Getting Politicians Off Welfare
When the Canadian Taxpayers Federation pulled its National Debt Clock in front of Parliament Hill last month, a formerly homeless man approached and stared in amazement. After a minute of staring at the massive, spinning clock, the man said, “I’ve lived on the street and it doesn’t take a lot of money to live. What the hell are politicians doing?” Before leaving, he added, “These guys need to get a job!”Sometimes it takes someone from outside of the political system to make sense of things and even though he was standing in front of Parliament, a formerly homeless man who now makes his own way is about as far outside of the Ottawa bubble as one can be.
And he was half right. Even though politicians do have a job, they and their respective parties still receive a generous welfare payout at taxpayer expense. This takes three forms, a): a $2 per vote subsidy, costing taxpayers approximately $68 million since the last election, b): a 50 to 60 per cent refund of election expenses costing taxpayers approximately $26 million per election, and c): generous tax credits encouraging donations to political parties worth tens of millions more. Each of these is a form of political welfare and need to be scraped.
Soon after winning re-election in the fall of 2008, the Conservatives moved to scrap the most egregious of these - the $2 per vote subsidy. While a good move for taxpayers and a moral victory for democratic reform, the opposition parties immediately viewed the move as an attempt to take away their free lunch. Such was their anger that they quickly cobbled together a coalition to replace the Tories.
We all know how that turned out; but while the Tories stayed, so also did the per-vote subsidy.
Elections are expensive and cost anywhere between $300-400 million, but such is the price of democracy. But while taxpayers picking up the bill for Elections Canada to set up polling stations is fair, forcing them to pick up the bill for partisan campaigns is not.
Some voters claim to dislike attack ads, but when they are forced to pay for them out of their own pockets, they are complicit. Eliminating political welfare would make such dilemmas easier: “Don’t like attack ads? Don’t donate!” Nothing forces a change in one’s behavior like a change in one’s bottom line.
Similarly, some voters are fatigued with having a fourth election in seven years. But losing ‘confidence’ in a government is not the only thing that triggers an election. Having a flush war chest replenished regularly by Mister and Misses Taxpayer can make an election seem mightily more appetizing. While party coffers are replenished between elections with the per-vote subsidy, the 50 to 60 per cent refund of campaign expenses means that parties are flush again and ready to fund the next election campaign almost as soon as the ballots are counted.
Even if both the per-vote subsidy and the 50 to 60 per cent campaign expense refunds were eliminated, parties would have little reason to fear. With a maximum 75 per cent tax credit inducing donors to contribute, any party that cannot attract cash is likely not taken seriously by its own supporters. By contrast, donating to charities that provide services to those in need only qualifies you for a maximum 29 per cent tax credit.
Put another way, from a tax perspective you are better off nearly three times over donating to the separatist Bloc Québécois than to the Red Cross.
During the course of this election, Canada’s federal debt will increase by $3.3 billion. Canada’s next government will have tough choices to make. If it is to get spending under control and eliminate the deficit, it will have to cut. The first place it should start is with its own political pogey.
For more information on this opinion column, please contact Derek Fildebrandt at 1-800-265-0442 or at dfildeb
randt@taxpayer.com.
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