Commercial drivers fuming over fuel

Cab driver Uriel Levi says the only way he could shrink his carbon footprint any more would be to swap his Toyota Prius for a rickshaw.

Drivers met with NDP leader Carole James at the legislature Tuesday to support her suggestion that record high gasoline prices make B.C.’s new carbon tax an unnecessary burden.

Levi said Victoria cabbies were such early adopters of hybrid cars that Toyota officials visited to get their input on a new car designed for taxi use. 

“We are not opposing the green movement,” he said. “I just think the oil price by itself is doing the damage, or the good for the green movement. We don’t need taxes to do it.”

A 3.5 per cent fuel surcharge comes into effect July 12 for B.C. taxi and limousine companies, to offset the 2.3 cent-per-litre increase from the carbon tax. The fuel surcharge stays in place until the provinces’ Passenger Transportation Board sets a new general rate for taxis next year.

James, whose own climate change plan suggests taxing greenhouse gas-producing industries rather than consumers, agreed with the drivers.

“My argument is that you’ve already got the market taking care of it,” James said. “At a time when you see the price of gas up 30 cents a litre just in the last few months, you don’t need government piling on with another unfair gas tax. It just doesn’t make any sense, when people are already feeling the incentives to change.”

Taxi drivers say the fuel surcharge will help cover sharply rising fuel costs, but higher rates are being passed on to seniors who can’t afford them.

And van taxis that accommodate wheelchairs aren’t being put on the road because they aren’t hybrids and drivers can’t afford to run them.

Truck drivers are also feeling the weight of the carbon tax. The B.C. Trucking Association calculates that it will cost the industry $500 million in the first five years.

Based on the rate for diesel fuel, 2.69 cents per litre this year and rising to more than eight cents by 2012, the association says the average long-haul trucker will pay $1,000 this year in carbon tax and can get back between $20 and $51 in personal income tax, plus the $100 rebate cheque.

In 2009 and beyond, the association estimates owner-operator will pay $3,000 in carbon tax and receive $55 in reduced income tax.

It says B.C. is paying the highest overall tax on diesel fuel. As of July 1 the combined federal excise and provincial tax on a litre of diesel is 27.69 cents a litre in the Lower Mainland, 25.19 cents a litre in the Victoria area and 21.69 per cent in the rest of B.C.

The average for provinces is 19.46 cents a litre.

- Lower Mainland: $2.85 flag rate plus $1.66 per km

- Greater Victoria: $3.05 flag rate plus $1.72 per km

tfletcher@blackpress.ca