A
Matter of Trust
By:
The Honourable John McCallum, Liberal Official Opposition Critic for
Finance
The
Conservatives’ stunning betrayal last week of Canadians who invested in
income trusts shows us just how far Stephen Harper was willing to go
during the last election to buy votes.
This is not just a matter of public policy, but whether Mr. Harper
can be taken at his word.
The
Prime Minister has tried to deny that he broke his election promise,
despite clearly stating during the campaign: “Only the Conservatives
will give seniors security by pledging to levy no new taxes on income
trusts.” Further, in a
campaign speech on January 9, Mr. Harper told a room full of seniors:
“Whether it is death taxes, or taxing income trusts, a new Conservative
government will never let this happen.”
Last
week, Canadians learned the hard way that this is a Prime Minister and a
government that can not be trusted. The new taxes he imposed on income
trusts evaporated $25 billion of Canadians' savings in a single day.
As
thousands of Canadians will tell you, this flip-flop is about much more
than just a broken promise. It
is about innocent Canadians suffering a devastating financial loss because
they trusted their government would live up to its word.
And this is just the latest example of Mr. Harper’s growing
tendency to forget what he said to get elected now that he is in power.
After
years of Stephen Harper ranting against the ‘unelected’ and
‘unaccountable’ Senate, Canadians watched as he, on his very first day
in office, appointed the unelected Montreal businessman and Conservative
campaign organizer Michael Fortier to the Senate so that he could sit in
his Cabinet.
After
promising to end patronage and cronyism this Prime Minister proceeded to
appoint long-time Conservatives, party donors and close personal friends
to key positions in the judiciary, on public boards and in high-profile
public positions. He then stood by as Minister Jim Prentice handed out a
sole sourced contract to a former Conservative Cabinet Minister with deep
ties to the oil industry valued on the Public Works website for up to
$500,000.
Stephen
Harper campaigned on bringing transparency and accountability to election
financing yet the Conservative Party failed to report, as required by law,
delegate fees to their last convention as campaign donations. This matter is still under investigation by the chief
electoral officer and represents millions of dollars of donations to the
Conservative Party of Canada that have yet to be accounted for.
During
the last campaign the Conservatives promised to “work with the provinces
to establish a Patient Wait Times Guarantee”, but last summer Mr. Harper
removed the Patient Wait Times Guarantee from his list of five priorities
and replaced it with the generic promise to “strengthen our country at
home and around the world." Recent
speeches and statements made by Health Minister Tony Clement make it clear
that this government is simply downloading this commitment to the
provinces with no new money and no national coordination or leadership on
the file. This is a shocking
abandonment of an issue which has consistently ranked as Canadians’
number one priority.
The
Conservative Government’s actions on income trusts and many of their
other commitments have shown Canadians they can no longer place their
faith in the word of this Prime Minister.
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