Bill Morneau voted “Business Newsmaker of the Year” by Canadian Press

You’ve worked hard for many years to build up your renovation or homebuilding firm. It’s a small business still – not a major commercial firm – but you are billing a few million dollars a year, and able to enjoy a decent income. You protect your company’s future by taking advantage of legal tax reduction methods, including income splitting with your wife. You don’t take all your profits out in salary, but invest them – within the business – in real estate, equities, bonds and other non-contracting opportunities. You do everything you can to minimize taxes, paying strict attention to the tax code and the law.

And Federal Finance Minister Bill Morneau, in late summer 2017, decided to go after you. With the Liberals’ proposed changes to the tax code, self-incorporated professionals like doctors, architects, contractors and even farmers, would see their Federal taxes potentially rise sharply.

An outcry from the contracting community, in part, convinced Morneau to water down his tax “reform” proposals. Just how watered down they will remain, we will only know when the legislation is introduced in Ottawa this spring or early summer.

Now, for the tremendous publicity – much of it highly negative – that Morneau’s plan generated – as well his own potential conflict of interests related to his own family’s business dealings – Morneau has been voted the 2017 Business Newsmaker of the Year by The Canadian Press.

See the full story here.