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.