End politician welfare
Posted Apr 18, 2011 12:55 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling for an end to what it calls politician welfare.
The CTF is blasting the various forms in which politicians and political parties get cash.
The CTF’s Derek Fildebrandt says the first thing that should be abolished is the 2 dollar subsidy politicians get from the votes they collect at the ballot box.
“So the day after election day, they’ve almost got enough money to run another election,” says Fildebrandt. “We wonder why we have so many bloody elections in Canada? Well, it’s probably because they have half the money to run the next one, the day after election day. And all they’ve got to do is sit around for one year and wait till the subsidy is back up.”
Fildebrandt adds it’s absurd that people get a bigger tax break when they make a political contribution as opposed to a charitable gesture.
“You get about 25 per cent if you give to a real charity like the Red Cross,” he says. “So you are three times better off, from a tax perspective, giving to the Bloc Quebecois than you are to the Red Cross.”
The CTF would also like to see the refund politicians get to offset their elections expenses eliminated.
