Dion campaign stop in Pickering

Media Release
September 9, 2008

Liberals will clean up Flaherty financial mess

PICKERING, Ontario – Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion today slammed Finance Minister Jim Flaherty for the Conservative government’s dismal mismanagement of the country’s finances.

“Canada’s economy is the worst in the G7. Canada has now had its worst performance in 17 years – since Brian Mulroney. The economy is slumping. Hard working Canadians are losing their jobs and what does this government do? Insult them and abandon them with laissez-faire, I don’t care policies,” Mr. Dion said.

“Conservatives do not understand the 21st century economy. The cost of fossil fuels is only going to go up. The only long term solution is to invest in the green economy and renewable alternatives. The Conservative short-sighted approach will only delay the inevitable.

“A Liberal government will invest in partnership with Canadians by cutting taxes for families, investing in the manufacturing sector and building strong jobs. By building Canada as a leader in the green economy we will build a strong economy for today and the next generation.”

Mr. Dion made his comments at a Liberal rally with Ajax-Pickering MP Mark Holland and was joined by Liberal Finance Critic John McCallum and Associate Finance Critic Martha Hall Findlay in welcoming the newest member of the Liberal team, candidate Brent Fullard, who is running in Mr. Flaherty’s riding of Whitby-Oshawa.

Mr. Fullard founded the Canadian Association of Income Trust Investors to fight Mr. Flaherty's decision to tax income trusts after the Conservatives promised not to.

“As a former General Motors employee and leading income trust investor advocate, Mr. Fullard knows all too well how Mr. Flaherty and his government have betrayed and abandoned Canadians,” said Mr. Holland. “Mr. Flaherty and his Prime Minister left investors bleeding and auto workers unemployed. This is not good economic management.

“It was a Liberal government that swept up after the last Conservative government, and we will do it again. We will build on our party’s solid history of job creation, balanced budgets and progressive tax cuts – working with Canadians, not against them.”

Mr. McCallum pointed out how in the dying days of the Harper government, Conservatives racked up almost $9 billion in pre-election spending promises – including a couple of funding announcements for the ailing auto sector.

“This government thinks it can ignore the auto sector for two-and-a-half years and then make a photo-op announcement on the eve of an election and everything will be alright,” said Mr. McCallum. “This is the same government that, prior to the writ dropping, refused to make investments in auto sector capital and innovation, calling them ‘band-aid solutions.’ The result of that negligence has been devastating, and nowhere has that devastation been felt more than in this region of Ontario.”

Ms. Hall Findlay said that while Ontario sits in the midst of the biggest economic downturn in years, Minister Flaherty does nothing but attack his home province.

“He called Ontario ‘the last place to invest’ and Premier Dalton McGuinty the ‘small man of Confederation’ for defending the principles of democracy,” she said. “He told Ontario mayors that he was not in the ‘pothole business’ and dismissed the huge infrastructure deficit they face by calling them ‘whiners.’

“The residents of Ontario – and all of Canada – need a government that is going to stick by them and work with them every day to find long-term solutions, not sit back and insult them in their time of need,” she said.

Mr. Fullard said he was proud to be joining the Liberal team because of Mr. Dion’s plan to build the Canada of the future through partnership with Canadian businesses.

“Canadians have had enough of Mr. Flaherty’s broken promises,” he said. “The income trust fiasco – which cost investors some $35 billion – is just one of a string of betrayals that Mr. Flaherty is going to have to explain to the residents of Whitby-Oshawa. Even worse is that this broken promise is predicated on the false premise that income trusts cause tax leakage.”