Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe offered congratulations online to new federal Liberal Leader Mark Carney – and wasted no time sending a list of provincial priorities to the incoming prime minister.
At the top of the list for Moe was the elimination of the consumer carbon tax – something Carney promised to do during the liberal leadership race.
Additionally, the provincial leader asked for Carney’s plan to deal with Chinese canola tariffs that are expected to take effect March 20.
Moe made his social media posts from Texas where he is attending an energy conference.
Political analysts, such as Jean Rodrique Pare of the University of Ottawa, expect Moe may get some of what he wants.
“Quite clearly he’s not for it [the carbon tax]. He repeated it last night at least for the small businesses, I don’t know if he’ll be able to do the whole thing all at once. It depends on what the regulations are and all that – but he has said clearly that he is against it,” Pare explained.
Conservatives MPs in Saskatchewan, such as former party leader Andrew Scheer, are concerned that Carney will keep the industrial portion of the carbon tax on industries like steel.
“I believe Mr. Carney is lying,” Scheer told CTV News. “He’s been caught lying several times throughout this campaign. What he’s talking about is rebranding it, hiding it, calling it a shadow carbon tax, those are his words and he has specifically singled out steel.”
“We have a lot of people that work in Regina at a steel factory and Mr. Carney thinks it’s okay to hike the production costs of steel,” he added.
Saskatchewan’s NDP also released its list of expectations for the prime minister designate.
“Investing in rail lines, investing in power lines, investing in pipelines, building Saskatchewan to help build this country,” MLA Aleana Young explained.
Carney may not have much time to act on Saskatchewan’s requests should the country be thrown into a spring federal election.
As the new Liberal Leader @MarkJCarney starts, there are a number of day 1 priorities for Saskatchewan residents. Firstly, Canadians look forward to you keeping your promise to eliminate the consumer carbon tax. It would be a great tariff relief measure and needs to happen before…
— Scott Moe (@PremierScottMoe) March 10, 2025
