In what will become a regular non-partisan election round up we aim to share with you the important promises and platform announcements made by the political parties during the campaign as we head towards election day on September 20. As a member of the Coalition of Hardest Hit Businesses, we continue to contact prospective MPs standing in Ontario ridings to speak with them to ensure that they’re fully briefed on the situation facing the tourism industry and the prolonged economic support we need to navigate the pandemic whilst facing government restrictions and closures.
In addition to publishing this roundup we have also created a new #ELXN44 tab on our website to keep you fully informed of all relevant election announcements.
Liberal Party
Yesterday was an important day for the tourism industry, especially for those like TIAO who are members of the Coalition of Hardest Hit Businesses as the Liberal Party announced a series of measures that were directly in line with the messaging of coalition members and a direct response to our request for a tailored wage and rent subsidy program for our industry into 2022.
In the release entitled ‘Supporting business and our Hardest Hit Sectors’ the Liberal Party announced it would:
Provide Canada’s hard-hit tourism industry with temporary wage and rent support of up to 75% of their expenses to help them get through the winter that would mean:
- Introduce a temporary wage subsidy and rent subsidy stream for sectors like hotels, tour operators, convention centers and festivals experiencing a minimum of 40% revenue loss.
- Qualifying businesses in these sectors would be able to access a maximum subsidy rate of up to 75%, commensurate to their revenue loss, in order to help cover fixed costs like wages and rent.
- The subsidy would be available between September 2021 until May 31, 2022.
At a time when capacity limits remain in place, after the prospect of losing two full summers to the pandemic and the closure of our international borders. Now is not the time to remove the economic supports that have been instrumental in helping our industry navigate these unprecedented times. This is a very welcome announcement from the Liberal Party and a major victory for the Hardest Hit Coalition in our lobbying efforts. We hope all the parties reach consensus that this is a necessary requirement to protect our industry moving forward.
In addition, the Liberal announcement included plans to:
- Extend the Canada Recovery Hiring Program to March 31, 2022, so businesses can hire more workers and Canadians can get back on the job;
- Launch the Arts and Culture 3 Program that will match ticket sales for performing arts, live theatres, and other cultural venues to compensate for reduced capacity;
- Extend COVID-related insurance coverage for media production stoppages to support 150,000 Canadian jobs; and
- Implement a transitional support program to help bridge workers from the creative industry who continue to be impacted by the pandemic.
Conservative Party
Conservative Party leader Erin O'Toole yesterday released a substantial document entitled ‘Canada’s Recovery Plan’ putting forward the Conservative plan to rebuild the Canadian economy post COVID-19. We’re still going through a lot of the detail, but we wanted to highlight some of the most relevant content:
To support the hospitality and tourism sectors and help ensure that women and young workers share in the recovery, Canada’s Conservatives will introduce a Dine and Discover Program:
- Provide a 50% rebate for food and non-alcoholic drinks purchased for dine-in from Monday to Wednesday for one month once it is safe to do so, pumping nearly $1 billion into the sector.
- Launch the Explore and Support Canada initiative with a 15% tax credit for vacation expenses of up to $1,000 per person for Canadians to vacation in Canada in 2022, helping our tourism sector get back on its feet.
- Eliminate the Liberal escalator tax on alcohol.
Canada’s Conservatives will launch the Canada Job Surge Plan - paying up to 50% of the salary of net new hires for six months following the end of CEWS.
- The government will pay at least 25% of the salary of a net new hire, with the subsidy increasing up to a maximum of 50% based on how long the new hire has been unemployed.
- The salary maximum will be the same as for CEWS.
- This will get Canadians back to work and particularly benefit the long-term unemployed.
Canada’s Conservatives Supporting the Aviation Industry
- Canada’s Conservatives will help the airline sector rebuild and get Canadian pilots, flight attendants, ground crews, mechanics, and all the other vital airline employees back to work.
- Support will be conditional on airlines agreeing to provide refunds to customers whose flights they cancelled, ending layoffs, restoring regional routes, allowing travel agents to maintain commissions collected for cancelled travel, and banning executive bonuses until the support is repaid.
- We will also pass legislation implementing strong protection of passengers’ rights based on the EU system. Among other things, this will make it clear that passengers are entitled to full refunds - not vouchers - when an airline cancels a flight and doesn’t offer an alternative.
Supporting Small Business
Canada’s Conservatives will give small businesses the support they need to get back on their feet by:
- Launching the Main Street Business Loan to provide loans of up to $200,000
- The $60,000 Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) loan is too small for thousands of small and medium businesses. Canada’s Conservatives will immediately offer a loan on similar terms but offering up to 4 months of pre-pandemic revenue up to a maximum of $200,000. We will forgive up to 25% depending on a company’s revenue loss.
- Making the first $25,000 of our Canada Investment Accelerator refundable for small business, providing a 5% investment tax credit for any capital investment made in 2022 and 2023.
Canada’s Conservatives will launch the Rebuild Main Street Tax Credit
- This will provide a 25% tax credit on amounts of up to $100,000 that Canadians personally invest in a small business over the next two years. This will give a strong incentive for Canadians to invest their money to help entrepreneurs rebuild our country.
- We will enable middle class investors to participate in the rebound while ensuring that those who want to open new stores, restaurants, and other small businesses to get Canadians back to work can get the investment they need.
Canada’s Conservatives will also ensure that the Government of Canada stands behind Canadian workers. We will:
- Reform BDC to ensure that its loan programs are accessible to small businesses. This will include broadening BDC’s mandate to have it guarantee a portion of loans that Canada’s banks make to small business, in the same way that CMHC guarantees mortgages.
- Look for ways to make it easier to start a business and reduce the time that entrepreneurs spend dealing with government when they should be concentrating on their business.
- Fix the mortgage stress test to stop discriminating against small business owners, contractors and other non-permanent employees including casual workers.
The Conservatives have released a plethora of policies designed to support small businesses and the tourism industry to improve access to credit, increase eligibility and increase forgivable elements. All of these policies recognize the importance of the tourism industry and small businesses to our economic future and recovery.
New Democratic Party
NDP Party Platform ‘Commitments to Canadians’
The NDP’s have released their 155-page document which lays out many commitments previously made by the New Democrats in previous elections and also has new ideas that have been informed by Canadians’ struggles during the last 18 months of the pandemic.
The New Democrats will make EI benefits work for Canadians by:
- Creating low-income supplement so that no one who is relying on EI regular or special benefits to stay afloat receives less than $2,000 a month
- Permanently restart the Extra Five Weeks pilot project to help Canadians in seasonal industries bridge the gap between the end of EI and the start of seasonal work; and restore the economic regions in the territories and PEI to their 2014 boundaries.
In order to support small businesses & jobs, the NDPs will:
- Continue the small businesses wage and rent subsidies until small businesses are able to fully reopen; and put in place a long-term hiring bonus to pay the employer portion of EI and CPP for new or rehired staff.
- The NDPs recognize that a shortage of workers is a major barrier for many small businesses operating in rural areas, they are committed to making new investments in training Canadians and boost support to traditionally underemployed groups, ensuring that they can access good jobs that pay a fair wage.
- put in place a living federal minimum wage starting at $15 an hour and rising to $20 an hour, indexed to the cost of living – setting a national standard for a fair, living wage
- capping high credit card merchant fees at a maximum of 1% to help small businesses
- strengthening and modernizing the Investment Canada Act to protect Canadian jobs
- dedicated support to get the hard-hit tourism sector back on its feet; ‘small business recovery plan’
New Democrats will work with the provinces to update federal standards and bring in a permanent safety net of paid sick leave across the country, and to close the gap until every worker has access to paid sick days, we will fix the Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit and keep it going until all Canadians have access to paid sick days.
- Allowing sick leave to be taken by workers one or two days at a time, give full income replacement to workers who are sick, and reimburse employers instead of putting the onus on workers to apply for the program. Immediately to legislate 10 paid sick days in the Canada Labour Code for federally regulated workplaces
Creating new jobs and opportunities:
- Scrap the failed Invest in Canada agency and create iCanada, a one-stop shop inside the federal government to help attract investors to Canada and turn their plans into reality – and champion Canadian industry on the international stage.
- Canadian start-up culture, with a focus on helping Canadian companies in all regions of the country commercialize new technologies and scale-up, train and retain the highly-skilled Canadian workforce needed to support industry growth, and bolster Canadian competitiveness on the world stage.
Remove interest from federal student loans, and to help lift the debt burden from young people starting out. Introducing:
- a targeted debt forgiveness program for graduates that will forgive up to $20,000 in student debt.
- In the first year alone, this will wipe out 20% of all student debt and help 350,000 borrowers save money every month.
Building infrastructure to help communities thrive
- from roads and bridges to community centres, long-term care, child care centres and everything in between. These investments will create good jobs in every part of the country
- provinces, territories and Indigenous communities to create an affordable public transit service that connects rural areas, including restoring cancelled bus services, expanding into under-served areas, restarting the Ontario Northlander train, re-establishing vital regional air routes and much more to keep our communities connected
Stay tuned for further TIAO updates from the Federal Election trail. .
Best Wishes,
The TIAO Team.