Later this fall, the government will be releasing new rules to fulfil their commitment to end public financing for fossil fuels from crown corporations. Those of you who have been following this file might recall that in Dec 2022, the government passed fairly strong rules which ended international public financing, and then last year less robust rules aimed at ending inefficient fossil fuel subsidies. (The government’s distinction between those is that subsidies are the money spent by departments or tax measures, while public financing are the loans, loan guarantees and insurance mostly provided by crown corporations like Export Development Canada). However, the lion’s share of the financial support going to the industry is public financing for domestic oil and gas companies and projects — which the government has committed to eliminating.
Unfortunately, Finance Canada (and to a lesser extent, Natural Resources Canada) is doing everything they can to weaken the rules. We need to draw some red lines. A weak domestic financing policy is worse than no policy at all — it legitimises ongoing public financing and sets a dangerous global precedent, especially with Canada assuming the G7 presidency in 2025.
Please consider signing on to this letter to Trudeau that lays out our redlines. I’ll be collecting signatories until September 11th. You can add your organisation by filling out this form We’ll also be collecting academic signatures. Please share with your networks so that we can have a really strong number of signatories.