(Reuters) – Key policy priorities of the main Canadian parties in the Sept. 20 federal election.
LIBERALS
ECONOMY – Help create more than 1 million jobs by extending a recovery hiring program to enable businesses to take on more workers. Provide aid to the culture and tourism sectors.
TAXES – Raise the corporate income tax that the largest banks and insurance companies pay on earnings above C$1 billion by three percentage points to 18%. Create a minimum tax rule to ensure the highest earners pay at least 15% a year, removing their ability to use deductions and credits to pay no tax.
COVID-19 & HEALTHCARE – Mandate 10 days of paid sick leave. Pledge to train up to 50,000 new personal support workers and guarantee them a minimum wage of C$25 an hour. Hire 7,500 family doctors, nurses and nurse practitioners. New permanent funding to provinces to boost mental healthcare.
CHILDCARE – Invest up to C$30 billion over five years to help deliver C$10-a-day childcare everywhere outside the province of Quebec, which already has its own system.
HOUSING – Create a rent-to-own program, ban new foreign ownership of homes for two years, institute an anti-flipping tax and improve transparency of bidding processes. Build or renew 1.4 million homes over four years.
CLIMATE CHANGE – Ensure the oil and gas sector cuts emissions of greenhouse gases to achieve a net-zero level by 2050. Require at least half of all passenger vehicles sold to be zero-emission by 2030, and all to be zero-emission by 2035.
CONSERVATIVES
ECONOMY – Create 1 million jobs within a year. Pay up to 50% of salaries for new hires for six months. Scrap the Canada Infrastructure Bank. Connect all of Canada to high-speed internet by 2025.
TAXES – Tax digital companies 3% of gross revenue in Canada if they don’t pay corporate income tax. Provide a 5% tax credit for any capital investments made in 2022 and 2023.
CLIMATE CHANGE – Create a “personal low-carbon savings account” that people pay into every time they buy hydrocarbon fuel and which can be used for later purchases of “sustainable” goods and services. Scrap the current carbon-pricing program. Introduce a tax credit to accelerate the deployment of carbon capture, utilization and storage technology.
COVID-19 & HEALTHCARE – Add C$60 billion to healthcare funding transfers to the provinces over 10 years.
CHILDCARE – Convert the existing childcare expense deduction into a refundable tax credit covering up to 75% of the cost of childcare for lower-income families.
HOUSING – Build 1 million houses over three years. Ban non-resident foreign investors from buying housing for two years. Ease mortgage stress-test rules and boost eligibility for insured mortgages.
NEW DEMOCRATS
ECONOMY – Create more than 1 million new jobs with the focus on addressing climate change. Ensure no one on unemployment insurance gets less than C$2,000 per month.
TAXES – Implement a COVID-19 excess profits tax of 15% on corporate windfall profits during the coronavirus pandemic. Increase top marginal tax rate by two points to 35%.
CLIMATE CHANGE – Set target of cutting emissions of greenhouse gases by at least 50% of the 2005 levels by 2030. Eliminate federal fossil fuel subsidies.
COVID-19 & HEALTHCARE – Introduce a national drug coverage program and mandated paid sick leave. End private for-profit long-term care.
CHILDCARE – Introduce a universal $10-a-day childcare system.
HOUSING – Build 500,000 affordable housing units within 10 years. Waive federal portion of taxes on the construction of new affordable housing units. Add a 20% foreign buyer’s tax on home sales.
(Reporting by Moira Warburton in Vancouver, David Ljunggren and Julie Gordon in Ottawa; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Paul Simao)
