CCI Response to the 2023 Federal Budget

Today in Ottawa, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland delivered her 2023 budget. The following statement can be attributed to Benjamin Bergen, President of the Council of Canadian Innovators, a national business association led by over 150 Canadian technology CEOs:

“The only way to sustainably pay for the social programs and services that all Canadians value is by driving economic growth and prosperity, and that should start with innovative, 21st century Canadian companies. We are in a difficult and uncertain economic environment for the tech sector, and today’s budget did little to support Canada’s most promising businesses through a challenging time.

“While we appreciate the government’s commitment to Canada’s clean technology sector, the fact remains Canada’s innovation policy still lacks a focus on the key ownership and intellectual property tools that build real, lasting national wealth. A cleantech strategy without a real plan in place to protect these assets will just keep subsidizing other countries’ success. We need to see a strong signal that Canada won’t be subsidizing other countries’ prosperity with a status-quo approach to intellectual property and data.

“We were happy to see some measures on procurement reform which may provide a boost to some Canadian innovators, and look forward to more details being released about the new cyber security certification program to protect Canada’s defence supply chain ahead of the release of the next national cybersecurity strategy.

“Still, we had hoped to see more urgency and broader support for technology companies:

• We did not see support for Canadian semiconductor companies, at a time when we should be urgently moving to secure this industry, for economic and national security reasons.
• We did not see any update on reforming the Scientific Research and Experimental Development (SR&ED) tax credit, which has been in a holding pattern since last year’s budget.
• We did not see any update on open banking, in spite of an election promise that was broken months ago.

“More broadly, we have been disappointed that the government has not moved more quickly and engaged with more urgency when it comes to promises made to the tech sector. In the 2021 election the Liberal Party promised to create a council of economic advisors, which could have helped guide policy during this turbulent period, but we have heard no update on it.

“Earlier this month we saw Minister Freeland move swiftly and engage with industry leaders in technology and finance to maintain stability and confidence in the wake of the Silicon Valley Bank collapse, and we applauded her for doing so. But we need to see this spirit of engagement and active co-operation with industry to continue, if the government truly wants to support the kind of growth and innovation that their rhetoric so often indicates.”

Media Contact:
James McLeod
jmcleod@canadianinnovators.org