THE FUTILE QUEST FOR JUSTICE..

THE FUTILE QUEST FOR JUSTICE IN CANADA

Canada as a nation -- where citizens are assured of “fair” and equal treatment under tax laws and justice when victimized by government criminal action -- no longer exists.

A Canadian robbed on the street, by hoodlums, may obtain justice through the courts but a Canadian victimized by those who administer Canada’s tax laws has little recourse – the victims must prove they can not afford to pay the tax, i.e. are “HARDSHIP” cases.
In what way does “hardship” justify tax relief when justice is denied all other similar victims?

A commentary by Victor Drummond ©
February 2010

A superficial glance at Canada would leave the observer fully convinced Canadians have the greatest system of government that anyone could possibly want.

Canadians have a constitution that guarantees them equal treatment under the laws of Canada.

We also have an updated “Taxpayers Bill of Rights” that again assures them of equal treatment under the tax laws of Canada.

On top of that we have a government publication bearing the title: “Serving Canadians – Canada’s System of Justice” which declares “fairness” is a primary purpose of Canada’s laws and legal system.
Ref: http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/dept-min/pub/just/img/courten.pdf

Furthermore this document declares Canadians are assumed to be innocent, of any criminal charges, until proven guilty in a court of law.

To guarantee the above rights are readily available to all Canadians we have a Federal Minister of Justice, and a Supreme Court of Canada and a “Taxpayers Ombudsman”. What more could any person want in their land of opportunity?

In view of the foregoing assurances and guarantees none of the following events could ever happen in Canada.

(1) A plan to fight the “brain-drain” during the Hi-Tech boom years could never result in those who participated and remained loyal to their Canadian employers – and to Canada -- being taxed into financial ruin by the Canadian government. But it did happen and still does.

(2) No Canadian would ever be taxed on an unproven, one sided assumption, made by a Canadian government agency. i.e. The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). But it did happen and still does.

(3) Any Canadian who has been taxed on the same basis as the 37 former employees of the SDL Optics Inc/JDS Uniphase plant in Saanich British Columbia -- who had their taxes and related penalties revoked by way of a “Tax Remission Order” (TRO) – are automatically assured of the same “fair” tax treatment.

Nothing could be further from the truth. All other phantom income tax victims have been excluded from the tax treatment given the SDL Optics/JDS Uniphase victims.

(4) When our Prime Minister (PM) commits to “resolving” this unfair, unjust, tax issue you can rest assured it will be corrected. That is the way it should be – but it is not. Our PM reneged on this commitment.

The PM’s commitment was made two years ago and all that has happened since is the topic has been stonewalled by the PM and House of Commons in spite of a motion by the members of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) to have the problem corrected.

(5)When such examples -- of injustice, and departures from the intent of “Canada’s System of Justice” document -- would be brought to the attention of Canada’s Minister of Justice he would automatically initiate corrective action.

That is the way any observer would expect the system to work – but it doesn’t work that way. This issue was sent to the attention of the Hon. Rob. Nicholson, CP, MP, Minister of Justice,over a year ago and absolutely nothing happened. Apparently the job of the Minister of Justice is not to assure Canadians actually receive justice.

(6) In order to have their appeal for justice reviewed, by the Supreme Court of Canada, a victim must first have their appeal for justice denied by a lower court. Several victims have tried hiring a tax lawyer and taken their quest for justice to a lower court.

Every such case, I have been made aware of, were denied on the basis that Canada’s tax laws have not been violated. And so far I have not been made aware of any of these denied cases being taken to the Supreme Court of Canada for a ruling.

Why?

Because (so far) taking an appeal to court has been a case of throwing good money after bad and those hit hardest by this tax trap do not have the monetary resources to have another go at the courts in their quest for justice.

A person would expect that when a few victimized Canadians have been granted fair treatment, by way of a TRO, that a precedent has been set that should guarantee the same treatment would be granted similar victims by a court of law.

According to Tax Court of Canada, Chief Justice Donald Bowman the court judges are not bound to observe any precedent that has been set by way of previous judgements.

Ref: http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/dept-min/pub/just/img/courten.pdf

Following is the important text from this document: “taxpayers would probably be surprised to learn that Canadian courts have generally refused to recognize a duty of consistency on the part of the CRA in the course of administering and enforcing the Income Tax Act, and have expressly held that the CRA has no positive legal obligation to treat similarly situated taxpayers consistently As stated by now Chief Justice Bowman of the Tax Court.”

So first impressions of the justice guaranteed Canada’s citizens are purely a façade. The Prime Minister and his gang of mandarins have found a way to control the elected members of the House of Commons, and the leaders of Canada’s Loyal opposition Parties, rendering these two watchdogs of Canadian justice totally ineffective.

Every Canadian voter is entitled to know the position the political party -- they prefer to vote for – has on the phantom tax issue.

But that information has been denied, time after time, by the current MP’s and federal political party leaders.

Until I receive that information I won’t vote for any of them -- and you shouldn’t either.

Canadians have recently been receiving wake-up calls from newspaper journalists such as James Travers who had his article: “PM wakes a sleeping electorate” published in the Jan 28, 2010 on-line edition of the Toronto Star

The important message in this article being: “Imagine a confidential manual instructing chairs to manipulate, obstruct and, when necessary, sabotage committees. Imagine directly challenging the independence and objectivity of the chief electoral officer, sacking the nuclear safety watchdog for dutiful barking and then systematically choking counterparts probing issues as diverse and seminal as timely access to information.”

Some democracy Canada is becoming – it is beginning to make a dictatorship look good by comparison.

Canadian voters have tolerated far too much deception on the part of our federal political leaders and it is now time to take corrective action.

Notify your local riding MP you demand they honestly represent the best interests of their constituents, and all Canadians, by making a commitment to have the tax on phantom income revoked and all those already victimized, by it, to be fairly compensated.

The U.S.A. government has corrected their equivalent defective “Alternative Minimum Tax” (AMT) legislation Canada’s government has no excuse for continuing this travesty of justice including unequal treatment of Canadian victims.

See you at the voting polls for the next federal election O’Grady.

Victor Drummond ©