Federal support from $2-billion aid package slow to pay out
Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland told an interviewer in Davos this week that once the U.S. drops its steel and aluminum tariffs, Canada will too, “30 seconds later.”
Until that day comes, the extra taxation is pretty lucrative for the federal government. Finance Canada says $839 million was collected in the six months leading up to Dec. 31 from retaliatory tariffs on imported American steel, aluminum and other products.
Canada didn’t start this tariff spat, and from the prime minister on down every Canadian official says he or she wishes it would end. The tariffs on both sides of the border have disrupted supply chains and added extra costs for consumers and businesses across a wide range of industries.
All the same, the new revenue is on track to hit the $1-billion mark by the time Finance Minister Bill Morneau tables his final pre-election budget this spring.
And this figure doesn’t include the 25 per cent surtax now collected on seven categories of steel imports from countries beyond the U.S. (Countries with whom Canada has a free trade agreement in place are mostly exempted, although some categories of Mexican steel were included.)
This “emergency safeguards” surtax is intended to prevent cheap foreign steel displaced from the U.S. market from disrupting supply chains in Canada.
For the rest of this article: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/steel-tariffs-update-sunday-1.4992800