The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) released its 25th annual Gas Tax Honesty Report that highlights the hidden taxes that Canadians pay at the pumps.
Saskatchewan lands second in Canada where consumers are paying less per litre at the pumps.
Gage Haubrich, the CTP prairie director, says Saskatchewan actually does pretty well when it comes to gas taxes that the drivers are paying at the pump.
“The average Saskatchewan driver, you know, they’re paying $0.46 per liter when it comes to gas taxes out there,” said Haubrich.
“Now, obviously, that’s still not great, but we don’t have many of the transit taxes or the provincial sales taxes that other provinces do that they charge on their gas taxes as well.”
Alberta has the lowest gas prices and lowest gas tax percentage in the country as the province’s premier, Danielle Smith, cut the provincial gas tax. With Saskatchewan being the province with the second-lowest gas prices, Haubrich said it’s definitely way better than it could be.
“We’d like to see the province do more in that front … Saskatchewan shouldn’t settle for second best,” he said. “The government usually rightly calls out the cost of how the carbon tax is making things like gas prices much more unaffordable … they have that extra revenue room to move and cut the gas tax and make prices even cheaper for drivers. And we think that they should do that.”
Although Saskatchewan pays $1.55 at the pumps with 30 per cent tax portion, the report shows Victoria pays more for gas at $1.95 with 36 per cent tax portion.
According to GasBuddy, the gas at Co-op in Warman is currently priced at $1.36 per litre and Klein’s Food Mart in Regina is currently at $1.53 per litre.