Save the apology Flaherty, since it’s as worthless as your word and as empty as your integrity. What Canadians are demanding of, is justification for your actions. Where is your proof of tax leakage, on which your reckless actions were ostensibly based? When will the paid elected members of the Official Opposition (Liberals) ever get off their collective asses and nail Flaherty for his lies and incompetence about the income trust fraud/fiasco?
Flaherty offers apology for income trust hurt
John Ivison,
National Post ·
Saturday, Aug. 7, 2010
I apologize that a lot of Canadians were affected, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said yesterday.
Jim Flaherty may have faced down the financial crisis, but he was forced on the defensive by a feisty senior yesterday at a policy conference, where he issued a public apology for the hardship inflicted by his decision to tax income trusts nearly four years ago.
"I apologize for the fact that it did affect a lot of Canadians, including you," the Finance Minister said in response to a question at the 79th annual Couchiching Conference from Sheila Whitzman, who called his Oct. 31, 2006, decision "a Halloween massacre."
Activists who have long opposed Mr. Flaherty's decision say it is the first time he has apologized in a public forum. Mr. Flaherty said he had been finance minister for only six months, "so it was probably a politically unwise thing to do -- certainly for me personally."
But he was unrepentent about the substance of the move that caused unit prices for all publicly listed income trusts to drop in the weeks after the sudden announcement. "It needed to be done, it wasn't going to get better....
"If you're in politics to be popular, you'll get a lot of bad government and the income trust rule was ruining our economy."
Critics point out that the Conservatives had campaigned during the 2006 election to leave the favourable tax structure for income trusts alone, and dispute the Department of Finance's calculation that the conversion to trust status was costing the country hundreds of millions of dollars in "tax leakage."
Ms. Whitzman said she saw her retirement savings sink 20% within days of the decision. "They assume people have forgotten and don't bear them a grudge. I choose not to forget. Still, he [Mr. Flaherty] spoke better than I expected and he was quite charming," she said.
Mr. Flaherty was at Couchiching to deliver the keynote address on the state of Canada's economy. While cautioning that Canada is "not out of the woods," he offered an upbeat assessment of the country's prospects. "The future is more hopeful than the treacherous past we have just lived through," he said, pointing out that Canada has recouped almost all the jobs it lost during the recession.
He categorized himself as a fiscal conservative but said he is also a pragmatist and defended the government's intervention in the economy over the past two years. "The role of government when the private sector fails is to intercede on behalf of the people of Canada.... It creates some difficulties with people insistent on ideological purity," he said.
New jobs numbers out yesterday ticked upward marginally by 0.1%, taking the unemployment rate back to 8% in July, after a particularly strong performance in June. The rate is still nearly 2% higher than October, 2008, largely because of an increase in the number of people in the labour force. When asked whether he was concerned about the possible adverse impact on employment of stimulus spending ending next spring, Mr. Flaherty said he was starting to see some signs of growing private-sector investment.
"Canada's economic action plan is a two-year plan and there has to be an exit strategy. It's time for the private sector to step up to the plate to resume strong investment and replace public-sector demand," he said.
The Couchiching Conference on public affairs at Geneva Park, on Lake Couchiching, is an annual event marking its 79th anniversary. This year's conference, entitled Watershed Moment or Wasted Opportunity, explores the global financial crisis and its consequences.
jivison@nationalpost.com
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Flaherty offers apology for income trust hurt
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20 comments:
Getting an apology from Flaherty is like getting an apology from a pick pocket after he has stolen your wallet & spent all the money.
It just "don`t cut it".
Bugger-off Jim.
Dr Mike Popovich --- Rodney Ont
"He noted, again, it was not a popular decision. But "the income trust rule was ruining our economy. If we had kept it there, we would have had our banks become income trusts. We would have become a passive economy"
How do people with such a shallow intelligence pool arise to Min of Fin?
The Whole world knows that the Trust Model is transparent,open,books are open for all to see,management is obligated to be more honest.The Trust Model pays more taxes,puts the distributions are put back in the economy via consumer spending.
I suggest that Canada pass a law that ALL publicly listed Companies become Trusts.
Canada would prosper like no other country has in the past or ever will.
Cheers
Cocoph
What a pile of shite complete BS. Now it's not tax leakage it is Trusts were going to ruin the economy.
Since when does profit sharing with the share holders cause a problem. In fact it is just the opposite, more money in more hands increases taxes and spending boosting the economy.
The only losers would be to obscenely over paid CEO's execs etc. They wanted all of the money for themselves and Flaherty saw that they got it at our expense.
Why Iggy and The Liberals remain mute is beyond me. They should be making this their number one platform issue.
Where is our so called media supposedly here to keep fools like Flaherty honest. They are all missing in action or silently supporting the liars and evil doers the CONS.
I think Canadians have had it with the lying CONS.
FC13
Does 'Pea brain' Flaherty listen to himself in the mirror before he makes absurd statements, or is this just normal for someone with no justifiable qualifications other than for economic destruction i.e. Ontario, and for being appointed a finance minister by another unqualified quasi-accountant? He "apologizes" for the income trust fiasco, then he has the gall to say that these trusts would have ruined the economy. This man who calls himself a finance minister said that if his government had not curbed them, our banks would have become income trusts as well - what a deceiving, lying stupid A$$hole he is!
Fransman
Now that he has apologised can we expect some compensation?
ENLIM
It takes a lot of courage to appologize to income trust investors. For that I give Mr. Flaherty credit. It is a good start. Now it will take even more character and courage to follow through and correct the mistake by bringing back income trusts. In lieu of that, please show us where the tax leakage is. BB
Come on now Mr. Flaherty. It needed to be done because ….? You and your clan are out right liars. There was no tax leakage. Your lies are protected behind 18 pages of blacked out documents. You gutless stiff. Why don’t you tell the truth about who you were really protecting? It surely wasn’t the average Canadian investor.
Bruce Benson
Calgary
It is like Bernie Madoff apologizing!
GL
The apology by the Honorable James M. Flaherty for his income trust hurt doesn't cut any ice; at least not for me.
If on October 31, 2006 he had said "I believe that the income trust vehicle will slow Canada's economic development", I could have respected his right to hold a wrong opinion and to implement a bad policy. There is a lot of bad policy in Canadian politics, and the income trust decision went to the head of long line. I understand all that.
But I will never forget, nor will I ever forgive, that the Honorable James M. Flaherty made a joke of the emotional suffering and financial loss he caused by doing his announcement on Halloween Eve. He laughed "Boo! here's a big scare for you. You trusting fools just lost thousands of dollars! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
He lied to the Finance Committee about RSPs and RIFs being tax-exempt. And to cover-up his deception he blacked-out the working papers that showed his stated reasons for the policy are false. He lied about government tax revenue, and he paid a-once-upon-a-time world renown economist and specialist accountants to produce the necessary documents to obsfucate his obviously false claim.
But he also showed to his fellow MPs that a Government Minister they can lie to and obsfucate Parliament and get away with it. He began the widespread acceptance of a poisoning of the democratic waters of Canada.
I am glad for one thing. The fact that the Honorable James M. Flaherty has apologized for the income trust hurt shows that he realizes that the decision continues to hang on him like the smell of a rotting albatross.
PS. Hi Bruce and Mike, I trust you've had a last good summer before the double taxation of retirement income begins.
Well said Louis!!
I am just sitting here contemplating this new tax , the newly minted HST here in Ontario with it`s higher hydro rates , the 1.5 billion dollars wasted on the summit that should have been spent on healthcare , the wrongful firing of Linda Keen , the lunacy of the prison bulk-up , the inane scrapping of the mandatory long form census , the "who knows what`s going on" with the Long Gun registry , Mad Max Bernier , Lisa Raitt , & the dumping of old friend Garth Turner just to mention a few things.
Man o man , is this gov`t ever depressing me.
Dr Mike Popovich
Cocoph, FC13 and Louis et al,
I couldn't have said it better if I thought a year about how to write a response to that drivel.
It bothers me though that even 30% of Canadians would vote for this mean spirited, incompetent and whole group of liars.
Railhound
Yes, it was well said Louis. The point about the rotting albatross is very insightful, as the only motivation that Flaherty has for apologizing at this late juncture is not borne of true remorse, but rather Flaherty angling for his own self interest as he attempts to rid himself of the rotting albatross. Good luck with that, as there will be a long line up when Flaherty is buried of people anxious to piss on his grave.
Louis very well said, no doubt is left in the mind of the reader. Oh, thanks for the reminder about the double taxation of my measly retirement earnings.
Well done Sheila for putting Flaherty on the spot and reminding mainstream media about what a liar Flaherty is and using the word massacre so appropriately.
Strongly agree based on Flaherty's words this is not an apology at all. If he had the slightest bit of remorse, he would have released those 18 blacked out pages and donated his Federal pension to a non profit senior's organization to make amends.
This smells like "an election is coming up soon. I pissed off a lot of people and my crappy party needs votes. So I will offer a half assed meaningless apology to save my job."
Seniors, please let your grandkids know about Income Trusts. Just ensuring the line to pee on Flaherty's grave is appropriate in length. A "leakage" memorial seems very appropriate for this jerk off's legacy. They deserve to know who sold off Canada's resources cheap to foreigners and what happened to Canadian owned resources.
Little JIm
I have 1 ply cheap toilet paper
so you can rub your tears.
Once,your done crying where is the proof of the tax leakage ?
JC
Little JIm
I have 1 ply cheap toilet paper
so you can rub your tears.
Once,your done crying where is the proof of the tax leakage ?
JC
And where is your proof that the tax leakage didn't happen hot shot
You had better be the one using toilet paper because you are so full of shit your nose is so brown from kissing a**holes. But I guess it takes one to support one. IQ nil
marie:
It seems the world that you occupy has the "burden of proof" for the government's actions on the citizenry as opposed to the government itself, when you state:
"And where is your proof that the tax leakage didn't happen hot shot"
Well since you asked,. our proof that income trusts do not cause tax leakage comes from the study performed by HLB Decision Economics entitled The tax revenue implications of income trusts, dated November 2005. This study was a collaborative study performed in conjunction with the Department of Finance and shows there is NO TAX LEAKAGE. Read it yourself by Googling the title. This conclusion has be corrobratied by many other credible groups, like PricewaterhposeCoopers, BMO Capital Markets, RBC Capital Markets, etc.
Meanwhile, where is the government's proof that there is tax leakage? They have none apart from 18 pages of blacked out documents, which actually reveal enough for us to know the government is LYING about tax leakage/
See our full page ad from the Toronto Star to that effect:
http://caiti-online-media.blogspot.com/2007/04/to-finance-minister-flaherty-your-tax.html
Sweet Marie Brown Marie
We have all the info you require at
www.caiti.info
Plus 2.5 Million taxpayers waiting for your proof.
Marie your IQ is in :
IQ = minus Emc2
JC
Oh Marie you did not deserve a reply. In fact your comments did not deserve to be cleared by the moderator. The only one looking like a shit is you Sweet Brown Marie. Speaking of IO, looks like you got the short end of the stick.
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