Prime Minister announces wage subsidy for businesses

The federal government has announced wage subsidies to help small to medium-sized businesses deal with the impacts of Covid-19.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the government will cover 75 per cent of wages for qualifying businesses, allowing staff to continue to be paid, or re-hired, and helping businesses recover.

Ottawa has also launched the Canada Emergency Business Account allowing banks to offer $40,000 loans to qualifying businesses which will be interest free for the first year.

Trudeau said the government will also defer GST and HST payments and duties and taxes on imports until June, which he said was the equivalent of giving 30 billion dollars in interest free loans to businesses.

“With these new measures our hope is that employers who have been pushed to laying off people because of Covid-19 will think again,” said Trudeau. “And for those of you that have already had to lay off workers, we hope you will reconsider rehiring them giving this payroll support.”

Trudeau said announcements in the coming days will focus on measures to help the most vulnerable: youth, marginalized people and people who live in poverty.

Trudeau was asked for an update on the US possibly deploying troops at the border, and he said Canada has told the U.S. that would be a “mistake” and they hope they won’t go through with that.

“We continue to engage closely in back and forths with the US administration on many issues around the border, and when we have more information, we’ll share it,” Trudeau stated outside his home in Ottawa.