Tony Clement fails to live up to his promises

He can stand up for us like he preaches he does.

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Dateline: Tuesday, December 01, 2009

From: Tim Pellett, Parry Sound

Now that Tony Clement is overseeing the Federal Competition Bureau, he should stand up for the people he represents and for every Canadian.

He can stand up for us like he preaches he does. He can take a good look at the local gas price differential. As Minister of Industry, his mandate includes Statistics Canada and the Federal Competition Bureau. The Federal Competition Bureau is the office that handles gas price complaints. Statistics Canada has all the numbers, and Tony's at the top of both.

Since Tony has gone to Ottawa, his mouth has been zippered by Harper, and Tony has said nothing on this issue or it would have shown up on government documents. If he insists he has, he should open his office up and show us, for he stood up in the House of Commons and stated, "My office is totally transparent and have nothing to hide."

Oh, Tony finally speaks the truth. My response to his statement: He is right for he has nothing to hide for there is nothing there in his penmanship on the local gas issue. He's got nothing. He's got nothing to hide. Absolutely, totally nothing. Right Tony?

Here is some more of Tony's penmanship on gas pricing while vying for our votes the first time he was elected. From a press release from Oct. 14, 2005.

"The Minster of Finance claims that oil companies would absorb any tax decrease. Perhaps then, he could explain why a survey a year ago found our gas prices about 19 percent higher than in the United States where taxes are 16 percent lower."

My response: Tony we have not heard you or seen you speak up on this.

Here is what Clement and Harper have done. That statement is all smoke and mirrors.

They lowered their taxes even lower for big oil, plus they want to take their tax rate down further. Not only did they lower the taxes for them in their first two years, they also gave big oil $2.3 billion dollars in subsidies and $1 million to go green.

I find this odd, for 63 percent of all oil-producing nations raised royalties and instigated windfall profit taxes. Canada is the only country in the world that lowered taxes, the rest of the world got gains. The other countries were already being treated more fairly than Canada ever will. Clement and Harper have done the opposite and have caused nothing but hardship for every Canadian.

They dropped the GST down by one percent, and promised that the savings would be passed on to the consumer. That was an outright lie by Harper and Clement. For the third quarter, right after they dropped the GST the first time, refiner profits per litre rose by 1.9 cents a litre. Those stats are from a statement from a chief oil industry analyst to the Minister of Energy. Since then the refiner margins on gas, diesel and home heating fuel have gone up and up.

The GST deductions have not been passed on to all Canadians like Harper and Clement preached. Just look at the refiner profits that are being posted for the third quarter for this year- all record profits. Clement and Harper mislead every Canadian on the GST deductions being passed on to the consumer.

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