A gas tax holiday that gasoline prices already outran
The Canadian Automobile Association put the national average price of regular gasoline at $1.729 per litre on September 2, as reported by The Canadian Press, which calculated that reinstating the tax would push that to $1.829, or roughly $5 more to fill a 50-litre tank.
Statistics Canada recorded a national average of about $1.79 in April.
Fuel prices have run ahead of the tax relief since the suspension took effect on April 20, 2026, per Finance Canada.
Economist Jim Stanford, writing for the Centre for Future Work on September 2, found gasoline and diesel prices are higher now than before the holiday began, and that consumers paid an extra $3bn for motor vehicle fuels between April and June.
Stanford’s briefing paper, Another Band-aid: Extending Gas Tax Holiday Won’t Fix Fossil Fuel Inflation, identifies a widening crack spread between refined product and crude prices, and early spillover from petroleum into air travel, transportation, and food.
