The Honourable James M. Flaherty, Minister of Finance, presented his 2014 federal budget (also known as Economic Action Plan) on 11 February 2014. This is the third budget after the Federal Conservative Party won majority government in 2011. Tax-related highlights contained therein are as follows:

Search and Rescue Volunteers Tax Credit

To recognize the important role played by search and rescue volunteers who put themselves at risk in the service of their communities, the 2014 Budget announced a new 15% non-refundable Search and Rescue Volunteers Tax Credit on an amount of $3,000 for ground, air and marine search and rescue volunteers. This credit will be available to search and rescue volunteers who perform at least 200 hours (or 25 8-hour full work days) of service during a year.

Assuming the minimal requirement of 200 hours of service is met, this translates into a tax saving of $15 per hour of volunteer work.

Remarks

The 2014 Budget introduced no new taxes on business. It asserted to continue to cut red tape in tax compliance and regulatory burden for small and medium-sized businesses.

On individual tax, the Budget kept taxes low, helped make adoption more affordable for Canadian families and provides further tax recognition of health-related expenses.

Although there is no earth-shaking tax changes in the 2014 Budget, a measure of ensuring everyone pays their fair share of tax is noteworthy. The Offshore Tax Informant Program announced in Economic Action Plan 2013 is still in effect. Contrary to previous policy of not rewarding tax evasion leads, CRA began to pay informants 5% to 15% of the federal tax collected related to the international tax non-compliance (not including interest and penalties). Award payment will be treated as taxable income to the informant in the year it is received.