https://globalnews.ca/news/10230624/...action-budget/
Liberals are apparently quite upset with Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow, where her new property tax levy may wake up Toronto folks that voting Liberal and supporting Liberal policies may actually have some negative consequences to them as well in forms of additional taxes and levies. A Liberal MP complaining that the city should look into savings is hilariously ironic.
Quote:
In the opening days of the budget process, the city’s budget chief warned that if the federal government didn’t commit to addressing the growing issue of shelter costs for refugees and asylum seekers, Toronto would have no choice but to increase taxes by an additional six per cent.
Calling it “the Federal Impacts Levy,” the tax is by design intended to elicit a federal response.
On Tuesday, Etobicoke Centre Liberal MP Yvan Baker responded to the threat angrily, taking a swing at Mayor Olivia Chow and accusing her of failing to find savings elsewhere.
“I’m outraged for a number of reasons. First, I’m outraged because if you have budget problems, the first thing you should do is look for savings,” Baker said. “Olivia Chow didn’t do that.”
City councillors have been quick to counter that the money the city received wasn’t enough at the time, and the needs have only grown since then. Outside a committee room, budget chief Shelley Carroll said the issue has been growing since the city first began engaging with the Trudeau government last spring. Hundreds of people fleeing persecution continue to arrive at Pearson airport, and Carroll pointed out that Toronto doesn’t have the jurisdiction to manage the influx.
“It’s now 5,800 (refugees) and it is growing every week and that is a direct response to federal actions and a federal policy,” Carroll said.
Coun. Gord Perks, the vice-chair of the budget committee, was much less patient in his response to Baker’s critique.
“Whether we’ve hit a nerve or we haven’t hit a nerve, I don’t much care,” he said.
“What I care about is that the federal responsibility take on the responsibility of people arriving in this country seeking refuge so that they have a chance at a decent life,” Perks said.
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Unfortunately for Liberals, federal level doesn't control city taxes and levies and cannot name them with virtue signaling names like the Climate action incentive payment and pollution pricing, or air travelers security charge. According to 338Canada, Liberals still have 16 seats leaning Liberal in their stronghold. I am sure they will happily cheer on the Federal Impacts Levy. Should polls dip in Toronto the federal will suddenly throw the city a bone as they did the Maritimes, and I expect they will eventually send money the city's way to save face.
Yvan Baker's riding is one of the Toronto ridings leaning Conservative and expected to change, this surely won't help him