Nash, Dewar and Ashton unveil job-creation plans

The Globe and Mail:

As the first in a series of NDP leadership debates approaches, three of the people vying to fill the job left vacant by the death of Jack Layton have come forward with economic visions for Canada that are heavily reliant on job creation.

Niki Ashton, an MP from northern Manitoba, unveiled on Friday what she called a 10-point plan for a more inclusive economy.

If named leader, Ms. Ashton says she would create a national jobs and growth fund that would include permanent funding for infrastructure. She also says she would, among other things, tackle the underlying causes of economic inequality, provide more affordable tuition and training, create a national child-care program and reform the income-tax system to help lower- and middle-income Canadians.

Toronto MP Peggy Nash released a plan called A New Direction for Jobs and Prosperity on Friday in which she takes a hard swipe at the economic management of Stephen Harper’s Conservative government.

“The countries that have truly succeeded in modern global commerce haven’t handed over all decision-making power to corporations. They’ve recognized successful development needs all stakeholders pulling in the same direction – government, business, unions, universities.”

Ms. Nash says that as leader she would find ways to enhance the value that Canadians extract from our natural resource industries while reducing their environmental impacts.

She says she would also require foreign investors to make binding commitments to jobs and development, replace no-strings-attached tax breaks with incentives for innovation, leverage long-run job-creating investments in essential infrastructure, transportation, and energy projects, maximize Canadians’ access to and utilization of modern telecommunications technologies, and strengthen income-security programs.

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