What the Conservatives have promised to do in their next term

Canwest News Service

Prime Minister Stephen Harper gives the crowd his thumbs up after giving his acceptance speech to the Conservative gathering Tuesday Oct. 14 at Calgary's Telus Convention Centre. (Ted Rhodes/Calgary Herald)

Jobs, the economy and business:     

• $60 million annually: for bonuses to apprentices who finish their training.     
• $60 million over three years: for job retraining for older workers.     
• $147 million annually: to allow the self-employed into the EI benefits program so they can claim maternity and paternity benefits.     
• $220 million over four years: to reduce the tax burden on small business.     
• $200 million over four years: for auto sector.     
• $200 million over four years: for aerospace sector.     
• $345 million over four years: the cost to eliminate tariffs on importing machinery for the manufacturing sector.     
• $600 million annually: to cut the excise tax on diesel and aviation fuel to two cents per litre from four.     
• Reduce red tape for small business.     
• Create a new venture capital fund.     
• New copyright, counterfeiting and piracy laws.     
• Allow more foreign investment, especially in airlines and uranium mining.     
• Be able to block foreign takeovers that endanger national security.     
• Invest in science and technology.     
• Reduce interprovincial trade and mobility barriers.     
• Open more trade offices in emerging markets.     
• Help the forestry, fishing and mining industries.     
• Facilitate the development of a northern pipeline.

Healthcare:     

• $20 million over four years: to induce Canadian doctors and nurses to return home to practise.     
• $15 million over four years: to study the impact of Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's.     
• $10 million over two years: for respiratory illness.      
• End discriminatory life insurance practices.     
• Ban flavoured cigarettes and kid-sized packages of cigarillos.     
• Ban tobacco advertising in print or electronic media marketed to youth.

Families:     

• $100 million annually: for changes to the Universal Child Care Benefit.     
• $150 million over four years: for changes to education savings programs to allow lower-income families to participate.     
• $80 million annually: for tax relief to allow a spouse to care for a disabled family member.
• $420 million annually: for tax relief for seniors.     
• $200 million annually: for tax credit for first-time homebuyers.
• Expand the Disability Savings Plan.

Environment:     

• $113 million over five years: to enforce environmental laws.     
• Strengthen the ban on the bulk export of water.     
• Prevent the export of raw bitumen from the oilsands to countries with lower environmental standards.     
• Invest in alternative energies.     
• Work towards a target of 90 per cent electricity from non-emitting sources by 2020.     
• Strengthen pollution laws in the north.     
• Create a cap and trade system to cut greenhouse gases.     
• Create a publicly available database of corporate polluters.     
• Create more national parks.     
• Strengthen the environmental protection act to better control toxic chemicals.

Regional development:     

• $300 million over four years: for regional economic development.     
• $7 million over three years: for Quebec sea farming and aquaculture industry.     
• $24 million one-time funding: to expand cruise ship tourism along the St. Lawrence River.     
• $25 million over five years: to increase funding to TV5, a Quebec-based international French-language television network.     
• Broaden the areas of Ontario eligible for regional development funding.     
• Create a regional development agency for the North.     
• Build a High Arctic research station.

Crime:     

• $10 million annually beginning next spring: to increase the funding to the Youth Gang Prevention Fund.     
• Tougher sentences for young offenders who commit violent crimes.     
• Make it harder to get out on parole.     
• End house arrest for a long list of offences.     
• Repeal the "faint hope" clause.     
• Toughen laws against bikers, gangs and for those who commit drive-by shootings.     
• Make it possible for victims of terrorist acts to sue for damages.     
• Mandatory prison sentences for some drug crimes.     
• Tougher laws for attacks on pregnant women.     
• Tougher penalties for impaired driving convictions.     
• Strengthen border security to keep illegal guns out of Canada.     
• All sex offenders will go on the sex offender registry and be made to provide DNA samples.

Consumers:     

• $5 million annually: for more consumer inspectors for gas pumps and heating meters.     
• Higher penalties for companies and cartels that engage in price fixing.     
• Ban text message fees on spam text messages.     
• Toughen laws against internet spam.     
• Improve "made in Canada" labelling of consumer products.     
• Stronger product safety legislation.     
• Guarantee one quarter of commissioners on the CRTC will be french speaking.     
• Launch an investigation into the recent listeriosis outbreak.

Native people:     

• Improve access to education.     
• Address grievances of aboriginals left out of the residential school settlement.

Immigration:     

• Reduce the immigration backlog.     
• Make it easier for skilled workers to work in their field.     
• Regulate immigration consultants.

Cities and Infrastructure:     

• Invest in new projects in rural and northern Canada.

Farmers:     

• Increase slaughterhouse capacity.     
• Continue to change the Wheat Board.     
• $500 million over four years: aid to farmers. ($250 million is new money)

Parliament:     

• Reform or abolish the Senate.     
• Redistribute and add seats as necessary to the House of Commons to better reflect population. No province would lose seats.     
• Create a Charter of Open Federalism.

Accountability:     

• Create a task force to identify unnecessary federal appointments.     
• Ensure federal appointees reflect the ethnic, age, and gender diversity of Canada.     
• Create a Public Appointments Commission.     
• Require all departments and agencies to produce quarterly financial statements.

Arts and Culture:     

• Not proceed with a clause in a tax bill that would cut funding for film and television projects with graphic content.     
• $150 million annually: for children's arts tax credit.     
• Will not cut funding to arts and culture.     
• Promote Canadian history and heritage.

Foreign relations and defence:     

• Increases the size of the military.     
• Keep troops in Afghanistan until July 2011.     
• $50 million annually: to restore the veterans' allowance for veterans from Commonwealth countries or Second World War allies who have lived in Canada at least 10 years.     
• Increase funeral/burial assistance for veterans.     
• Promote democracy around the world with a new agency.     
• Double foreign aid from 2005 levels.