UPDATE January 24, 2015: THIRD OF FIVE LEGAL BILLS PAID
[We now have a NEW POST taking us up to May 1, 2015. This post will be retired from service.]
On August 11, 2014, Constitutional Litigator Joseph Arvay filed a FATCA IGA lawsuit in Canada Federal Court on behalf of Plaintiffs Ginny and Gwen, the Alliance for the Defence of Canadian Sovereignty (en français), and all peoples worldwide. Read Alliance’s Claims and comment on our Alliance blog.
Chers amis et donateurs,
Ensemble, nous avons atteint notre but : ramasser les fonds nécessaires pour payer la troisième des cinq factures légales de notre poursuite judiciaire.
Ramasser 300 000 $ provenant de petits dons est un exploit tout à fait extraordinaire et nous invitons notre gouvernement canadien, ainsi que tous les autres gouvernements qui ont piétiné les droits de leurs citoyens, à en prendre bonne note.
Chaque jour, nous nous rapprochons de notre but. Déjà, nous avons ramassé plus de la moitié des fonds nécessaires pour payer les frais légaux de notre poursuite contre le gouvernement canadien et l’entente FATCA.
Si nous avons parcouru un si grand bout de chemin, c’est grâce à nos deux courageuses plaignantes, Ginny et Gwen, à nos donateurs provenant du Canada et de partout dans le monde, ainsi qu’aux administrateurs des sites Internet Isaac Brock Society et Maple Sandbox. Ils permettent tous à nos voix d’être entendues.
Merci !
L’équipe de l’ADSC
———————————————————————————————–
Dear Friends and Supporters,
Together we have reached our goal of paying off the third of five retainer fees for our Canadian FATCA IGA lawsuit.
Raising $300,000 from small donations is a pretty amazing achievement and we ask the Government of Canada, and those other governments who have also tossed away rights of their citizens, to take notice.
It’s still a marathon, but we are more than half way to pay off the Federal Court legal costs.
We have come so far because of our brave Plaintiffs, Ginny and Gwen, our Canadian and International donor-supporters, and the administrators of the Isaac Brock and Maple Sandbox websites who make it possible for our voices to be heard.
Thank you all,
—The ADCS-ADSC team
@ Bubblebustin Harper FATCA IGA has a ring to it. Anyone have some musical talent to the tune of the old country song Harper Valley PTA? That’s what came to my mind when I read that phrase.
@ heartsick
I did that parody a month ago after a prompt from Bubblebustin. It’s here:
https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2014/11/17/what-should-be-the-position-of-people-living-abroad-with-unwanted-united-states-deemed-citizenship/comment-page-1/#comments
See:
EmBee says
November 17, 2014 at 4:33 pm
DÉJÀ VU — https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2014/11/10/oh-canada/comment-page-2/#comment-4230362 and https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2014/11/10/oh-canada/comment-page-2/#comment-4231045
Yes, EmBee again: https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2014/11/17/what-should-be-the-position-of-people-living-abroad-with-unwanted-united-states-deemed-citizenship/comment-page-1/#comment-4329093
Thanks, calgary411
I never figured out how to direct someone to a specific comment. How’s that done?
@Embee,
they didn’t answer MP Mai’s questions with any substance either;
See:
“Q-412 — Mr. Mai (Brossard—La Prairie) — With regard to the Canada Revenue Agency’s (CRA) responses to the provisions of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) regarding the Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts (FBAR): (a) according to the government’s analysis, do the IRS provisions comply with the provisions of the Convention Between Canada and the United States of America With Respect to Taxes on Income and on Capital and its amending Protocol (2007); (b) are there Canadian exemptions to FBAR; (c) has Canada negotiated the FBAR provisions with United States Treasury Officials or the IRS, (i) at what time was the government made aware of these provisions, (ii) how long did it take for Canada to respond to the changes made by the IRS and the United States Treasury; (d) how will the government ensure that the CRA does not act on behalf of the IRS to collect revenues and penalties; (e) has Canada informed dual citizens about their tax obligations resulting from FBAR; (f) what was the number of exchanges of information between Canada and the United States of America this year and during the past ten years regarding FBAR, (i) has the CRA set internal deadlines to be able to respond to exchange of information requests in a timely manner, (ii) will Canada work to improve bilateral cooperation on this issue, (iii) has there been an increase of exchange of information requests at the CRA due to FBAR; (g) will the government lose revenue as a result of the implementation of FBAR; (h) what are the cost implications emanating from FBAR (i) for the government, (ii) for the CRA, (iii) for Canadian banks, (iv) who will absorb these costs, (v) are there other types of non-financial costs such as efficiency or fairness reductions; (i) how many complaints has the CRA received regarding FBAR or related vexatious inquiries by the IRS, (i) what are the main complaints, (ii) what has the CRA done concerning these complaints, (iii) what department at the CRA is in charge of dealing with complaints of this nature, (iv) will the CRA cut Full-Time Equivalents from that department or reduce its funding, (v) has the office of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsman looked into the matter; (j) will FBAR prevent double taxation of pre-migration gain; (k) has there been an increase in arbitration cases due to active procedures by the IRS, (i) what departments are most affected, (ii) has the CRA cut Full-Time Equivalents from each of these affected departments or reduced their funding; (l) will FBAR affect different saving vehicles such as, but not limited to, (i) Registered Retirement Savings Plans, (ii) Registered Education Savings Plans, (iii) Registered Disability Savings Plans, (iv) Tax-Free Savings Accounts; and (m) how many Canadian-American dual citizens are affected by FBAR and does Canada have contact information for the dual citizens affected by FBAR?” —
Publications – March 13, 2012
Debates | Order Paper and Notice Paper | Journals
HOUSE OF COMMONS OF CANADA
41st PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION CHAMBRE DES COMMUNES DU CANADA
41e LÉGISLATURE, 1re SESSION
Journals
No. 95
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
10:00 a.m. ‘
Sessional Paper No. 8555-411-412.”
http://www.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=41&Ses=1&DocId=5448576
Here is the ‘response’ that NDP MP Mai received:
http://isaacbrocksociety.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/irs-fatca-q-413.pdf
which schubert posted here:
https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2012/03/19/cra-replies-regarding-fatca/
@ Embee Thanks
@ Embee Great job, sorry I missed your Harper FATCA IGA, I was on a non-US holiday at the time.
For those who haven’t been reading IBS from the beginning, or those who need a refresher, and those who haven’t given to the ADCS legal challenge fund yet – in order to defend Canadian sovereignty against US predations ala FATCA;
Read/review the non-answers received back in 2012 to the Order Paper questions tabled by NDP MP Mai:
Here are MP Mai’s questions, and the (non) ‘responses’ that NDP MP Mai received:
ORDER/ADDRESS OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS
Q-413 Mr. Mai (Brossard-La Prairie) January 26, 2012 1 26 janvier 2012
MAR 1 4 2012.
http://isaacbrocksociety.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/irs-fatca-q-413.pdf
which schubert posted here:
https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2012/03/19/cra-replies-regarding-fatca/
You might scroll through and review pages 8-9, and see the ‘answer’ by the Ministry of Finance – keeping in mind that then the Minister of Finance was Jim Flaherty. Part of the ‘answer’ is a shorter version of the statements which many are familiar with from the letter published only in a Canadian newspaper September 16, 2011 http://business.financialpost.com/2011/09/16/read-jim-flahertys-letter-on-americans-in-canada/ (I think the Financial Post was the only one to publish it, though it was, apparently, designed/intended for publication by US media – who apparently declined. The Financial Post notes: “Finance Minister Jim Flaherty penned this letter, intended for publication in major newspapers including The Washington Post, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.”).
Compare that letter penned by Finance Minister Flaherty in 2011, to the non-answers to MP Mai’s questions of 2012, and the later non-answers rec’d by Liberal MP Hsu in ‘reply’ to his Order Paper questions. See Q-121 Mr. Hsu (Kingston and the Islands) posed October 25, 2013 in Parliament http://blog.tedhsu.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Q121-2.pdf – sourced from http://blog.tedhsu.ca/2014/01/28/government-responds-to-my-fatca-question/
@Embee,
have always loved your parodies.
@ heartsick
Nobody can follow everything at Brock and I am delighted that you had a non-US holiday. As the FATCA fallout continues there will be more and more of those, by more and more of us.
@ badger
My first post (very, very tentative) at Brock was March 26, 2012 so I missed seeing M.P. Mai’s excellent set of questions — or maybe I saw them and they got lost in my early-days bewilderment. Thank you for retrieving that from your extremely well organized databank. You, with your amazing research abilities and articulate comments, are a Brock treasure.
Directing someone to a specific comment — I may do it a long way around, but I get to that specific comment (sometimes going back a ways on that particular post) and then right-click on the date and time, COPY and PASTE into a new comment.
OH. It’s one of those right-click things. My mouse doesn’t do that but I think the control key works the same way. I’ll try it …
https://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2014/10/22/97975-more-needed-to-make-the-february-1-2015-payment-for-canadian-fatca-iga-lawsuit-il-nous-reste-97-975-a-ramasser-pour-notre-poursuite-judiciaire/comment-page-27/#comment-4823921
@Calgary411, great I did not know that.
Ideas, ideas…
@Badger Is there benefit to having a Welcome section for persons new to IBS? The About Isaac Brock Society has some information. Could the link be in menu bar to right of Archive. Maybe talk about sections including comment on media blog & encourage people to comment and join the community.
@Calgary411 Do we incorporate on this page a nice Donate Now button as there is on the ADCS site. Perhaps below the ADCS link on the upper right. This would go straight to the donate section on ADCS.
Somewhere we may also emphasize donation to Isaac Brock Society.
Sure you’ll all be interested :
Swiss Bank exits FATCA programme
http://cnsbusiness.com/2014/12/15/swiss-bank-exits-fatca-programme/
And :
U.S. Citizenship Based Taxation: Unique or Outrageous?
If Kenya matched citizenship tax laws with U.S., Obama would be required to file income tax returns to both United States and Kenya. With more than $10,000 in assets, this would include a comprehensive and invasive Foreign Bank Account Report (FBAR) to Kenya on all his bank accounts and other savings and investments–including joint accounts with Michelle and education savings for Malia and Sasha. For failing to do, Obama could face a penalty of the greater of 50% of the value of each account or $100,000.
“That’s outrageous,” Obama would likely declare. “I didn’t even know. Why should I pay taxes to another country? I pay taxes here in United States where I live.”
– See more at: http://www.tax-news.com/articles/US_Citizenship_Based_Taxation_Unique_or_Outrageous___571149.html#sthash.ZbeaVrsP.dpuf
VERY IMPORTANT:
Read the conversations in the Dec 2014 results from this search of openparliament.ca :
Ex. see http://openparliament.ca/search/?q=fatca&sort=date+desc
CRA is asking for specific amounts from ALL CANADIAN TAXPAYERS to pay for implementing FATCA, and talks about costs.
Read transcript from December 3rd, 2014 / 3:40 p.m.
NDP MP Guy Caron Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC asking the CRA questions “…When the committee was studying the matter, the department wasn’t able to provide us with the costs of the agreement, for either the agency or the financial institutions. Do you now have that information, from the moment when the funding for implementation is released?…”… http://openparliament.ca/committees/finance/41-2/63/guy-caron-4/ . Read CRA answers, ”
3:45 p.m.
Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
Rick Stewart
“The costs that we are working with for our ability to implement the obligations that we have to administer this agreement is funding of, I believe, $15.7 million or $15.8 million, which has been allocated to the CRA to implement this over these next few years.
Those costs are principally intended to support the costs of implementing a new electronic form for mandatory filing for financial institutions to be able to file their obligations to us, a database in which we would be able to receive and store that information, and the tools to give us the ability to select files from that database for subsequent transmission electronically to the Internal Revenue Service in order to comply with those obligations.”
Witness recent comments by Conservative MP Mike Allen http://openparliament.ca/committees/finance/41-2/63/mike-allen-1/ (remember from the infamous Omnibus Bill C-31 Finance hearings re the FATCA IGA, etc.?
All those out there reading and not donating – you’ve got to contribute. There is no other way to stop the Harper government from unlawfully denying some Canadian citizens their Charter and Constitutional rights, and wasting our hard earned Canadian savings and tax money on doing the dirty work of the US government, and assisting the US Treasury predator from sucking lawful, local assets out of Canada and away from Canadian families, children and businesses – based only on the nationality of our parent/s, or where our mothers gave birth, or long expired greencards, etc.
Read for yourself how the CONS – that is the Conservatives dodged the cost-benefit question, or even just the cost question when questioned in earlier days on this point by MP Mai and MPs Hsu and Brison, yet, here we go – ALL CANADIANS are going to pay the CRA substantial sums of our CANADIAN TAXPAYER revenues to do the US bidding – with NOTHING in it for CANADA except that Canadian banksters and their investment industry kin get to continue on their merry way with ALL CANADIAN TAXPAYERS, ALL CANADIAN CITIZENS, ALL LEGAL RESIDENTS and ALL ACCOUNTHOLDERS footing the bill for the FATCA IGA.
DONATE to the ADCS Legal Challenge now. http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/
WE MUST NOT FAIL.
Seems like we will likely cross the 15 Million page view line later today or tomorrow perhaps. Present count on this site is 14.324 Million and on the old site 0.6 Million. Word keeps on spreading … hopefully the contributions to the constitutional challenge at http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/ will grow as the ground is seeded with information.
@Nervousinvestor,
—and I will say again that these are my numbers that I focus on each day:
“We now need approximately $1375/day by February 1, 2015.”
Badger, re: ” and the tools to give us the ability to select files from that database for subsequent transmission electronically to the Internal Revenue Service in order to comply with those obligations.”
Its not the first time I’ve been accused of over-reacting, and I have asked this question before, but will put it out there again, could the CRA FATCA systems be designed to summarize holdings by SIN, which would make the strategy of ‘keep everything at any one FFI under 50K to elude FATCA’ ineffective? If so, this could be why some FFI’s will not/are not distinquishing accounts over/under 50K? In other words, report them all and let CRA figure out how much an individual has in total based on reports from multiple FFI’s.
It also would not surprise me if CRA databases used for FATCA, have a ‘shit disturber’ file of SINs containing bad Brockers who will be cross referenced with the FFI data, and given closer scrutiny regardless whether over/under 50K, or invested in RRSPs, etc. Hey, they are not spending 15.8 million for nothing!
On that same tangent…I am surprised we have not had any leaks from systems analysts working on the CRA FATCA project….or maybe I am NOT surprised.
@WhiteKat
Aren’t the databases for CRA housed in the US? So without a warrant… they can just seize the info under the Patriot Act. What.. we had no canadian firms who could do this on canadian land… ohhh… wait… didn’t we also get a congress also…. I am sure I recall someone in the canadian gov’t saying that… so it must be true… u know them gov’t people are way smarter then we are… lets see how smart they will be when they become unemployed… we have long memories…
@WhiteKat:
You are not wrong on any level, as far as I am concerned!
When I watched the Finance Committee hearing and read through the IGA it was clear they intended to do several things: They might start out with thresholds, but they would fall by the wayside fairly quickly. Hence the questioning of the police officer regarding getting a warrant, to which he replied, and I paraphrase ‘well, of course we would prefer not to have to go to the trouble, but it is the law, so there you have it’ in response to how they handle FinCen, which was and is current law regarding reporting of $10.000 and over. When the proposals by all who attended, including Lynne via video, Dr. Christians, NDP MPs, Green and a couple of Liberal mps who had proposals for the implementation of the IGA that would exempt Canadian citizens and permanent residents, which was rejected out of hand and stonewalled. Watching the Bank rep swivel in his chair with a superior and sanctimonious look on his face made me want to vomit all over his shiny shoes. Watching the Conservative MPs make the lamest excuses and the most inane comments made me want to slap them across the face. HARD.
The IGA make it possible for all banks to send everything and anything to CRA and CRA to IRS anytime they wish for any reason they wish and there is nothing to stop them from it. In addition the implementation in the IGA of ‘third party’ investigators means they can do all this and have deniability of any perceived wrong doing.
It is clear from what they have done by passing the IGA is to give this foreign entity carte blanc to every financial vehicle available in Canada regardless of citizenship or privacy issues.
I have often objected to the 1 million number of citizens who are affected by this, since most draw in collateral damage spreading out in all directions much like a ripple from a stone in the water.
Inasmuch as the agreement with Treasury does not have senate approval (a two thirds majority mandatory) the IGA need never have been signed since it was an illegal vehicle from the beginning. Yet, because of that, with no senate approval, it relieves the US from any kind of reciprocity at all. Not that they were going to reciprocate anyway.
So your intuition and perceptions are not wrong, WhiteKat. They are right on the bullseye!
@WhiteKat:
Further to your concerns regarding the methods they use to ferret out information any way they choose to violate the privacy of all while they now whine for taxpayer money to pay for it all ( we knew that was coming, as we knew we would have to fight the lawsuit with our money while the government fights us with our money as well! There is only one taxpayer while there are many government ways to spend the taxpayer’s dollar.
Where is the integrity and respect for Canadian law , Sovereignty and the Canadian taxpayer! This government will someday no longer be in power and if we do nothing, it may well be the last Canadian government. This IGA lets the enemy , not only through the door but over the wall. A trojan horse that will release in the bright light of day , no longer needing the dark of night, a flood of invasion into all financial aspects of Canadian life and banking that will ruin Canadian financial structure, while the banks gain protection, funding while ruining their own fellow citizens for the enhancement of their bottom line.
It is egregious and criminal on all levels and it must be stopped!!
Canadians and others: be aware of http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/first-steps.html
And thank Alliance for the Defence of Canadian Sovereignty with your needed donation to the Canadian challenge: http://www.adcs-adsc.ca/DonateADCS.html. It is easy to do, even anonymously. You will have a sense of empowerment by helping right the wrong. Thank YOU!!!
Get out of the banking system, it’s all going to collapse soon anyway and FATCA is just a one last effort to save the american economy in my opinion. They’re very obviously desperatly looking for money.
Go buy gold coins and hide them Well.
Sell one or two when you need some cash.
Best investment today in this unsure financial system.