The promise Stephen Harper made to voters in 2011 – and broke in 2014

The 2011 Conservative Party of Canada election platform (picture with link above) made a very specific promise to voters who were parents with children under the age of 18. Here is how the Family Tax Cut, as it was called in 2011, was presented to voters:

…couples with the same number of children and the same total income are not treated equally. A two-income couple, in which one spouse earns more than the other, pays more federal income tax than a two-income couple in which the two spouses earn equal amounts. And a single-income couple pays even more.

We will soon be in a position to take an historic step forward to achieve greater fairness for families. We will establish the Family Tax Cut : income sharing for couples with dependent children under 18 years of age. This will give spouses the choice to share up to $50,000 of their household income, for federal income-tax purposes. This important new measure will be implemented when the federal budget is balanced within our next full term in office.

The results will be significant  tax relief for approximately 1.8 million Canadian families – each of them saving, on average, $1,300 per year. Most of all, it will ensure that the federal income tax system respects and supports the choices that families make. It will increase fairness for single-income couples. And it will ease the burden on double-income families, by allowing them to keep more of what they earn and to benefit more from having a second income.

This was a very specific promise. You can read it for yourself on page 26 of the document. (And one which will benefit my family).

Today, Harper told Canadians he would not honour that commitment.

First, Conservatives promised this Family Tax Cut “when the federal budget is balanced.” The federal budget has not been balanced. In fact, the prime minister himself told us that on Oct. 9 at an event in Oshawa when he announced that he was doubling the Children’s Fitness Tax Credit (something else the Conservatives said they would do only when the budget is balanced).  At that event, Harper himself said we’d finish this current fiscal year with “a small deficit.”

So that means Canada is borrowing $3-billion — three billion dollars! — to cover the shortfall in revenues it will incur so that it can give a key group of voters a big tax break.

Secondly: There never was to be a cap on this income splitting scheme. Putting a cap on it is what in some quarters would be called “bait and switch.”

I suspect there were more than a few voters who like Harper’s promise here: Balance the budget and, once you’ve done that and once we can afford it, then provide your “Family Tax Cut.”

All of that said, I expect I will be a lonely voice complaining about this broke promise because rather than lower taxes on Canadians who have children and a spouse who does not work or who earns a substantially lower income, Harper today has announced a vast income redistribution scheme for all Canadians with children. One parent, two parents, eight parents — all you need is a child to qualify:

The Government’s proposed new measures consist of the following:

* The Family Tax Cut, a new federal non-refundable credit of up to $2,000 for couples with children under 18, effective as of the 2014 taxation year.

* An enhancement of the Universal Child Care Benefit that would provide an increased benefit of $160 per month for children under the age of 6 – up from $100 per month, and a new benefit of $60 per month for children aged 6 through 17, effective January 1, 2015. The enhanced Universal Child Care Benefit would replace the existing Child Tax Credit for the 2015 and subsequent taxation years.

* A $1,000 increase in the maximum dollar amounts that can be claimed under the Child Care Expense Deduction, effective for the 2015 taxation year. This means that the maximum amount would increase to $8,000 from $7,000 per child under age 7, to $5,000 from $4,000 for each child aged 7 through 16 (and infirm dependent children over age 16), and to $11,000 from $10,000 for children who are eligible for the Disability Tax Credit.

When all these measures are fully implemented in 2015-2016, the net cost to the federal treasury will be $4.6 billion and 4 million Canadian households will benefit. The cost of those measures — cost, here, being foregone tax revenue — that will take place right away is about $3 billion.