Premier François Legault confirms that Quebec families will receive a check to offset a possible 4% to 5% increase in hydroelectricity rates in 2023. The sharp increases linked to inflation will allow Hydro Quebec to reap more overpayments, says an expert.
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“We are going to give a check to Quebecers to make up the difference,” confirmed the Prime Minister, arguing that a tariff freeze as desired by the opposition parties would be a “paternalistic” gesture.
“Quebecers will choose. Quebecers are adults, most of them vaccinated, and are able to choose what they want to do with the money.
They will suffer a Hydro tariff increase of 2.5% in April and 5% according to experts if inflation continues.
Already, his government has promised a check to compensate for the general increase in the cost of living in the short term. The amount and the provisions will be revealed in the next budget, on March 22.
Inflation is on the rise due to the conflict in Ukraine, as food and fuel prices reach new highs.
Due to the new law on Hydro Quebec rates, passed under gag order in 2019 by the government and its Minister of Natural Resources Jonatan Julien, hydroelectricity prices are now fixed on the growth of inflation.
The Minister assures that this method allows more “predictability”.
“The bill that was adopted was precisely intended to avoid the yoyo games that we have seen in the past on hydroelectric rates,” repeated Minister Julien.
Return of overpayment
However, the current inflation crisis has played a bad trick on him, so much so that the Prime Minister has decided to intervene and offer compensation to citizens.
According to the professor at HEC Montreal, Pierre-Olivier Pineau, with such a growth in inflation, there will be an overpayment for Hydro Quebec which will be paid as a dividend to the government. This sum will be able to finance checks to the population, says the holder of the Chair of management of the energy sector, but this way of doing things is not provided for in the mechanisms of the Régie de l’énergie.
“For the Régie’s analysis, there will be an overpayment… and discussions will resume on this issue, even though CAQ law 34 was intended to settle the question of overpayments… Misery !”, reported the expert.
The legislation allows Hydro Québec not to justify the increase in its rates to the Régie each year. This exercise is now done every five years.
“Quebecers who pay”
For their part, the opposition parties want Quebec to return to a review of annual hydroelectricity rates.
“Everyone was once morest it. Consumer associations, businesses, industrialists, experts, analysts, everyone was once morest it, except the Prime Minister. He went ahead, then finally, today, it is Quebecers who pay, ”said the leader of the Liberal Party, Dominique Anglade.
