Re: PM says policy was on menu at private fundraising events, Dec. 13

PM says policy was on menu at private fundraising events, Dec. 13

To be taken seriously as an agent of real, timely and inclusive change, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau must do at least two things:

First, he must act on his promise to make every vote count. At this point that means reviving Parliament’s Electoral Reform committee with five new appointments — five Liberal MPs who want to keep the promise and introduce proportional representation for the 2019 election.

Second, he should distance Parliament a bit from the suffocating grip of the wealthy by reducing or eliminating the personal contribution limits to political parties and reviving the Chretien per vote subsidy — a powerful instrument of proportional financing.

Thanks to the GST/HST, all Canadian citizens are taxpayers. They already provide most of the financing to all Canadian political parties through the tax system and the political tax credit.

In any representative democracy worthy of the name, citizens should be entitled to direct their tax dollars to the political party they prefer — and they should be fairly represented in Parliament by a politician or party they prefer.

Justin Trudeau is in position to complete the political logic of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms and make this country an adult representative democracy.

That’s the leadership Canada and the world now need more than ever.

John Deverell, Pickering

I find it a bit rich that the federal Liberal government feels so concerned about democracy’s future in Canada that they feel the need to involve the Canadian citizenry in an electoral reform survey. This while at the same time engaging in the most crass political act — that of granting access to government ministers (including the Prime Minister) in return for large financial contributions to the Liberal party from rich donors.

I’m not sure if others are smelling a bit of hypocrisy here, but it is pretty clear that any achievements on the democratic front will be severely undercut by the adverse effects of this shady practice.

Ross Hollingshead, Toronto

A foundation bearing Mr. Trudeau’s name, with relationships to his family and his government, raising money from foreign donors? And all of it legal?

Foundations are legal because they were set up by the extremely rich to protect their inheritance in a tax free manner. For a number of years the interest on the foundation’s millions is given away, but only to whomever the foundation deems fit. Then the millions of untouched inheritance becomes non-taxable.

What more could guarantee families continued wealth?

John Oliver, Ennismore