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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.

‘It may go unnoticed’: Why Canada is ripe for immigration scams 

Imagine that your business name is used as bait to scam foreign workers hoping to come to Canada or that your stolen personal identity is used as the contact for the scheme.It is happening to some of Canada’s best-known companies, including Bell Canada, Via Rail, Scotiabank and Bombardier and to a Montreal businessman, CBC News has learned.Those companies and the Montreal man were unaware that someone had used them as a front to defraud foreign job seekers out of thousands of dollars until CBC News told them.

Source: ‘It may go unnoticed’: Why Canada is ripe for immigration scams – Canada – CBC News

‘Shadow System’ Of Tax Breaks For The Rich Costs Canada Billions: Study

Canada’s income tax deductions are helping make the rich richer, a new study has concluded.

The research paper released Monday by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) says breaks on personal income taxes in Canada cost almost as much as the government collects from those taxes, and they disproportionately benefit the rich.

Source: ‘Shadow System’ Of Tax Breaks For The Rich Costs Canada Billions: Study HUFFINGTON POST

Auditor general blasts Liberals for waste 

Ontario’s government watchdog says taxpayers spend millions of dollars paying repair bills for shoddy work by contractors hired for road maintenance and public transit projects, including part of one bridge that was installed upside down.

Auditor general Bonnie Lysyk also warns of serious shortcomings in the health-care system, and predicts cap-and-trade will cost businesses and individuals $8 billion between 2017 and 2020 but won’t meet the emissions reduction target.

Source: Auditor general blasts Liberals for waste | The London Free Press

Restoration, repairs to PM’s official residence could cost $38M: report

OTTAWA — A report from iPolitics says restoration and repairs to the prime minister’s residence at 24 Sussex Drive, including building a new annex with private quarters and a pool, could cost almost $38 million.The online news site says documents provided mainly by development consultants Marshall & Murray Inc., and Ottawa-based KWC Architects, with numbers up to date as of last February, suggest renovations to the main building to replace the electrical system, install new exterior windows and doors and build a new sun room, among other things, are projected to cost $13.49 million.

Source: Restoration, repairs to PM’s official residence could cost $38M: report | Canada TORONTO SUN

It’s time for big cities like Toronto to get new taxes

Toronto, like many Canadian cities, faces a growing number of challenges — changing demographics, increased income inequality, increasingly complex expenditure demands, growing social service needs, and deteriorating infrastructure, to name the most notable. At the same time, the city’s revenue sources have remained largely unchanged — property taxes, user charges, the land transfer tax, occasional provincial and federal grants for infrastructure projects, and a hodgepodge of relatively small revenue sources including licences, permits and fees.

This growing divergence between expenditure needs and revenue sources means the services and infrastructure that residents are demanding from their local government cannot be delivered with existing revenues. Yet, all too often, the only solution we hear is budget cuts across the board.

Source: It’s time for big cities like Toronto to get new taxes | Toronto Star

CRA intensifies scrutiny of complex transfer pricing tax avoidance scheme

Life is getting harder for Canadian multinationals trying to reduce taxes by transferring profits abroad.

In its latest budget, the federal government committed to increasing enforcement efforts against companies that improperly shift profits to lower-tax countries by abusing a legal practice known as transfer pricing—but the Canada Revenue Agency has already been cracking down on the abuse for years.

Source: http://www.canadianmanufacturing.com/regulation/cra-intensifies-scrutiny-transfer-pricing-tax-avoidance-scheme-176923/

Tory leadership hopeful would lower income taxes, drop some tax credits

Conservative leadership candidate Maxime Bernier wants to eliminate some of the boutique tax credits favoured by former prime minister Stephen Harper to help cover the cost of cutting income taxes for a majority of Canadians.

“I prefer to have a tax system that would be fair for everybody,” the Quebec MP said at a news conference Thursday as he unveiled his plan for income tax reform.

“I don’t want the government to choose winners and losers,” he said.

Bernier is promising a more-straightforward income tax plan that would mean anyone who makes between $15,000 and $100,000 a year would be taxed at a rate of 15 per cent.

Anyone who earns below $15,000 a year would not pay any federal income taxes and anyone who makes more than $100,000 would be taxed at 25 per cent.

That would bring the number of income tax brackets down to two from five.

Right now, the current personal exemption is set at $11,474, the lowest tax rate is 15 per cent for earnings up to $45,282 and the highest is 33 per cent for anyone whose annual income exceeds $200,000.

Bernier said his proposed change, inspired by reforms brought in during the 1980s by former Progressive Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney, would make the tax system fairer, easier to understand and less expensive to manage and enforce.

Source: http://www.canadianbusiness.com/business-news/tory-leadership-hopeful-would-also-drop-some-boutique-tax-credits/

Corporate Canada’s dealing with a notorious tax haven

Canadians for Tax Fairness says it is estimated that Canada loses at least $7.8 billion in revenues every year because of tax dodging facilitated by tax havens.

Ottawa (23 September 2016) — There is a powerful Bahamian connection in the mess that is Canada’s offshore tax haven epidemic, says Canadians for Tax Fairness (CTF). Now, a new leak(link is external) to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and media reports are blowing its cover.

Leak shows Canadian banks helped set up offshore companies 

The Toronto Star(link is external) and the CBC report(link is external) that 3 of Canada’s top banks have enabled the formation of nearly 2,000 offshore companies and private foundations in the Bahamas. Analysts are quick to point out that not every transaction with a tax haven breaks the law. But tax fairness watchdogs have long warned that Canada has a series of tax treaties with some of the most secretive jurisdictions in the world.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” Richard Leblanc, a leading corporate governance expert and professor at Harvard and York universities told the Toronto Star(link is external). “Why are there so many companies registered and such a high volume in a jurisdiction that doesn’t have the population base or the economy to support it? That’s a legitimate question.”

Source: Corporate Canada’s dealing with a notorious tax haven | National Union of Public and General Employees

Has all-day kindergarten been a waste of taxpayer money in Ontario?

I don’t know which piece of news is more depressing:

That math test scores of Ontario’s Grade 3 and 6 students continue to sink lower, according to the latest results from the Education Quality and Accountability Office?

Or that, after six years of full-day kindergarten in Ontario, which costs $1.5 billion a year, the promised improvements in student education are nowhere to be seen?

On Wednesday, the office released results of last spring’s Grade 3 and 6 literacy and math tests. You can examine them for yourself at www.eqao.com.

Source: D’Amato: Has all-day kindergarten been a waste of money? THE RECORD