Update: Moving Taxes To The Ones Who Can’t Afford Them

Image by Zolk via Flickr

I mentioned yesterday that in the Toronto budget, it was announced that there would be a TTC fare hike 10 cents. Well today, the TTC chair, Karen Stintz, announced that all the money they needed to avoid the fare hike had been found and so the hike wouldn’t be happening.

It all seems a bit convenient doesn’t it? One day after they said “we won’t be able to freeze property taxes without this fare increase” they suddenly found millions of dollars to avoid it. If they were planning this, you think they would have at least waited a few days instead of just one. That way everyone would start saying “Ford is talking out of his ass when he says he wants to avoid the hike” then BOOM, no fare hike, people are on his side and it makes the media look like they hate him. But this just looks too planned.

This doesn’t mean there won’t be a fare hike. It just won’t be on January 30th.

 

Moving Taxes To The Ones Who Can’t Afford Them

Image via Wikipedia

Today, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford revealed his first budget and big shock, the TTC fares are going up 10 cents.

So far in his few months as mayor, Rob Ford has cut the $60 car tax and… well that’s about it. Now he is talking about closing libraries, raising the garbage tax and now he has raised the fares to use Toronto public transit.

The sneakiest thing he has done, and this really got me upset, is raise the price of an adult metropass by $5. Now you’re probably wondering why that in particular makes me mad. Well let me explain. If you buy a metropass, you most likely buy one every month. So do the math, 12 months times $5. What does that equal? Big surprise $60. Its the car tax but other people are paying it. People who don’t drive. People who can afford it even less than people with cars. The whole reason lots of people take public transit is because they can’t afford cars or they have no need for a car. Now they are paying for a tax that other people didn’t want to pay.

Of course the budget has other things in it. Fees for city services going up, cuts to services. The usual bad things that no one wants.

Mayor Ford says that this budget is “in the interest of taxpayer”. If this is what a budget “for the taxpayer” looks like then I want one that isn’t for the taxpayer. Hopefully people will start to see through Ford’s facade before it’s too late.