Water

Gas is more expensive than ever before — but it’s not just at the pump where we are taking the hit. What many don’t know is Canadians are also paying more for gas through our tax dollars. And when we consider the environmental impacts, that cost is even greater.

In fact, as we waste time complaining about how much it costs to fill our tanks, the Canadian government is busy pumping billions of our tax dollars into fuelling global warming. By subsidizing not only oil and gas but also animal agriculture and other harmful industries, we’re essentially financing our own destruction.

Industry-specific reviews of government subsidies have been much more common than analyses examining several natural resource sectors at once. Yet there is a great deal of overlap across sectors. Indeed, it is the combination of support provided by multiple levels of government and government programs, across numerous natural resource areas, that can accelerate resource depletion, pollution, or habitat loss in particular regions.

This report is the latest of a string of assessments produced over the past 18 years to identify and quantify federal subsidies that harm the environment as well as waste prodigious amounts of money.  The exact coalition producing the reports varies a bit year-to-year, but the Green Scissors Campaign has always been a collaboration between budget and environmental groups aimed at eliminating wasteful spending that is harmful to the environment.

Government subsidy programs, like many areas of government expenditure, are at risk of corruption and fraud that cost taxpayers millions of dollars. The extent to which these two factors affect subsidy policy is difficult to fully estimate because it is not commonly detected or reported to official sources. Precise figures are difficult to obtain, and governments are also often unwilling to publicize occurrences of fraud and corruption out of fear of bad publicity or public concern at their lack of oversight.