Barrett to McGuinty: Drop the 100 per cent cement mix eco fee

For Immediate Release:
July 8, 2010

Simcoe – Under the McGuinty government’s yet-to-be-announced eco fee program, a 60 pound bag of cement mix, which retails for $3.99, as of July 1st has a new tax of $3.90 – an almost 100 per cent increase.

As many know, an Ontario-government agency, Stewardship Ontario, has launched its recycling cost-recovery program resulting in retail price increases on close to 5,000 items. Of course, as of July 1st, the HST also applies to these consumer products.

While many in Ontario accept a few cents here and there to foster recycling, the 100 per cent tax on cement mix is clearly over the top, according to Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett, who is also the Environment Critic for the Official Opposition.

“Doubling the price of cement mix is bad for business, bad for customers, and ultimately bad for the environment because it compromises the credibility of the Stewardship Ontario program,” Barrett said. “I am calling on Premier McGuinty to intervene and work with industry to drop this $3.90 a bag eco fee.

“When we as a Progressive Conservative government passed the Waste Diversion Ontario Act back in 2002 we neither envisioned nor intended such a punitive tax on cement mix – only a tax-and-spend government would allow such a measure.

Barrett encourages people concerned with the cement mix fee, or other measures, to contact their local MPP or Stewardship Ontario’s new website at www.makethedrop.ca.

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For more information, please contact MPP Toby Barrett at
(519) 428-0446 or (905)-765-8413, 1-800-903-8629