From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Jay Goldberg

Are political parties more valuable than charities?

You’d be hard pressed to find a single Canadian that thinks so, but that’s how they’re treated under today’s tax system.

The way tax credits are handed out in Canada needs to be revamped. The system is broken, both federally and provincially. It’s time to stop giving big tax credits for political donations. Instead, let’s give tax breaks to folks when they donate to charity.

Consider this present-day scenario.

Last year, Sally donated $250 to the Conservative Party of Canada and another $250 to Save the Children. Jim donated $250 to the Ontario Liberals and another $250 to the Make a Wish Foundation.

When tax time came, the federal government let Sally use both her donations to lower her tax bill.

But one donation counted a lot more against Sally’s tax bill than the other. And it’s not the one that you might think.

For the Save the Children donation, Sally’s $250 donation netted a $44.50 credit towards her tax bill. The province added in another $15.90. That means she will get $60.40 back at tax time.

How about her political contribution?

Because it was a federal political party donation, Sally only received a federal tax credit. But the feds will give her back $187.50 when she files her taxes.

In other words, the amount Sally gets back from donating to a political party is three times as much as her donation to charity.

For those paying income tax, the tax credit situation for a $250 donation, both to charities and political parties, is identical at the provincial level.

Jim gets $60.40 back at tax time from his charitable donation and $187.50 from Queen’s Park for his provincial political donation.

That means the money Jim gets back from his provincial political donation, like Sally’s at the federal level, is three times larger than what he gets back for donating to charity.

On what sane planet should both the feds and Queen’s Park be giving out tax credits for political donations so much more generous than tax credits for making donations to charity?

Making a terminally ill child’s wishes come true should be valued more than helping politicians pay for political attack ads.

Canada’s provincial and federal governments should take funds that go toward tax credits for political donations and reallocate them to tax credits for charitable donations. Credits for political donations should be scrapped.

Tax credits exist to try to encourage behaviour. The whole idea behind it is that if you give folks a bit of a financial incentive to make a donation, they’ll be more likely to do so.

That makes sense when it comes to charities. It’s a worthy policy goal to have a tax credit in place to encourage Canadians to make donations to organizations that work to make a meaningful difference in people’s lives.

But why should taxpayers be incentivizing donations to political parties? Why encourage Canadians to shell out money that will end up paying for leaflets, lawn signs and attack ads?

Some try to justify the tax credit regime by arguing that because political parties can’t take corporate or union donations, they need help encouraging individuals to make donations.

But ask anyone on the street, and they’ll tell you it’s charitable donations, not political ones, that should be encouraged.

If political parties can’t raise as much money without the tax credit, they should just spend less money. No one is going to shed tears over seeing fewer attack ads on television.

The sole goal of a political party is to get themselves elected. Why should they get credits of up to 75 per cent while charitable donations get trivial treatment?

It’s time to stop treating political parties like charities on steroids. That means putting political donation tax credits on the chopping block. Instead, the same money can and should be used to supersize tax credits for charitable donations.

From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Ryan Thorpe

“Can someone in government explain why taxpayers are being sent a bill so bureaucrats can decorate their offices with artwork that taxpayers have already bought and paid for?”

When bureaucrats hang art in their offices, taxpayers are on the hook – twice.

First, the government uses tax dollars to purchase artwork for its Art Bank. Then bureaucrats rent out that artwork and send the bill to taxpayers.

And that art bill comes to millions of dollars.

“Can someone in government explain why taxpayers are being sent a bill so bureaucrats can decorate their offices with artwork that taxpayers have already bought and paid for?” asked Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “This is an outrageous waste of money and, to add insult to injury, the government is double billing taxpayers for artwork we’ll never see.”

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation obtained access-to-information records detailing all art rentals made by federal departments and agencies from the Canada Council for the Arts’ Art Bank between January 2016 and July 2024.

During that time, federal departments and agencies racked up $7,808,827 in art rentals.

That means since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau came to power, federal bureaucrats have been spending an average of $76,000 a month renting artwork for their offices.

“Every month, federal bureaucrats spend more money renting art than what the average Canadian earns in an entire year,” Terrazzano said. “It’s amazing that we need to say this, but maybe these bureaucrats could ease up at the taxpayer-funded Art Bank when record numbers of Canadians are lined up at food banks.”

Last year, the average Canadian worker made less than $70,000, according to data from Statistics Canada. In March 2024, Canada saw a record high two million visits to food banks, according to Food Banks Canada.

Federal departments and agencies made 1,445 rentals from the Art Bank between January 2016 and July 2024, according to the records.

The highest single rental came in April 2020, when a federal department or agency expensed $120,240 in artwork to taxpayers.

The records obtained by the CTF do not specify which federal departments or agencies expensed the art rentals.

The Art Bank contains more than 17,000 works of art from more than 3,000 artists, according to the CCA website.

“The Art Bank has the largest collection of contemporary Canadian art anywhere,” according to the CCA. “It houses paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs and prints by emerging and established artists.”

The CCA is a federal Crown corporation, which dishes out hundreds of millions in grants to artists and arts organizations every year. In 2023-24, CCA grants totalled more than $300 million.

In 2022-23, the CCA received $423 million in federal funding, which accounts for about 90 per cent of the agency’s revenue.

So taxpayers not only foot the bill for this artwork through parliamentary appropriations to the CCA, but also get hit with a secondary expense when that artwork is later rented by a federal department or agency.

In Budget 2023, the government promised to find savings in the Crown corporations.

“The government will also work with federal Crown corporations to ensure they achieve comparable spending reductions, which would account for an estimated $1.3 billion over four years,” according to Budget 2023.

“Bureaucrats billing taxpayers $76,000 a month in art rentals is outrageous at the best of times, but with the government more than $1 trillion in debt and so many Canadians struggling, it’s utterly inexcusable,” Terrazzano said. “The government said it would find savings at Crown corporations, so defunding the Canada Council for the Arts is a perfect place to start.”

Federal departments and agencies expensing art rentals isn’t the only way taxpayers are hit with big bills so government officials can decorate their offices.

In July 2023, the CTF reported 52 Canadian Senators expensed $514,616 in art rentals to taxpayers since 2016.