Ontario Responds to the 2024 Federal Budget

Today, Peter Bethlenfalvy, Ontario’s Minister of Finance, issued the following statement in response to the 2024 federal budget:

“Today’s budget was a missed opportunity to scrap the costly federal carbon tax, which is making everything from gasoline to groceries more expensive. Our government continues to urge the federal government to put more money back into peoples’ pockets by eliminating the carbon tax once and for all, particularly at a time when it is contributing to high inflation.

Canada is not immune to global economic uncertainty. Now more than ever, as our government rebuilds Ontario’s economy, we need our federal partners to support our plan to build. We were glad to see that the budget responded to Ontario’s call for more housing-enabling infrastructure funding to support getting more homes built. We look forward to working with our federal partners and municipalities to ensure that this funding supports our shared goal of building homes for people to own that also reflects unique needs of local municipalities.

However, we are disappointed by the lack of dedicated funding to expand two-way, all-day GO train service to Milton. Our government recently announced the largest expansion of GO train service in more than a decade and we urge the federal government to work with us to help commuters in Ontario get where they need to go faster. Our government is ready to invest.

We are encouraged that the budget recognized the importance of Canada’s end-to-end electric vehicle battery supply chain and the benefits it will bring to remote, Northern and Indigenous communities, including through the new electric vehicle supply chain investment tax credit. We urge the federal government to help fully realize the potential of the billions of dollars in investment we have attracted to the electric vehicle and battery sectors by matching the more than $1 billion Ontario has dedicated to build all-season roads to the Ring of Fire region and by working with us to eliminate duplicative reviews and processes that are slowing down this nationally significant project, as we have recently done in the case of Highway 413.

Several weeks ago, I released Ontario’s 2024 budget, Building a Better Ontario. It lays out a clear plan to rebuild Ontario’s economy and return to balance without imposing extra costs or new taxes on people, workers, businesses or municipalities. We stand ready to continue working with the federal government to get it done.”