Unless one defines Canada's middle class as the wealthiest 10 per cent, Liberal pledges of greener pastures for hard-working families were apparently nothing more than empty campaign promises.
The tax reforms introduced by the Trudeau government offer absolutely no benefit for the two-thirds of Canadians who earn less than $45,000.
In fact, according to an Internal Finance Canada document, the so-called middle class tax cut will largely benefit the richest Canadians.
"Despite the Trudeau government's sunny rhetoric about helping the middle class, its very own public opinion research suggests Canadians are having trouble seeing any results," reads an excerpt from a July 5 PressProgress article.
"At least some participants in each group felt that the Government of Canada could be doing more to assist the middle class," reads the Finance Canada report that was based on focus groups held across the country and published internally in February 2017.
Among the ideas or suggestions offered by Canadians surveyed were to crack down on tax havens as well as to tax big polluters and make the country's top earners pay a fairer share of taxes. Considering less than 100 Canadians ó or a fraction of a fraction of a percentage point of the overall population ó own about as much of the country's wealth as more than 11 million of us, perhaps there's some merit to that approach.
Yet the government's tax reforms in the end are mainly going to benefit the top bracket earners.
"Internal documents obtained by PressProgress through access to information show even Finance Canada thinks the Liberal Party's ëmiddle class tax cut' actually benefits much of Canada's richest 10 per cent," reads an April 2016 article by PressProgress.
The broken promise on electoral reform, the inaction on revising Bill C-51 ó Canada's very own Patriot Act ó and allowing to continue unabated the siphoning of billions of dollars from our economy to tax shelters through unscrupulous legal loopholes do not bode well for the track record of the allegedly altruistic Trudeau government, which talked a big game about helping those who need it the most.
The irony is particularly thick, especially coming from a party that lambasted during the last election campaign the former Conservative government for enacting policies that favoured the rich.
And meanwhile, still showing up in my social media feed and email inbox are donation requests from the Liberal government. Someone needs to tell Trudeau it's really hard to squeeze a drop of blood from a stone.
It's almost as though the Liberal government is just as bought and paid for by wealthy interests as previous federal governments.
I think the late, great comedian and actor Robin Williams, rest in peace, said it best.
"Politicians should wear sponsor jackets like NASCAR drivers. Then we know who owns them."
