Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes-Brock MP Jamie Schmale says the audit Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his party are trying to push on small businesses is “unfair”
“It’s an interesting tactic that the prime minister is taking,” he told Rick Lowes on the Moose Morning Show on 93.5 Moose FM. “Haliburton County is built on the back of small business owners. These are the businesses that have been told to lock down and shut down.” Schmale points to bigger stores like Wal-Mart or Home Depot that are able to be open, even though they mostly offer the same service and goods as the smaller businesses do. “This has created a huge distortion in the marketplace,” he says, adding that it’s hurting those small businesses.
“Now the prime minister is saying ‘well, I think you might be taking advantage of some of these programs,” Schmale says. Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole called on the Liberals to pause the audits.
Schmale says small businesses are in tough because they’re losing their customer base to bigger box stores. “Your life dream of owning a small business is going down the drain,” he says. “The last thing you need is the Canada revenue agency to sit down and go through your books,” he says.
Schmale says small businesses are getting the short end of the stick. It’s these businesses, he says, that help to grow our community.