Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is promising an income-tax cut amounting to 15 percent for those in the lowest tax bracket, which he says will save a two-income family $1,800 per year.
The Tory leader said he would reduce the tax rate on the lowest income-tax bracket of $57,375 or less, dropping the rate from 15 percent to 12.75 percent. “This is a tax cut for everybody who has ever got up early in the morning and worked hard to build our country,” Poilievre said in Brampton, Ont., on March 24.
The party said the measure would cost $7 billion a year in the first two years of its implementation, for a total of $14 billion. In a video launching the measure, Poilievre said this would be paid for by getting rid of government waste and cutting the federal bureaucracy. In his remarks, Poilievre referred to income tax as “the fine you pay for the crime of working hard,” and said many Canadians are being punished by “tax after tax.”
Poilievre said reducing the income tax at the lowest tax bracket would lead to lower taxes for other working Canadians.
“Because we are cutting the lowest bracket, every single Canadian who pays income tax will pay less,” Poilievre said. “Modest-income people will pay less in relative terms and as a share of their overall income.”
The Conservative leader said the measure is part of his “bring it home tax cut” plan, which also includes measures like dropping the carbon tax for consumers and businesses, taking the GST off new homes, and lowering taxes on investment.
When asked by reporters how his government would reduce taxes while also shrinking Canada’s deficit, Poilievre said the Conservatives would be limiting foreign aid, reducing spending on outside consultants in the federal government, and cutting federal bureaucracy.
Poilievre also highlighted his government’s proposed “dollar-for-dollar law” that would require ministers to cut spending by a dollar before they spend a dollar.
Liberals and NDP Plan
Liberal Prime Minister Mark Carney, who called a snap election on March 23, also announced a change to Canada’s tax policy if his government is re-elected. Carney said he would reduce the lowest-income tax bracket by 1 percent, saving a two-income family up to $825 per year. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh criticized Poilievre and Carney’s proposals as “tax cuts for millionaires,” saying both plans would “help out millionaires more than they help out families.”
Speaking to reporters in Montreal on March 24, Singh said both income tax cut plans would give a Canadian earning $57,375 the same tax reduction as it gives someone earning much more. “Why would we give away the exact same amount of money to someone that earns a million dollars, as someone that earns $30,000? That’s a nonsensical plan,” Singh said.
The NDP leader said his party will be proposing its own tax plan in the coming days.
Canadians will head to the polls to vote in the general election on April 28.
