Freeland’s first budget must set Canada on a strong investment-innovation growth path
TORONTO—Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s first budget must set Canada on the strong investment-innovation growth path that we urgently need. The reality today is that we are not up to the challenges of a much more competitive global economy and failure to respond will mean a stagnant standard of living and an inability to afford the […]
Finance Committee chair Easter top non-cabinet-MP target for lobbyists in 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic kept MPs away from Ottawa for most of the year, but that didn’t stop lobbyists from meeting with MPs to try and influence both the government’s and the opposition’s agenda. Liberal MP and House Finance Committee chair Wayne Easter was lobbied 190 times in 2020, the most for an MP not serving […]
New federal program for hard-hit sectors will help investors and banks—not workers
The federal government may well leave Canada’s most vulnerable workers behind in its effort to bail out hard-hit sectors like hospitality. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland recently announced the Highly Affected Sectors Credit Availability Program (HASCAP), designed to give low-interest loans of up to $1-million, fully backed by the federal government, to hard-hit companies. Government support […]
Supporting Canadians next tax season needs to start now
As we near the end of a very tumultuous 2020, a COVID-19 vaccine will soon be more widely available, ushering in economic recovery and a return to some normalcy. While we remain optimistic, more challenges await as infection rates surge and businesses continue to struggle. Most of us have friends or family or at least […]
Feds’ mid-year revenue fell by nearly 22 per cent during pandemic
The federal government brought in 21.5 per cent less revenue from April to September this year as the country battled the COVID-19 pandemic than it did during the same period last year, a recently released document from Finance Canada shows. The government’s borrowing and spending during the pandemic has attracted considerable scrutiny, as the federal […]
Liberals harness more spending power to fight COVID and lay out election-ready agenda
OTTAWA—Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland reopened Ottawa’s spending taps to help Canadians cope with the epidemic while setting out an expansive, equity-focused agenda for the next Liberal election campaign. In her first accounting of government spending since she took over as finance minister from Bill Morneau in August, Freeland released a 237-page package of new supports […]
This just in: staffing update for Freeland’s finance ministerial team
It’s been more than three months since Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland put on the added hat of minister of finance, and Hill Climbers finally has some staffing decisions to report. The minister’s office has for months declined to confirm who is staffing Ms. Freeland in her capacity as finance minister, saying the office was […]
Dip in RCMP watchdog’s budget shakes faith in its ability to exercise oversight, says NDP MP Harris
NDP MP Jack Harris says the decrease in the RCMP watchdog’s projected budget for this fiscal year offers little assurance that it will have the ability to improve its oversight duties. Addressing Public Safety Minister Bill Blair (Scarborough-Southwest, Ont.) during a House Public Safety Committee meeting on Wednesday, Mr. Harris (St. John’s East, N.L.) noted […]
Canada’s surface combatant costs might be taking on water
Sometime soon, the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) will release an updated costing of the Navy’s Canadian Surface Combatant (CSC) project. Much of Canada’s naval future, military combat capability, and ability to defend our country and continent are wrapped up in that project, the most expensive we have ever undertaken. Currently budgeted at between $56-billion and […]
Three weeks to deadline, gridlocked Finance Committee’s pre-budget study in doubt
Locked in an impasse since the House of Commons’ return, the Finance Committee has yet to begin its pre-budget consultations and the clock is running out for it to submit a report with recommendations to Parliament. The Standing Orders dictate that the Finance Committee must table its report on the government’s budgetary policy no later […]
