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Stop exporting jobs during the transition to a low-carbon economy Wynne is told

The OCC warns that the province must measure the impact of cap and trade among other input costs to fully understand the cumulative burden facing Ontario’s business community.
BayToday Staff
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The Ontario Chamber of Commerce (OCC) sent an open letter to Premier Kathleen Wynne calling on the government to take action through Budget 2017 to contain the costs of the cap and trade system to better support Ontario’s business community.

"At a time of low business confidence across the province, and increasing competition from the United States, rising input costs for Ontario business risk negatively impacting jobs and investment in Nipissing district and across the province," says a news release.

In the letter, the OCC warns that the province must measure the impact of cap and trade among other input costs to fully understand the cumulative burden facing Ontario’s business community. Because businesses are directly affected by the costs associated with cap and trade, the Government of Ontario must ensure that the revenue and design of the system is allocated and developed in a way that supports Ontario’s business community. 

“With all the other increasing costs to businesses, the provincial government was quick to add the cap and trade without any regard to what this added cost would mean to businesses,” said Patti Carr, Vice President of Policy and Communications, North Bay & District Chamber of Commerce. “Along with the OCC, we are calling on the Premier to take action and support our businesses and local economy.”

The OCC has identified four priority actions that would assist the business community to better navigate the cap and trade system:

  1. Prioritize the allocation of cap and trade revenue for businesses, in addition to other efforts to offset the cost of cap and trade. Making the process to access resources as quickly as possible will be important, especially for smaller businesses who have little time or money to dedicate to program applications.
  2. Prioritize innovation funding. Many Ontario businesses have already taken steps to reduce their carbon footprint. Achieving further reductions could be difficult and will often require the implementation of new technologies.
  3. Create greater post-2020 design certainty. Post-2020 certainty is important for businesses looking to make long-term investments in Ontario.
  4. Monitor and respond to regional impacts. To ensure the strategic allocation of cap and trade revenues, government should conduct a regional analysis of the impacts.