B.C. Energy Minister Adrian Dix said he expects gasoline and diesel companies to pass on savings to consumers from the elimination of the carbon tax.
But he also acknowledged that there is no guarantee that they will given existing legislation in B.C.
Prices, meanwhile, are dropping across B.C., but the real question is whether those drops will lead to permanent relief or remain temporary.
Government said yesterday that British Columbians filling up their tanks can expect savings of 17 cents per litre and evidence so far suggests that companies are passing on the savings.
According to GasBuddy.com, a website tracking gasoline prices across North America, a litre of regular gas in Other trackers point to similar developments. In Vancouver, the price for a regular litre on April 1 was $1.789 per litre, down from $1.969 on March 31, according to . In Victoria, prices dropped to $1.729 from $1.909. In Kelowna, prices dropped to $1.459 from $1.639 and in Kamloops, prices dropped to $1.479 from $1.659.
But it is not clear yet whether they represent the new normal and if they rise again, and the government won't have the power to regulate them as B.C. is not among the five provinces 香蕉视频直播� Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec 香蕉视频直播� that regulate gasoline prices.
When asked whether B.C. would join provinces currently regulating gasoline prices, Dix said B.C. is satisfied that actions taken so far, including transparency legislation effective since 2020, are having a positive effect. "(We) expect to see those benefits for people at the pump," he said.
"We don't have that kind of regulated economy on those questions, so equally on other issues," he added. "What we can do in B.C. is do what we did, which is force transparency."
Central to this transparency is the Fuel Price Transparency Act passed in 2019 under the administration of the British Columbia Utilities Commission. It requires B.C.'s gasoline and diesel fuel industry to report prices on a regular basis.
BCUC does not regulate fuel prices, but Dix points to the effects of transparency.
"When we force transparency, the discrepancies start to go away," Dix said in pointing to the effects of public pressure but also what he called administrative pressure.
"BCUC is providing a place where those things are reviewed and where the industry has to demonstrate the validity of the price differentials between ours and other jurisdictions."
A series of dashboards available on BCUC's website allows consumers to compare and contrast gasoline prices along different criteria and across time with a three-day-delay in the case of the dashboard that tracks . Other dashboards allow consumers to track prices across and in B.C. Other dashboards, meanwhile, break down components of and compare .
Carol Montreuil, eastern vice-president for the Canadian Fuels Association, said his organization noted that the removal of the carbon tax had an immediate impact in B.C. and across all Canadian provinces (except Quebec) as prices at the pump were all trending towards the expected reduction.
"While we can香蕉视频直播檛 predict future gas price fluctuations as they are influences by several other factors such as global crude oil prices, transportation and logistics costs, and geopolitical developments, it香蕉视频直播檚 fair to say that the fuel retail industry is highly competitive and prices are ultimately determined by market forces, supply and demand and economic conditions," Montreuil said.
