Newfoundlanders and Labradorians got a huge reminder today of a piece of red tape the provincial government deliberately ignored in its recent three year crusade to rid the province of unnecessary and burdensome government regulation.
Gas prices leaped six and a half cents.
The provincial government’s petroleum products price fixing agency has cost taxpayers in the province more than $65 million above what would have occurred if the regulatory system wasn’t in place.
Some taxpayers, like those on the coast of Labrador, get an extra shaft from the province’s price fixing scheme. Early price freezes mean the price per gallon stayed well above what the island portion of the province paid through the fall and early winter as prices everywhere else dropped.
Supposedly the provincial government eliminated 27% of the red tape that used to be there. How they measured it is beyond anyone other than the people who issued the news releases over the past three years that contained little more than numbers: government has cut another 3,652 pieces of red tape on its goal of cutting some other bigger meaningless number.
Rather than quantity, they should have gone for quality. if they really wanted to wipe out useless government bureaucracy they’d have closed the gas pricing fixing office.
That’s something every consumer in the province – businesses included – would have seen every single day.
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