Monthly Archives: January 2014

Toronto Globe & Mail editorial on the rights of dual citizens:

“You Can’t be Partly Canadian”

The Globe recognizes the needs and rights of dual citizens. I have responded with a posted comment, emphasizing the needs of dual citizens to be protected from their country of origin while within Canada, especially from FATCA and related US initiatives.

For now, the Department of Foreign Affairs seems uninterested in pursuing the suggestion of one of its senior bureaucrats: to scale back consular services for some Canadians with dual citizenship, who live abroad for long periods of time.

For Mohamed Fahmy, a Canadian journalist who has been held for more than two weeks in one of Egypt’s most notorious prisons, that’s especially welcome news.

If Ottawa were to change the rules of consular assistance – along the lines of what has been floated — Mr. Fahmy couldn’t count on Canada’s help to free him from detention in Egypt’s Tora prison. He has been held there, without charge, since Dec. 29, after authorities accused him of filming interviews with members of the now banned Muslim Brotherhood…

Canadians like Mr. Fahmy should get the consular assistance they need. There’s no such thing as a second-class Canadian citizen.

I have been bounced from person to person this morning as I attempted to get a list of the attendees to the Calgary meeting with Minister of State (Finance) Sorenson this afternoon in Calgary at the Chamber of Commerce.

http://www.fin.gc.ca/notices-avis14/2014-01-15_1-eng.asp

My last was a call back from MP Joan Crockatt’s office (Calgary Centre). First of all I was asked my reason for wanting to have the list. I was told that FATCA would not be a subject up for discussion at the pre-consultation budget meeting.

I am a Canadian citizen who thinks FATCA should be part of the discussion for it will be a huge cost to Canada as a whole and for every Canadian taxpayer, not just those who will be deemed ‘US Persons in Canada’.

I am a Canadian citizen and for that reason expected a reasonable response.

It was suggested that I would better contact Michelle Rempel’s office (my MP) and ask to be a part of their pre-budget consultations. Also suggested was that I check Government of Canada, Finance online as there are opportunities to make submissions regarding the Budget from time to time. I was told that Canada is in arbitration with the US – and that is a good thing.

I am posting this so there is a record of my attempts at reasonably asking for a list of individuals attending a pre-budget meeting in my the city where I live — DENIED, told ‘the list’ is a “Closed List”.

I will also send yet another email on this to my Canadian Finance Minister Flaherty and to the opposition Finance critics.

This should be public information. Shame on Finance.

Does this make anyone else angry?

Off topic, this was on MP Joan Crockatt’s website and likely many of other MP websites.

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January 10, 2014
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Hey folks, this is hot off the Press Secrectary Jay Carney who said that Obama believes that the circumstances of one’s birth should not determine a person’s destiny.

He said this today during a press conference.  Can anyone dig up a video or a transcript?

UPDATE:  Here is something that WhatamI found from last February:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/02/12/president-barack-obamas-state-union-address

Tonight, let’s also recognize that there are communities in this country where no matter how hard you work, it’s virtually impossible to get ahead. Factory towns decimated from years of plants packing up. Inescapable pockets of poverty, urban and rural, where young adults are still fighting for their first job. America is not a place where chance of birth or circumstance should decide our destiny. And that is why we need to build new ladders of opportunity into the middle class for all who are willing to climb them.

Let the exodus of foreign investments from the tax haven of USA begin! A new article out today at accountingtoday.com reports:

A federal court has ruled that U.S. banks must report to foreign governments on the holdings of nonresident alien account holders under the intergovernmental agreements that the Treasury Department has signed with other countries’ tax authorities in an effort to implement the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act.

http://www.accountingtoday.com/news/Judge-Rules-Banks-Must-Report-Foreign-Countries-FATCA-Deals-69297-1.html

I received links today from an Isaac Brock Society friend who says ‘Please feel free to post the links on Isaac Brock. I really don’t have the energy to start posting myself, so if it is OK I will send you anything I think might be useful (I get google alerts every day), and you can decide whether to post it or not.’

Yes, I absolutely will help out. I hope you too will find these contributions from Helen Burggraf to International Adviser, Tax & Regulation of interest and use.

IRS watchdog says agency’s offshore voluntary disclosure schemes too harsh

and:

IRS unveils latest batch of FATCA, PFIC regulations

Despite much effort on the part of those in Switzerland who were aware of the FATCA threat, the referendum against the Swiss IGA and the unconstitutional Swiss Application Law did not obtain enough signatures Continue reading →