Mr. Speaker, given the substantial preoccupation by government members about the risk of increasing income taxes, I think it is appropriate to present this petition pursuant to Standing Order 36 and certified by the Clerk of Petitions on what else but the income trust broken promise. This petition was sent to me by Mr. Dave Jones of British Columbia who remembers the Prime Minister boasting about his apparent commitment to accountability when he said that the greatest fraud was a promise not kept.
The petitioners want to remind the Prime Minister that he promised never to tax income trusts, but he broke that promise. He imposed a 31.5% punitive income tax which wiped out over $25 billion of the hard-earned retirement savings of over 2 million Canadians, most of them seniors.
The petitioners call upon the Conservative minority government, first, to admit that the decision to tax income trusts was based on flawed methodology and incorrect assumptions, as was demonstrated in the finance committee hearings; second, to apologize to those who were unfairly harmed by this broken promise; and, finally, to repeal the punitive 31.5% tax on income trusts.