Parker Gallant and I unintentionally wrote on the same topic this weekend.
The explanation for the coincidence is that great minds think alike
Wind Concerns Ontario Blog: Parker Gallant on the Ontario government and the debt retirement charge:
Taxing Ratepayers: The Energy Minister giveth some but taketh away moreRead the rest of Parker Gallant on the Ontario government and the debt retirement charge
Ontario's Energy Minister Bob Chiarelli was recently quoted in the Toronto Sun as saying, “When the OCEB (Ontario Clean Energy Benefit) comes off the [hydro] bill, residential customers don't face additional costs.”
The news article actually began with this: “The provincial government is trying to rejig hydro bills to ensure that customers aren’t hit with a sharp increase when the Ontario Clean Energy Benefit is phased out, Energy Minister Bob Chiarelli says.” There was more: “The plan was to also eliminate the debt retirement charge on hydro bills at the same time, he said Wednesday.” Chiarelli also apparently said: “It was scheduled to come off at the time the Clean Energy Benefit was coming off, and they would balance each other out more or less.” He added, “The financial projections turned out not to be as precise as they were anticipated.”
The debt retirement charge or DRC has been around for over a decade; it was meant to pay off the “residual stranded debt” of $7.8 billion, not the full stranded debt—earnings and payments in lieu of taxes (PILT), were estimated to be sufficient to retire the remaining $11.8 billion. But now, the government through its continued interference in the energy sector, has in fact caused those “financial projections” referred to by the Minister to bevery imprecise.
My article coincidentally written and posted during the same period is Debt and indecency in Wynne's Ontario
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