DEVELOPING Jasper updates: 'Significant loss' within Jasper townsite
One of two wildfires threatening Jasper National Park has reached the townsite.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland is pushing back against the idea that the federal government is wavering on its Jan. 1 timeline for implementing a new digital services tax.
Language in last week's fiscal update suggested the government wanted some flexibility in the timeline for when the tax would go into effect.
Freeland insists the government's position on the controversial measure remains unchanged, although she did not explicitly say if the tax would take effect early next year, as originally planned.
The three per cent levy, aimed at foreign digital services companies that profit off Canadian audiences, is deeply unpopular in the United States, where critics say it unfairly targets the U.S. tech sector.
Freeland says Canada's preference has always been to be part of an international tax framework that is still under development, but also that it would not wait until any later than 2023.
The tax is just one of a suite of measures from the fall economic statement that the government is taking steps to enact with a so-called ways and means motion introduced on Tuesday.
The fiscal update itself noted that forthcoming legislation "would allow the government to determine the entry-into-force date" of the new tax.
"Our government's position is unchanged," Freeland said when asked about the timing of the tax, describing the motion as "the next step" on the path towards fairness.
"Other countries -- our partners and allies, like the U.K., like France -- currently have a DST in place. And that DST is raising much-needed revenue to support the British people, to support the French people."
Critics, including members of Congress and David Cohen, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, have been urging Ottawa to put the tax on hold to allow the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development more time to get its global framework in place.
Freeland's update last week insisted that Canada would continue to work with its international partners to implement a multilateral taxation system "as soon as a critical mass of countries is willing."
"We always prefer finding a win-win outcome," she said on Tuesday.
"And that is the case here, and we have been having constructive conversations with all our partners."
The digital services tax, which takes effect in January, is deeply unpopular with Canada's most important ally and trading partner, says Goldy Hyder, president and CEO of the Business Council of Canada.
And those tensions are mounting at a time of growing international instability, when the country's relationship with like-minded allies such as the U.S. should be a top priority, Hyder writes in a new letter to the prime minister.
Instead, Canada should agree to U.S. demands that the tax be held in abeyance until a global taxation framework being developed within the OECD can be introduced.
"Canada's economic interests will be severely harmed if Canada continues to defy the overwhelming OECD consensus," Hyder writes in the letter, a copy of which was provided to The Canadian Press.
"Amid growing economic uncertainty around the globe, Canada cannot afford a costly trade war with our most important trading partner."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 28, 2023.
One of two wildfires threatening Jasper National Park has reached the townsite.
Alberta has called in the Canadian Armed Forces to help assist with the worsening wildfire situation in the province.
U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday delivered a solemn call to voters to defend the country's democracy as he laid out in an Oval Office address his decision to drop his bid for reelection and throw his support behind Vice President Kamala Harris.
Staff at a Barrie child care centre say they are frustrated by what they call a local MPP's inadequate response after a car crashed through a window in one of the toddler rooms.
The North American Aerospace Defence Command (Norad) intercepted two Russian and two Chinese bombers flying near Alaska Wednesday in what appears to be the first time the two countries have been intercepted while operating together.
An analyst and an assistant coach with Canada Soccer are being removed from the Canadian Olympic Team and 'sent home immediately,' according to the Canadian Olympic Committee.
After a handful of Australian water polo players tested positive for COVID-19 this week, questions have emerged around how the spread of the disease will be mitigated at the Summer Olympic Games in Paris.
A B.C. man who was hired to help a non-profit build a food hub but instead spent the money on personal expenses – including travel, restaurants, booze and cannabis – has been ordered to pay more than $120,000 in damages.
Two people are dead and two others suffered serious injuries following a shooting that police have described as a 'gun battle' outside a plaza in Scarborough, Ont. early Wednesday morning.
A local First Nations elder and veteran is helping to bring the Ojibwe language to a well-known film for the first time.
A cat who fled her Montreal home nearly a decade ago has been reunited with her family after being found in Ottawa.
A woman in Waterloo, Ont. is out thousands of dollars for a car crash she wasn’t involved in.
A swarm of bees living in a lamppost in Winnipeg’s Sage Creek neighbourhood has found a new home for its hive.
Around 100 acres of Manitoba Crown Land near the Saskatchewan border is being returned to the Métis community.
Nova Scotia is suspending the licensed Cape Breton moose hunt for three years due to what the province is calling a “significant drop” in the population.
A well-known childhood prank known as 'nicky nicky nine doors,' or 'ding dong ditch,' has escalated into a more serious game that could lead to charges for some Surrey, B.C. teens.
It's been more than a month since their good friend was seriously hurt in an accident and two teens from Riverview, N.B., are still having a hard time dealing with it.
Halifax bridges have collected thousands of coins from around the world.