Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 and as certified by the Clerk of Petitions I would like to present yet another income trust broken promise petition sent to me by Mr. J. Bedford of my riding of Mississauga South, who remembers the Prime Minister boasting about his apparent commitment to accountability when he said, “The greatest fraud is a promise not kept”.
The petitioners remind the Prime Minister that he promised never to tax income trusts, but he broke that promise by imposing a 31.5% punitive tax, which wiped out over $25 billion of the hard-earned retirement savings of over two million Canadians, particularly seniors.
The petitioners therefore call upon the government, first, to admit that the decision to tax income trusts was based on flawed methodology and incorrect assumptions; secondly, to apologize to those who were unfairly harmed by this broken promise; and finally, to repeal the punitive 31.5% tax on income trusts.