Only In the City of Toronto would this happen.

Forget about free will or democracy if you happen to live in the City of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Because whether you like it or not, and whether the retailers likes it or not. Retailers are now forced by a new city of Toronto bylaw to charge 5 cents per plastic bag to customers.

http://www.toronto.ca/garbage/packaging_reduction/5centbag_bylaw.htm

This is nothing more then a cash grab as retailers get to keep this money, but some retailers I'm sure don't want to charge this fee, but the city of Toronto and the lovely Toronto city councillors don't give these retailers a choice. So where is the freedom in all of this? Where is the democracy? The last time I checked Canada was still a democratic country where everyone has the right to choose.

I mean fine if stores and retailers want to charge 5 cents for plastic bags that's alright, but to force them to do so isn't democracy and isn't fair to people like me or others who don't feel we should be forced to pay 5 cents for a plastic shopping bag or be forced to carry around plastic shopping bags or those recyclable bags those so called environmentalists love so much.

The bottom line is the City of Toronto councillors have decided to play communism with the citizens of Toronto. As whether we like it or not, or accept it or not! We do as we're told like little children and if we want to get a plastic bag to take our groceries home from the store we pay 5 cents period. Now don't you just love to be told what you can and can't do?

Other surrounding municipalities outside of the city of Toronto like Mississauga, Vaughan, Newmarket, Markham, Oakville, Pickering, Whitby, even Oshawa have no intention of charging for plastic bags or forcing retailers to charge their customers 5 cents for plastic bags. So why is Toronto doing it?

For the Environment is the excuse by Toronto city councillors, which is fine. But we're still suppose to be living in a free society where we should be given the choice to choose whether we want to use plastic bags or not and not be forced to pay for them just because a bunch of city councillors feel they have the absolute power to do so.

If you feel just as ticked off as I am, feel free to contact your local Toronto City councillor and let them know how the Toronto City bylaw forcing 5 cents per plastic bag is nothing more then Toronto hog wash for hard working Toronto tax-payers.

http://app.city.toronto.on.ca/im/council/councillors.jsp