What's Hot and What's Not in the New Tory Budget
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
What's Hot
- GST will drop to six per cent from seven per cent effective July 1.
- Fitness tax credit for up to $500 in eligible fees for physical fitness programs for each child under age 16.
- New tax credit for textbooks, which is to provide a tax reduction of about $80 per year for a typical full-time post-secondary student.
- Elimination of current $3,000 limit on amount of scholarship, bursary and fellowship income a post-secondary student can get without paying federal income tax
- Tax credit on cost of monthly public transit passes, or passes of longer duration, effective July 1, 2006
What's Not
- absent is funding to arts and culture, excpet for the $50 million promised to the Canada Council for the Arts
- no mention of the Liberals' $10 billion commitment to implement the international Kyoto accord, which aims to reduce the greenhouse gases that cause climate change.
- missing from the fiscal agenda is the 10-year, $5.1 billion federal-provincial deal to help aboriginal people signed in Kelowna, B.C. last year under the former Liberals. However, natives will receive $450 million in 2006-2007 and 2007-2008 in areas of priority that include education; advancing socio-economic conditions for women, children and families; and improving the water supply and housing on reserves.
Source CTV
I think the Conservatives won the election by making promises which touched almost every demographic and that is now echoed in their budget.
" The important thing politically is, you cannot find an individual or group untouched by this budget, right in their pocketbook," CTV's Chief Political Correspondent Craig Oliver.
posted by aforward @ 1:36 PM,
