Peggy Nash

[The Economy, April 16th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, that is nonsense. In addition to hiking taxes, the Conservatives are cutting the budgets of all the departments. These austerity measures have been condemned by the IMF, which has downgraded its forecast of Canada's GDP growth. The IMF report indicates that the unemployment rate will remain high and that we will continue to post a huge current account deficit.

Will the Conservatives stand by their partisan austerity measures and twiddle their thumbs while the economy flounders?

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his comments on the Conservatives' efforts to raise taxes that are really going to hurt the average Canadian family. We have heard about taxes on school supplies, bicycles, shoes, iPads, iPods and hospital parking. I want to talk about the latter.

A few years ago, we had a family member who had a sudden illness and was in the hospital for about six weeks. Every family hopes to avoid something like that, but sometimes family members are in hospital for weeks or sometimes months. I know we were at the hospital every single day, and boy, the parking adds up. For an average family, paying that every single day as an unexpected charge can really hit a family hard at a time when they are already down with a family illness.

Could the hon. member comment on why the Conservative government would possibly hit Canadians while they are trying to deal with a family emergency like a major illness?

[Taxation, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, it is executives from Sony who are saying taxes are going up on MP3 players. Does the minister think Sony is part of some NDP conspiracy?

In their budget, Conservatives chose to spend more on the Senate, while raising taxes on already squeezed families. They are raising taxes on the price of coffee, the price of iPods, and now, we learn, even of coffins.

The minister promised Canadians he would not raise taxes. When will he admit he broke his promise and is now even raising taxes on coffins?

[Taxation, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, in addition to denying the existence of climate change, the Conservatives are also denying the existence of their new iPod tax.

However, Canadians are not fooled. They know that the Conservatives have imposed a real tax on iPods and other electronics.

Living in denial and having it in for the economist who discovered the tax is not going to change the facts.

Will the Conservatives keep their election promise and remove their tax on almost all consumer goods from their budget?

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague and I sit together on the finance committee so I know she has read budget 2013. She has read pages 331 and 332 and has seen the increase in taxes on hospital parking, on credit unions, on shoes, on iPods.

Why are Conservatives breaking their promise? Why are they increasing taxes on Canadians, but letting tax cheats and profitable corporations slip through the tax net? Why are they doing that?

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague, who asked an excellent question.

Canadian consumer debt has hit a record high. It will be very difficult for consumers to pay more for so many of the goods they need.

This government is being hypocritical because Canadians will be paying more and its friends will be exempt from these taxes, which do not apply to the one percent.

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right: retailers in Canada, especially those along the border with the United States, are already hit hard by a price differential between our two countries that makes no sense. There is no justification for it in most cases, and now they will be faced with a double whammy by these tax increases by the government.

Why is the government doing it? It is because it has an artificial political deadline of balancing the books by 2015, prior to the next election. That is the political commitment it has made. Where will it get the money? It will grab it out of the pockets of average Canadians, rather than making its friends pay their fair share of taxes and contribute to the national good and welfare.

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, in terms of fairness, perhaps the hon. member could answer this question: at a time when Canada is not collecting substantial amounts of tax dollars from offshore tax havens, why is the government undermining the Canada Revenue Agency by losing the jobs of 3,000 people who could be reviewing this tax leakage or tax gap and collecting taxes from those who are storing money offshore, so that average Canadians would not be hit so hard in their pocketbooks?

[Business of Supply, April 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I want to, first of all, thank my NDP colleague from Victoria for introducing and supporting the debate on this important opposition day motion. I also want to say that I will be splitting my time with my colleague, the member for Beauport—Limoilou.

I am very pleased to speak on this important motion today. At heart, what we are talking about is taxes, but ultimately, it is about hypocrisy on the part of the government. I would go even further and say that it is hypocrisy and disregard for Canadians and the difficult times that so many Canadians find themselves in.

Let me start with hypocrisy. The current Prime Minister promised that during his term as prime minister, there would be no new taxes. That was echoed by the Minister of Finance when he said in this particular budget that there would be no tax increases. Let me just clarify with a couple of quotes.

I give you my word: As long as I will be Prime Minister,...there will be no new taxes.

Further:

You know, there's two schools of economics on this, one is that there are some good taxes and the other is that no taxes are good taxes. I'm in the latter category. I don't believe any taxes are good taxes.

That was the Prime Minister who said that.

The Minister of Finance, in his budget speech just this year, said, “We will not raise taxes”.

It is profound hypocrisy to then, in this budget, forget this promise and raise taxes for Canadians that will mean nearly $8 billion out of their pockets. The Conservatives are raising taxes on over 1,200 types of goods that will hit Canadians right in the pocketbook, things Canadians have to pay for every day—basic goods and services—whether it is school products for kids, household utensils or bicycles. Even iPods are not exempt. The list of taxes is quite significant. Over 80% of consumer goods will be affected. They include baby carriages, school supplies, as I said, shoes, clothes, and many other consumer products in a time of a still very fragile economic situation. The economy is still in a fragile state, and to have this kind of tax on everything is very difficult for consumers.

I want to emphasize the iPod tax, which is, of course, buried among the taxes listed in budget 2013. It is a new 5% tax on MP3 players and iPods that are coming into Canada. To emphasize the hypocrisy of this tax, I want to cite the Minister of Industry and the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, who, in December 2010, said:

During this fragile economic recovery, the last thing Canadian families and consumers need is a massive new tax on iPods.

However, that is exactly what the government has introduced. This is going to be hitting more than 80% of Canadian products, things such as safety deposit boxes and insurance programs and even more substantial programs, such as labour-sponsored venture capital corporations, which are investment bodies that create jobs and help build communities across this country.

I have spoken to chambers of commerce and investors who are very concerned that the government has simply misunderstood what these venture capital corporations are about. It saw the word “labour” and thought maybe it would just be attacking unions by raising taxes on these labour-sponsored funds rather than attacking communities and jobs and upsetting business and the investment community.

The government has also raised taxes on credit unions. We believe that competition is a healthy thing, including in the financial sector; credit unions provide healthy competition for the major banks in this country, but instead the government has opted for a cash grab that is going to impact the operation of credit unions across this country. Again, I do not know whether this is just an exercise in hypocrisy or whether they really do not like credit unions, because the impact of this tax on credit unions is going to be significant.

In sum, Conservatives are increasing the costs on average Canadians, but let us look at the record of the government when it comes to profitable companies and when it comes to the wealthy in this country. We have seen the current government, like the Liberal government before it, cutting tens of billions of dollars in taxes on profitable corporations. At the same time, it has turned a blind eye to tax havens and money going offshore that could be contributing to the public coffers. Maybe it would mean Canadians would not have to be taxed on iPods, bicycles and kids' shoes.

Fully one-quarter of all Canadian foreign direct investments has gone into tax havens. In 2011 alone, Canadians invested, so to speak, $53.3 billion in Barbados and $25.8 billion in the Cayman Islands. Is this money that should be here in Canada, being taxed and contributing the public good in this country? Would that not be a fair way to treat Canadian tax dollars?

At a time when nearly 1.4 million Canadians are unemployed and when in March alone Canadians lost 54,000 full-time jobs, we have seen a record increase in temporary foreign workers. They have tripled in number. Companies are allowed to pay them 15% less than Canadian workers, so we are seeing the suppression of Canadian wages and the undermining of jobs and taxes here in Canada at the same time as the dinging of average consumers in the pocketbook, which will affect every Canadian family across this country.

It is the height of hypocrisy. It is a betrayal of the needs of Canadians during this fragile economic period.

We believe that fair is fair. We should all be contributing fairly to the good of this country to make sure that our social programs and services run in a manner that Canadians want to see and contribute to the public good right across this country.

[Taxation, March 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives are making up budget facts and watching their own caucus disintegrate at the same time; very good. It is like the minister over there has not even read the budget. He is free, however, to borrow my copy and have a look for himself at pages 331 and 332. There he will find billions of dollars in Conservative tax increases very clearly laid out.

Will the minister now admit that he is raising taxes on thousands of everyday items and even making family, friends and patients pay for hospital parking?