Post mortem: Rewriting Flaherty's Ways and Means Motion to conform with its actual outcome

Flaherty’s Ways and Means Motion to introduce the double taxation of income from trusts in RRSPs, but not pensions funds was a sham see through exercise from the very outset, to those with any finance knowledge to speak of, and was more deserving of being called a Ways and Means Notion, rather than a Ways and Means Motion, so I thought it would be insightful to rewrite the original Notion in a way that conforms with actually transpired

Notice of Ways and Means Motion to Amend the Income Tax Act

That it is expedient to amend the Income Tax Act, in accordance with proposals announced by the Minister of Finance on October 31, 2006, to uphold the value of gross unfairness for Canadians by:

* unlevelling the playing field between RRSPs and pension funds by double taxing RRSPs but not pension funds, thereby creating a 31.5% tax arb that favours pension funds that can exploited in transactions like OMERs predatory purchase of Teranet Income Fund, a transaction solely motivated by the evasion of the 31.5% taxes by OMERs and triggering government induced losses in the hands of Teranet’s previous public investors who are forced to pay the 31.5% tax.

* ensuring that taxes are unfairly shifted onto the shoulders of Canadian taxpayers, especially Canadian families, arising from the loss of $1.5 billion in annual taxes from the 51 trust takeovers, with up to $6 billion more per year to come, unless stopped by measures such as the Marshall Savings Plan

* weakening Canada's social security system for pensioners and seniors by making more seniors reliant upon it and less funding available for it, in addition to imposing losses of $35 billion in their retirement savings and retirement nest eggs

* eliminating businesses from having choices that were previously available to them that were more consistent with economic growth and competitiveness, and

* bringing Canada's approach to the taxation of trusts and partnerships out of line with other jurisdictions like the US who have a $480 billion income trust market that goes by the name of MLPs, or Singapore who modeled their market after Canada’s enormously successful business income trust to attract much needed investment capital to the country, while at the same time providing a new investment vehicle perfectly suited to the country’s aging demographic

The original Ways and Means Notion read like this:

That it is expedient to amend the Income Tax Act, in accordance with proposals announced by the Minister of Finance on October 31, 2006, to uphold the value of fairness for Canadians by:

* levelling the playing field between trusts and partnerships and corporations,

* ensuring that taxes are not unfairly shifted onto the shoulders of Canadian taxpayers, especially Canadian families,

* strengthening Canada's social security system for pensioners and seniors,

* helping corporations make choices that are consistent with economic growth and competitiveness, and

* bringing Canada's approach to the taxation of trusts and partnerships back in line with other jurisdictions,