Many Sudbury drivers are fuming about gas prices. Resident Gerry Houle said he thinks the prices of gas is “ridiculous.”
“Why is Sudbury so bloody high,” the Greater Sudbury resident asked. “There was a time when Sturgeon (Falls) was higher. But in the last few years, Sturgeon is always lower.”
According to OntarioGasPrices.com, as of July 12, gas in Sturgeon Falls and North Bay ranged between $128.7 and $136.9 per litre. In Sault Ste. Marie, prices were $126.9 to $127.9 and in Barrie, gas prices started at 124.1 and went up to $129.9.
Drivers in Greater Sudbury say they’re tired of paying high gas prices and worry about the impact on the area. Photo by Martha Dillman
However, in Greater Sudbury, gas prices started at $135.6, with the highest price sitting at $136.9.
“This is completely ridiculous,” Houle said. “I think Sudbury, out of all the places I’ve seen, (has) just the most ridiculous (prices).”
Resident George Gardner said he believes the higher prices will affect tourism, not only locally, but around the province.
“People will just stay home and have a home-cation instead of a stay-cation because of the high gas prices,” he said.
Across the province, there is more than a 30-cent difference per litre of gas between the lowest price of $109.9 in Muncey, outside of London, and the highest price of $141.9 in Manitouwadge, a small community about 400 kilometres northeast of Thunder Bay.
Sudbury MP Glenn Thibeault, who is also the critic for consumer protection, said the New Democrats have been working to monitor gas prices.
“We had many of the gas executives come to our committee in the House of Commons and we also had the consumer side of them come,” he said.
“The gas companies really have no real reason to be, as I say, gouging the prices for those of us in northern Ontario.”
Thibeault said gas executives have told him higher prices in northern Ontario were a result of communities being further away from processing plants.
However, that doesn’t explain price differences between places like Greater Sudbury and Sturgeon Falls, he said.
The New Democrats are looking at creating a gas ombudsman office, he said. A gas ombudsman’s office would oversee the gas industry and act as a watchdog for various issues that may arise, including the spikes in fuel prices. The province of Ontario has a provincial ombudsman, André Marin, but he is responsible for overseeing government services.
“The ombudsman is one way of making sure we can stop the gouging and making sure that there are some fair practices in place,” Thibeault said.
Another way to deal with rising prices could be regulation, he added, and with that, “anything is on the table.”
“There’s regulation in place in places like New Brunswick and other Atlantic provinces where ... it’s not all of a sudden going to jump on a Friday ... by five or 10 cents a litre and then drop back down on a Monday,” he said.
“What we need to do is look at why, when the cost of a barrel goes down, the prices don’t go down.”
Regulation and a gas ombudsman isn’t something Houle would be opposed to.
“What’s the difference whether it be Toronto (or) Barrie?” he said.
“As far as I’m concerned, if it takes the ombudsman to do this, it’s up to the people to try and get together and force the government to do this.”
-Posted by Heather Green-Oliver
