The Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) is telling the Canadian government to follow the lead of other countries that have lowered taxes to combat inflation.
“Canadians are fueling up at the pumps and then worrying about whether they have enough left over for ground beef at the grocery store,” said CTF federal director Franco Terrazzano in a press release on Wednesday. “Inflation is a key economic issue facing Canadian families and our politicians need to wake up and provide some relief.”
Canada’s inflation rate for December was up 4.8% compared to last year, the highest the country has seen since 1991.
The federal carbon tax on gasoline has increased twice during the COVID-19 pandemic and is scheduled to go up again in April to 11 cents per litre. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised to increase the carbon tax to almost 40 cents per litre of gas by 2030 and implement a second carbon tax through fuel regulations that will add an additional 11 cents per litre.
Canadian workers making more than $64,900 per year will see their tax bills increase by $396 this year. The Canadian government is set to increase alcohol taxes for the third time during the pandemic on April 1.
The CTF said that while Canada is raising taxes during the pandemic, other countries have provided relief. For example, South Korea reduced gas taxes for six months while eleven American states cut income or business tax rates.
Terrazzano said high taxes and rising prices are “making the tough times tougher in Canada.”
“While other countries are cutting taxes, all we get from Canadian politicians are higher tax bills,” said Terrazzano. “It’s time for Ottawa to provide some tax relief and make life in Canada a little more affordable.”
The current inflation rate has led to gas prices in Canada rising more than 33% compared to last year’s figures. Inflation has contributed to food prices going up by more than 5%.
Conservative leader Erin O’Toole called on the Canadian government Wednesday to take action on inflation.
“The cost of living is skyrocketing across Canada,” said O’Toole. “The Trudeau Liberals need to realize the impact this is having on you and your wallet.”
New statistics show there are fewer homes for sale in Canada than at any recorded point in history.
According to the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA), end-of-month supply of properties reached an all-time low in December.
Records show that newly listed properties fell by 3.2% from November to December 2021. A drop in listings in the Greater Vancouver Area, Montreal and other regions in Quebec offset much of the new supply produced in Toronto.
“There are currently fewer properties listed for sale in Canada than at any point on record,” said CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart.
“So, unfortunately, the housing affordability problem facing the country is likely to get worse before it gets better. Policymakers are starting to say the right things, but now they have to act to change this course we’re on.”
By the end of December, there was only 1.6 months’ worth of inventory across the country.
Cathcart said that an unprecedented nationwide home building push might be the only thing that will remedy the situation.
“An aggressive national push to build more homes is what will address the issue, but it will probably have to be a greater amount of building than anything we’ve ever undertaken. A touch over the status quo won’t cut it,” said Cathcart.
Housing prices have surged across the country with a 17.7% year-over-year gain at the end of 2021.
Six of Canada’s largest cities have seen housing prices skyrocket, some reporting six-figure increases over the past year.
The largest spike in the cost to buy a home was in the Greater Toronto Area, which saw 31% growth totalling $286,000. The cost of the average home in Toronto is currently priced at $1.2 million.
Housing in the Greater Vancouver Area surpassed the cost of Toronto, however, with the average home costing $1.23 million. This represents a $181,600 jump, or 17%, since 2020.
“With the housing supply issues facing the country having only gotten worse to start 2022, take any decline in sales early in the year with a grain of salt because the demand hasn’t gone away,” said CREA chair Cliff Stevenson. “There just won’t be much to buy until a little later in this spring.”
Canadians gathered by the thousands in various cities on Saturday to voice their opposition to lockdown measures, vaccine passports and mandatory COVID-19 shots.
The Worldwide Freedom Rally was held in solidarity with cities around the world. Protests took place at dozens of urban centres including Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Fredericton.
In the streets of downtown Toronto, protestors waved Canadian flags and held signs with statements such as “Unvaxxed are not sick!” and “Compliance isn’t science.”
People’s Party of Canada leader Maxime Bernier was among thousands who stopped to gather at Queen’s Park. Speaking to the crowd, Bernier said he has been voicing his opposition to heavy-handed government measures since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and that “when tyranny becomes law, revolution becomes our duty.”
“And now we have that ideological revolution, that freedom revolution, here in Canada,” said Bernier. “We are winning that battle because truth will always win.”
He led the crowd in a chant of “freedom!”
Other speakers at the Toronto rally included Ontario First Party leader Randy Hillier, former Grey Bruce Health Services family and emergency medicine specialist Dr. Rochagne Kilian and Free2Fly co-founder Greg Hill.
Thousands of people also protested public health measures in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery.
Hundreds at the World Wide Freedom Rally in Vancouver right now. #FreedomRally
Some protesters held Canadian and “F*ck Trudeau” flags as they walked through downtown. Others carried signs with statements such as “We will not comply” and “We want our freedom.”
Speakers at the Vancouver rally included Police on Guard founder Bert Mayo, Action4Canada president Tanya Gaw and Ronald McDonald House evicted father Austin Furgason.
In Montreal, a large number of people attended the freedom rally at La Fontaine Park.
Protestors waved Canadian and Quebec flags as they walked through Old Montreal. Some of them brought signs with statements such as “No vax pass!” and “We want choice.”
Protestors chanted “Freedom now!” and blew whistles. They concluded their protest by walking to the George-Etienne Cartier Monument.
In recent weeks, governments across Canada have reimplemented strict lockdowns in order to curb the spread of the Omicron variant.
In Quebec, the government reinstated a curfew and pledged to tax those who choose to remain unvaccinated. In Ontario, the government has extended the use of mask mandates and vaccine passports indefinitely. New Brunswick has returned to a Level 3 lockdown, the most restrictive level of the government’s “COVID alert system.”
The rallies also served as the unofficial launch for a massive convoy of truckers who began heading to Ottawa on Sunday to protest vaccine mandates and an erosion of freedoms under COVID-19. A GoFundMe campaign for the “Freedom Convoy 2022” had raised almost $2 million as of Saturday evening.
A majority of Canadians are struggling to feed their families as grocery prices skyrocket across the country.
According to a new Angus Reid Institute poll, 57% of Canadians said they were having trouble putting food on their tables. This compares to only 36% of people who reported the same difficulty in 2019.
When taking into account the “Economic Stress Index” which considers factors including debt, housing prices and financial situations, 98% of Canadians who reported they were struggling financially had trouble affording food.
The index breaks down groups of respondents into four categories: Struggling, Uncomfortable, Comfortable and Thriving. According to the index, 52% of the country fell into the Struggling or Uncomfortable categories.
“For those who are Thriving, food costs are manageable, or an afterthought,” Angus Reid analysts wrote.
“For those who are Uncomfortable or Struggling, putting food on the table can be a substantial challenge.”
The latest Statistics Canada data shows that the price of basic foodstuffs has surged across the country. The price of cooking oil has shot up by 41.4% while the cost of stewing beef and bacon has increased by 17.2%.
Even vegetables such as carrots saw a price increase of 13.5%, meanwhile the cost of white sugar jumped by 21.6% last year.
Last week, inflation in Canada reached a 30-year-high with the Consumer Price Index reporting a rate of 4.8%.
The Conservatives have taken the Liberal government to task over its responsibility for rising inflation rates. Recently, parliamentarians met for an emergency meeting at the Commons finance committee to schedule hearings on the matter.
“The biggest increases for consumer products have been those that we source right here at home, not those that depend on foreign supply chains,” said Conservative finance critic Poilievre.
“Home price inflation is a home-grown problem… The more (Trudeau) spends, the more things cost.”
Ontario’s new reopening roadmap has no projected end for mask mandates or vaccine passports. In Alberta, Premier Jason Kenney has not said anything more specific than “soon” when asked how long he plans to keep vaccine passports and mask mandates in place. True North’s Andrew Lawton says it’s clear there’s no exit strategy for pandemic restrictions in most of Canada, which is bad news for those of us unwilling to adopt the new normal.
Also, Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown joins the show to talk about why following the science actually means reopening and avoiding lockdowns.
Two British Columbia mothers whose young children have serious eye disorders are saying their families’ long-time ophthalmologist has refused to see their kids for not having COVID shots.
Laura Ziemer and Sandra Scrimes told True North that the office of Dr. Ross Kennedy, an eye doctor with West Coast Vision in Surrey, B.C., contacted them just days before appointments they had booked months before.
The office asked them to disclose their children’s vaccination status.
“In light of the rising Omicron cases, we are only able to see vaccinated patients in clinic during this time,” read a letter from Kennedy’s office that Ziemer showed to True North.
“We apologize for the inconvenience but our goal is to keep everyone safe during this unprecedented time. Please reply to this email of your vaccination status so we can confirm your upcoming appointment…”
Both Scrimes and Ziemer, whose families live in Chilliwack an hour away from the clinic, said the recent flooding in the Fraser Valley had made it more difficult than usual to find a space in Dr. Kennedy’s busy schedule.
Laura Ziemer’s six-year-old daughter was born with pediatric strabismus.
For Scrimes, the appointment was an emergency. Her nine-year-old son has optic nerve hypoplasia, being blind in one eye and prone to vision loss in the other. Scrimes said she was stunned by the policy, having brought her son to Kennedy’s office for years.
“I said, you’re just calling me now to tell me this?” Scrimes told True North. “I mean, my kid could be going blind here.”
“These appointments are really hard to get into. They’re putting families out. First Ronald McDonald House and now this? More people are going to start following suit.”
Ziemer’s six-year-old daughter was born with pediatric strabismus, a condition where the eyes do not line up. She got her first pair of glasses at 10 months and underwent her first surgery at two years old.
“I phoned and very nicely just asked, ‘uh, for real?’” Ziemer told True North. “Because to my best knowledge, this is not okay.”
“This appointment was necessary because it’s been a while since she’d been able to see him. I’ve got four kids, and I have a pretty decent understanding of what’s imperative – of what we can wait for. When we leave these appointments too long, her vision starts to shut down in one eye. And once the vision goes, it’s difficult to get that vision back.”
Ziemer was able to correspond with Kennedy through email, telling him she was “gutted and disappointed” over the policy and that she was “unsure how to proceed.” Kennedy, in a written response Ziemer showed to True North, admitted that “Covid has introduced massive stress in the medical system and the lives of many people,” but that “deferral of the office visit represents a reasonable compromise.”
“This wave of Covid will pass and we will return to more normal visits with time but no one knows when at this time,” Kennedy wrote. “Should you decide to go elsewhere we will support your right to do so and will help as we can.”
Despite this offer to help find alternatives, both Ziemer and Scrimes say they had to take the initiative themselves to sign their children up with an ophthalmologist at the same office.
For Scrimes, this meant citing the Charter and threatening consequences.
“I asked, how is this ethical to do this to a child who is in need of immediate attention for his eyesight?” she said. “I said it was against the Charter of Rights, and if the situation is not resolved, I will take further action.”
Scrimes said the office called her back within an hour to register her son with another doctor.
Sandra Scrimes’s nine-year-old son has optic nerve hypoplasia.
Ziemer told True North she has filed a complaint with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of British Columbia but that she doesn’t expect much to come of it.
Both women say they’re grateful to be seeing one of Kennedy’s colleagues but that this incident should not have happened, and they are worried about other families.
Ziemer added that the policy made no sense.
“I’m still going into his office,” she said. “I’m still seeing the technician, and I’m grateful for that. But to me, that’s not the point. The point is that he is discriminating against children.”
“First of all, if you’re so worried about getting COVID, then obviously seeing only vaccinated patients is going to do squat for you. Second of all, he made no effort on his part whatsoever at all to accommodate us by offering a rapid test, which to me would have been the simplest.”
True North reached out to Kennedy’s office for comment but received no response by deadline.
Canada has ranked the least favourite country to visit for Chinese citizens, a poll conducted by Chinese state-media outlet Global Times has found.
According to the survey by DATA100, Canada ranked just below Japan, with only 0.4 percent of respondents saying they liked the North American country.
Meanwhile, Singapore, Germany, France, the US, Russia and the Maldives were reported to be the favourite destinations for Chinese travellers.
Despite the poll, many Chinese people continue to immigrate to Canada to avoid political and religious persecution by China’s authoritarian communist government.
Recent diplomatic troubles have put a chill on Canada-China relations. Last year, the Chinese government released two Canadians – Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig – after illegally detaining them for years. Their detentions had come in retaliation for the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou by Canadian authorities.
China has also launched a campaign of foreign influence and surveillance on Canada as Beijing increasingly seeks to wage information warfare on the international community.
Attitudes towards China among Canadians have also taken a downward turn in recent years.
A 2020 Nanos Research poll found that 53.6% of Canadians want the federal government to be more aggressive towards China.
The Canadian government is also warning travellers against visiting the communist country. A travel advisory asks Canadians to exercise “a high degree of caution in China due to the risk of arbitrary enforcement of local laws.”
“Local authorities have put in place invasive security measures in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Chinese authorities are increasingly detaining ethnic and Muslim minorities in the region without due process,” the advisory also states.
“There are reports of extrajudicial internment and forced labour camps. Family members of Canadian citizens with Chinese citizenship have been detained. You may be at risk of arbitrary detention if you have familial or ethnic ties to the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.”
Despite being ousted from the Conservative caucus by Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole in Nov. 2021, the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC)’s Saskatchewan caucus voted to stand behind Senator Denise Batters remaining in the regional caucus, a source told the Hill Times on Friday.
The source said the overwhelming majority of MPs voted to confirm the continued participation of Batters in a special meeting on Thursday.
Batters referred all questions from the Hill Times to Saskatchewan CPC caucus chair Kevin Waugh, who declined to comment because of caucus confidentiality.
Official Opposition Leader’s Office spokesperson Matthew Clancey offered comments, however, saying that even though the senator had been expelled from the national caucus, “she could continue to attend regional and Senate caucus.”
Clancey did not answer questions from the Hill Times about why the Saskatchewan caucus held a vote on Batters if she had never been removed.
Batters had launched a petition in November calling on the Conservatives to hold a review of leader Erin O’Toole’s leadership within six months. She said she started the petition as a referendum on O’Toole, accusing him of causing division in the party.
“Under Erin O’Toole’s leadership, the rift in our party is growing – he told us ‘This is not your grandfather’s Conservative party’ and warned campaigning MPs they must agree 100% with his ‘new direction’ – which constantly changes – or get out of caucus,” she said.
O’Toole ejected Batters from the party’s caucus the day after she launched the petition, accusing her of “a clear lack of respect” towards the party’s caucus.
“As the Leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, I will not tolerate an individual discrediting and showing a clear lack of respect towards the efforts of the entire Conservative caucus, who are holding the corrupt and disastrous Trudeau government to account,” O’Toole said.
Batters fired back at party leadership in December, saying the national council must listen to its members and hold an early leadership review for O’Toole.
She made the statement after receiving an email from CPC president Robert Batherson stating that the national council had found her petition “invalid.”
“The question you are proposing to ask in a referendum does not adhere to the constitution of the Conservative Party of Canada,” wrote Batherson. “Your petition is not in order as it does not adhere to sections 7, 10 and 12 of the constitution.”
Following Batherson’s letter, a former member of the CPC’s national council accused the organization of an “indefensible attempt” to silence thousands of party members.
Batters’s petition has received more than 7,600 supporters as of Tuesday.
The petition website states CPC members are supporting this petition “because Erin O’Toole has reversed his own positions from his leadership campaign, betrayed Conservative principles, lost seats in the election and cannot win the next election.”
Ontario First Party leader Randy Hillier blamed bare shelves in grocery stores on the Ontario and Canadian governments on Thursday.
“The numerous images and stories from constituents and citizens of Ontario that have been shared with my office illustrates that the collapse of the supply chain has begun,” said Hillier in a press release. “It is clear that the looming crisis Canadians are beginning to face is not the result of a virus but a product of the orders and fiats of both our premier and the prime minister.”
Hillier said a number of small and medium shipping companies across Canada have closed over the last two years.
He said the shuttering of businesses and Ontario premier Doug Ford’s pressure on employers to mandate COVID-19 vaccines “are just some reasons that contributed to these closures.”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s requirement that truck drivers crossing the Canada-US border and the delays they face while crossing “means the lines to our stores and supermarkets are being irreparably damaged,” said Hillier.
Hillier called on Ontarians and truck drivers to “raise your voices against the Premier’s and Prime Minister’s edicts before basic necessities for life are unavailable.”
“All of Canada’s provincial Premiers and the Prime Minister must immediately revoke all mandates and orders that are collapsing our economy and destroying our freedoms,” he said.
Hillier had warned about these concerns in a letter he wrote in March 2020, one day after the lockdowns in Ontario began.
He said that the Ontario government should think about rising unemployment, business closures and disruptions to supply chains before continuing to keep people locked down.
“It appears the cure we are administering may eventually be worse than the disease we are attempting to treat,” he said.
Contrary to Hiller’s claims, Loblaws spokesperson Mark Boudreau told the CBC that bare shelves in grocery stores are due to inclement weather.
“I know that with the weather, some of our stores are facing some issues, which are typical of this time of year,” said Boudreau.
He said that the shortages would not be a long-term issue.
Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre said on Wednesday that the vaccine mandate for truck drivers is “going to drive up the costs for our people, drive people out of work and leave us with empty shelves.”
“If you walk into a grocery store and you see products on shelves, thank a trucker,” said Poilievre. “If you walk into a grocery store and you see empty shelves, thank Justin Trudeau.”
