Opinion

[This article was first posted at http://blog.ontarioliberal.ca/2011/01/president-obama-on-winning-the-fut..., written by Christine McMillan, vice-president communications of the OLP]

Last night, as I am sure many of you watched, the President of the United States implored his country to “Win the Future” by spending smarter: investing heavily in education, replacing aging infrastructure, building clean energy, fostering innovation and reforming tax policy to encourage business investment — the very things our province has been doing successfully for some time now, thanks to the hard work and ingenuity of Ontarians, and the strong and thoughtful leadership of our Premier.

We are getting results and helping families through full day kindergarten, a new OSAP app to make life easier for students, fixing the infrastructure deficit created by the Tories, leading the way when it comes to green energy, and ensuring that one million more Ontarians have a family doctor.

There is still so much to do but Ontario is on the right track.

It makes you wonder, why would we ever risk letting Tim Hudak knocking us off track again. I mean, just how off-track is Tim Hudak? He was only one of six MPPs opposed to the McGuinty government’s law making it harder for children to buy cigarettes! Hudak just doesn’t measure up to the challenges of the times or the needs of families and he’s not worth the risk.

Christine

Read the August 16th article by Jim Coyle on the nature of Premier Dalton McGuinty's government.
http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/mcguinty/article/848193--coyle-the-n...

My view by Ron Dennis

Despite “myths” contrived by Ontario’s Conservative and NDP opposition parties – focused only on the small Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) component – the McGuinty governments bold new tax reform legislation will benefit all Ontarians and create nearly 600,000 jobs.

When it comes to the Harmonized Sales Tax, (HST), there appears to be more misinformation than fact out there. Accordingly, what follows is a summary of what this measure entails.

The TD Economics Special Report, September 18, 2009, which can be found at http://www.td.com/economics/special/dp0909_hst.pdf, provides an excellent in-depth analysis. While I have attempted to be accurate in my comments, this paper is not an official OLP document and should not be treated as such.

What is the Harmonized Sales Tax?

With harmonization, the rules that govern the provincial retail tax are integrated with those of the federal goods and service tax to create one final tax – the HST.

Changes in Taxable Items under a Single Sales Tax

Michael Ignatieff made the right decision to allow for an open nomination in Outremont. To suggest there is a rift among Liberals as a result is absurd. This is a personal decision by Denis Coderre – his efforts to block Martin Cauchon from running in Outremont did not get the support of the general Liberal membership or the media. Mr. Coderre is a great organizer and his resignation is a setback for the Liberal Party. Mr. Ignatieff stood for strong democratic principles. This represents a great day.

Deep Chawla, Burlington, Ont.