Fall Economic Update
INCREASED DEBT AND INTEREST PAYMENTS: The Liberals are going to spend two times more than what they will bring in and also what they promised in the budget 9 months ago. Interest rates are going up which means people (middle and low-income earners being hit the hardest) pay more taxes to cover the interest on the increased debt. In just 4 years, it is projected that the interest on our debt will increase 60%. What we know is that Canadians are now paying $850 per family more in tax than they were when PM Trudeau first took office. The very wealthy are paying $4.1 billion less in tax – something seems wrong here! This is your money he is mismanaging!
MEDIA BAILOUT: Instead of the $50 million assistance promised in February’s Budget 2018, Prime Minister Trudeau now announced he will spend over half a BILLION DOLLARS, starting January 1, 2019, on a news media industry bailout. A Liberal-selected panel will decide who qualifies for support. This sounds a bit like the Canada Summer Jobs Program where if you don’t agree with the Liberal ideology or meet their core standards, you likely won’t get any funding. All this is happening 1 year before an election and right after Jerry Dias, head of the union for thousands of Canadian Journalists, announced an anti-Conservative political campaign! Regardless of party affiliation, the government should never be seen as influencing the media with taxpayer dollars.

General Motors Closure in Oshawa
On Monday, General Motors announced it is shutting down its Oshawa plant in December 2019. This announcement is a devastating blow to thousands of working families – it will surely cause a ripple effect to small and medium sized suppliers in Lambton-Kent-Middlesex and across Ontario. Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer traveled to Oshawa early Tuesday morning to meet with workers and hear straight from them before coming back to Ottawa to advocate to the Prime Minister. While GM says the decision is part of a restructuring of its global operations, what they really are saying is that it’s too expensive to do business in Canada. Tariffs on steel and aluminum; carbon tax on their energy, transportation and everything they need to build a vehicle; and increased pay roll taxes are surely all factors in this decision. These job losses in Ontario are just a continuation of a Liberal trend: Alberta has lost around 100,000 jobs in the energy sector because of barriers put up by PM Trudeau. Those job losses affect all provinces since many Canadians traveled west to work in the energy sector and there are many other spin-off industries and suppliers across Canada. Conservatives continue working to keep jobs in Canada and calling on the Liberal government to do the same.

Bill C-75- Omnibus Justice Bill
Conservatives strongly believe rights of victims should be a central focus in the Canadian criminal justice system, rather than special treatment for criminals, which is why we introduced the Victims Bill of Rights while in government. The safety of Canadians should be the number one priority of any government. Justin Trudeau seems to favour the rights of criminals rather than victims as shown with the $10.5 million payout to convicted terrorist Omar Khadr, convicted child-murderer Terri Lynn McClintic’s transfer from prison to a healing lodge, and the financial support from Veterans Affairs Canada to a non-veteran who was convicted of murdering a police officer. Under proposed changes in the Liberals’ Bill C-75, several serious offences – such as actions related to terrorism, criminal organization activities, kidnapping, etc. – could now be punishable under a summary conviction (i.e. without a jury trial) thus resulting in lighter sentences. This is NOT right!

Did you know?
• In 1816, eastern Canada didn’t have a summer. People were sledding in June and thawing water cisterns in July, due to a volcanic eruption in 1815. Less sunlight reached the earth and caused the surface to cool due to the ash and dust that spewed into the air.

• In the Library of Parliament archived collections, their oldest book dates to 1558, they own one of Samuel Champlain’s maps dating to 1632, and their most valuable book has a current evaluation of $11-14 million.