A Green Party candidate in the Kamloops area says a major reform of Canada’s tax system is needed.
Speaking in Kamloops, Green Party finance critic and Mission-Matsqui-Fraser Canyon candidate John Kidder says his party would increase the federal corporate tax rate from 15 to 21 per cent and charge a five per cent surtax on commercial bank profits.
“They (the Parliamentary Budget Office) came back and said ‘the money’s all there, that’s not an issue. The problem you’re going to face is, these guys are going to find clever ways to evade paying those taxes.’ So we just need to be equally clever, and bring it on I say. Because we know we can do this. The money is there, that money comes into the budget, enables us to pay for things without having to nickel and dime to get things done,” Kidder says.
“By laying that groundwork in place, it means that we can actually move strongly on global warming. That’s the existential crisis in this election, so this changing of tax policy, so that the people who have the most money – they’ve got the greatest ability to pay but often the least willingness to pay – we want to marry those things together and see how much we can amp their willingness up to match their ability.”
The Greens also would plan to charge a financial transaction tax of 0.2 per cent for the finance sector.