Today in the Senate, Senator Ringuette denounced the fact that the Conservative’s Budget is willingly adding to the great social and economic divide between rural and urban Canada. It’s also willingly giving preferential treatment for urban Canadians to the detriment of rural Canadians. Senator Ringuette made the following comments:
“The Government has announced that it will spend $2 billion on Public Transit, over a period of five years, funded by all Canadians, both urban and rural.
What are you offering to Canadians that do not have access to Urban Transit? This is like Double Barrel Taxation for Canadians who do not live in Urban Areas. What about your mantra of “giving people choices”? Rural Canadians have “no choice” but to have a car and its expenses, if they want to go to work.
There is no money for Regional Airports which you promised in the last campaign. An actual decrease in funding for VIA RAIL, while having to maintain their current lines, never mind adding to them, so that other communities can have access to mass transportation!”
The Senator further added: “I believe the Conservatives have to give some type of Transportation Cost Tax Credit to rural Canadians, which should be, comparable to both the Urban Transit Capital Funding and the Tax Credit for Urban Transit Users.”