Matthew Lau: $160 billion says Trudeau doesn't buy his own carbon tax pitch - "There is no rhyme or reason to the Trudeau government’s climate spending... a new project costing over $20 million “that will focus on improving gender-responsive and climate-resilient agricultural practices” in Tanzania, to take two examples just from last week. What “gender-responsive and climate-resilient agricultural practices” in Tanzania are the Liberals did not explain. How gender-responsive Tanzanian climate action will benefit Canadian taxpayers who are being made to pay more than $20 million for it, they did not say, either... the Trudeau government committed over $1 million to “Ontario Tender Fruit Growers to develop climate resilient fruit varieties” — though on this occasion without mention of gender responsiveness. Do the Liberals care more about the gender responsiveness of taxpayer-funded climate-resilient agriculture in Tanzania than about the gender responsiveness of taxpayer-funded climate-resilient peaches, pears and apricots in Ontario? A better question: why are taxpayers paying for either of these two programs to begin with? Another Trudeau government climate spending announcement, this one two weeks ago, was for $1 million to reduce the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario’s (CHEO) carbon footprint. Government funding of hospitals is nothing extraordinary but possibly the money could have been put to better use providing actual medical care... Only 24 per cent of patients are admitted to hospital from emergency within the target time of eight hours. The other 76 per cent of patients suffering excessive wait times in emergency may at least be comforted by the knowledge that the Trudeau government is greatly concerned with reducing the hospital’s carbon footprint. The day after the hospital announcement, the Liberals announced two more climate spending initiatives: $1.4 million for 13 electric vehicle chargers in Prince Edward Island and a handout of up to $11 million to Glencore Canada Corporation for battery-powered equipment for a mining project in Ontario... What he really must have meant is that it demonstrates the Liberal government’s commitment to central planning and wasting taxpayers’ money. Just two months ago, in insisting that his fifth annual carbon tax increase (to $80 per tonne) must go through, Trudeau defended the carbon tax on the grounds that it is better than using “the heavy hand of government through regulations or through subsidies or some other way to pick winners and losers in the economy.” If Trudeau practiced what he preaches, Canadians — of both genders — could have saved a cumulative $160 billion."
Trudeau seems unhinged when it comes to the carbon tax. Trudeau keeps saying Canadians get back more from the carbon tax while Poilievre presents information from the PBO showing they don't. Trudeau then accuses Poilievre of not caring about facts or evidence. : r/Canada_sub
Pierre Poilievre, "Carbon Pricing" on March 19th, 2024 | openparliament.ca
Canadians need more time to digest new capital gains inclusion rules - "Since April 16, tax practitioners have fielded an unending number of questions from people wondering what they should do. Unfortunately, tax practitioners and their clients are planning in the dark. You might think that legislation to change the capital gains inclusion rate should be pretty easy to draft. But you would be incorrect. Details matter... The government is being blatantly misleading as it continues to say that this measure will only affect 0.13 per cent of taxpayers. That’s hogwash and, thankfully, many other experts are pushing back against such a disingenuous statistic."
Trudeau's class war over capital gains taxes not working to plan - "Trudeau is still trying to explain his capital gains tax changes and as they say in politics, if you are explaining then you are losing. Secondly, the explaining has gone so badly, the pushback has been so strong that the tax changes aren’t in the government’s budget implementation bill... It is beyond strange that any government wouldn’t include a major budget promise in the legislation to enact their budget promises, especially one set to take place just over a month from now... From the start, Trudeau and his team have tried to make it seem that these tax changes were only hitting the wealthiest of the wealthy. They were hoping the anger and envy generated by class warfare would have most Canadians saying, “Ya, take more from those guys.”... One of the reasons the capital gains changes aren’t in the legislation is the massive pushback from those who will be hurt, which include an awful lot of middle-class professionals and entrepreneurs. The biggest group leading the charge against these changes, though, is one that the Trudeau government is trying not to go to war with – doctors."
Sorry, Canada, but we can't tax our way to prosperity - "Freeland posed the rhetorical question to a phalanx of journalists, “What kind of Canada do you want to live in?” If her just-delivered budget was anything to go by, Freeland dreams of a Canada in which unequal levels of wealth are resolved by aggressive acts of forced sharing. It is a Canada in which the shrinking remnants of a sclerotic economy are divvied up among select demographic groups and the successful can always be “asked” to pay “just a little more” to inch ever closer but never quite reach their “fair share.” Apparently her vision also never anticipates financial default, even when interest payments outgrow all the other spending priorities of the nation. It is a triumph of theory over practice but ultimately, Freeland’s vision is one of shared misery. My answer to Freeland’s question is rather different. The kind of Canada I want to live in is one that applauds economic growth through the encouragement of entrepreneurship. It’s one that is unhappy with the OECD prediction that we will have the worst economic growth of any OECD nation over the next 35 years and sees that as a challenge to be confronted and overcome. It’s one that understands that shrinking per capita productivity means worsening living standards for everybody. It is also a Canada that recognizes that economic growth and financial stability are what underwrite the costs of the social supports that we expect in a modern developed economy. No country ever taxed its way to prosperity. That is a lesson firmly rooted in reality."
Pierre Trudeau damaged Canada far less than his son - "The elder Trudeau left his premiership under remarkably similar circumstances to those now faced by his son. Pierre faced levels of public revulsion that were virtually unprecedented. Even the pro-Trudeau columnist Tami Nolan greeted his 1984 departure with the prediction that he “would be remembered for all time as the most reviled personally.” Canada in 1984 had a debt load, an international reputation and a military that were in measurably worse shape than when Trudeau started. Most notably, Trudeau faced a revitalized Conservative opposition that would swiftly hand his Liberals one of their most humiliating defeats. But for all the messes left behind by 16 years of Pierre Trudeau, Canada in 1984 lacked many of the most potent national crises that now define his son’s third term...
Houses were actually quite affordable... Immigration was lower than usual (instead of higher than ever)... The military was weakened, but not in utter crisis... The scandals and corruption weren’t quite as brazen... Per-capita GDP still wasn’t too far off the Americans"
Trudeau owes Canadians an apology for his gross mismanagement - "Many Canadians are well aware of the myriad of apologies that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has delivered throughout his time in office. Some half-hearted apologies were issued for his own behaviour; others have been for the ills and errors of his predecessors, with no explanation of the context in which they lived. I never would have believed I’d say this, but it occurred to me recently that he has one more apology to make — to Canadians. One more heartfelt, tearful apology for his complete mismanagement of our country. And wouldn’t it be fitting if he delivered it and then resigned in shame. That would show courage. Let’s look at his record, beginning by asking ourselves if we’re better off than we were in 2015. At that time, Canadians traded an experienced, able and credible prime minister for a youthful, inexperienced politician with colourful socks promising sunny ways. Four years later, the novelty had worn off and voters handed Trudeau a minority government in 2019. So incredulous and so convinced that Canadians must have made a mistake, he called a needless election two years later in the middle of a global pandemic, which yielded the same result. Desperate to hang onto power, he then entered into an agreement with the NDP, giving the fourth-place party in the House of Commons outsized control over government policy. That disgraceful alliance has harmed all facets of Canadian life, and continues to impede on provincial authority. Trudeau should apologize for his fiscal mismanagement. From the beginning, the prime minister promised “moderate” deficits and that the budget would balance itself. Yet all of his budgets have produced enormous deficits, and our debt has more than doubled. We spend more on interest payments servicing the debt than we do on the entire defence budget. We’ve had the WE Charity scandal and the ArriveCan app debacle that cost taxpayers millions. Since 2015, the size of the public service has increased markedly, yet seems less efficient than ever. Veterans have faced obstacles getting benefits and long delays have been seen at passport offices. Yet these extra bureaucrats did had the time to redesign our passports, erasing our history and ridding them of any reference to our glorious past, our many heroes and our most prized monuments. We deserve an apology for that. Today, almost nine years on, we are faced with an affordability crisis, a housing crisis and increased taxes. The carbon tax has not only increased the price of gas, it is making everything more expensive, while doing little to further reduce the inconsequential 1.5 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gases that Canada produces. Our resource sector is being sacrificed by Trudeau’s obsessive fixation with climate change. The industries that employed thousands, raised our productivity and filled our coffers are due an apology. We have a poorly thought out immigration policy, which has seen unprecedented numbers of refugees and immigrants welcomed to this country without any thought of what those numbers would do to our housing supply, our social services and our already overtaxed health-care system. Those who believed they were coming to a prosperous country to build a better life but are now homeless and unemployed are owed an apology, too. And some are regretting their decision to emigrate. The Canadian Armed Forces are in worse shape today than during what Gen. Rick Hillier, Canada’s former chief of defence staff, called the “decade of darkness” in the 1990s... Trudeau has not lived up to our NATO commitment to spend two per cent of GDP on defence, and has privately stated that he has no intention of meeting it. This basically amounts to a breach of contract. It’s time to apologize to our men and women in uniform, and to our allies in NATO... Due to Trudeau’s view that there’s no business case for Canadian natural gas, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz was rebuffed and had to look elsewhere to replace the gas Germany got from Russia. Canadians of the Jewish faith are dealing with the government’s lack of courage in allowing the promotion of genocide by supporters of Palestine, not snuffing out antisemitism and not standing by Israel. He should apologize for his abhorrent behaviour. Of course, Trudeau repeatedly apologized for his behaviour as a young man when he wore blackface. Yet he refused to apologize over allegations that he groped a female reporter decades ago... He pushed out his former attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould, an Indigenous woman who stood by her principles in the SNC-Lavalin affair. Former Treasury Board president Jane Philpott in turn stood by her colleague and resigned from cabinet over Trudeau’s behaviour. And Celina Caesar-Chavanne, disillusioned by what the Liberal party had become under Trudeau’s leadership, also left the fold. An apology from this fake feminist is long overdue. Regardless of your views concerning the Freedom Convoy, it is a fact that the prime minister did not have the courage to meet with the protesters to hear their grievances, then called them fringe radicals and finally invoked a law to have these Canadians treated like terrorists. Today he allows hate speech bellowed by terrorist supporters who march in our streets and threaten and intimidate anyone with a different opinion... is it any surprise that talk of separation in my home province of Quebec is back in the news? Never have Canadians been so divided and so devoid of hope. It is past time for new leadership who will be proud of Canada and its citizens, who will properly manage our country, its resources and its potential. We need leaders who will unite us and make us the proud and prosperous country we once were, and can be once more."
Opinion: Capital gains tax hikes are terrible optics for Canada - "Critics of the capital gains tax hike not only are legion, they’re reputable, credentialled and noteworthy. Kathleen Ross, president of the Canadian Medical Association , says the changes could undermine efforts to recruit and retain physicians and even threaten the stability of the health-care system at a time when Canada is facing a severe doctor shortage. Former Liberal finance minister Bill Morneau argues the changes are antithetical to economic growth, increased productivity and greater investment. Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke believes they will be an innovation killer. Over 2,000 other CEOs, tech managers, entrepreneurs and innovators have express similar concerns, adding their names to an open letter from the Council of Canadian Innovators. Even Tom Mulcair, former leader of the federal NDP, has expressed concern with the capital gains tax hike, indicating it will hit more than just the rich. Yes, Tom Mulcair. We are clearly through the looking-glass now... A post-budget survey by regional innovation hubs MaRS Discovery District, Communitech and Invest Ottawa details how Canada’s top innovators and tech talent are responding to the hike in capital gains taxes. Forty-five per cent of more than 150 startup leaders who responded say they personally are considering relocating outside the country, 23 per cent say they may move their headquarters outside Canada, 60 per cent say the capital gains tax increase will deter investment and innovation and 21.9 per cent say it will harm job creation and talent recruitment. So, as we all focus on the details, arguing the pros and cons of carve-outs and caveats, our own innovators — and the rest of the world — have yet another reason to look elsewhere for places to invest, build companies, create jobs and provide economic opportunity. Details obviously matter, but the narrative matters more. And our current narrative is one of limiting growth, deterring investment and stifling entrepreneurialism. Not a good story."
Ivison: Another warning about Trudeau from yet another former minister - "has anyone been as roundly abused as Justin Trudeau by people who were formerly some of his closest associates and colleagues? Former government whip Andrew Leslie, in his recent interview with National Post, is merely the latest senior Liberal to publicly pour scorn on Trudeau, his cabinet and the cabal of senior advisers around him. He can be added to the list that includes former ministers Bill Morneau, Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott in recent books and memoirs. Other former ministers who have left government, such Catherine McKenna and Scott Brison, have hinted at their exasperation, while publicly keeping their own counsel. Can they all be dismissed as disgruntled former employees, or is there merit to the criticisms that the prime minister and his entourage are unprincipled hyper-partisans who care more about spin than substance? A common complaint is that Trudeau makes brazen commitments that he knows he can’t, or won’t, deliver upon. The latest charge from Lt. Gen Leslie is that the prime minister and his cabinet are not serious about defence and have no intention of meeting spending targets because they believe the Americans will always defend Canada. Leslie was involved in drawing up the Liberal defence policy document prior to the 2015 election. He says that this contributed to 2017’s “Strong, Secure, Engaged” policy that had specific timelines for equipment and an annex of 110 or so deliverables that were mostly missed. He said that since 2015, the Liberal government has not spent or has reprofiled, deferred or lapsed around $20 billion that was promised to defence, leaving the army “in a state of despair.” Wilson-Raybould was at the centre of the infamous SNC Lavalin scandal, in which Trudeau was found to have used means that violated the Conflict of Interest Act to exert influence on his attorney general. Wilson-Raybould later resigned from cabinet, was kicked out of the Liberal caucus, won her seat as an Independent and then left politics in 2021. Trudeau said he was merely standing up for the jobs of his fellow Canadians. In her book, Indian in the Cabinet, she said she thought Trudeau would make a good prime minister and create a good team but was proven wrong. “There are lots of pretty words, but there are a lot of promises that have been made that have not been kept. And that leads, of course, to disillusionment and disappointment,” she said in an interview with Reuters in 2021. In her book, she said she was angry that she had believed Trudeau “was an honest and good person, when in truth, he would so casually lie to the public and then think he could get away with it.” Philpott has also written a book — Health for All — which is diplomatic about her exit from the Liberal party, after leaving in solidarity with Wilson-Raybould. But she also notes the demands by Trudeau’s staff to land partisan punches on the opposition. “I don’t think that things turned out the way they were initially described. The hyper-partisanship is so built-in, it just becomes insurmountable,” she wrote. Morneau’s criticisms in his book, Where to From Here, are more explicit and damaging. The former finance minister said policy rationales were often tossed aside in favour of scoring political points. He noted the recommendations of the Department of Finance were disregarded on the emergency wage subsidy during COVID, as Trudeau announced a much more generous program than the one Morneau thought had been agreed upon. “It was one of the worst moments of my political life,” Morneau wrote. Challenges, he said, were not managed on a daily basis at the highest level and Trudeau’s management and interpersonal communication abilities were sorely lacking. “The prime minister had an inability (for) or lack of interest in forging relationships with me, and as far as I could tell, with the rest of his cabinet,” he said. Wilson-Raybould said she was chosen because she was “an Indian in the cabinet” and Morneau agreed that ministers were picked for promotional reasons rather than for what they brought to the table. But that hardly mattered because power resided in the hands of a cabal of advisers around the prime minister who compelled agreement from cabinet ministers, he said. One example of the improvised nature of public policy-making, according to Morneau, was the “baffling” decision to commit to a public dental plan when the pledge to bring in pharmacare remained unfulfilled... the consistency in the accounts of some of the most senior Liberals elected in the sweep of 2015 adds to their credibility. Not all were political rookies who became quickly disenchanted at the grubby compromises of politics. Veterans no longer in the frontlines complain that the Liberal party’s centrist traditions were trashed to allow Trudeau to become Canada’s “first NDP prime minister.”... his has been a government captivated by words, not action. Trudeau has no apparent interest in the banalities of government, including the management of his cabinet or caucus. Ministers — senior ministers — report that they rarely talk about their portfolios with their boss. In the 2018 book, Un selfie avec Justin Trudeau, Jocelyn Coulon, a former adviser to Stéphane Dion, said the relationship between prime minister and his then foreign affairs minister was “glacial” and the only private meeting the two men had was when Dion was fired. “The prime minister is a man incurious about the affairs of the world,” Coulon remarked. It is a situation that is unlikely to have improved as capable ministers were replaced by less able men and women, who, it was made clear, reported not to Parliament but to the issues-management team in the prime minister’s office. Senior bureaucrats say the partnership with cabinet is frayed and the exhaustion palpable. In the wake of the pandemic, there was a near breakdown in the delivery of core services — from passports to immigration visas; from airport security to the flow of travellers across borders. This week, years after the crisis passed, CBC is reporting that Canadians who want a passport still need to wait for three hours for service at a Passport Canada office."
Ford government's auto theft moves aimed at Trudeau, not car thieves - "Kerzner, meanwhile, said the federal government can help Ontario deal with this issue in two important ways. “Number one, there has to be minimum consequences, minimum sentencing for people stealing cars,” Kerzner said. “And the second thing — equally important — is you must step up the inspections of outgoing cargo at the intermodals at the rail yards, and most importantly, at the Port of Montreal.” Cars stolen in Ontario are often shipped out of the country through the Port of Montreal, which spends most of its time screening what comes into the country rather than what goes out. A police operation carried out between last December and this March saw 400 shipping containers inspected at the Port of Montreal and nearly 600 stolen vehicles recovered. Most of the stolen vehicles were from the Toronto area. The federal government knows what the problem is; it just doesn’t want to act. For months, Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre has been hammering the Trudeau Liberals on the lack of scanners at the Port of Montreal for outgoing traffic. Rather than commit to installing more scanners, they have launched partisan attacks against the Conservatives. Auto theft is a very real issue, costing billions at this point in lost vehicles, lost productivity, insurance claims and more. Investing in the people or technology to stop it is the right move. Putting in stiffer penalties for stealing a car would also go a long way to keeping repeat offenders off the streets."
Opinion: Trudeau’s capital gains tax video misses the point - "the prime minister claims that this tax increase will affect only the “very richest” people in Canada and will generate significant new revenue — $20 billion, according to him — to pay for social programs. But economic research and data on capital gains taxes reveal a different picture. For starters, it simply isn’t true that capital gains taxes only affect the wealthy. Many Canadians who incur capital gains taxes, such as small business owners, may only do so once in their lifetimes. For example, a plumber who makes $90,000 annually may choose to sell his business for $500,000 at retirement. In that year, the plumber’s income is exaggerated because it includes the capital gain rather than only his normal income. In fact, according to a 2021 study published by the Fraser Institute, 38.4 per cent of those who paid capital gains taxes in Canada earned less than $100,000 per year, and 18.3 per cent earned less than $50,000. Yet in his video, Prime Minister Trudeau claims that his capital gains tax hike will affect only the richest “0.13 per cent of Canadians” with an “average income of $1.4 million a year.” But this is a misleading statement. Why? Because it creates a distorted view of who will pay these capital gains taxes. Many Canadians with modest annual incomes own businesses, second homes or stocks and could end up paying these higher taxes following a onetime sale where the appreciation of their asset equals at least $250,000. Moreover, economic research finds that capital taxes remain among the most economically damaging forms of taxation precisely because they reduce the incentive to innovate and invest. By increasing them the government will deter investment in Canada and chase away capital at a time when we badly need it. Business investment, which is crucial to boost living standards and incomes for Canadians, is collapsing in Canada . This tax hike will make a bad economic situation worse. Finally, as noted, in the video the prime minister claims that this tax increase will generate “almost $20 billion in new revenue.” But investors do not incur capital gains taxes until they sell an asset and realize a gain. A higher capital gains tax rate gives them an incentive to hold onto their investments, perhaps until the rate is reduced after a change in government. According to economists, this “ lock-in ” effect can stifle economic activity. The Trudeau government likely bases its “$20 billion” number on an assumption that investors will sell their assets sooner rather than later — perhaps before June 25th, to take advantage of the old inclusion rate before it disappears (although because the government has not revealed exactly how the new rate will apply that seems less likely). Of course, if revenue from the tax hike does turn out to be less than anticipated, the government will incur larger budget deficits than planned and plunge us further into debt."
Canadians’ standard of living is on the decline: Report - "In her 2022 budget, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland described low productivity and innovation as “the Achilles heel of the Canadian economy.”... The problem, critics say, is that in the Liberals’ 2024 budget released last month, its major themes — higher spending, higher deficits, higher debt and higher capital gains taxes — are all sure-fire ways to reduce business confidence in the economy, discouraging private sector investment aimed at increasing productivity and innovation."
Matthew Lau: Activists look to turn daycares into woke indoctrination camps - "Here is a tale of two recent childcare webinars. One was organized by entrepreneurs who see their daycare centres and the families they serve being bulldozed by the Trudeau government’s national takeover of their sector; the other was held by government-funded activists and aspiring central planners who see the governmentalization of childcare as an opportunity to inject it with their notions of social justice... The consensus view of conference participants, AACE chair Krystal Churcher told me last week, was that the government’s promise of accessible childcare has failed miserably... One person said her centre now has two wait lists: one for families who will never get a spot, and another for families who could get a spot in two to three years. Numerous providers used such phrases as: “huge wait lists,” “wait lists everywhere,” “wait lists packed,” “our wait lists are overwhelming” and “extremely long wait lists.” The Trudeau government has clearly created widespread shortages: access to a wait list is not access to childcare. In addition to the shortages, operators said the government is degrading the quality of childcare by pushing private centres out of the sector and starving them of revenue through price controls... the federal government is “limiting parental choice, forcing families into state-sponsored, regulated childcare.”... it is not clear that forming advisory committees in which race is a criterion for admission is really an “anti-racist” initiative. Second, there is scant evidence that the childcare sector is a hotbed of racism against minorities to begin with: visible minorities are over-represented in the childcare sector compared to the workforce as a whole. Third, there is abundant evidence that free markets and competition, not expanded government control (as advocated by the government-funded activists, who say the Ontario government should “enshrine” the right to government-regulated childcare), is an effective way to reduce racism and other forms of discrimination."
GUNTER: Job stats simply a mirage in Canadian growth - "In the past year, the public sector (federal, provincial and municipal) has added 208,000 new jobs versus just 190,000 in the private sector. In recent decades, private sector employment has usually been four or even five times total public sector employment, 75/25 or even 80/20. It is crucial to maintain that ratio because public-sector employment is not self-sustaining. It’s funded by the taxes generated from private-sector employment and sales. Therefore, our economy cannot sustain itself if the public sector is growing faster than the sector it is dependent on... if even the service sector is insufficient to prop up the economy, imagine how inadequate the public sector is. Yet that is what the Liberals are relying on with their massive spending, while at the same time doing their level best to suppress producing industries. Canada’s statistical growth is a mirage, if it comes from the tax-funded and debt-funded public sector... Despite the billions in the recent Liberal budget, there will simply not be enough jobs to absorb all the newcomers nor enough housing built to lower the price of home buying or renting."
Opinion: Capital gains tax hike is another fulfillment fiasco in the making - "The bigger question is why a government announced major tax changes before figuring out how they will work. The answer seems to be that this is a pattern of modern politics, and certainly a trait of the current federal government. The announcements — talking points and slogans that will grab attention on social media — are policy-makers’ main focus. Implementation is an afterthought and considering advice from the government’s own officials and outside experts a low priority. Consider the recent last-minute walkbacks of the requirement for tax-filers in “bare trust” arrangements like joint bank accounts to file trust returns, and for homeowners to report potential liability for the Underused Housing Tax . These ill-advised initiatives caused tens of thousands of tax-filers months of anxiety, effort and cost before the government, realizing it had an implementation nightmare on its hands, rescinded the requirements at the last minute. Will the same occur with the capital gains tax changes? The early deadline and lack of rules are not the only problems with these proposals. Retroactive taxation of accrued gains — especially after a bout of inflation — sends a terrible signal to savers and investors. The federal government is making its hostility to wealth creation even more obvious."