Peter Bevan-Baker, Leader of the Official Opposition, and Amita Kuttner, Interim Leader of the Green Party of Canada, call on federal government to step up inflation relief for Islanders and all Canadians (La version française suit)
Charlottetown, PE – Canadians across the country are faced with a crisis of rising costs. Nowhere is that this more pronounced than in Prince Edward Island where inflation has soared into double digits. For months, the PEI Green caucus has been calling on the provincial government to do more to assist Islanders.
“Day-after-day we hear from people who find themselves combating these higher prices, and who’re being forced to reduce on the fundamentals they need,” said Peter Bevan-Baker, Leader of the PEI Official Opposition Green Caucus. “No person must have to make a choice from food, medicine, and paying their bills, but we’re seeing increasingly people being forced to accomplish that.”
“Premier Dennis King took months to get relief into the hands of Islanders, and what finally has come has been five months late and nowhere near what is required. This just isn’t adequate.”
Given the King government’s failure to take meaningful and timely motion to deal with rising costs, Islanders will need assistance from elsewhere.
Green Party of Canada Interim Leader Amita Kuttner is joining Bevan-Baker in calling for Ottawa to step up relief for Islanders and all Canadians by:
“With the inflation rate continuing to rise, now above eight percent nationally, it’s time for the Prime Minister and his team to search for more impactful and artistic solutions to the crisis facing Canadians,” said Kuttner.
Bevan-Baker and Kuttner are also calling on the federal government to overturn PEI’s carbon pricing system and to implement the federal backstop.
“The federal system would see lots of more dollars going into the pockets of Islanders. As a substitute we’ve got a system that takes tens of millions of dollars from Islanders and uses it to subsidize fossil fuels,” said Bevan-Baker.
“It’s necessary that our carbon taxes work to scale back emissions, while also helping individuals with the fee of transitioning to a clean economy,” said Kuttner. “PEI’s carbon tax does neither, and it’s high time that Ottawa put a stop to it and provides Islanders the cash they should make green decisions of their lives, or simply to purchase groceries if that’s what they need.”
For media inquiries, please contact:
Katie Rankin
Chief of Staff
Office of the Official Opposition
Tel: (902) 213-6378
Email: kerankin@assembly.pe.ca
Fabrice Lachance Nové
Press Secretary
Green Party of Canada
Tel: (514) 463-0021
Email: fabrice.lachance@greenparty.ca
