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CANADIAN INDUSTRY ONLINE - JANUARY 2012
spend hours in line trying to get
paperwork done.
Another area that we’ve fought
hard for is to make sure E.I. rates
are much lower. E.I. premiums
stayed reasonable, about half what
the government originally planned
to implement. Those would be a
couple of areas where we’ve been
working hard. A third area would be
in lobbying, we’ve been lobbying
hard to get training tax credits
implemented for businesses. Some-
thing that is hugely important to
small businesses, having some extra
dollars to put towards training.
We also made some inroads with
Canada Revenue Agency. Many
businesses call us and complain
that they will call CRA a number of
times and each time are given a
different answer about a particular
issue. Now, because we have done
so much lobbying to get to the
bottom of these issues, CRA is
taking some action to rectify the
CIO: Why do you think CFIB “works”?
Laura Jones: I think one of the
biggest strengths of CFIB is that we
have grown a lot over the years,
which helps with our credibility and
our influence, and how we have
influence in public policy, we have
maintained the sense of being a
really grassroots organization.
Our members are very important
to us, we take direction from our
members, so we evaluate what we
think about public policy but really
that is driven by our members. I
think that’s why we’re so effective.
CIO: What are some of the successes that
you had in 2011 and what policy
initiatives are you working on now?
LJ: One of the big areas we’ve had
success in is in the area of red tape
for small businesses. You might take
an hour to go get your driver’s
license renewed, it will be annoying
because you have the kids etc. but
this is not a daily occurrence. For
small business owners, red tape and
paper work is part of everyday life.
CFIB is continually trying to get
politicians to take this seriously—
small business owners would be
much more productive if they didn’t
EXCLUSIVES - CFIB