May 2023
We all want a safe environment & a fair society.
But oil and gas companies pollute our air and climate while raking in record profits. Instead of cleaning up their own mess or reinvesting earnings back into society, these companies are laying off workers and paying out huge bonuses to CEOs and large dividends to shareholders. Meanwhile, Canada's wildfire seasons become increasingly more devastating.
It's time to make polluters pay their fair share into our public purse, and
into loss and damage, instead of reaping the rewards of damaging our climate
while Canadians bear the consequences.
Read our open letter to Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland below.
To the Honourable Chrystia Freeland
The oil and gas sector rakes in record-breaking profit at the expense of people in Canada.
Responsible for the biggest and growing share of emissions in Canada, oil and gas companies are expanding operations and extraction — instead of changing their damaging business model, investing in the energy transition or cleaning up their own mess. Record profits go toward padding the pockets of C-suite executives and shareholders, while workers are laid off to "cut costs". To add insult to injury, these very same companies receive billions in federal subsidies each year — drawing money from essential public services. But for the sector, these billions are still not enough.
Despite massive, record-breaking profits, Canada's biggest six oil companies launched a misleading advertising campaign and massive lobby effort to take even more public money from Canadians, for the purpose of unproven carbon capture projects.
From the housing crisis to the rise in cost of living, most people living in Canada are feeling the pinch. Inflation is driven by profits in a few sectors — but most notably oil and gas. Instead of taking for granted the inflation caused by extreme price hikes in oil and gas, the federal government could impose a windfall profits tax on the oil sector, like it did on the banking and insurance sectors excess profits in 2022. This is money that could go toward providing heat pumps that would lower Canadians' energy bills, programs to create good green jobs for youth and workers who face job losses, or compensation for loss and damage caused by climate impacts. Recent polling shows a majority of Canadians support the implementation of a windfall tax in Budget 2024 on the historically high profits of oil and gas companies.
The Parliamentary Budget Office released an assessment for a windfall profits tax on oil and gas companies. A 15% windfall profits tax on fossil fuel companies over $1 billion could generate $4.2 billion. In comparison, the Czech Republic has applied a windfall tax of 60% on energy companies whose profits were 120% of the 2018-2021 average. Canadian oil and gas companies enjoyed a profit increase of $38 billion since 2019, which is more than 1000%.
The profits of one sector should not be prioritized over the safety and wellbeing of all Canadians. We urge you to implement a windfall profits tax in Budget 2024.
Endorsers
