Ambrose talks economy and security with local Rotarians

Editor’s Note: Last week we published two videos of Rona Ambrose’s presentation. These can be found at the bottom of this story.

by Stephen Dafoe

Canada’s economy and national security were the main topics of a 20-minute presentation to local Rotarians by Federal Minister of Health and Sturgeon River–Parkland Conservative candidate Rona Ambrose Aug. 12.

The Rotary visit was Ambrose’s second to the Morinville club. Her first visit was where she announced she would be running in the newly announced Sturgeon River — Parkland riding.

Ambrose told Rotarians her government has been focused over the last nine years on the issues they believe matter to Canadians: creating jobs, focusing on financial security, lowering taxes for families, and keeping Canadians safe in what Ambrose said is an increasingly dangerous world.

“Prime Minister Harper has made, I believe, very careful and principled choices that reflect the values of hardworking Canadians across this country,” Ambrose said, adding she believed the true mark of a leader was achieving success in times of risk and danger. “We’ve seen economic risk, whether it was in the 2008 Great Recession or around the world in economic instability and also the danger of ISIS.”

Ambrose said during the 2008 financial crisis, Harper promised to set a course towards balanced budgets once the recession was over and to do so not by raising taxes but by controlling spending and reining in costs. “Canada continues to be exposed to what is a fragile global economy, but under the strong leadership of Prime Minister Harper, Canada has made the right choices through the global recession. We have weathered this economic instability with a certain plan. that plan is low taxes, a balanced budget now, economic growth and benefits going directly to family in the forms of either direct cash benefits or low taxes.”

Ambrose said the result has been a considerable rise in employment since 2008, numbers she says are 20 per cent higher than the closest G7 competitor. “You’ve created in the economy 1.2 million new jobs,” she said. “Government doesn’t create jobs. We create the environment for job creation. It’s businesses that create jobs.”

The Conservative candidate went on to say Canada is the only G7 member to have the highest Triple A credit rating from all the major rating agencies. “That makes a big difference to people who are thinking about investing in our country,” Ambrose said, adding Canada’s GDP has increased more and its debt-to-GDP ratio is lower than any G7 country. “Again, that’s what everyone looks at when they are thinking of investing in our country. Now both the International Monetary Fund and OECD [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development] now expect Canada to be among the strongest growing economies in the G7 over a number of years. The World Economic Forum has now ranked Canada’s banks as the best in the world for seven years in a row.”

Ambrose said her government reduced business taxes to 11 per cent and are planning to reduce them to 9 per cent, a measure that will reduce business taxes by $2.7 billion. It is money Ambrose and her party believe will create additional Canadian jobs.

“Because of the tax measures Prime Minister Harper has put in place for small businesses, by 2019 the tax burden on small businesses will be cut in half,” she said. “This means an annual tax reduction of up to $38,600 that can be reinvested in a business to grow and hire more people. and that’s exactly what we want to see.”

National Security

Ambrose spent the second half of her presentation talking about national security and the threat of ISIS.
“We are in a different world now because this threat of Jihadism that isn’t just coming from parts of Asia and Africa where there’s failed states where these guys hide in refuge and plot their next attack. We’re now seeing ISIS attacks in places like Australia, France and Belgium, and, of course, here in Canada, we’ve had two attacks so far.”

Ambrose said Jihadist terrorism is not a future possiblility but a present day reality, one that could arise again in Canada. “These terrorist, these barbarians as I call them, seek to harm us here in Canada. We’ve been harmed by them. We’ve been targeted by them, and they want to harm us because they hate our way of life. They hate our tolerance, our freedom of religion and freedom of speech.”

Ambrose went on to say what seperates her party’s leader from other leaders in the world and at home is that Harper has not been afraid to confront the issue and call it what it is.

“I would say the highest responsibility of any government, of any Canadian government, is that we keep Canadians freedoms strong and keep Canadians safe,” Ambrose said.

VIDEO COVERAGE

Rona Ambrose in Morinville Aug. 12.

Federal Minister of Health and candidate in the upcoming federal election spoke to the Rotary Club of Morinville this morning. Here is the first of two video segments of her presentation, this one on the economy.

Posted by MorinvilleNews.com on Wednesday, 12 August 2015

Rona Ambrose in Morinville Part 2

Here is part two of our video coverage of Rona Ambrose's visit to Morinville this morning.

Posted by MorinvilleNews.com on Wednesday, 12 August 2015

Print Friendly, PDF & Email