• CTF published its prebudget submission to the Government of Quebec this morning.

MONTRÉAL, QC: The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is asking the Legault government to lower taxes to help families face the rising cost of living.

“We’ve all felt it at the grocery store or at the pump: prices have risen sharply in the last year,” said CTF Quebec Director Renaud Brossard. “By taking less cash out of taxpayers’ pockets, the government would help Quebecers maintain their standard of living.”

The CTF is asking the government of Quebec to lower Quebecers’ income tax bills by 10 per cent. For a taxpayer earning $50,000 this year, the savings would represent $539 annually.

Taxpayers are also asking the government to stop applying sales taxes on the value of volumetric taxes on goods such as alcohol and gasoline. This tax on tax is estimated to cost Quebecers $377 million annually.

To finance this tax relief, the CTF is asking Premier François Legault to respect his pledge to reduce the size of the provincial government’s workforce by one per cent from 2018 levels.

“It’s bureaucracy,” said Legault. “These are people writing reports to other people writing reports, and then who apply budgets that were clearly labeled by ministers in Quebec City.”

“If there has been one growth industry in Quebec in the last few years, it must be bureaucracy,” said Brossard. “Instead of letting go of 5,000 bureaucrats, the CAQ government hired more than 47,000 extra. All we’re asking the premier to do is respect his pledge to Quebecers.”

Once fully implemented, reducing the size of the provincial bureaucracy would save Quebecers an estimated $5 billion per year.

Taxpayers are also using the occasion to remind the Legault government to review the method it uses to compare bureaucrats’ compensation to include all of the private sector.

“By excluding half of all private sector workers, the government is using incomplete data when it negotiates with unions,” said Brossard. “By only including employees working for large companies, which tend to make more money, the current formula drives up the cost to taxpayers.”

In all, the measures proposed by the CTF would reinvest $8.5 billion into Quebec’s economy, which would be made possible thanks to $9.2 billion in budgetary savings. On net, it would lower the province’s deficit by $700 million based on estimates for 2022-23.

To consult the CTF’s prebudget submission, click here: http://www.taxpayer.com/media/Qc%20Prebudget%202022%20-%20Pour%20un%20Qu%c3%a9bec%20plus%20prosp%c3%a8re.pdf