Doug Ford is pumping up his promise to cut gasoline taxes by giving motorists a break of 10 cents a litre if elected premier June 7.

The PC leader said Wednesday he’ll top up his earlier pledge to axe the Kathleen Wynne government’s 4.3 cent a litre carbon tax — it’s part of his plan to scrap her cap-and-trade program designed to fight climate change — with a 5.7-cent reduction in the provincial fuel tax.

“These are real savings that will leave money in your pocket,” Ford said at a Husky gas station in Oakville where a litre of regular is priced just under $1.36 as gas prices have soared recently in the GTA.

The gas tax pledge would mean $1.2 billion in lost revenue for the provincial treasury under Ford, who has vowed to cut $6 billion in government spending and trim income taxes by $2.3 billion.

Appearing in a riding represented by Wynne labour minister Kevin Flynn, Ford was not specific when asked how a Progressive Conservative government would pay for the gas-tax promise.

“We are going to wipe out the deficit the first year, maybe the second …. We will balance the budget in our term,” he said.

“We can’t afford not to do this,” added Ford, who said the carbon tax and rising gas prices are hammering the finances of people who need cars to get to work and to shuttle their kids to school and sports.

“Carbon taxes, like all taxes, punish low-income families the hardest.”

A campaign official, speaking on background, later said a PC government would not feel the pinch from $1.9 billion in lost cap-and-trade revenues, including the gas tax, because green programs funded with that money will be cancelled.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath, who has promised to bring “stability” to gas prices by regulating how often stations can raise prices, said Ford has still not explained what government programs he would cut in his search for $6 billion in promised “efficiencies.”

“He talks a good game about things he’s going to give families, but what he’s not being honest about is the things he’s going to take away,” she told reporters in Scarborough.

On the campaign trail Wednesday, Ontario PC Leader Doug Ford said he will balance the budget and “give relief” to taxpayers. NDP Leader Andrea Horwath says her party’s “first priority” will be helping families. (The Canadian Press)

“He’ll give with one hand; he’ll take away with the other.”

The Liberals said Ford’s pledge to cancel cap-and-trade, which puts limits on how much companies can pollute the air with climate-changing emissions, suggests he has “no plan to fight climate change.”

“This is the worst of all worlds,” said Cambridge Liberal candidate Kathryn McGarry, who served as Wynne’s minister of natural resources. She predicted gas companies would raise prices to make up for Ford’s axed tax.

“People won’t get the savings he promises. But they’ll, for sure, feel the cuts.”

Ford, who is leading in public opinion polls — Horwath’s New Democrats are in second place — continued his attempts to make voters wary of voting NDP.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

He called the Bob Rae government from 1990-95, which raised taxes to battle a lingering recession, “an absolute disaster.”

Read more:

Doug Ford promises to cut gas prices by 10 cents a litre

Anybody-but-Ford movement is percolating as June 7 election nears: poll

More raises at privatized Hydro One turn former Crown utility into bigger lightning rod in election

With files from Kristin Rushowy

Read more about: