Christian Heritage Party

Harper Legacy - No end in sight to deficits by Kevin Gaudet   Canadian Taxpayers Federation Son of stimulus delays spending reductions See more media on CTF responseSee our Balanced Budget campaignSign our petitionOTTAWA: The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) responded today to the 2010 Federal Budget expressing with great dismay that the Harper government continues to delay efforts to balance the federal budget.CTF Federal Director, Kevin Gaudet, said “a plan to balance the budget should actually balance the budget and this doesn’t do that. Restraint delayed is restraint denied. Taxpayers have heard similar promises of restraint before. Canadians will believe it when they see it.”No Projected End To Deficits – Seven Years and CountingThe government projects deficits into the future with no end in sight. At minimum, through 2014-15, Canadians will have suffered through seven years of deficits. Gaudet said, “The deficits of today are the taxes of tomorrow. Canada’s children will be left to pay for this legacy of spending.”Program spending in 2007-08 stood at $199.5 billion. In 2009-10 it grew to $238 billion. For 2010-11 it is projected to have ballooned to $249 billion – a spending increase of 25 per cent in three years. The CTF has called on the government to balance the budget over three years including the elimination of regional development programs. Instead, spending continues to grow out of control, including another $48 million per year for regional development programs.Harper Government Adds Back $164.4 billion to DebtIn 2007-08, the last year of surplus, the federal debt stood at $457.6 billion. Over 11 years the Chretien, Martin and Harper government paid down $105 billion to get it to that level. In just three years, in early 2011, all of the $105 billion will have been added back to the debt – and more. Today the federal debt is above $514 billion.EI Tax HikesThe government intends to reinstate increases to Employment Insurance (EI) premiums effective January 2011. Gaudet concluded, “until the government makes EI a real insurance program and stops using it as a slush for ‘training’ these increases are tax hikes.” Details...
Canadian Taxpayers Federation Video Explains Federal Debt SIGN THE PETITION at Canadian Taxpayers Federation! Details...
BC: Debt Threats by Maureen Bader       Canadian Taxpayers Federation   The first Olympic games were held in Greece - now they are in British Columbia. Out-of-control government spending, fuelled by debt, has sent Greece to the brink of bankruptcy. The government of British Columbia has also been on a debt-fuelled spending spree. Greece, as part of the European Union, is being forced into an economic austerity plan. British Columbia's taxpayers should take note because what is happening in Greece gives us a glimpse of the threats posed by debt here in B.C.The B.C. government likes to claim it had to run a deficit because the recession drove tax revenue down. However, a closer look at the books shows the real reason the government is running a deficit – skyrocketing spending. B.C.’s Liberal government was elected on a platform of fiscal responsibility and started off well. Between 2001 and 2004, government spending hovered around $30 billion per year. The government commendably reduced the debt from almost $38 billion in 2003 to $33.4 billion in 2006. However in 2005, spending restraint started to fly out the window – a result of that dreaded second-term spending disease that seems to infect governments at re-election time. Spending rose steadily to $40 billion in 2009 and is expected to hit $42 billion in 2011. This could send the debt to almost $60 billion by 2013, practically double its 2006 level. No problem, some say; the government needs to spend more now to stimulate the economy and protect healthcare and education. But the legacy of debt created by out-of-control spending threatens healthcare and education. In fact, Greece provides a good example of what happens when government spending flies out-of-control. When Greece joined the European Monetary Union (eurozone), its interest rates fell. That's because investors assumed strong countries in the eurozone, like Germany, would help weaker countries if they got into trouble. Greece then went on a debt-fuelled spending binge, and its economy and voting public adapted to high government spending subsidized by low interest rates. The binge in Greece ended with the economic downturn in 2008. Suddenly, the low interest rates Greece paid on its debt started to rise as investors worried it would default on its payments. Greece practically stimulated itself into bankruptcy. The binge left Greece with a very bad hangover. The Greek government has now laid out an austerity budget, cutting $3 billion in public spending in part by freezing public sector wages, cutting public sector employment and increasing taxes on gas, tobacco and alcohol. Spending addictions aren't cured by squeezing even more money out of the pockets of taxpayers, but the spending cut is a move in the right direction.The Greeks know they are in serious trouble. The Greek finance minister, George Papaconstantinou recently said: “We're trying to change the course of the Titanic, it cannot be done in a day.” Is B.C. also taking a ride on the Titanic? Taxpayers now spend $7 million dollars per day to fund the debt, and that will go up to $8 million per day in 2011. This is money that could otherwise be spent on healthcare, education, or better yet, tax cuts. But no, it goes to bondholders to pay the interest on the debt. Interest rates in Canada are expected to rise later in 2010, which will send debt servicing costs even higher, meaning more money for bondholders and less money for health care and education.Left unchecked it will invariably mean higher taxes, as the Greeks are discovering. Fortunately, we haven't hit the iceberg yet. There is still time to change course. The B.C. government must cut spending and start on a real program of deficit and debt elimination. Otherwise we’ll be sharing more with the Greeks than just the Olympic Games. by Maureen Bader Contact the Canadian Taxpayers Federation regional director Maureen Bader for further information. Details...
Fight HST Fires Up Former Premier Bill Vander Zalm has officially launched the Citizens' Initiative to Repeal the HSTVisit the site and consider signing up as a canvasser in your district. We need 10% of the votersin every district to sign the petitions and YOU CAN HELP! Details...
BC: HST on Parking Tax - Hosed Again by Maureen Bader    Canadian Taxpayers Federation People have lots reasons to be upset about the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST). For starters, it means the price of many goods and services will be 7 per cent higher. Of course, the government assures us this will only be at first. They claim businesses will pass cost savings along to consumers because they will no longer pay the provincial sales tax (PST) on their business inputs. Many citizens are skeptical about whether businesses will lower prices. However, what citizens should really be skeptical about is whether the prices for services the government provides will go down. So far it seems it will be government, not business, ripping-off consumers.One example is the PST on liquor in restaurants, which will fall from 10 to 7 per cent. Will this mean a price reduction to hard-pressed consumers? No, the government will increase the wholesale mark-up on alcohol to keep its revenue the same. So tipplers will see no savings when the HST arrives -- no harmonization-induced price reduction here, folks.Taxpayers were also supposed to say goodbye to the 7 per cent parking sales tax that goes to TransLink, the Lower Mainland's public transit Leviathan. The government said that tax would be repealed with the implementation of the HST, and "options for TransLink related to the removal of the parking tax are being reviewed."That not only led the naïve observer, but TransLink Chair Dale Parker to muse about what TransLink would do once it no longer had the 7 per cent parking sales tax to count on for revenue.So imagine the shock and awe when the Ministry of Finance announced in December that the PST on parking in TransLink’s region would triple from 7 per cent to 21 per cent. But, wait a minute! Wasn't the PST on parking supposed to be eliminated? Oh no, explained the finance ministry. The PST on parking isn't really a PST (even though it’s covered in the Social Services Tax Act, otherwise known as the PST legislation), it’s a tax collected by the province for TransLink, so it doesn't fall into the PST cuts originally announced, even though they in fact, did announce it. If you are not already a bit befuddled by this, hold on to your wallet. According to federal GST legislation, if a sales tax in B.C. is more than 11 per cent, the 12 per cent HST will be charged on top of it. That means the parking sales tax will not be 21 per cent as originally announced, but 23.52 per cent as of July 1, 2010. Paying HST on a tax? Can you say tax grab? But not only will working stiffs and shoppers trying to park in the Lower Mainland pay HST on the parking sales tax, they will pay HST on parking as well, bumping up the total tax paid on parking to 35.52 per cent! Theory says that consumer prices should go down once the HST is implemented. Experience tells that when government gets involved, prices go up. The government says it is bringing in the HST to lower costs and make the province more competitive for business investment. But forgetting facts when they are no longer convenient and arbitrarily increasing a tax is the mark of a government out of control. The government must stick with original plan and repeal the TransLink parking tax. By: Maureen Bader Posted: January 11, 2010 Details...
FED: Audit Nightmare by Kevin Gaudet Canadian Taxpayers FederationImagine the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) shows up at your door to do an audit. As if that alone isn’t scary enough, they proceed to take both copies of your documents, originals and photocopies -- without your permission. They lose or destroy these key originals. Then they assess hefty tax bills against you because you cannot provide documents in your defense. CRA mistakenly demands you pay $800,000 in taxes allegedly owed. This helps ruin your business, leaving you broke. Does this sound far-fetched? Not according to British Columbia’s Mr. Irvin Leroux, who has lost everything fighting for 14 years against such bully tactics by the CRA.His treatment outraged his MP, the long-serving Dick Harris, who took up his cause with the former Minister of National Revenue. According to Mr. Leroux, his MP was told by the Minister that the CRA couldn’t pro-actively compensate Mr. Leroux for his loss, but that he could sue the government and they would offer a settlement.As ridiculous as it is that Mr. Leroux has been forced to sue the Canadian government to get back some or all of what he has lost in his lengthy tax fight fiasco, not a nickel has been offered. In this case it appears the federal government made a mistake; a big one at that. They should just admit it, apologize for it, and settle out of court with Mr. Leroux. Instead, they are playing the Goliath against his David, fighting him in court and denying any wrong-doing on their part.The latest tactic employed by government lawyers, scheduled for court at the end of this January, has been to argue that Leroux’s lawsuit has no merit as his tax case was resolved earlier. Details...
FED: Resolutions for 2010: Honesty First by Kevin Gaudet Canadian Taxpayers FederationAs the end of the year approaches many people take stock of the year that was and make resolutions for the year to come. If politicians did this they first would realize that there is much work to be done. The political year of 2009 in Canada was – yet again – marked too often by hypocrisy and self-interest. Looking forward to 2010 there are many ways which politicians could raise the bar higher. Start with more honesty in politics, focusing on making Canada more prosperous, instead of only worrying about grabbing and holding on to power for its own sake. Here are suggestions for a few of Canada’s political leaders.1. Prime Minister Stephen Harper:Stop worrying about holding on to power for its own sake. Focus more on the basics of providing prosperity through limited government. Provide a clear detailed plan for balancing the budget – preferably over three years.If you don’t believe in man-made global warming, then stop pretending you do. Instead, reject all forms of new carbon taxes like cap-and-tax. If you want to be ‘green’ find policies that won’t break the bank and will provide a cleaner environment in ways all can agree on.2. Opposition Leader Michael Ignatieff:Stop trying to be all things to all people. You can’t both demand stimulus spending, having threatened to topple the government if it didn’t happen, then criticize the deficit that arose from it.Start issuing clear ideas you to which you are committed. You have mused about a new high-speed railway, national daycare, East-West power grid, the Kelowna Accord, and raising the GST. Pick some you believe in and defend them. Better to debate the merits of a controversial plan than to have none at all.Even better still, outflank Mr. Harper with a fiscally prudent agenda.3. Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe:The Bloc Quebecois are honest and clear. They want taxes raised to balance the budget and want Canada torn apart. Take a long hard look at the benefits to Quebec of being in Canada – including the $8 billion a year in Equalization payments. Wind up your party, the goals of which never go higher than draining as much as possible into Quebec from the rest of Canada. The country deserves better; that includes Quebec.4. City MayorsProvincial and federal coffers are bare. Deficits loom for years and debt is piling up. Cities also have been over-spending. This time, though, cash bailouts won’t be on offer from higher levels of government. Mayors should protect local ratepayers from hikes in property taxes, user fess and levies. Now is the time to get back to basics focusing on core city priorities not grandiose ideas that cost billions of dollars.5. All Politicians:Resist calls to balance budgets on the backs on over-burdened taxpayers. The easy path of tax hikes is followed too often. Take the less-trodden road of reducing spending.Focus more on honesty and sincerity. You might be surprised by the benefits that accrue. Canadians may actually like what they hear. If not, we are broad-minded enough to agree-to-disagree with respect.Happy New Year! By: Kevin Gaudet Posted: January 04, 2010 Details...
"The Spin Stops with CHP Canada" by Jim Hnatiuk, National Leader of CHP Canada Yesterday I was challenged with the comment: "If the CHP is really serious about winning .... then let us see some promises that amount to something!" my challenger then went on to give me some sample promises we should consider."Promise to remove the G.S.T. and the Federal government's part of the H.S.T. across the nation and promise a standard of living for all the poor that matches the cost of living in the country."I say, sir, the CHP will do much better than that! We'll instead remove all federal income taxes both personal and corporate, gift, estate, and capital gains, and replace them with one simple, visible, federal retail sales tax! This makes taxation simpler and much more sensible, instead of paying taxes on what you earn; you would pay on what you spend. Now, to ensure that this tax is fair, all taxpayers will receive a monthly subsidy, called a "pre-bate," to offset the tax on bare necessities. So, low-income families would end up paying no taxes at all. The wealthy that buy and spend a lot, would pay a lot. 'Fair Tax' rewards productivity and better protects the very low income earners. Consumption based taxation is widely recognised by economists to be the most equitable form of taxation, hence its name, the 'Fair Tax'.Another promise he suggested we use was to "Raise the Old age pensions and Canada pensions in a method that keeps up with a cost of living and give stay at home mom's Canada pension benefits.Once again, sir, CHP Canada will do much better than that! We'll instead overhaul the broken Canada Pension Plan with a new Personal Income Security Account (PISA). This proven plan will provide a portable investment portfolio, vested in the name of each worker, for health, employment, and retirement income. This proven plan adopted by Chile has shown that those Chilean workers who chose this investment plan are now retiring wealthy -- and Chile has become an economic powerhouse in Latin America because of the pools of investment created.As for the stay-at-home mom, CHP Canada would do much more than just pension benefits. We see the married two-parent family as the most important foundation of society, and as such, deserves protection. CHP Canada's Family Friendly Childcare Allowance would provide $1000 per month to any family where one of the parents chooses to stay home and raise their children-until age 18. Now that's real childcare and true recognition of the importance of the stay-at-home mom.Another of my challenger's suggestion was to: "Bring in a law that will confiscate all assets of those who gain financially through crime, such as swindling by white collar workers, the sale of street drugs, and any other criminal activities in which profit is made."Under the Criminal Code of Canada, the government does have broad powers of seizure, but this is not the full picture of what criminal justice in Canada should accomplish either. The CHP would require criminals to make restitution to the victim, who is all too often forgotten in today's justice system.He said promise to "Make the Senate ..elected positions.." Yes, again, we agree! That is CHP Canada's position.CHP Canada provides Canadians with sound federal political solutions, unfortunately as with this gentleman, most Canadians have yet to find this out. That is where each CHP member comes in, our solutions are not complicated; they only need to be communicated. Let's all work to show Canadians that the Spin stops with CHP Canada! We're not all politically minded but we can all communicate CHP Canada's basic, better solutions. Our national team is always glad to help you present it clearly. Make it your New Year's project to present our better solutions to those who don't know about the CHP.For a more comprehensive read of our platform check out our Better Solutions at www.chp.ca Details...
BC: 2009 taxes unplugged by Maureen Bader Canadian Taxpayers Federation There were lots of stories in the news in 2009 about government spending and taxation, but of all the stories, none has more serious long-term consequences than the return to deficit spending. The B.C. government has a spending addiction and is supporting its habit by a massive increase in the provincial debt. If spending is not brought under control, taxpayers will be left with a legacy of higher taxes. B.C.'s across-the-board income tax cuts have created a relatively competitive tax regime, second only to Alberta in Canada. But out-of-control spending is obviously unsustainable. Is the government looking for ways to cut spending? No, it's creating a legacy of debt for future generations and designing automatic stealth tax hikes to feed its spending addiction. The debt is expected to balloon to almost $60 billion by 2013, up from $38 billion in 2008. That means each child born in 2013 will owe the provincial government almost $13,000. Debt servicing costs are expected to rise to $8 million per day by 2011. Sending millions of dollars every day to bondholders to pay the interest on the debt is nothing more than fiscal child abuse. Further, automatic stealth tax hikes build a tax burden on unsuspecting taxpayers and do nothing to help government overcome its spending addiction. The Medical Services Premium (MSP), otherwise known as the health tax, will feed the government's spending addiction by increasing automatically every year. While many British Columbians believe the health tax is an insurance program that pays for health care, nothing could be further than the truth. The health tax is a poll tax -- a per-person tax charging a fixed amount that goes directly into the government’s general revenue pot. Right now, the health tax takes $1.6 billion per year out of taxpayers' pockets and will take a bigger bite in the future -- $1.7 billion in 2010-11 and $1.8 billion in 2011-12. The carbon tax, like the health tax, also increases every year. The government must eliminate these two stealth taxes to start its spending withdrawal program. Without spending reductions, the legacy of debt will be long lasting and lead to lower economic growth. Stealth tax hikes already show the direction B.C. is heading. But government spending-induced economic stagnation and future tax hikes are not inevitable. Details...
No Christmas Bonus? Over a Measly $15.3 Million? by Rod Taylor   CHP Deputy LeaderHeave a collective sigh of relief. The $15.3 million worth of gold missing from the Royal Canadian Mint has been, er…accounted for! Actually $1.6 million of it has actually been found kind of lying about in the buildings and machinery. We really ought to be a little more thorough when we do our housecleaning.The balance of it---rest assured!---has not been stolen! That's the good news. The bad news is that is still missing…Canadians, however, should take comfort in the knowledge that $8 million worth was only miscounted, not stolen. (I'm not sure whether that means that trustworthy mint employees handling a product worth over $1000 per ounce couldn't count in 2008 and there is more there than earlier reported or whether they couldn't count in 2007 and reported more than there actually was…details, details!) Over the Christmas holidays, I'm sure those employees will be asking their children for tutoring in the basic techniques of counting. If new calculators would help, perhaps some "stimulus" money could be found. It's a shame that we had to involve the RCMP and hire three independent auditing firms to re-establish confidence in the Mint.The other amount that "has not been stolen" is an inconsequential sum (barely worth mentioning) of $3 million that was "accidentally" sold as slag to the US. After all, both slag and pure gold are metallic in nature. You could hardly expect employees of the Royal Canadian Mint to make sure that truckloads of outbound product were correctly stored, labeled and shipped. At any rate, Conservative MP Rob Merrifield, Minister of State for Transport and the minister responsible for the mint, has decided to draw a line in the sand and reset expectations for the mint executives. After expressing "disappointment" at the misplacing, miscounting and misshipment, he has told mint executives they will NOT be receiving a bonus for their performance in 2008. (I used to think a "bonus" was awarded for some exceptional or outstanding dedication or achievement, not for simply doing one's job WITHOUT losing $15.3 million of national resources.)Now some might find Mr. Merrifield's stern rebuke a bit harsh just before Christmas. We all make mistakes don't we? Still others might think it a little soft. After all, with hefty annual salaries and perks, usually there is some accountability for results. In the private sector it wouldn't be unusual for highly-placed executives to find themselves "looking for another job".Then again, when you consider that Mr. Merrifield's government still dishes out $30 million dollars per year to the largest political parties, that they overspent the federal revenues in 2009 by about $55.9 BILLION, that they are willing to spending further BILLIONS per year placating a misinformed world gone crazy over discredited "global warming", perhaps a slap on the wrist for a $15.3 million "error" is appropriate after all. But next time they need help counting inventory, I'd be willing to help for a small "finder's fee". Based on details from a CBC storyhttp://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2009/12/21/mint-missing-gold163.html?ref=rss&loomia_si=t0:a16:g2:r5:c0.103246:b29480192#socialcomments Details...

Son of stimulus delays spending reductions

No Projected End To Deficits – Seven Years and Counting

Harper Government Adds Back $164.4 billion to Debt

EI Tax Hikes

by Rod Taylor CHP Deputy Leader

This is an unpopular idea as well. As of last night, this CBC poll.