Party Platforms (Promises)

October 7, 2015

Attached is a comparison of party platforms and promises to date. It is by no means an exhaustive list and several things should be taken into consideration while reading. Platforms are being added to on a daily basis. This is simply a snapshot to this point.

Green and Bloc are silent, or at least it is difficult to find information, on several items – this was not a conscious decision to ignore - it was simply based on availability.

The order of how they were listed is unintentional other than the three major parties were listed in order of seats at dissolution. Read nothing more into that please, this was not meant to be a partisan document. Apart from one item (the GST), we only dealt with platform issues where we could find at least two platforms from different parties.

Sent on behalf of the Political Action Committee

Robert Campbell's signature

Robert Campbell
National President, UTE

Party Platforms (Promises)

The Economy

	Conservative Party of Canada	New Democratic Party	Liberal Party of Canada	Green Party of Canada	Bloc Quebecois
Budgets	Introduced Balanced Budget Legislation and promises to balance the budget	Promised to balance its first budget	Would run modest deficits until they saw growth
Corporate and Business Tax	Lowered corporate taxes to 12%. Promises to lower small business tax to 9%	Will raise corporate taxes to 17% and close loopholes. Will lower small business tax to 9%	Committed to maintain the current corporate tax structure	End corporate bailouts, raise corporate taxes and keep small business taxes low	Increase Corporate taxes to 16.5%, raise tax rates to 20% on banks and oil companies
Personal Tax			Increase tax rate to 33% for those earning over $200,000. Reduce the rate for those earning $44,700-$89,400		Impose 1.5% extra tax on those earning above $150,000
GST					Abolish the GST on books
TFSA	Raised from $5,500 to $10,000	Will revert to $5,500	Will revert to $5,500
Wages	Does not support a federal minimum wage	Proposed a $15/hr federal minimum wage	Does not support a federal minimum wage of $15/hr
Income Splitting	Implemented	Will Cancel	Will Cancel

Social Issues

Mail Delivery	Moving to community mailboxes	Will restore door-to-door delivery	Will restore door-to-door delivery		Maintain home delivery in Quebec
Census	Eliminated long-form census	Will restore long-form census	Will restore long-form census
Child Care	Increased the Universal Child Care Benefit	Will introduce $15/day national childcare program, honour the Universal Child Care Benefit	Work to provide access to affordable childcare, introduce income-tested tax-free benefit for those making less than $150K
Post-Secondary Education		Increase transfer funds to provinces to lower tuition, eliminate interest on student loans	Invest more in education with bursaries and loans	Invest in undergraduate research fellowships
Health Care	Committed to increasing the Health Care Transfer “on a predictable and sustainable path” over the next 5 years	Invest $300 million to build new health care clinics, hire 7000 doctors and nurse practitioners, 5000 more hospital beds, national plan to improve access to prescription drugs	Committed to working with the provinces, improve wait times, improve affordability of prescription drugs and home-care
Drug Use	National toll-free line, increase funding to RCMP Clandestine Laboratory Team, considering a new police ticketing procedure for small amounts of marijuana	Immediately decriminalize marijuana possession	Immediately legalize marijuana	Legalize and regulate marijuana
Public Transit	$750 million over two years and $1B annually thereafter	$1.3B annually over next 20 years	$6B over next 4 years and almost $20B over the next 20 years
Retirement	Introduced pension income splitting in 2007, raised the age of eligibility for Old Age Security to 67 from 65, will consider additional voluntary Canada Pension Plan contributions	Will keep pension income splitting, will boost the Guaranteed Income Supplement by $400 million annually, will restore the age of eligibility for Old Age Security to 65	Will legislate additional CPP contributions, will restore the age of eligibility for Old Age Security to 65, boost the Guaranteed Income Supplement by 10%

Aboriginal Affairs

Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report	Study the recommendations	Consult with first nations and prioritize the implementation of the Commission’s recommendations	Implement full recommendations	Act on the Commission’s recommendations
Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women		Call public inquiry within 100 days	Call public inquiry	Call public Inquiry
Nutrition North		Commitment to fix the program by increasing funding and eligibility	Have called the program a failure and have voted on motions to increase eligibility
Aboriginal Education	Funded new skills training programs	Invest in First Nations education	Increase First Nations education spending by $2.6B over 4 years

Governance

Electoral System	Status Quo, introduce legislation that a national referendum would have to be held before the system is changed	Replace the First-Past-The-Post system with Mixed Member Proportional Representation	Eliminate the First-Past-The-Post system and study ranked ballots, proportional representation, mandatory voting and online voting	Eliminate the First-Past-The-Post system and consult on proportional representation
The Senate	Self-imposed moratorium on appointments, favours electing the senators or eliminating the Senate but this is on hold	Abolish the Senate	Favours a non-partisan independent appointment board for Senators, not allowed to sit in caucus	Elect Senators
Parliamentary Budget Officer	Created in 2006	To make the officer fully independent and free from influence	Strengthen the role of independent parliamentary watchdog agencies

International/Military

Bill C-51	Passed in 2015	Would repeal Bill C-51	Voted for C-51 but would introduce oversight if elected	Favours more oversight
Veterans Affairs	$193 million towards services for veterans	Re-open 9 offices	Re-open 9 offices	Provide Veterans Affairs the resources it needs to service veterans
Foreign Aid	$3.5B towards maternal and child health in Africa	Increase foreign aid to 0.7% of gross national income	Reverse the dropping trend of foreign aid as a percentage of GDP	Development assistance to the poorest of the poor

Environment

Climate Change/Emissions	Sector by sector regulations, low carbon footprint by 2050 end to fossil fuels by end of century,	Create cap and trade system, redirect $1B from fossil fuel subsidies to clean energy initiatives	Work with provinces to put a price on carbon	Introduce a carbon fee, reduce emission to 40% less than 2005 levels by 2025
Keystone XL Pipeline	Support	Oppose	Support

Public Service and Unions

C-59 Sick Leave	Introduced	Committed to undo the changes in C-59 regarding sick leave.	Opposed to the provisions regarding sick leave, will ensure bargaining is “fair and reasonable”
Collective Bargaining		Will honour the process as determined by the courts as a right, will repeal any legislation that contains language contrary to that right	Has committed to respect the bargaining process and the “important role unions play”
Bill C-377 Bill C-525	Introduced both	Will repeal both	Will repeal both
Canada Revenue Agency		Commitment to cracking down on tax evasion and money laundering	“significant overhaul” to fight international tax evasion and ending “political harassment” of charities
Public Service As a Whole		No new spending cuts, Establish a code of conduct for ministers and their staff to “ensure ministers stop blaming the public service when things go wrong, introduce legislation to better protect the anonymity of whistleblowers	Spending review, new performance standards for services offered by the federal government, starting with veterans’ services, immigration processing, Employment Insurance and Canada Pension Plan processing, and appeals at the Social Security Tribunal

References:

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-politics/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-parties-platforms

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2015/06/23/federal-election-2015-what-the-parties-are-promising.html

http://hkstrategies.ca/english/federal-election-2015-party-promises-economic-and-fiscal-issues/

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-politics/stephen-harper-writes-open-letter-to-canadas-world-class-public-service-in-order-to-correct-misinformation

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-bloc-election-promises-1.3246596

Subjects

Election