Common menu bar links
Address by the Prime Minister on how the budget will boost Canadian business
24 May 2006
London, Ontario
PLEASE CHECK AGAINST DELIVERYMembers of the London Chamber of Commerce,
Honoured guests of the head table,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Thank you, David (Gurnham), for your generous introduction.
And thank you all for the warm welcome today.
I believe this is my first address to your organization,
But over the years I have had the opportunity to speak to chambers of commerce and boards of trade from one end of this great country to the other.
And I am always impressed by the commitment of these organizations to their communities and your dedication to the debate of public policy matters.
So thank you again for that dedication and commitment and for the invitation to speak today.
This is my first visit to London since the federal election campaign.
And I am particularly proud to be joined by two colleagues in Parliament who were successful in that election.
First, a veteran member, the MP for Elgin-Middlesex-London and member of the House Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, Joe Preston.
And a new member, the MP for Lambton-Kent-Middlesex, and member of the House Committees on Veterans Affairs and Industry, Science and Technology, Bev Shipley.
As you all know, it has been a very challenging, busy and exciting four months.
And things must be going well. Why, the other day my wife burst into my office and announced that I had just past the longevity record of John Turner.
What’s worse is she seemed very surprised by that.
Last week we marked our first 100 days in office.
And I’m pleased to report we have made significant progress --delivering on the changes we promised during the election.
Our approach has been to keep our legislative agenda focussed on a few key priorities – and to be guided by three basic objectives:
When I campaigned in London early this year, I spoke of the damage caused by years of scandals under the previous administration.
Of the need to end waste, gross mismanagement, and corruption.
And of the need to clean up government.
Well, that’s just what we started doing last month.
When we introduced the most comprehensive piece of reform and anti-corruption legislation in the history of the Canadian Parliament.
The Federal Accountability Act.
This is an omnibus bill of over 200 clauses.
This bill will overhaul electoral financing legislation:
It will end the revolving door between ministers’ offices, the bureaucracy and lobbying firms,
By banning ministers, ministerial staff and senior public servants from lobbying the federal government for five years after they leave office.
It will clean up the federal government’s contracting, polling, procurement and advertising processes to ensure they are not used simply to reward political friends.
To make sure the system stays clean, we will also give greater powers to independent watchdogs such as the Auditor General
The Federal Accountability Act will not make government perfect, because people are not perfect.
But when things go seriously wrong, the act will provide ironclad protection to whistleblowers who come forward with proof of wrongdoing.
We’re going to ensure truth in budgeting, and assist Parliament in doing its job by setting up an independent Parliamentary Budget Office.
Our government also remains committed to cleaning up the appointments process in Ottawa.
We will nevertheless push ahead. Some of the operations of the Public Appointments Commission are already in place and our government will introduce the following core ethic
The idea is to replace the culture of entitlement that thrived under the previous government.
And give Canadians good, clean government.
Government that is accountable.
Government that treats their tax dollars with respect.
That’s what Canadians voted for on January 23.
And that is what we are going to deliver.
But what is even more important, ladies and gentlemen, is that our government has set itself a series of priorities that are very different from those of the previous government.
Ladies and gentlemen, it isn’t enough just to clean up Ottawa,
On January 23, the people of Canada voted for that kind of change.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty delivered that kind of change in his first budget.
A budget with a surplus.
A budget that’s responsible.
A budget that cuts the taxes paid by Canadian individuals, families and businesses of all sizes.
It cuts two dollars in taxes for every dollar in new spending.
Over the next two years, we’re going to deliver $20 billion in tax cuts to Canadians – more than the last four federal budgets combined.
Sales taxes. Down.
Income taxes. Down
Business taxes. Down
Immigration taxes. Down.
Capital and capital gains taxes. Down.
You name it.
There are no fewer than 29 different taxes reduced in this budget.
And over 650,000 low-income Canadians will be dropped from the federal tax rolls altogether.
Of course, on Canada Day this year, the GST will fall from seven to six percent – a change that benefits every single Canadian.
We are also cutting personal income taxes.
Not just by raising the personal exemption and keeping low-income rates down.
But also by giving an employment tax credit that will especially benefit middle-income workers.
This tax credit, worth up to $500 - and set to double to $1,000 in January 2007 - will offer working Canadians relief.
These cuts will mean real savings for ordinary Canadians.
Families earning between $15,000 and $30,000 a year will save almost $300.
While those earning between $45,000 and $60,000 will save almost $650.
Money that will help them get a little further ahead.
So they can buy the necessities of life.
Or save for their children’s education.
Whatever you want.
After all, it’s your money.
You worked hard to earn it.
And you should be able to keep more of it.
The same is true for businesses.
We’re going to unleash the entrepreneurial potential of our small business sector.
We will, for example, increase the amount of income eligible for the small-business tax rate from $300,000 to $400,000.
And this rate will drop to from 12% to 11.5% in 2008 and 11% in 2009.
The budget will reduce the tax burden on all Canadian employers, and it also contains some significant exemptions for capital gains taxation.
For example, there will be no capital gains tax on securities donated to charity
In fact, it has already sparked a $50 million donation of stock to a charitable foundation here in Ontario.
Our budget also contains new spending initiatives,
Now let me just say, ladies and gentlemen, that I am concerned about how much federal spending grew under the previous government.
In this budget it is way down from the double-digit increases we’ve seen in recent years.
But spending is still increasing at least as fast as economic growth.
So Minister Flaherty and the President of the Treasury Board, John Baird, are looking at how we can overhaul the federal government’s expenditure management system - which is not working as it should.
I look forward to receiving their recommendations in the early fall.
But while there are still challenges on the spending side, our government will not be wasting money on ever-changing and ever-expanding priorities.
We know what we believe.
We know where we stand.
And our spending is focused on areas of federal jurisdiction.
Like enforcing public security and the surveillance of our borders.
Toughening criminal justice and re-staffing the RCMP.
And rebuilding the armed forces of Canada.
When we do spend, we want to spend in ways that reflect the real priorities of ordinary Canadians.
For example, we promised a new approach to child care.
The previous government was prepared to transfer billions of dollars to bureaucrats, advocates and other politicians in the name of daycare.
In our budget, all parents with pre-school children will now receive a Universal Child Care Benefit of $1,200 directly.
Because we believe parents, not governments, should make their child care choices.
We’re also investing in our economy and our future.
We’re providing more investments into our public infrastructure and providing tax credits to those who use public transit.
We are offering students new credits for scholarship income and for text books, and tax relief for the tool costs borne by apprentices and tradespeople.
We’re giving seniors the ability to shelter more private pension income from taxation and helping with the costs of kids’ sports.
These are all things we promised to do in the election, and now we are doing them.
Of course, the role of a national government is not simply to deliver benefits and services, and to do so in an accountable and efficient manner.
It is also to build on the heritage passed to us by our founders, Macdonald and Cartier and their colleagues
We are taking steps forward on the fiscal imbalance and national unity, to move Quebecers and all Canadians past the damage of the sponsorship scandal.
As a first step in our efforts to resolve the fiscal imbalance, we have increased transfers to the provinces in their fields of jurisdiction.
And finally, some provinces are now running a budget surplus.
Thanks to a federal government that does not have a centralizing philosophy,
We are working to crack down on gun, gang and drug crime and to make our streets and neighbourhoods safe once again.
To do this, we’ve introduced bills in Parliament to end conditional sentences for serious crimes
We are also acting to restore our special trade and security relationship with our biggest customer and closest neighbour – the United States.
We have renegotiated, renewed and passed through Parliament the NORAD agreement.
We also reached an agreement to end the longstanding, crippling softwood lumber dispute with the United States.
Ladies and gentlemen, this deal is good for Canada and for Canadian producers.
Under it we get:
This shows what can be achieved when we put goodwill and hard work ahead of crass politics and cheap rhetoric.
And this is the same straight-forward approach we are leading with on other international issues, such as:
So there you have it.
Ladies and gentlemen, on January 23 Canadians voted for change.
They gave our party a mandate to lead that change.
A little over a 100 days have passed.
And we are determined to lead…
…determined to deliver.
We promised to clean up government.
And we’ve introduced the Federal Accountability Act.
We promised to cut taxes and deliver benefits to working Canadian families.
And those are the priorities in our budget.
We promised to work to unite the country, to crack down on crime, to build a more mature relationship with the United States, and to play a leadership role in the world.
And we’ve made progress here too.
So we’re off to a good start.
But it won’t be easy.
For we have a minority Parliament.
Where support can shift.
Where the positions of the parties can change on a dime.
We got a wake-up call on this last week.
We agreed to a vote to back our men and women in uniform in Afghanistan by extending their mission – a mission they were sent on by the previous government.
We had all-party support for the process, and we had the consistent support of the Liberals and Bloc for the mission going back many years.
But, on the day of the vote, they switched their positions on our troops, just so they could vote against the government.
It shows that, in this minority Parliament, nothing is sacred - not even our troops – and there is nothing you can take for granted.
So if you want to ensure that the federal accountability act passes and we make long-term reforms to clean up government in Ottawa, you must let your Members of Parliament know how you feel.
If you believe the budget should pass, that Canadians should get real tax relief, or parents receive support for their pre-school children,
If you want our country and our military to stand tall in the world,
To ensure this Parliament works, that things actually get passed, Canadians like yourselves must write, call, or email MPs of all parties to let them know that these aren’t just our priorities, but your priorities as well.
Thank you.
God bless Canada.
