Maple Sandbox Historical Archive – 2012 to 2016

Budget 2015 Protects Others but Not Us?

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maplesandboxarchive

April 21, 2015

The Conservative budget for 2015 Supplementary Information contains an Update on the Automatic Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes including:

Under the new standard, foreign tax authorities will provide information to the Canada Revenue Agency relating to financial accounts in their jurisdictions held by Canadian residents. The Canada Revenue Agency will, on a reciprocal basis, provide corresponding information to the foreign tax authorities on accounts in Canada held by residents of their jurisdictions. In order for the Canada Revenue Agency to obtain the information to be exchanged, the common reporting standard will require financial institutions in Canada to implement due diligence procedures to identify accounts held by non-residents and report certain information relating to these accounts to the Agency. It will not require reporting on accounts held by residents of Canada with foreign citizenship. The standard includes important safeguards to protect taxpayer confidentiality and ensure that the exchanged information is used only by tax authorities and only for tax purposes.

Note the statement:

It will not require reporting on accounts held by residents of Canada with foreign citizenship.

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Unfortunately I don’t think that statement includes us–but I would love to be wrong about that.
Thanks to Tim for this find. Stephen has sent it to Joe Arvay.

11 responses to “Budget 2015 Protects Others but Not Us?”

Tim

April 21, 2015

For whatever its worth, I believe this latest statement by government will actually hurt them in court against our lawsuit. It would have been easier to single out ALL “foreign” citizens resident in Canada under S.15 Charter grounds(although not by much) than it would be to just single out “us.”
Unfortunately I am not sure the government of Canada really intends to “win” in our case against them as much as they simply want to stall “us.”

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1. Lynne Swanson
  
  April 22, 2015
  
  Why do you think the government just wants to stall us?
  
  This Con government certainly seems to love spending millions of tax dollars fighting Canadians in the courts and losing.
  
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recalcitrantexpat

April 21, 2015

FATCA and U.S. tax treaties bar U.S. persons abroad from any kind of protection from the U.S.’ rapacious tax laws. The U.S. government has clearly stated that U.S.. persons abroad will NOT come under the rules of the new common reporting standard. The “Savings Clause” is still in effect even under SCE.
If they had intended to do that then they would have just waited for the common reporting standard to be implemented. The U.S. always knew it was coming.

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1. Lynne Swanson
  
  April 22, 2015
  
  More hypocrisy from one of the world’s largest tax havens. It seems the US is trying to make itself the ONLY Tax haven in the world with FATCA.
  
  We all know “reciprocity” us not going to happen, but governments around the world fell for it.
  
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No_FATCA

April 21, 2015

RT @MapleSandbox: Budget 2015 Protects Others but Not Us?: http://t.co/e69qg2U8Vo Y is @JoeOliver1 not protecting Canadian citizens from #…

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NOTOFATCA

April 21, 2015

RT @MapleSandbox: Budget 2015 Protects Others but Not Us?: http://t.co/e69qg2U8Vo Y is @JoeOliver1 not protecting Canadian citizens from #…

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Marie

April 22, 2015

Such a blatant display of discrimination. Canada acknowledges that “residents of Canada”, (no mention of Canadian citizens) have certain rights. Yet U.S. persons resident in Canada, Canadian citizens, do not have the same rights.

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1. Lynne Swanson
  
  April 22, 2015
  
  “Congress has spoken” for Canada’s Parliament.
  
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PatCanadian

April 22, 2015

I agree. This is a blatant display of discrimination, as Marie says. Thank you to Stephen for passing this information on to Joe Arvay. All the more reason to support our lawsuit.
From Budget 2015, Protects Others But Not Us:
“It will not require reporting on accounts held by residents of Canada with foreign citizenship.”
Wouldn’t it be nice if the Supreme Court of Canada takes notice of this when the lawsuit goes to court.

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calgary411

April 22, 2015

Global News “…the cost is not enough for them to not do it, because the relief they will get from having ceased to be a U.S. person is greater than the cost.”

And, in case you missed it in Stephen Kish’s update today, an important PS. If you need any more reason to turn those pockets inside out…
$36,060 more needed in 8 days to make the May 1 2015 payment for Canadian FATCA IGA lawsuit/ Il nous reste 36,060 $ à ramasser pour notre poursuite judiciaire
An anonymous donor said this to me today in a long letter:
“…I can feel the fatigue in our small team, but please forward my words of encouragement: We are the only ones fighting FATCA [‘…the most arrogant piece of illegal, immoral and evil overreach by any foreign — yes, America happens to be foreign to the rest of the world…’] and CBT and any injury we can do to it will crack it open and show how evil it is inside. If we stop, nobody will do it…”
He/she describes some of the harm:
“…I also join a small testimony how all this affected my family…My mother, the only one with a hint of a long faded American accent, is scared of talking in public. She hasn’t had access to a bank account in three years, she cannot be associated with any of our businesses and cannot even be named on any of the assets she should be entitled to. She has become a non-person and so would we if our very dirty secret was discovered. Because of the fear of her place of birth being noticed at the U.S. immigration, we missed the funerals of her four closest relatives, including her parents. [Bold in original:] Let me repeat this: my mother wasn’t present at her parents’ funerals because she feared it might destroy the life of her husband and children!…“
Damn all that has made such things happen!!! If you want to stop such outrageousness, please donate so we can make the May 1st payment on justice: http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/.

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Stan in Ottawa

April 26, 2015

I’m one of those who agrees FATCA is an outrageous over reach of both Canadian sovereignty and unreasonable treatment of its long term dual citizens. Can you imagine Russia or China demanding we do what we are now doing for the IRS and US Dept. of the Treasury?
At the same time as a dual citizen I have been in compliance with the IRS for years. It’s not difficult because I’m an accountant and know both CDN & US tax law, forms and what is relevant. Filing the IRS return and the FBAR electronic form takes me about 3 hours per year and that’s when I have all documents at hand. Since approximately 2000 the IRS has not sent acknowledgements when they have processed my return although the DOT does acknowledge the FBAR’s when electronically filed. My income is below the foreign tax credit thresholds, I hold no US assets and have no US income. I have been in Canada for 42 years and a citizen for 35 years.
Here’s my appeal to followers of this blog. Besides the list of what we know the IRS could do including the process of renouncing citizenship, treatment of various tax programs, ie., RESP’s/TFSA’s/listing of cash accounts held in banks etc. What is the IRS actually doing in the first half of 2015 regarding enforcement against Canadians who hold dual citizenship? This would take the form of the type of threatening FATCA letters, demands to disgorge information, direct threats by Canadian chartered banks or near banks to close accounts, inability to open accounts, etc. It would be vital to have real examples on what behaviours the IRS is currently engaging in then factually highlight them. To me, it’s clear that virtually 99% of dual citizens in Canada will result in zero increase in taxes for the US treasury yet the fear is palpable and extremely stressful. Information would be vital. Keep up the good work!

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