There are two interesting aspects to this debate. The first is the cross-party battles taking place across the country. In Ontario you have provincial Liberals walking hand in hand with federal Conservatives, while the provincial Conservatives are fighting back. In B.C., where the HST is also expected to pass, a former right wing premier has teamed up with the NDP leader to plan protests against the tax. It’s a little weird, and while some of this is just plain politics, the unusual alliances also show just how divisive this tax is. I wrote more about this in a Canadian Business story — you can read it here.

I’ve written about this other issue in the past, but MoneySense magazine does a great job covering what the HST will mean to investors. There’s been some talk that the Liberals will make investments HST exempt, but so far that hasn’t happened. Read more about this here.

There are a number of other interesting HST-related issues — hopefully I can get through some of them in the weeks ahead.

On Friday he pushed back against criticism that the party wasn’t being transparent enough saying the government’s spending needs have to remain flexible and the opposition parties can’t have it both ways.

“There is no excuse for an opposition that has been saying ‘we need to deliver money more quickly’ to now say ‘we need to delay that money’ or say things like ‘we need to have parliamentary sign-off on every individual project,’” Harper told a crowd in Berwick, N.S.

Now the Liberals have accused Harper for calling a “phony war” and creating a fight where there isn’t one.

“I think some of the comments by some of the people out of the Prime Minister’s Office has left the impression either deliberately or inadvertently of some enormous confrontation shaping up here,” said Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale on Friday. “We’ll cross bridges when we come to them. What I’m saying now is that there’s no need for this phony war. Surely to goodness the opposition wants, Canadians want, and the government wants to deal with the recession effectively and to make sure that all the rules about public spending are properly respected. The two objectives are not in conflict. Let’s find a way to have common sense prevail here.”

Whether you like it or not, expect this back and forth, complete with election threats, to continue as the economy worsens.

]]> http://blog.canadianbusiness.com/harper-pushes-back/feed/ 0 http://blog.canadianbusiness.com/is-the-stimulus-working-cfas-weigh-in/ http://blog.canadianbusiness.com/is-the-stimulus-working-cfas-weigh-in/#comments Fri, 06 Feb 2009 16:19:42 +0000 Jeff Sanford http://blog.canadianbusiness.com/?p=588 Canada has just racked up its biggest monthly job loss in a generation and the commercial real estate market in the U.S. is slipping closer to meltdown stage as the winter of our economic discontent drags on.
And to make themselves look busy on the recession file, it seems Canadian   politicians are now making hay out of the recent stimulus budget brought down by the Conservatives.
The front page of today’s Globe says the Libs are now blaming the Tories for not moving fast enough, or far enough, in terms of stimulus spending. We need more say the Liberals, and soon, or else we’re going to sink deeper into the mud.
Is this a valid criticism, or are the Liberals just playing politics?
If a recent poll from the CFA Institute (a trade organization for holders of the Chartered Financial Analyst designation) is to be believed, the political positions on this question are lining up just as you might expect.
When Canadian CFAs were polled about the budget and asked whether it went far enough to mend the economy, respondents were split.
Almost half of members, forty three percent, said the government should have done more to support the Canada through the crisis, but 44% suggested the Conservatives had done enough. It couldn’t be much closer on that question.
Where the differences show up is when the results are broken down by region. A higher proportion of CFA holders in Quebec (55%) and Ontario (45%) felt the government could have done more. While just 32% of CFA holders in Alberta and 33% in B.C. felt the government could have done more.
The regional split extends to the question of whether or not it was a good decision for the government to purchase $75 billion of insured mortgage pools. On that question, 73% of CFA holders in Ontario said yes, while in Alberta and B.C just 56% said yes. That’s an average of 66%.
When asked whether the new measures in the budget will be enough to improve the functioning of capital markets, Albertans were more likely to say yes, Quebecers least so. Canadian regionalism, you’ve got to love it.
Another interesting finding from the poll: a big majority of CFA holders, 78%, think the new TFSAs will do nothing to address the current financial crisis.

Conservatives 143
Liberals 71
BLQ 47
NDP 30
Other 2

I think the Conservatives needed to get a majority if they were to have any chance of becoming a dynasty like the Liberals were in previous decades. The Liberals are now likely to replace Mr. Dion with someone who might be more of a vote getter. And as the economy sinks, the Conservatives will decline in popularity, opening the door to a Liberal government within two years or so.