本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛Martin, Goodale — who's in charge?
Jan. 4, 2006. 07:09 AM
DAVID OLIVE
Paul Martin and Ralph Goodale have more than one story about how they acted in the income-trust scandalette, and they're sticking to each of them.
In the process, the Prime Minister and his finance minister are signalling to domestic and foreign investors that Canada's top two government officials can't quite decide who's in charge of economic policy in this member of the Group of Eight industrialized countries.
The controversy over potential leaks of Goodale's November about-face on the tax treatment of income trusts may well turn out to be a scandal of piddling proportions. But the spectacle of Martin and Goodale tripping over their tongues in recent days to distance themselves from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's criminal investigation of suspicious trading in trust units immediately prior to Goodale's flip-flop could help seal the Grits' fate Jan. 23.
Start with Goodale's policy reversal on trusts, another reminder that this government is as constant as the North Star, except when it isn't.
In September, Goodale cavilled over the $300 million in what finance department officials call "tax leakage" due to the income trust phenomenon, in which scores of publicly traded firms have converted themselves to trusts that pay little or no income tax and distribute most of their profits in fat dividends.
But Goodale was struck by an epiphany after imposing a moratorium on trust conversions in September and placing their status under review, with the prospect of eventually taxing or outlawing them.
Trusts now account for almost 10 per cent of the value of firms listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, and an estimated 1 million Canadians own trust units. Many of those investors are retirees and other individuals on fixed incomes who understandably swoon over average trust returns of 7 per cent to 8 per cent — and double-digit returns in some cases — compared with the miserly yield on most fixed-income investments.
Contemplating the likely collapse of the Liberal government, Goodale was suddenly troubled by the prospect of thousands of elderly protesters marching on Parliament Hill, their anger fuelled by a drop in value of trust units of more than $10 billion after Goodale's freeze on conversions. Stoking the investors' anger was a well-co-ordinated campaign by Bay Street, which has reaped a mighty windfall from orchestrating the trust-conversion mania.
Goodale caved Nov. 23, scrapping the moratorium and aborting the planned review of trusts, opting instead to slash taxes on dividends to level the playing field between trusts and traditional companies. The reaction was so exuberant that trading volume in trust units soared about 50 per cent even before the announcement, suggesting either that investors were able to read the minister's mind or that something fishy was going on.
The Liberals might have escaped lingering censure over their inconsistency had the RCMP not announced last month a probe of possible leaks of Goodale's change of heart before he went public with it.
Thus began Act Two of the increasingly comical saga, now playing on the campaign trail, in which Goodale and Martin have strained voter credulity in attempting to exonerate each other from any wrongdoing in the trust debacle.
Asked on Friday who in the Prime Minister's Office had advance knowledge of Goodale's November flip-flop, Martin said, "Well, I knew and I'm one of them." But, the PM added, he only learned about the policy change "that very day" — when Goodale announced the new plan.
Under that scenario, the PM — facing an imminent election, no less — was merely told about a significant change in his government's policy, rather than helping shape it and approving it.
Why not let the formidable Goodale defend himself? Why did the PM allow himself to be dragged into the mire? Was it the opinion poll conducted Dec. 28 and 29 that found 45 per cent of Canadians — there's that popular demand again — saying Goodale should resign, and just 38 per cent of the view the finance minister should stay put?
Was there an intervention by David Herle, the Grits' chief campaign manager, on behalf of Goodale, with whom he has been joined at the hip since the days when the two were the most prominent — some say the only — spark plugs in the forlorn Liberal Party of Saskatchewan? Martin would be amenable to such an appeal, having frequently stumped for Goodale far from Westmount back in the 1980s before Martin entered Parliament, identifying Goodale as a comer when the Canada Steamship Lines owner moonlighted as a recruiter of House of Commons candidates.
What followed arises either from the cohesion of those triumvirs or the entrance, stage left, of the writer who does Homer Simpson's lines. For one day after Martin tried to take Goodale off the hook, the finance minister returned the favour, explaining on CTV's Question Period that Martin had not, after all, known what Goodale was going to announce.
In what Goodale described as his last chat with the PM before the about-face, Goodale recalled Martin saying, "You're the minister of finance, you make the decision and I'll support your decision, whatever it may turn out to be. And I made the decision after that conversation."
Which is to say Martin and the nascent Grit war room took a passive view of whether they would soon be accosted by mad as hell retirees, or not. This is the part where pigs take flight.
But wait, there's more!
On Monday, Martin came to Goodale's needless rescue once again. Turns out Martin did know, after all, that Goodale was going to pacify the retirees — and the Grits' Bay Street donors.
"What happened," Martin said in Ottawa, is that the finance minister told the PM what Goodale was "leaning towards" doing. "So, I quite well knew which way he was going." And was presumably okay with it, or, if not, deferred to his subordinate anyway. Or Martin aide Scott Reid, of popcorn and beer renown, and wearing an excellent disguise, was spelling for the PM that day.
The amusing thing — well, one of them — is that, had Goodale stuck with his original misgivings about income trusts, we could have had a useful debate about these dubious entities.
Too many trusts have been launched with overvalued units, and in some cases are thought by analysts to be promising unrealistic returns. The Toronto-based Accountability Research Corpreported last month that three-quarters of Canada's 50 largest trusts have been making cash distributions to unitholders in excess of actual profits.
Goodale, speculating on the consequences of the stampede of companies toward the conversion strategy, had it right in the first place in worrying about the implications for an economy studded with corporations that have given up their growth prospects.
"You could be embedding a kind of sluggishness in the economy," he said then.
The RCMP has made a point of saying it has no evidence to suggest wrongdoing by anyone. Rumours were rampant in newspapers and on the Internet last summer that, with an election pending — Martin had promised one by early this year at the latest — Ottawa was unlikely to bust the popularity of trusts.
The Liberal war room is primed to emulate the Tories' pre-Christmas promise-a-day rollout between now and Jan. 23. But the Grits have embedded a kind of sluggishness in their campaign to date. Unless the Liberal platform includes acceding to the Turks and Caicos Islands' long-sought annexation by Canada, the effort may serve mostly to remind voters not only of promises the Grits haven't kept, but of their difficulty in tracing exactly who is in charge of making them更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net
Jan. 4, 2006. 07:09 AM
DAVID OLIVE
Paul Martin and Ralph Goodale have more than one story about how they acted in the income-trust scandalette, and they're sticking to each of them.
In the process, the Prime Minister and his finance minister are signalling to domestic and foreign investors that Canada's top two government officials can't quite decide who's in charge of economic policy in this member of the Group of Eight industrialized countries.
The controversy over potential leaks of Goodale's November about-face on the tax treatment of income trusts may well turn out to be a scandal of piddling proportions. But the spectacle of Martin and Goodale tripping over their tongues in recent days to distance themselves from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's criminal investigation of suspicious trading in trust units immediately prior to Goodale's flip-flop could help seal the Grits' fate Jan. 23.
Start with Goodale's policy reversal on trusts, another reminder that this government is as constant as the North Star, except when it isn't.
In September, Goodale cavilled over the $300 million in what finance department officials call "tax leakage" due to the income trust phenomenon, in which scores of publicly traded firms have converted themselves to trusts that pay little or no income tax and distribute most of their profits in fat dividends.
But Goodale was struck by an epiphany after imposing a moratorium on trust conversions in September and placing their status under review, with the prospect of eventually taxing or outlawing them.
Trusts now account for almost 10 per cent of the value of firms listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, and an estimated 1 million Canadians own trust units. Many of those investors are retirees and other individuals on fixed incomes who understandably swoon over average trust returns of 7 per cent to 8 per cent — and double-digit returns in some cases — compared with the miserly yield on most fixed-income investments.
Contemplating the likely collapse of the Liberal government, Goodale was suddenly troubled by the prospect of thousands of elderly protesters marching on Parliament Hill, their anger fuelled by a drop in value of trust units of more than $10 billion after Goodale's freeze on conversions. Stoking the investors' anger was a well-co-ordinated campaign by Bay Street, which has reaped a mighty windfall from orchestrating the trust-conversion mania.
Goodale caved Nov. 23, scrapping the moratorium and aborting the planned review of trusts, opting instead to slash taxes on dividends to level the playing field between trusts and traditional companies. The reaction was so exuberant that trading volume in trust units soared about 50 per cent even before the announcement, suggesting either that investors were able to read the minister's mind or that something fishy was going on.
The Liberals might have escaped lingering censure over their inconsistency had the RCMP not announced last month a probe of possible leaks of Goodale's change of heart before he went public with it.
Thus began Act Two of the increasingly comical saga, now playing on the campaign trail, in which Goodale and Martin have strained voter credulity in attempting to exonerate each other from any wrongdoing in the trust debacle.
Asked on Friday who in the Prime Minister's Office had advance knowledge of Goodale's November flip-flop, Martin said, "Well, I knew and I'm one of them." But, the PM added, he only learned about the policy change "that very day" — when Goodale announced the new plan.
Under that scenario, the PM — facing an imminent election, no less — was merely told about a significant change in his government's policy, rather than helping shape it and approving it.
Why not let the formidable Goodale defend himself? Why did the PM allow himself to be dragged into the mire? Was it the opinion poll conducted Dec. 28 and 29 that found 45 per cent of Canadians — there's that popular demand again — saying Goodale should resign, and just 38 per cent of the view the finance minister should stay put?
Was there an intervention by David Herle, the Grits' chief campaign manager, on behalf of Goodale, with whom he has been joined at the hip since the days when the two were the most prominent — some say the only — spark plugs in the forlorn Liberal Party of Saskatchewan? Martin would be amenable to such an appeal, having frequently stumped for Goodale far from Westmount back in the 1980s before Martin entered Parliament, identifying Goodale as a comer when the Canada Steamship Lines owner moonlighted as a recruiter of House of Commons candidates.
What followed arises either from the cohesion of those triumvirs or the entrance, stage left, of the writer who does Homer Simpson's lines. For one day after Martin tried to take Goodale off the hook, the finance minister returned the favour, explaining on CTV's Question Period that Martin had not, after all, known what Goodale was going to announce.
In what Goodale described as his last chat with the PM before the about-face, Goodale recalled Martin saying, "You're the minister of finance, you make the decision and I'll support your decision, whatever it may turn out to be. And I made the decision after that conversation."
Which is to say Martin and the nascent Grit war room took a passive view of whether they would soon be accosted by mad as hell retirees, or not. This is the part where pigs take flight.
But wait, there's more!
On Monday, Martin came to Goodale's needless rescue once again. Turns out Martin did know, after all, that Goodale was going to pacify the retirees — and the Grits' Bay Street donors.
"What happened," Martin said in Ottawa, is that the finance minister told the PM what Goodale was "leaning towards" doing. "So, I quite well knew which way he was going." And was presumably okay with it, or, if not, deferred to his subordinate anyway. Or Martin aide Scott Reid, of popcorn and beer renown, and wearing an excellent disguise, was spelling for the PM that day.
The amusing thing — well, one of them — is that, had Goodale stuck with his original misgivings about income trusts, we could have had a useful debate about these dubious entities.
Too many trusts have been launched with overvalued units, and in some cases are thought by analysts to be promising unrealistic returns. The Toronto-based Accountability Research Corpreported last month that three-quarters of Canada's 50 largest trusts have been making cash distributions to unitholders in excess of actual profits.
Goodale, speculating on the consequences of the stampede of companies toward the conversion strategy, had it right in the first place in worrying about the implications for an economy studded with corporations that have given up their growth prospects.
"You could be embedding a kind of sluggishness in the economy," he said then.
The RCMP has made a point of saying it has no evidence to suggest wrongdoing by anyone. Rumours were rampant in newspapers and on the Internet last summer that, with an election pending — Martin had promised one by early this year at the latest — Ottawa was unlikely to bust the popularity of trusts.
The Liberal war room is primed to emulate the Tories' pre-Christmas promise-a-day rollout between now and Jan. 23. But the Grits have embedded a kind of sluggishness in their campaign to date. Unless the Liberal platform includes acceding to the Turks and Caicos Islands' long-sought annexation by Canada, the effort may serve mostly to remind voters not only of promises the Grits haven't kept, but of their difficulty in tracing exactly who is in charge of making them更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net