VOTE 2022: Vaughan-Woodbridge candidates share views on COVID-19 recovery

Yorkregion.com
May 18, 2022

We asked Vaughan-Woodbridge candidates running in the June 2 election five questions.

Here, they tackle an important issue facing Ontario small businesses.

The candidates each had a maximum of 150 words to respond.

QUESTION: What are 3 concrete steps your party would take to help small businesses impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic to recover?

New Blue's Luca Mele: 1. I'm going to donate my own salary to help struggling citizens in Woodbridge.

2. HST (harmonized sales tax) lowered from 13 per cent to 10 per cent.

3. Remove the taxpayers subsidy that took $10 million into the pockets of the major provincial parties.

Green's Philip Piluris: We will lower their taxes paid, allowing them the freedom to balance expenses. We will increase exemption levels for small business owners, allowing for immediate cash flow savings. The greatest impact we can have is to guarantee a living wage for all citizens; people cannot start spending their money in the community until their basic expenses can easily be paid.

Liberal's Steven Del Duca: It’s time to ... make life easier for small businesses, so that they can bounce back stronger than ever. That’s why we’ll eliminate corporate taxes for small businesses most impacted by the pandemic for two years — with relief scaled to losses in revenues and eliminated entirely for businesses that lost more than 50 per cent of revenues as a result of the pandemic. We’ll create a $300-million loan portfolio and partner with financial institutions and credit unions to backstop loans for thousands of small businesses. And we’ll support restaurants with economic recovery by eliminating HST on prepared food under $20.

Progressive Conservative's Michael Tibollo: Our plan has enabled an estimated $4.1 billion in cost savings for Ontario small businesses this year alone. We want to reduce WSIB (Workplace Safety and Insurance Board) premiums by 47 per cent without any reduction in benefits, cutting the gas and fuel tax, or continuing to slash hundreds of millions of dollars in red tape.

Ontario NDP's Will McCarty: We will bring in two rounds of the Small Business Recovery Grant, one in 2022 and another in 2023; we will launch a COVID-19 emergency business fund for Black-owned small businesses and entrepreneurs and others who have faced systemic barriers, such as women and people with disabilities; we will engage in strategic government procurement from small and medium-sized businesses and non-profits; we will work with business organizations and insurance industry to ensure that commercial insurance is affordable for small businesses; and we will work with the federal government to allow small business owners to form employee ownership trusts and create employee-owned co-operatives.