Key Party Platforms
Economy
• Increase the amount of income eligible for the reduced federal small business tax rate to $500,000, a measure that will allow more small businesses to grow without being in a higher tax bracket.
• Index the lifetime capital gains exemption, to keep the value of the exemption from being eroded over time by inflation.
• Open up regulated airline and uranium mining sectors to allow increased foreign investment subject to negotiation with our trading partners and to considerations of national security.
• Establish a new national security review mechanism in the Investment Canada Act to ensure foreign investments do not jeopardize Canada’s national security.
• Establish a new stand-alone regional development agency for Northern Canada, with one focused vision: a prosperous future for those who call the North home.
• Establish a satellite office in the North to specialize in dealing with the unique challenges of Northern projects, as recommended by the Major Projects Management Office created by the Conservative government.
• Improve the regulatory process for Northern natural resource projects, as recommended by The Road to Improvement.
• Introduce a Consumer Protection Plan that has:
• increased penalties for bid-rigging and cartel behaviour like price-fixing;
• increased civil penalties for false and misleading advertising, and upon criminal conviction, tougher fines and prison terms;
• action to combat gas-pump tampering and overcharging on home-heating meters;
• a ban on fees charged by telecom companies for unsolicited commercial text messages;
• legislation to reduce Internet spam and to prohibit practices such as identity theft, the spreading of viruses, “phishing” and other forms of fraud;
• increased fines for false and misleading e-mail, and for attempts to steal personal information.
• Fund a long-term transportation action plan in the Greater Toronto Area that includes:
• extending Highway 407 to Clarington;
• widening Highway 7 in Durham Region;
• extending Highway 404 north from Green Lane to Ravenshoe Road.
• rapid transit projects in Brampton, Mississauga, York Region and Durham Region.
• Invest $24 million into the development of international cruise destinations along the St. Lawrence.
• Increase funding for the Targeted Initiative for Older Workers program to $50 million per year through 2012.
Environment
• Cut the federal excise tax on diesel fuel in half, from four to two cents per litre
• Invest $113 million into an Environmental Enforcement Action Plan over the next five years — and an additional $25 million for:
• stiffer penalties for the most serious environmental crimes: up to $6 million for corporations and $1 million for individuals;
• increases in inspection and seizure powers;
• a team of specialized environmental prosecutors;
• creation of environmental laws that allow courts to compel offenders to remedy any harm to the environment;
• a searchable database that tells the public the details of a corporation’s convictions for environmental crimes.
• Require corporations convicted of environmental crimes to notify their shareholders of their conviction and punishment.
• Prohibit the exportation of bitumen to countries outside Canada that do not have equivalent emission-reduction targets.
• Re-affirm Canada’s position that the North American Free Trade Agreement cannot require Canada to export bulk water to other NAFTA countries.
• Continue to promote the development of northern pipelines to bring oil and gas to markets in Canada and throughout the world.
• A regulatory framework that will impose mandatory emissions reduction targets on Canadian industry and reduce Canada's greenhouse gas emissions by an absolute 20 per cent by 2020.
• A $2-billion ecoENERGY initiative to promote smarter energy use, greater use of clean energy sources, and cleaner use of traditional energy sources.
• Protection of numerous conservation areas, including the world’s largest freshwater protection area.
Immigration
• Place on the agenda of the next first ministers’ meeting the issue of standardizing and recognizing foreign professional credentials.
Food/Agriculture
• Set aside $500 million over the next four years and work co-operatively with provinces to implement an agricultural flexibility program.
• Invest $50 million for slaughter capacity in various regions of the country in beef and dairy industries, and other livestock sectors.
Families
• Give first-time homebuyers a tax credit for up to $5,000 of the closing costs on the purchase of a new home.
• Reduce seniors’ taxable income by raising the Age Amount by $1,000.
• Allow families to split their income between spouses to reduce their taxes in situations where one spouse is not working full-time in order to care for one or more family members with disabilities — whether children or adults.
• Improve the Registered Disability Savings Program so that a person with disabilities can access money that has been transferred from the unused retirement savings of a deceased family member.
• Give self-employed Canadians the opportunity to access maternity and parental benefits.
• Establishing a new Children’s Arts Tax Credit, worth an estimated $150 million annually, to encourage greater participation by children in arts activities.
• Extending the benefit of the existing Children’s Fitness Tax Credit and the new Children’s Art Tax Credit to lower-income families that pay little or no income tax, by making both credits fully refundable.
Health
• Ban “kiddy packs” of cigarillos and other tobacco products by: setting a minimum package size for cigarillos that is less affordable for children, prohibiting flavour and additives that would appeal to children, and banning all tobacco advertising and promotion in print and electronic media which may be viewed and read by youth.
Education/the Arts
• CRTC: Guarantee alternating French- and English-speaking chairpersons and require the two vice-chairperson positions be held by an English speaker and a French speaker simultaneously; ensure at least 25 per cent of the CRTC commissioners are French-language speakers.
• Fund the TV5, the international French-language television network, with $25 million over the next five years.
• Launch the Roadmap for Canada’s Linguistic Duality to preserve Canada’s bilingual heritage and promote our official-language minority communities.
• Create a new program to help official-language minority communities assert their rights.
• Appoint a special advisor to make Government more responsive to the needs of these communities.
Justice
• Make the following crimes ineligible for house arrest: serious property crimes, such as robbery, breaking and entering, and arson; weapons offences, such as possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose; home invasion; serious vehicular crimes, such as impaired driving causing bodily harm or death; drug trafficking; kidnapping and trafficking in persons.
• Extend the Youth Gang Prevention Fund and increase its budget to $10 million per year.
• Introduce a new law dealing with young offenders, which will:
• make it easier to detain, prior to trial, persons charged with violent offences or a “pattern of offences” for which an adult would be liable to imprisonment for more than two years if convicted;
• ensure that persons aged 14 and older convicted of violent crimes face youth sentences proportionate to the severity of the crime and the level of responsibility of the offender, with maximum enhanced youth sentences of up to 14 years for violent offences, and maximum enhanced youth sentences of life for first- or second-degree murder;
• allow prosecutors to apply to make public the names of young offenders convicted of other violent offences endangering other persons.
Other
• Restore Veterans Allowances for veterans living in Canada for more than 10 years who fought for Commonwealth or Allied forces during the Second World War.
• Increase the amount of income eligible for the reduced federal small business tax rate to $500,000, a measure that will allow more small businesses to grow without being in a higher tax bracket.
• Index the lifetime capital gains exemption, to keep the value of the exemption from being eroded over time by inflation.
• Open up regulated airline and uranium mining sectors to allow increased foreign investment subject to negotiation with our trading partners and to considerations of national security.
• Establish a new national security review mechanism in the Investment Canada Act to ensure foreign investments do not jeopardize Canada’s national security.
• Establish a new stand-alone regional development agency for Northern Canada, with one focused vision: a prosperous future for those who call the North home.
• Establish a satellite office in the North to specialize in dealing with the unique challenges of Northern projects, as recommended by the Major Projects Management Office created by the Conservative government.
• Improve the regulatory process for Northern natural resource projects, as recommended by The Road to Improvement.
• Introduce a Consumer Protection Plan that has:
• increased penalties for bid-rigging and cartel behaviour like price-fixing;
• increased civil penalties for false and misleading advertising, and upon criminal conviction, tougher fines and prison terms;
• action to combat gas-pump tampering and overcharging on home-heating meters;
• a ban on fees charged by telecom companies for unsolicited commercial text messages;
• legislation to reduce Internet spam and to prohibit practices such as identity theft, the spreading of viruses, “phishing” and other forms of fraud;
• increased fines for false and misleading e-mail, and for attempts to steal personal information.
• Fund a long-term transportation action plan in the Greater Toronto Area that includes:
• extending Highway 407 to Clarington;
• widening Highway 7 in Durham Region;
• extending Highway 404 north from Green Lane to Ravenshoe Road.
• rapid transit projects in Brampton, Mississauga, York Region and Durham Region.
• Invest $24 million into the development of international cruise destinations along the St. Lawrence.
• Increase funding for the Targeted Initiative for Older Workers program to $50 million per year through 2012.
Environment
• Cut the federal excise tax on diesel fuel in half, from four to two cents per litre
• Invest $113 million into an Environmental Enforcement Action Plan over the next five years — and an additional $25 million for:
• stiffer penalties for the most serious environmental crimes: up to $6 million for corporations and $1 million for individuals;
• increases in inspection and seizure powers;
• a team of specialized environmental prosecutors;
• creation of environmental laws that allow courts to compel offenders to remedy any harm to the environment;
• a searchable database that tells the public the details of a corporation’s convictions for environmental crimes.
• Require corporations convicted of environmental crimes to notify their shareholders of their conviction and punishment.
• Prohibit the exportation of bitumen to countries outside Canada that do not have equivalent emission-reduction targets.
• Re-affirm Canada’s position that the North American Free Trade Agreement cannot require Canada to export bulk water to other NAFTA countries.
• Continue to promote the development of northern pipelines to bring oil and gas to markets in Canada and throughout the world.
• A regulatory framework that will impose mandatory emissions reduction targets on Canadian industry and reduce Canada's greenhouse gas emissions by an absolute 20 per cent by 2020.
• A $2-billion ecoENERGY initiative to promote smarter energy use, greater use of clean energy sources, and cleaner use of traditional energy sources.
• Protection of numerous conservation areas, including the world’s largest freshwater protection area.
Immigration
• Place on the agenda of the next first ministers’ meeting the issue of standardizing and recognizing foreign professional credentials.
Food/Agriculture
• Set aside $500 million over the next four years and work co-operatively with provinces to implement an agricultural flexibility program.
• Invest $50 million for slaughter capacity in various regions of the country in beef and dairy industries, and other livestock sectors.
Families
• Give first-time homebuyers a tax credit for up to $5,000 of the closing costs on the purchase of a new home.
• Reduce seniors’ taxable income by raising the Age Amount by $1,000.
• Allow families to split their income between spouses to reduce their taxes in situations where one spouse is not working full-time in order to care for one or more family members with disabilities — whether children or adults.
• Improve the Registered Disability Savings Program so that a person with disabilities can access money that has been transferred from the unused retirement savings of a deceased family member.
• Give self-employed Canadians the opportunity to access maternity and parental benefits.
• Establishing a new Children’s Arts Tax Credit, worth an estimated $150 million annually, to encourage greater participation by children in arts activities.
• Extending the benefit of the existing Children’s Fitness Tax Credit and the new Children’s Art Tax Credit to lower-income families that pay little or no income tax, by making both credits fully refundable.
Health
• Ban “kiddy packs” of cigarillos and other tobacco products by: setting a minimum package size for cigarillos that is less affordable for children, prohibiting flavour and additives that would appeal to children, and banning all tobacco advertising and promotion in print and electronic media which may be viewed and read by youth.
Education/the Arts
• CRTC: Guarantee alternating French- and English-speaking chairpersons and require the two vice-chairperson positions be held by an English speaker and a French speaker simultaneously; ensure at least 25 per cent of the CRTC commissioners are French-language speakers.
• Fund the TV5, the international French-language television network, with $25 million over the next five years.
• Launch the Roadmap for Canada’s Linguistic Duality to preserve Canada’s bilingual heritage and promote our official-language minority communities.
• Create a new program to help official-language minority communities assert their rights.
• Appoint a special advisor to make Government more responsive to the needs of these communities.
Justice
• Make the following crimes ineligible for house arrest: serious property crimes, such as robbery, breaking and entering, and arson; weapons offences, such as possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose; home invasion; serious vehicular crimes, such as impaired driving causing bodily harm or death; drug trafficking; kidnapping and trafficking in persons.
• Extend the Youth Gang Prevention Fund and increase its budget to $10 million per year.
• Introduce a new law dealing with young offenders, which will:
• make it easier to detain, prior to trial, persons charged with violent offences or a “pattern of offences” for which an adult would be liable to imprisonment for more than two years if convicted;
• ensure that persons aged 14 and older convicted of violent crimes face youth sentences proportionate to the severity of the crime and the level of responsibility of the offender, with maximum enhanced youth sentences of up to 14 years for violent offences, and maximum enhanced youth sentences of life for first- or second-degree murder;
• allow prosecutors to apply to make public the names of young offenders convicted of other violent offences endangering other persons.
Other
• Restore Veterans Allowances for veterans living in Canada for more than 10 years who fought for Commonwealth or Allied forces during the Second World War.