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Bringing about a higher level of transparency and accountability in provincial and federal governments to help protect taxpayers from abuse

Bringing about a higher level of transparency and accountability in provincial and federal governments to help protect taxpayers from abuse.

Global travel, sky-high dining and office massages: Your tax dollars at work

Metro Vancouver is defending controversial expenses on staff massages, a new high-rise cafeteria with mountain and ocean views, and hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on global travel for politicians.

The new expenses come as Metro Vancouver reels from an angry public backlash to a 15-per-cent pay raise and retroactive severance package that Metro politicians voted for themselves last month. That decision is now under review.

Now comes word Metro Vancouver has spent $1.5 million on a 29th-floor cafeteria with stunning skyline views and opened a staff massage clinic on the same floor.

Read more at Vancouver Sun

Factory in undercover Star investigation faces CRA scrutiny

The Canada Revenue Agency set its sights last summer on the industrial bakery at the centre of an undercover Star investigation into temp work, according to internal Workplace Safety and Insurance Board emails obtained by the Star.

Fiera Foods, along with at least 13 temporary employment agencies that supplied the factory’s production lines, were identified in emails obtained under freedom of information laws as companies the workers’ compensation board “may wish to look at” because they were facing scrutiny from the CRA.

Read more at Toronto Star

Toronto legal aid, healthcare providers plead guilty to auto insurance fraud

A legal aid and two healthcare providers in Toronto have each pleaded guilty to auto insurance fraud charges, in connection to a benefit-sharing scheme.

Paralegal Anna Kovtanuka, chiropractor Edward Hayes, and clinic employee Michelle Osacenco each pleaded guilty to fraud under $5,000, Toronto Star reported.

Read more at Insurance Business Canada Magazine

Trudeau government’s Davos trip cost taxpayers nearly $700,000: documents

The Trudeau government’s trip to this year’s exclusive gathering of global elites in Davos cost taxpayers almost $700,000, with tens of thousands of dollars for pricey accommodations in the swanky Swiss resort, newly released documents show.

The total cost of the three-day trip in January to the World Economic Forum in Switzerland was $678,000, most of that for hotels, office and room rentals and transportation, according to figures recently tabled in Parliament.

Read more at The Globe and Mail

Ottawa promises crackdown on loopholes that let big banks avoid billions in taxes

The federal government has singled out Canadian banks for gaming the tax system to artificially reduce their tax bills.

In the budget released Tuesday, Ottawa announced it will tighten tax rules “meant to prevent a small group of taxpayers, typically Canadian banks and other financial institutions, from gaining a tax advantage.”

The measure was one of a slew of reforms to prevent tax evasion and avoidance that Ottawa estimates will bring in almost $1 billion per year.

Read more at Toronto Star

Canada’s phony debate about carbon taxes

In the Ontario PC leadership race, all four candidates hoping to replace Patrick Brown as leader oppose carbon taxes, a centrepiece of Brown’s Tory platform. The federal Conservative Party also opposes carbon taxes.

Some commentators see this as a betrayal of Conservative free-market instincts because (supposedly) our choice is between inefficient bureaucratic regulation and the enlightened Liberal approach of using price-signals to hit greenhouse gas targets. According to this reasoning, economically-literate Conservatives should prefer the latter.

Read more at Maclean’s

Canada’s ‘Filthy Five’ tax loopholes

Inequality is not inevitable. It’s the product of specific political and economic decisions made over decades, decisions that can be corrected.

One glaring cause of inequality is the structure of the tax system itself. In many cases, richer Canadians pay a lower rate of tax on financial instruments such as stock options than middle-class and working Canadians do on their earned income. This is both blatantly unfair and deprives the federal government of much-needed revenue that could be spent on valuable social programs.

Read moire at Toronto Star

Wealthy ‘ghost immigrants’ using empty homes to claim citizenship: tax expert

Some foreign investors, particularly those from China, are taking advantage of Canadian loopholes to become ghost immigrants, according to David Lesperance, a tax and immigration consultant with Lesperance & Associates.

Lesperance cites one recent judge’s decision from a lawsuit in which the judge said Chinese millionaire Guoqing Fu bought multiple multi-million-dollar homes in Canada while claiming just $97 in worldwide income on his taxes. The judge’s 600-page ruling in the case was posted online earlier this month.

Read more at CTV News

The CRA Is Denying The Disability Tax Credit To Some With Disabilities

“Providing benefits not burdens” is how former Health Minister, Judy LaMarsh once described the vision for disability policy in Canada.

Unfortunately, this vision is not a reality when it comes to one of the main benefits open to Canadians with disability: the federal Disability Tax Credit (DTC.) Administered by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), the DTC is designed to recognize some of the higher costs faced by people with severe disabilities and their caregivers.

Read more at Huffington Post

U.S. citizens living in Canada: Beware these five tax traps

They are out there. They walk among us. They even look and sound like us. They are in our workplaces and communities, and they may even be in our families. They are U.S. citizens, living in Canada.

More than one million U.S. citizens, including dual citizens, are happy to call Canada home. They enjoy living here, but if you talk to them about tax issues, they become anxious, angry and fearful.

Read more at The Globe and Mail