Alice Wong

[Small Business, March 24th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals misled Canadian small businesses. They said one thing and did the other.

Conservatives believe that the best way to help small businesses is trade, training, and tax cuts. Instead, the Liberals are killing small businesses with taxes, taxes, and more taxes.

When will the Liberals stop raising taxes on job creators?

[Small Business, March 24th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals broke their promise to business owners by suspending the tax cut to small businesses.

On December 11, the Minister of Small Business and Tourism stood in this House and stated:

I will be working closely with the Minister of Finance to ensure that our commitment to lower the tax burden on small businesses is fulfilled.

Why did the minister decide to flip-flop and lobby her own government for higher taxes?

[Business of Supply, March 21st, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his detailed account of what the Office of Religious Freedom has achieved both nationally and internationally.

Let me tell the House a personal story that I was told when I was taking a cab here in Ottawa. As soon as the driver knew that I was a member of Parliament, he told me this sad story about his parents. They were shot when they opened their door because they were Copts in their country. The cab driver has pleaded with us as parliamentarians to do something about it because it affects not only people overseas but our own Canadians here as well.

The City of Richmond has a street called Highway to Heaven, where all our religious groups live in harmony. Unfortunately, this does not happen overseas.

How does my colleague see this important office not only being beneficial to religious groups all across the nation but being beneficial to those different faith groups in our communities as well?

[Small Business, March 8th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, for weeks the Liberals have been giving mixed signals and dodging questions about small businesses and the new job killing start-up tax. Some days they want to increase taxes for everybody, and some days they only want to raise taxes on small business owners.

When will the Liberals abandon their job killing start-up tax?

[Business of Supply, March 8th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, just to set the record right, the Vancouver airport is not in New Westminster—Burnaby. It is in the city of Richmond. We see a lot of economic activity because of the former Conservative government's development in that airport.

Has my colleague learned or experienced growth in her communities because of the success of the Vancouver airport?

[Income Tax Act, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my young hon. member for that question.

Indeed, the Liberal government is heading to create more deficits, and I worry about the younger generation. That is why we wanted our students to be able to save for education, our families to save to start a family, entrepreneurs to save for their businesses, parents to save for their children, and low-income seniors, who are close to my heart, save for retirement.

If Bill C-2 passes without change, these changes will make life less affordable for Canadians who are trying to save for vulnerable years. Therefore, we will vote against Bill C-2 in its current form.

[Income Tax Act, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I will state again that the Conservative government was able to increase the TFSA contribution limit because our full fiscal year in government had a surplus. The Auditor General confirmed this. Indeed, the Department of Finance, through its monthly “Fiscal Monitor” publication showed that in the first nine months of the current fiscal year ending December, Canada's budgetary surplus was $3 billion.

[Income Tax Act, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member opposite for quoting historical records.

Historically, it was our government that cut taxes and yet was able to balance the budget. The way that the Liberals did the balancing was to cut transfers to provinces for education and health care. We had to keep adding our contribution to the provinces in order to get rid of their deficits. It was our government that was able to balance budgets several times. It was during the recession that we were able to use the deficit to create jobs,1.2 million net new jobs. When the government on the other side was doing that, they lost jobs. This is our proud record.

[Income Tax Act, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, there are two provisions to Bill C-2. One is the reduction in the annual limit one can deposit into a tax-free savings account, and the other is a reduction in the second income tax bracket while increasing the top tax bracket. I will begin my discussion with the tax-free savings account.

The TFSA was introduced in the 2008 federal budget, back when the late Jim Flaherty was the minister of finance. Canadian families were able to invest their after-tax dollars and earn income tax-free through their TFSAs. TFSAs can be used to invest in all sorts of eligible financial products, whether they are GICs, mutual funds, or stocks and bonds, to name a few. Canadians were already taxed once on their income. The TFSA allows them to earn income on their savings without having to be taxed again. Unlike RRSPs, the TFSA alleviates the risk that governments will change the tax rates, as withdrawals from the TFSA are not taxed.

It is not surprising, especially with the Liberals set to increase taxes in the upcoming budget, that Canadians at all income levels are choosing to invest in TFSAs. The Liberals would like nothing more than to get their hands on the savings of Canadians. Simply put, the country benefits from Canadians saving their hard-earned money, and the TFSA allows them to do so. We should be encouraging saving and not discouraging it, as Bill C-2 will do.

The previous Conservative government was able to increase the TFSA contribution limit because our last full fiscal year in government was in surplus. The Auditor General confirmed this. Indeed, the Minister of Finance's own department, in the monthly “Fiscal Monitor” publication, showed that in the first nine months of the current fiscal year ending in December, Canada's budgetary surplus was $3 billion. Now the Liberals are choosing to squander this surplus and plunge us into massive deficits, including with Bill C-2.

I will now bring my attention to the second part of Bill C-2, which is the proposed adjustment of the income tax brackets. Since I was elected to the House of Commons in October 2008, the rates for the federal tax brackets have not changed. There is a 15% bracket, a 22% bracket, a 26% bracket, and the top bracket of 29%. With this stability, Canadians can reliably predict how much income tax they would be paying.

The new Liberal introduction of a higher tax bracket would create a situation where top-paid and top-performing professionals in Canada will be discouraged from working further and encouraged to look into ways of legally reducing their taxable income levels. In particular, I would like to point out that when we add together the combined federal and provincial marginal tax rates, Canadians who live in over half of our provinces will be paying a top combined tax rate of over 50%. These provinces include Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. This means that people in the top tax bracket will be paying the government more than half of their income for each extra dollar they make.

Does anyone in the House believe that these individuals will be seeking to earn more money when they will be paying more than half of their income in the form of income taxes? We should be encouraging Canadians to work hard and earn more money. This income tax change will have the opposite effect for those highly paid professionals who qualify for the top income tax bracket. There will be a point when people will choose to work less because the money they earn will simply be given to the government. Indeed, I foresee the only growth in high-paying jobs resulting from Bill C-2 will be of tax accountants, who will be finding ways to reduce the income tax burden on highly paid professionals. That was maybe the Liberal plan after all.

Speaking of Liberal plans, the other fact that the Liberals promised in their election platform is that the reduction of the second tax bracket will be paid for by the increase in taxes in the top tax bracket. Subsequent projections from the Department of Finance have indicated that Bill C-2 will not be revenue neutral but will put us further into deficit.

Indeed, our previous government's election commitments, including an increase to the TFSA annual contribution rate, were contingent on balancing the budget. Not only have the Liberals squandered the surplus, but they are implementing changes that were clearly from incorrect premises.

In summary, Bill C-2 is wrong for Canadians. I will be voting against it in its current form.

[Petitions, February 3rd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I am presenting a petition that sadly highlights the fact that 22-year-old Kassandra Kaulius was tragically killed by a drunk driver. A group of families who have also lost loved ones to impaired drivers called Families For Justice believes that Canada's impaired driving laws are much too lenient. They are calling for new mandatory sentencing and that the crime be called what it really is, vehicular homicide.