(Bloomberg) -- Ontario plans to extend a temporary cut to gasoline and diesel taxes to next June, Premier Doug Ford said at a news conference Sunday.
The extension would keep the taxes at 9 Canadian cents per liter, according to a government statement. The cut was first implemented in 2022 during a period of surging inflation; previously, the gasoline tax was 14.7 cents a liter.
Legislation will be introduced Wednesday as part of the province’s fall economic statement, Ford told reporters at a gas station in Toronto. By next June, an average household in the province will have saved C$380 ($274) over the three years of the tax reduction, the government said.
Ford, who has led Canada’s largest province since 2018, is an opponent of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s climate policy of an escalating carbon tax on most fossil fuels. The premier, who’s well ahead of his opponents in public opinion polls, has considered whether to try to call an early election in 2025 rather than wait until the scheduled date in 2026, according to news reports.
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