Liberals to hike GST rebates, help with rent payments in new affordability plan
The federal government intends to temporarily hike GST rebate cheques in a bid to ease some of the hurt of inflation for lower-income Canadians.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will announce a three-pronged plan to address affordability at the Liberal cabinet retreat in Vancouver today.
Cabinet ministers are gathering ahead of the fall sitting of Parliament with the economy and the cost-of-living crisis top of mind.
New clean fuel regulations to raise gas prices, affect low-income Canadians the most
New federal regulations to force down the greenhouse gas emissions from gasoline and diesel will cost Canadians up to 13 cents more per litre at the pump by 2030.
An impact analysis of the Clean Fuel Regulations published Wednesday estimates they will cut about 18 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions in 2030, or five to six per cent of what Canada needs to eliminate to meet its current targets for that year.
Full ban on six single-use plastics coming by end of 2025: Guilbeault
The federal government is banning companies from importing or making plastic bags and takeout containers by the end of this year, from selling them by the end of next year and from exporting them by the end of 2025.
The move will also affect most single-use plastic straws, as well as all stir sticks, and cutlery. Six-pack rings used to hold cans and bottles together will get slightly more time before the ban affects them, with June 2023 targeted for stopping production and import, and June 2024 to ban their sale.
Electric vehicle popularity grows in 2021 but still not on track for federal targets
Electric vehicle sales grew almost 60 per cent last year but they need to pick up the pace even more to hit the new federal sales mandates expected by the end of this year.
Statistics Canada released the latest quarterly data on new vehicle registrations Thursday, showing in the fourth quarter of 2021, plug-in cars and SUVs made up more than six per cent of new vehicle registrations for the first time.
Extreme heat should be labelled a natural disaster, new report urges
Governments should consider extreme heat a natural disaster as climate change raises the risk of soaring summer temperatures in much of Canada, a new report says.
Irreversible Extreme Heat, penned by experts at the Intact Centre on Climate Change at the University of Waterloo, says "Canadian alarm bells should be ringing" about the risk of intense heat.
"Extreme heat is kind of a disaster waiting to happen," said lead author Joanna Eyquem, managing director of climate−resilient infrastructure at the Intact Centre.