ndp planforthenorth2011

8/3/2019 NDP Planforthenorth2011

1/20

1PLAN FOR THE NORTH

PLAN FORTHE NORTH


2/20

2 PLAN FOR THE NORTH

EDMONTONALBERTA


3/20

1PLAN FOR THE NORTH

MY COMMITMENT TO YOULEADERSHIP YOU CAN TRUST

TO GIVE YOUR FAMILY A BREAKFor too long, Ottawa has misunderstood Northernpriorities. Its invested in military hardware, whileignoring vital ports and roads. Its rewarded bigpolluters, while ignoring climate change. And itsabandoned amilies in the ace o skyrocketing pricesand doctor shortages.

Now, more than ever, the North needs a strong

partner in Ottawa. Someone who will invest inthe regions biggest assets its people and itscommunities.

My New Democrat team and I are working to bethat partner.

Our Plan or the North ocuses on practical rststeps that matter to you. Well improve healthservices, support local mining and shing, invest inhousing and rural inrastructure, and help make yourlie more aordable.

And well do it by building respectul partnershipswith territorial governments and Aboriginalcommunities.

New Democrats are ready to deliver or the North.And we wont stop until the job is done. Jack Layton

Leader of Canadas New Democrats


4/20


TABLE OF CONTENTSAFFORDABILITYPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS.........................................PG. 5

1.1 Lowering Household Costs on Energy Bills andRenovations

1.2 Cracking Down on Excessive Credit Card Rates and

Bank Card Fees

1.3 Increasing the Northern Residents Tax Deduction

1.4 Helping Lit Children and Families Out o Poverty

1.5 Ensuring Your Employment Insurance Benefts Are

There When You Need Them

JOBS AND PENSIONSPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS.........................................PG. 8

2.1 Strengthening Pensions and Retirement Security

2.2 Reducing the Small Business Tax Rate

2.3 Establishing the Job Creation Tax Credit

HEALTH CAREPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS.......................................PG. 10

3.1 Strengthening Health Care with a New 10-year Accord

3.2 Addressing the Health Needs o Northeners

3.3 Investing in More Family Doctors and Nurses

OUR NATURAL RESOURCESPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS.......................................PG. 12

4.1 Strengthening Our Northern Resources

4.2 Extending Tax Credits or Job-Supporting Investment

4.3 Ensuring Foreign Investment Delivers Quality

Canadian Jobs

4.4 Protecting Our Fisheries

COMMUNITIES THAT WORKPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS.......................................PG. 15

5.1 Addressing the Northern Housing Crisis

5.2 Investing in Northern Inrastructure

5.3 Ensuring All Northerners Have Access to Broadband

5.4 Hiring More Police to Protect Your Community

FIRST NATIONS, INUIT AND MTISPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS..................................PG. 20

6.1 Building a New Relationship


5/20

3PLAN FOR THE NORTH


6/20

4 PLAN FOR THE NORTH4



7/205PLAN FOR THE NORTH

AFFORDABILITYPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS1.1 Lowering Household Costs on Energy Bills

and Renovations

We will remove the ederal sales tax rom home heating to givehomes in Canadas North and High Arctic a break;

We will introduce a permanent ecoEnergy retrot program tocut your home heating bills permanently, reduce greenhouse

gases and create jobs;We will provide an Inter-generational Home Retrot Program

to help amilies retrot their homes to accommodate senioramily members.

1.2 Cracking Down on Excessive Credit Card Ratesand Bank Card Fees

We will ensure Canadians have access to credit cards withinterest rates no higher than 5% above prime;

We will give ederal nancial regulators new powers to identiyand ban excessive interest rates on credit cards, payday loans,store cards and other orms o consumer credit;

We will oblige lenders to provide clearer, easy-to-understanddisclosure o the real costs o credit cards, store cards andpayday loans;

We will end unair bank and credit card transaction chargesor both consumers and small businesses.

1.3 Increasing Northern Residents Tax Deduction

We will move to increase the residency portion o theNorthern Residents ax Deduction and have this portion othe deduction indexed to a Northern ination measurement.

1.4 Helping Lift Children and Families Out of Poverty

As a practical rst step to eliminate child poverty, we willcombine existing supports like the Child ax Benet to createa non-taxable Child Benet and increase the support steadilyby up to $700 per child over the next our years. Tis will be inaddition to the current Universal Child Care Benet;

We will table legislation that will set goals and targetsor poverty reduction in consultation with the provincial,territorial, municipal and Aboriginal governments and withnon-governmental organizations.

1.5 EnsuringYourEmploymentInsuranceBeneftsAre

There When You Need Them

We will extend Employment Insurance stimulus measures untilunemployment alls to pre-recession levels;

In practical steps and as nances permit, we will restore theintegrity o the Employment Insurance program by amendingthe Employment Insurance Act to:

Eliminate the two-week waiting period;

Return the qualiying period to a minimum o 360 hours owork, regardless o the regional rate o unemployment;

Raise the rate o benets to 60 percent and base benets on thebest 12 weeks in the qualiying period;

Improve the quality o monitoring o training and re-training;

Close the loophole that deprives you o EI support i you lose

your job while accessing special benets such as maternity,compassionate care or sickness leave.

Fighting for Western Arctic: Dennis Bevington was successul in pushing or a study on Northern Economic Development

by the Northern Development Committee and ought or the committee to include a recommendation to increase the Northern

Residents ax Deduction.


8/206 PLAN FOR THE NORTH6 PLAN FOR THE NORTH


9/20

7PLAN FOR THE NORTH 7

JOBS AND PENSIONSPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS2.1 Strengthening Pensions and Retirement Security

We will work with the provinces to bring about increases toyour Canada Pension Plan benet, with the eventual goal todouble the benets you receive;

We will work with the provinces to build in the exibility oryou and your employer to make voluntary contributions to yourindividual public pension account;

We will amend ederal bankruptcy legislation to movepensioners and long-term disability recipients to the ronto the line o creditors when their employers enter courtprotection or declare bankruptcy;

We will increase the annual Guaranteed Income Supplementto a sufcient level in the rst budget to lit every senior inCanada out o poverty immediately.

2.2 Reducing the Small Business Tax Rate

We will reduce the small business tax rate rom 11 percent to 9percent to support a sector o our economy that creates nearlyhal o all new jobs in Canada.

2.3 Establishing a Job Creation Tax Credit

We will introduce a Job Creation ax Credit that will provideup to $4,500 per new hire;

Employers will receive a one-year rebate on the employer

contributions or the CanadaPension Plan and EmploymentInsurance premiums or each new employee hired (or newpositions created only);

Companies and organizations that keep a new employee or12 months or more will be eligible or a retention bonus - a$1,000 non-reundable tax credit. Tis initiative will helpcreate 200,000 amily-supporting jobs a year;

We will empower a Jobs Protection Commissioner to step inwhen theres a major layo or shutdown, to work with workers,employers, banks and communities to maintain employment;

We will invest in youth job creation to stem the tide o youngpeople leaving their Northern communities to nd work inother parts o the country.

Fighting for Western Arctic: Dennis Bevington introduced a Private Members bill which would accelerate devolution

and provide the NW with greater nancial capacity and reduce the amount o control the Federal government holds over

Northerners.


10/20

8 PLAN FOR THE NORTH8 CANADAS NEW DEMOCRATS


11/20

9PLAN FOR THE NORTH

We will work in partnership with the health authorities in eachregion o Inuit Nunaat to ensure that the required resources areavailable to allow them to reduce the high rates o tuberculosisin Inuit communities.

3.3 Investing in More Family Doctors and NursesWe will work with the provinces and territories to address the

shortage o doctors, nurses and other health care proessionalsby training 1,200 new doctors over the next 10 years, adding

6,000 new training spaces or nurses over 6 years andsubstantially increasing the number training spaces or otherhealth proessionals;

In collaboration with the provinces and territories, we will establishprograms aimed at recruiting and supporting low-income, rural andaboriginal medical students;

We will substantially increase the number o other healthproessionals including psychiatric nurses, nurse practitioners,midwives, technicians, nurse aides and patient service associates;

We will grow the pool o new amily doctors by orgiving their

student loans i they stay in amily practice or ten years.;We will strengthen equity programs to recruit and support more o

the rural and Aboriginal medical students who are most likely topractice in remote areas;

We will launch a Quality Home Care Plan to help 100,000Canadians each year get the care they need at home instead ochecking into an overcrowded hospital;

We will launch a Long-erm Care Initiative to work with provincesand territories to substantially increase the number o non-protspaces or seniors, as part o the next phase o Medicare;

We will launch a Long-erm Care Initiative to work with provincesand territories to substantially increase the number o non-protspaces or seniors, as part o the next phase o Medicare.

3.1 Strengthening Healthcare with a New 10 Year AccordWe will negotiate a new ten-year health accord with the

provinces and territories in 2014. Te accord will guaranteea continued strong ederal contribution including the 6%escalator to Canadas public health care system in return ora clear, monitored and enorced commitment to respect theprinciples o the Canada Health Act and to the integrity andmodernization o health care.

We will work with provincial and territorial partners to:

Promote a clear commitment to the single-payer system; Make progress on primary care;

ake appropriate steps to replace ee-or-service delivery;

ake rst steps to reduce the costs o prescription medicines orCanadians, employers and governments;

Extend coverage to out-o-hospital services like home careand long-term care.

3.2 Addressing the Health Needs of Northeners

We will replace the Conservatives Nutrition North Programwith a more air, balanced and eective ood subsidy programto be developed ater consultation with Dene and Inuitorganizations, public, Dene and Inuit governments, retailersand consumer groups;

We will support the creation and strengthening o pre-nataland early childhood programs through developing amilyresource centres and extending the Dene and Inuit Head StartProgram to include every Dene and Inuit community;

We will introduce, An Act Respecting a National Strategy orSuicide Prevention, and work in partnership with Dene andInuit organizations and public, Dene and Inuit governmentsto develop, implement and support evidence- based measuresto lower the tragically high rate o suicide in Dene and Inuitcommunities;

HEALTH CAREPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS

Fighting for Nunavut:Jack Hicks assisted NDP MP Megan Leslie crat House o Commons legislation that would create a

National Suicide Prevention Strategy.


12/20

10 PLAN FOR THE NORTH10 PLAN FOR THE NORTH


13/20

11PLAN FOR THE NORTH

4.1 Strengthening Our Northern Resources

We will develop sector-based strategies or lumber, pulp andpaper, steel, mining, tourism and telecommunications, to ensurethat industries in Canadas North and Arctic regions have thetools to innovate and compete globally;

We will support mining exploration in the North with targeted tax

incentives and a permanent Flow-Trough Shares program in themining sector giving continuing support to junior prospectingrms that soten the boom-and-bust cycle o the mining sector;

We will develop a national orestry strategy that will identiyeconomic measures needed to grow Canadas orestry sectorsustainably and support community-based orestry initiatives.

4.2 Extending Tax Credits for Job-Supporting Investment

We will extend the Accelerated Capital Cost Allowance oreligible machinery and equipment acquired beore 2016. Tis

would apply to machinery and equipment or primary use inCanada or the manuacturing or processing o goods or saleor lease;

We will extend eligibility or the mineral exploration tax or anadditional three years beyond March 31, 2012. Tis will applyto ow-through share agreements entered into on or beoreMarch 31, 2015;

We will give tradespeople and apprentices whose job sites arelocated at least 80kms away rom their ordinary residence a taxdeduction or their travel and accommodation costs.

4.3 Ensuring Foreign Investment Delivers QualityCanadian Jobs

We will strengthen the Investment Canada Act by:

Reducing the threshold or investments subject to review to$100 million;

Providing explicit, transparent criteria or the net benet

to Canada test, with an emphasis on the impact o oreigninvestment on communities, jobs, pensions and new capitalinvestments;

Requiring public hearings that allow or community input intodecisions on both the assessment o net benet and conditionsto apply to the investment;

Ensuring public disclosure and enorcement o all commitments

undertaken by potential investors.

4.4 Protecting our Fisheries

We will require aquaculture operations to meet highestenvironmental standards with meaningul community input;

We will redirect DFO unding toward habitat protection,monitoring and enhancement o wild Pacic salmonpopulations;

We will legislate and enorce tanker moratorium on BCs inlandwaters, North Coast (specically the Inside Passage, and the HecateStrait);

We will prohibit the breeding and import o genetically modiedsh and their introduction into the Canadian ood system or human

consumption.

OUR NATURAL RESOURCESPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS

Fighting for Western Arctic: Dennis Bevington ought or Northern voices to be heard during the National Energy Boards

review o Arctic o-shore drilling.


14/20



15/20


5.3 Ensuring all Northerners Have Access to BroadbandWe will apply the proceeds rom the advanced wireless

spectrum auction to ensure all Canadians in Northern andArctic communities will have quality high-speed broadbandinternet access;

We will expect the major internet carriers to contributenancially to this goal;

We will rescind the 2006 Conservative industry-orienteddirective to the CRC and direct the regulator to stand up

or the public interest, not just the major telecommunicationscompanies;

We will enshrine net neutrality in law, end price gouging andnet throttling, with clear rules or Internet Service Providers(ISPs), enorced by the CRC;

We will prohibit all orms o usage-based billing (UBB) byInternet Service Providers (ISPs).

5.4 Hiring More Police to Protect Northern Communities

We will keep our communities sae rom crime by investing ina balanced, eective approach based on prevention, policing,and prosecution;

We will ensure that communities have the resources they needto invest in crime prevention programs, particularly thosetargeting youth, by increasing ederal support o to crimeprevention initiatives rom $65 million to $100 million per

year;

We will work with the provinces, territories, and FirstNations communities to provide stable, multi-year unding to

eventually put at least 2,500 new police ofcers on the streets,and keep them there permanently.

NORTHERN COMMUNITIES THAT WORKPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS5.1 Addressing the Northern housing crisis

We will enact the NDPs legislation to ensure secure, adequate,accessible and aordable housing or all Canadians;

We will restore unding or the homeowners ResidentialRehabilitation Assistance Program (RRAP), and theAordable Housing Initiative to increase the supply oaordable housing, in partnership with provinces andterritories;

We will provide signicant new unding or aordable and

social housing; Program to help amilies retrot their homes to accommodate

senior amily members.

5.2 Investing in Northern Infrastructure

We will develop a stable, predictable Canadian inrastructureplan, to include:

Create a Northern Highways investment und and beginwith completion o the Inuvik-uktoyaktuk link, ollowed byeventual completion o the Mackenzie Valley Highway;

Federal Investment in major green energy projects across thecountry;

Clean water treatment upgrades;

Continuing current ederal inrastructure unding

commitments, like those under the Building Canada Fund.


16/20



17/20


FIRST NATIONS, INUIT AND MTISPRACTICAL NEXT STEPS6.1 Building a New Relationship

We will build a new partnership on a nation-to-nation basiswith First Nations, Inuit and Mtis people across the countryto restore a central element o social justice in Canada andreconcile the hopes o Aboriginal people with those o allCanadians

We will establish this new partnership by orging a newrelationship with First Nations, Inuit and Mtis peoples,

ostering economic opportunity and lasting prosperity, endingthe discrimination still aced by Aboriginal people in Canadaand supporting the process o healing the harms o pastinjustices. We will begin by:

We will remove the punitive 2% unding cap on Indian andNorthern Aairs Canada transers to aboriginal communities;

We will increase access to capital or aboriginal businessdevelopment so that First Nations, Inuit and Mtis peoplein the North and High Arctic can ully participate in theCanadian economy;

We will improve Northern and Arctic inrastructure such ashousing, drinking water acilities, roads and other essentialservices;

We will improve health in First Nation, Inuit and Mtiscommunities by investing in adequate housing, clean water,traditional healing, addiction treatment, mental health supportand other services;

We will work in partnership with the health authoritiesin each region to ensure that mental health services aresignicantly strengthened, with a particular ocus onaddressing the intergenerational transmission o historical

trauma;

We will work in partnership with the language authoritiesin each region o Inuit Nunaat to help them preserve andpromote the Inuit language;

We will address the education decit with a $1 billion peryear investment over the next 4 years in education undingand learning services provided to First Nations children,

youth and adults in both K-12 as well post-secondarylevels;

We will support the initiative known as Shannens Dreamto ensure that all First Nations children get the sameeducation chances as non Native children.

We will respect the right o First Nations, Inuit andMtis communities to be consulted on and to share inthe management o natural resources on their traditionallands;

We will accelerate the process or land claim settlementsand sel-government agreements with properimplementation unding;

We will work in partnership with the language authoritiesin each region o Inuit Nunaat to help them preserve andpromote the Inuit language;

We will work in partnership to ully implement the 2007United Nations Declaration on the Rights o IndigenousPeoples.


18/20


19/20


20/20

Authorized by the registered agent for Canadas NDP. 225-kl

ndp.ca | @jacklayton | text NDP to 101010 | facebook.com/JackLayton | download the iPhone and iPad app

ndp planforthenorth2011

Documents