Ontario Premier Doug Ford is making a move to shield Ontario Taxpayers from a provincial carbon tax.

Premier Scott Moe should copy Ford’s homework and then go further.

Ford announced he plans to introduce a law that would force any future Ontario government that tries to bring in a provincial carbon tax to put the question forward in a referendum first.

Carbon taxes hike the price of everything from gasoline to groceries. It only makes sense that the government should need to ask permission to take even more money out of taxpayers’ wallets. Politicians should have to face the music when they plan to hike taxes, not years later during the next election, after they’ve already hiked taxes.

This move would protect Ontarians from a provincial carbon tax and the government of Saskatchewan should do the same. Moe has been fighting the federal carbon tax since the beginning and it’s a good bet he wants to protect Saskatchewan from a provincial carbon tax.

Step one is passing legislation that forces provincial politicians to hold a referendum if they want to bring in a carbon tax, but step two is taking inspiration from other taxpayer protection legislation around the country, so the government must ask permission from taxpayers for all tax hikes.

To the west, the Alberta government recently buffed up its Taxpayer Protection Act. Along with already requiring a referendum before the government can impose a PST, now it also needs to ask Albertans to raise personal or business taxes.

Saskatchewanians have been paying whatever taxes the government wants to impose on them, for years, because the province lacks taxpayer protection legislation.

In 2017, the government raised the PST and removed pre-existing exemptions to the tax on children’s clothes and restaurant meals. In 2022, Moe added the PST to events like sports games and concerts, charging you more to cheer on the Riders.

In 2016, before the government’s last PST hike, a family making $75,000 paid about $1,173 in PST. This year, a family making the same amount of money can expect to pay $1,932 in PST. Albertans paid zero provincial sales taxes the entire time.

If the government had to ask permission for these tax hikes, Saskatchewanians could have rejected them in a referendum.

But Moe’s party has been in power in Saskatchewan for 17 years and hasn’t introduced taxpayer protection legislation, so why do it now?

Well, that’s why Carla Beck and the Saskatchewan NDP have an opportunity step up and push for taxpayer protections if Moe continues to fail do so. A move like this would build the NDPs’ position on affordability and force government MLAs to take a stance on the legislation.

But taxpayer protection shouldn’t even stop there, it should also protect taxpayers from future tax hikes by punishing politicians that run deficits and add to the provincial debt.

Manitoba used to have the most robust taxpayer protection law in the country. Under that law, along with requiring a referendum for a tax hike, the extra pay an MLA receives for being a cabinet minister would be reduced if the government fails to balance the budget. If the deficit continued into the next year, the extra pay was docked even more. A pay cut like that could motivate Saskatchewan politicians who have failed to balance consecutive budgets since 2014.

The main critique with taxpayer protection laws is that the government can just repeal or ignore the law. But that can’t be done without consequences. Former Manitoba premier Greg Sellinger gutted Manitoba’s law and raised the PST without a referendum in 2013. In the next election, his party was defeated and reduced to its lowest number of seats in over 25 years. 

Moe should use Ford’s announcement as cue to start working on Saskatchewan’s own taxpayer protection legislation. But if Moe fails, Beck should take up the taxpayer mantle and force Moe to take a stance on accountability to taxpayers.