British Columbia Opposition Leader John Rustad is proposing a “carbon tax” on U.S. thermal coal that is shipped out of B.C. ports to use as leverage against threats of American tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber.

Rustad says such a tax would be a “tool to fight back” on softwood tariffs and duties proposed by U.S. President Donald Trump, which Forests Minister Ravi Parmar said last week could increase to more than 50 per cent.

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He says that until “unfair and unwarranted” U.S. duties on B.C. softwood are removed, the province needs “to be ready to hit the Americans where it hurts.”

The B.C. Conservatives had previously said that “rather than retaliate and exacerbate” the tariff threat, it should be considered an “opportunity to rapidly advance B.C.’s economy.”

Rustad Monday distinguished between retaliating with tariffs and applying a “graduated carbon tax” that would be increased until B.C. got a softwood lumber deal.

“This isn’t actually about the threat of tariffs from from Donald Trump. This is about a soft lumber agreement that we haven’t had in place since 2016. We have now about $10 billion that is sitting in a trust that have been paid by our B.C. forest companies because of the duties that have been put in place deal with living with softwood lumber,” Rustad told 1130 NewsRadio.

“It gives us that leverage, I think, to help us get to the table and try to get a fair deal done, so that we connect we can access the U.S. market for our softwood.”

He says 18 million tonnes of U.S. thermal coal is shipped through Vancouver, but the province doesn’t use it.

Rustad also proposed a ban on American funding for B.C. environmental activists, who he called “troublemaking layabouts” who wasted police and courts’ time and “dragged our resource industries through costly litigation.”

“These are direct influence that has come from American organizations to try to stymie British Columbia’s resource development,” Rustad claimed.

The governing NDP is meanwhile calling for unanimous endorsement for a motion condemning Trump and backing a national plan for “strategically targeted retaliatory action.”

—With files from Anthony Atanasov.