Canada Politics

Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak announces plan for corporate and personal tax cuts

·Politics Reporter

May 13, 2014 at 3:11 p.m.

There's a school of thought that opposition parties — who are leading in the polls — should play it safe.

For example, you can bet political strategists who follow this theory are telling Ontario Progressive Conservative party leader Tim Hudak to lead a front runner campaign ahead of the June 12th election. They're telling him to introduce only broad stroke policy issues (nothing specific) while focusing on the numerous scandals accumulated by the Dalton McGuinty/Kathleen Wynne Liberals.

Hudak isn't doing any of that. In fact, it looks like he's doing the opposite — he's running a very bold and aggressive campaign focused on policy; his policy.

[ More Ontario election coverage: Unions mobilizing against Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak ]

Case in point: On Tuesday, Hudak announced that a PC government would lower corporate tax rate by 30 per cent and reduce bureaucratic red tap by at least one-third. Moreover, he vowed to reduce personal income taxes by 10 per cent —over four years — after the budget is balanced in 2016/17.

Hudak says that these policies emanate from his ambitious plan to create 1 million jobs over eight years.

"I’m committed to making job creation job one. So our kids don’t have to go to Alberta to start a career and a family," he said in a statement.

"So we can afford the health care we all rely on. So all our neighbors and fellow citizens can have the dignity and self - reliance that only come from a good job."

These policies come on the heels of another meaty policy announcement last Friday. At a campaign stop in Barrie, the PC leader said that he intends to eliminate 100,000 public sector jobs, implement an across-the-board wage freeze for all government workers and lower spending in every area of government but health care.

Only health care? Not education?

When's the last time you heard a political leader -- during any election campaign anywhere in Canada -- say that he'll spend less on education?

All the bold -- very conservative -- policy edicts has one pundit calling Hudak's plan the "Deeper, Faster Common Sense Revolution" referring, of course, to former Tory Premier Mike Harris' massive spending cuts in the 1990's.

Nevertheless, it seems to be working.

According to a polling analysis done by ThreeHundredEight.com's Eric Grenier, on Monday, the PCs have an eight point lead over the Liberals and poised to win a slim majority.

"The PCs are now projected to have 39.6 per cent support (or between 38 per cent and 43 per cent), followed by the Liberals at 31.1 per cent (or between 30 per cent and 34 per cent) and the New Democrats at 25.3 per cent (or between 23 per cent and 27 per cent)," Grenier notes.

Meanwhile, since the beginning of the campaign, the Liberals having been going harder after the NDP than the PCs even releasing an attack ad dubbed "Is Andrea Horwath for real?"

Despite the PC's aggressive campaign and their strong lead in the polls, don't expect that to change — according to Abacus Data pollster David Coletto.

"The numbers...demonstrate why the Liberals are going after the NDP," Coletto told Yahoo Canada News.

"If the NDP gets 25 to 28 per cent of the vote, the Liberals can't win. And most of the persuadable voters are on the centre-left side of the political spectrum."

(Photo courtesy of the Canadian Press)

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