• purchased feed above historical quantities
• transportation costs for hauling feed to the breeding animals or self-hauling of feed
• transportation costs for hauling breeding animals to feed or self-hauling of breeding animals to feed
• custom feeding arrangements or alternative grazing arrangements for eligible animals

Eligible producers must have lost a minimum of 25 feed days.

Applications can be made online or by paper application. Applications are available from Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation (SCIC) https://www.scic.ca/2023-canada-saskatchewan-feed-program.

The deadline for applications is March 1, 2024.

Under the program producers are eligible for an initial payment of up to $150 per eligible breeding female and males of the reproductive age of the species owned inventory as of August 21, 2023 and intended to be kept through to January 31, 2024. Producers must be within the map guided by the Canadian Drought Monitor D2 Drought Area https://www.scic.ca/2023-canada-saskatchewan-feed-program to be eligible for the Federal-Provincial Funding of up to $150/head.  A Saskatchewan Provincial-only payment of up to $60 per head will be available to producers outside the Canadian Drought Monitor D2 Drought Area

In the application, producers must:

1. Report total eligible breeding livestock inventory.
   • Eligible livestock for this initiative includes Canadian-owned male and female beef cattle, bison, horse, elk, deer sheep or goats that are bred or intended to be bred.
   • The number of open replacement females considered eligible livestock is up to 15 per cent of total bred females per species.
   • The maximum number of breeding males required to maintain the herd that can be considered Eligible Animals is 5% of the total number of female Eligible Animals per species.
2. Declare eligibility, as outlined in the Terms and Conditions.

A Premise ID is required to apply. Producers must report extraordinary expenses.

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Underused Housing Tax

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Suspension of review, audit and collection activities

The Canada Revenue Agency regularly carries out review activities in which taxpayers are asked to provide documentation or other information with respect to their entitlement to claimed benefits or credits.

The CRA has indicated that taxpayers who have received a letter that includes a date to respond or asks for documents do not need to respond at this time. Verification work is currently on hold and the CRA will re-contact taxpayers at a future date.

The Agency has also announced that it will generally not contact small or medium (SME) businesses to initiate any post assessment GST/HST or income tax audits during the month of April.

Finally, collection activities on new tax debts are suspended until further notice.

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Wage subsidy program for employers

The federal government will be providing eligible employers who have experienced a significant decline in revenues with a wage subsidy. For purposes of the subsidy, eligible employers include individuals, taxable corporations, and partnerships consisting of eligible employers, as well as non‑profit organizations and registered charities.

The subsidy amount for a given employee on eligible remuneration paid between March 15 and June 6, 2020 would be the greater of:

• 75 per cent of the amount of remuneration paid, up to a maximum benefit of $847 per week; and
• the amount of remuneration paid, up to a maximum benefit of $847 per week or 75 per cent of the employee’s pre-crisis weekly remuneration, whichever is less.

Details of the wage subsidy program, and how it will be administered, are still being developed and the most up-to-date information can be found on the Finance Canada website at https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/news/2020/04/the-canada-emergency-wage-subsidy.html.

Deferral of GST/HST remittance deadlines

Businesses which are required to make GST/HST payments or remittances which become owing on or after March 27, 2020 and before June 2020 can defer payment of those amounts.

The deferral will apply to GST/HST remittances for the February, March and April 2020 reporting periods for monthly filers; the January 1, 2020 through March 31, 2020 reporting period for quarterly filers; and for annual filers, the amounts collected and owing for their previous fiscal year and instalments of GST/HST in respect of the filer’s current fiscal year.

Where such remittances are made on or before June 30, 2020, no interest or penalties will be imposed by the Canada Revenue Agency, regardless of the original due date.

Deferral of income tax filing and payment due dates for corporations

Corporations which have a tax filing due date after March 18, 2020 and before June 1, 2020 will have until June 1, 2020 to effect that filing.

In addition, where any income tax balance or instalment payment of income tax is payable after March 18 and before September 1, 2020, the deadline for making such payment is now September 1, 2020.

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Changes to filing and payment deadlines for 2019 returns

Individual Canadians are generally required to file their tax returns for the 2019 tax year on or before April 30, 2020. Self-employed Canadians (and their spouses) have until June 15, 2020 to file such returns. All individual Canadians, regardless of their filing deadline, must usually pay all taxes owed for 2019 by April 30, 2020.

However, the filing deadline for individuals who would normally have to file by April 30 has been extended to June 1, 2020. The filing deadline for self-employed individuals and their spouses remains June 15, 2020.

The new payment deadline for all individual income tax owed for the 2019 tax year has been extended and is now September 1, 2020. No interest or penalty will be assessed where payment is made on or before September 1.

While individual taxpayers now have until June 1 to file, those who receive Canada Child Benefit or the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax credit (or similar credits provided by their province of residence) should consider filing as soon as possible. The benefit year for those programs starts on July 1, 2020 and both eligibility for, and the amount of any benefit payable is based on information provided in the 2019 tax return. A delay in the filing of the 2019 return could mean a delay in receiving benefits starting in July 2020. As well, regardless of when they file, taxpayers will have until September 1 to pay any tax balance owed for 2019.

Change to June 15 instalment payment deadline

Many Canadians pay their current year (i.e. 2020) income taxes quarterly, through the income tax instalment system. Such instalment payments of tax are normally made on March 15, June 15, September 15 and December 15.

The federal government has indicated that taxpayers who would normally make an instalment payment of tax on June 15 will instead have until September 1, 2020 to make that payment. No interest or penalties will be assessed where the payment is made on or before September 1.

One-time increase to GST/HST tax credit

The federal government will be providing a one-time increase to the GST/HST tax credit, which is usually paid to qualifying individuals in January, April, July and October of each year.

Those individual Canadians who are eligible for the GST/HST credit will receive a special one-time payment in early May 2020. While precise figures have not been provided, the federal government announcement indicates that the payment will be “close to” $400 per individual and $600 for couples.

Increase to Canada Child Benefit

Eligible Canadian families receive a monthly non-taxable payment of the Canada Child Benefit, with the amount of that payment based on family size and income.

The federal government has announced that, for the 2019-20 benefit year only, the amount of the Canada Child Benefit will be increased by $300 per child. There is no need to make any application, as the increased payment will be added automatically to the regular May 2020 payment, which is scheduled to take place on May 20, 2020.

Change to registered retirement income fund withdrawal requirements

Canadian taxpayers are required to collapse their registered retirement savings plans (RRSPs) by the end of the year in which they turn 71. Most Canadians convert their RRSPs into registered retirement income funds (RRIFs) and they are then required to make annual withdrawals from those RRIFs.

The amount of such annual withdrawal is, by law, a specified percentage (based on the taxpayer’s age) of the balance in the RRIF as of January 1 of the year. There has been a significant decline in the markets since the beginning of this year and, consequently, many RRIF holders will have seen a corresponding decline in the value of their investments.

So that RRIF holders are not penalized by those events (by having to liquidate investments at a loss in order to make a required withdrawal) the federal government has reduced the amount of required withdrawals, for the 2020 taxation year only. Specifically, the minimum withdrawal requirement for RRIFs for 2020 has been reduced by 25%.

It’s important to note, however, that individuals who have already withdrawn more than the reduced 2020 minimum amount will not be permitted to re-contribute to their RRIFs an amount up to the 25% proposed reduction.

Finally, the changes announced also apply to the minimum amount for individuals receiving variable benefit payments under a defined contribution registered pension plan or pooled registered pension plan. Such amounts will also be reduced by 25%, for 2020 only.

Student loan repayments suspended

As of March 30, required repayments of Canada Student Loans will be suspended for a period of 6 months, and no additional interest will accrue on unpaid amounts during that time. There is no requirement that an application be made, as the moratorium on payments during that period will be implemented automatically.

Canada Emergency Response Benefit

Canadians who have no source of income as a consequence of the pandemic may receive $2,000 per month, for a four month period, with that amount provided under under the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB). The CERB is available to a broader group of Canadians than would normally be eligible for income replacement under the Employment Insurance system. Specifically, the CERB applies, in addition to wage earners, to contract workers and self-employed individuals who would not normally qualify for EI.

CERB will be available for Canadians who have lost their job, are sick, quarantined, or taking care of someone who is sick with COVID-19, as well as working parents who must stay home without pay to care for children who are sick or at home because of school and daycare closures. In addition, those who are still employed but are not currently receiving any income from their employer – i.e. are laid off – can qualify.

The specific requirements for an individual to receive CERB, as set out on the federal government website, are as follows:

• Residing in Canada, who are at least 15 years old;
• Who have stopped working because of COVID-19 or are eligible for Employment Insurance regular or sickness benefits:
• Who had income of at least $5,000 in 2019 or in the 12 months prior to the date of their application; and
• Who are or expect to be without employment or self-employment income for at least 14 consecutive days in the initial four-week period. For subsequent benefit periods, they expect to have no employment income.

The federal government has indicated that applications for the CERB can be made online at https://www.canada.ca/en/services/benefits/ei/cerb-application.html as of April 6. As thousands of applications are expected, applicants are asked to apply in the following order:

• on April 6, for those with dates of birth in January, February and March;
• on April 7, for those with dates of birth in April, May and June;
• on April 8, for those with dates of birth in July, August and September;
• on April 9 for those with dates of birth in October, November and December.

Payments will be made within 3-4 days by direct deposit and within10 days if sent by mail.

Detailed information on the CERB, including a list of FAQ, can be found on the federal government website at https://www.canada.ca/en/services/benefits/ei/cerb-application.html?utm_campaign=not-applicable&utm_medium=vanity-url&utm_source=canada-ca_coronavirus-cerb.

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The reason such Reminders are sent during July has to do with how tax is collected in Canada, and when tax returns are filed. Most Canadians, and certainly all Canadians who are employees, have income taxes deducted (or withheld) from each paycheque and remitted to the federal government on their behalf. They then file a tax return for the year the following spring: if they have overpaid taxes they receive a refund and, where taxes were underpaid, they will have a balance owing.

Where, however, a taxpayer receives income from which no tax has been deducted or withheld, the federal government must have another way of collecting the tax owed on such income amounts. And, while it’s possible that such taxpayers could simply pay the full amount of taxes owed for the year when filing the annual tax return, it’s not likely that many individuals would have the financial wherewithal to do so. And, in addition, the federal government is not prepared to wait until then to receive tax amounts owed for the entire year. Instead the instalment payment system is the means by which the Canada Revenue Agency collects such tax amounts, on a quarterly basis, throughout the year.

More technically, an individual is subject to the instalment payment requirement where his or her tax owed on filing for the current year and either of the two previous years is more than $3,000. In other words, the amount of tax collected from that individual throughout the year was at least $3,000 less than the actual tax owed for that year. And, since Canadian tax returns are filed in the spring, the assessment of those returns allows the Canada Revenue Agency to identify individuals who will be subject to the instalment requirement for the current year – and it is those individuals who receive an instalment reminder this month.

Regardless of the type or amount of his or her income for the year, or the amount of any instalment payments, the options available to the recipient of an Instalment Reminder are the same. On its website, the CRA describes the three different payment options open to taxpayers, and outlines the benefits and risks of each option in different circumstances, as follows:

No-calculation option
This option is best for you if your income, deductions, and credits stay about the same from year to year.

We will give the no-calculation option amount on the instalment reminders that we will send you. We determine the amount of your instalment payments based on the information in your latest assessed tax return.

Prior-year option
This option is best for you if your 2019 income, deductions, and credits will be similar to your 2018 amount but significantly different from those in 2017.

You determine the amount of your instalment payments based on the information from your tax return for the 2018 tax year. Use the Calculation chart for instalment payments for 2019 to help you calculate your total instalment amount due.

If you use the prior-year option and make the payments in full by their 2019 due dates, we will not charge instalment interest or a penalty unless the total instalment amount due you have calculated is too low. For more information, see Instalment interest and penalty charges.

Current-year option
This option is best for you if your 2019 income, deductions, and credits will be significantly different from those in 2018 and 2017.

You determine the amount of your instalment payments based on your estimated current-year (2019) net tax owing, any CPP contributions payable, and any voluntary EI premiums. Use the Calculation chart for instalment payments for 2019 to help you calculate your total instalment amount due.

If you use the current-year option and make the payments in full by their 2019 due dates, we will not charge instalment interest or a penalty unless the amounts you estimated when calculating your total instalment amount due were too low. For more information, see Instalment interest and penalty charges.”

Under any of these options, the dates for payment and the percentage amounts payable are summarized as follows:

No-calculation option – Pay the amount shown in box 2 of the Instalment Reminder for September 15 and December 15.

Prior-year option – Determine net taxes owed for 2018. Pay 75% of the total on September 15 and 25% on December 15.

Current-year option – Estimate current-year 2019 net tax owing. Pay 75% of the total on September 15 and 25% on December 15.

The first option – paying the amounts identified on the Instalment Reminder by the September and December deadlines – is the easiest and simplest choice. If the amounts paid represent an overpayment of taxes for 2019, the taxpayer will receive a refund of that overpayment on filing in the spring of 2020. If the amounts identified turn out be an underpayment of tax (in that they are insufficient to cover total tax owed for the year), the taxpayer will have a balance owing on filing. In no case, however, will the taxpayer be charged any interest on insufficient instalment payments.

Taxpayers who don’t wish to pay the amounts specified in the Instalment Reminder (perhaps because they believe that such amounts don’t accurately reflect their tax payable for the year) can use options 2 or 3. The only risk to doing so is that, should the instalments paid be insufficient to cover tax liability for the year, interest will be levied on the underpayments.

More details on the options available to taxpayers who receive an Instalment Reminder, and information on the instalment payment system generally, can be found on the CRA website at https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/tax/individuals/topics/about-your-tax-return/making-payments-individuals/paying-your-income-tax-instalments.html.

No one particularly likes receiving an Instalment Reminder and everyone dislikes paying taxes. It’s worth remembering, however, that the payment of income tax isn’t a choice – the only real choice is whether to pay now, or pay later. And, for most Canadians, paying taxes on a regular basis throughout the year is much more manageable than being faced with a huge tax bill when filing their return for 2019 next spring.

The information presented is only of a general nature, may omit many details and special rules, is current only as of its published date, and accordingly cannot be regarded as legal or tax advice. Please contact our office for more information on this subject and how it pertains to your specific tax or financial situation.

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Although few Canadians have this perspective, the reality is that getting either a big tax refund or having to pay a large tax bill is a sign that one’s tax affairs need attention. A refund, especially a large refund, means that the taxpayer has overpaid his or her taxes for the previous year and has essentially provided the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) with an interest-free loan of funds that could have been put to better use in the taxpayer’s hands. The other outcome — a large bill — means that taxes have been underpaid for the previous year and could mean paying interest charges to the CRA. Either way, it’s in the taxpayer’s best interests to ensure that tax paid throughout the year is sufficient to cover his or her taxes, without overpaying or underpaying. The best-case scenario is to complete one’s tax return and to then receive a Notice of Assessment which indicates that there is neither a refund payable nor any amount owing.

All of this makes the mid-point of the tax year a good time to make sure that everything is on track, and put in place any adjustments needed to help ensure that there are no tax surprises when filing one’s tax return for 2019 next spring. And, as the calendar year goes on, the opportunities to make a significant difference to one’s current year tax situation diminish.

The first step in doing that review is to get a sense of how much tax one will have to pay for 2019. The income of most taxpayers doesn’t change significantly from year to year and, by mid-year, most taxpayers will have a good sense of what their income will be for 2019. Consequently, where income hasn’t changed much, the amount of tax which was paid for 2018 (a number which can be found on Line 435 of the Summary on page 3 of one’s 2018 Notice of Assessment) serves as a good starting point. (In most cases, owing to increases in tax brackets and credits, the amount of tax payable by taxpayers whose income doesn’t change significantly between 2018 and 2019 will decrease slightly.)

There are two ways of paying taxes throughout the year. The majority of Canadians (including all employees) have income taxes deducted from their paycheques and remitted to the federal government on their behalf — known as source deductions. Taxpayers who do not have income tax deducted at source — which would include self-employed individuals and, frequently, retired taxpayers — make tax payments directly to the federal government (four times a year, on the 15th of March, June, September, and December) through the tax instalment system.

Once a rough idea of one’s tax liability for 2019 is arrived at, it’s necessary to figure out whether income tax payments made to date, either by source deductions or instalment payments, match up with that tax liability figure, recognizing that by this point in the year, approximately one-half of 2019 taxes should already have been paid. If they haven’t, and particularly if there is a shortfall which will mean a balance owing when the tax return for 2019 is filed next spring, the taxpayer will need to take steps to remedy that.

Where the individual involved pays tax by instalments, the solution is simple. He or she can simply increase or decrease the amount of remaining instalment payments made in 2019 so that the total instalment payments made over the course of 2019 accurately reflect the total tax payable for the year. The only caveat in that situation is that the individual should err on the side of caution to ensure that there isn’t a shortfall in instalment payments, which could result in interest charges being levied by the CRA.

The situation is a little more complex for employees, or for anyone who has tax deducted at source. Often when such individuals discover that they are overpaying taxes through source deductions, it’s because other deductions which they claim on their return for the year — for expenditures like deductible support payments, child care expenses or contributions to a registered retirement savings plan (RRSP) — aren’t taken into account in calculating the amount of tax to deduct at source. The solution for employees who find themselves in that situation is to file a Form T1213, Request to Reduce Tax Deductions at Source, which is available on the CRA website at www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pbg/tf/t1213/README.html with the Agency. On that form, the taxpayer identifies the additional amounts which will be deducted on the return for the year and, once the CRA verifies that those deductible expenditures are being made, it will authorize the taxpayer’s employer to reduce the amount of tax which is being withheld at source, so as to reflect the reduced tax payable for the year by the employee/taxpayer.

Where it’s the opposite situation and a taxpayer finds that source deductions being made will not be sufficient to cover his or her tax liability for the year (meaning a tax bill to be paid next spring) the solution is to have those source deductions increased. To do that, the employee needs to obtain a TD1A form for their province of residence for 2019, which is available on the CRA website at https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/forms-publications/td1-personal-tax-credits-returns/td1-forms-pay-received-on-january-1-later.html. On the reverse side of that Form TD1, there is a section entitled “Additional tax to be deducted”, in which the employee can direct his or her employer to deduct additional amounts at source for income tax, and can specify the dollar amount which is to be deducted from each paycheque, on a go-forward basis.

A final note — while no one likes getting a tax bill, there are taxpayers who simply like getting a tax refund and overpay their taxes through the year to create that result. Some of them view that approach as a kind of “forced” savings plan, while others simply like the idea of getting an annual cheque or direct deposit from the tax authorities. There is nothing inherently wrong with that approach, so long as the taxpayer understands that a tax refund is simply money which was always theirs and is simply being returned to them by the CRA (without interest). Those who would rather not loan money to the CRA interest-free and who don’t want to face a tax bill each spring can avoid both scenarios by investing a couple of hours of time and a little paperwork to ensure that this year’s tax payments are on track.

The information presented is only of a general nature, may omit many details and special rules, is current only as of its published date, and accordingly cannot be regarded as legal or tax advice. Please contact our office for more information on this subject and how it pertains to your specific tax or financial situation.

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The most recent release of “Mortgage and Consumer Credit Trends” issued by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation shows that the debt-to-income ratio of Canadians reached 178.5% as of the fourth quarter of 2018. In other words, Canadian households were carrying, on average, $1.78 in debt for every $1 of household income. Just fifteen years previously, in 2005, Canadians held less than $1 of debt for every dollar of household income — the debt to household income ratio was then 93%.

The figures published by CMHC for 2018 are of particular interest, as new rules designed to rein in excessive mortgage lending took effect in April of that year. It’s not surprising, then, that the figures show that mortgage activity during the year slowed. Of greater concern is the fact that non-mortgage borrowing by mortgage holders has accelerated, as average balances for credit cards and lines of credit held by such mortgage-holders grew at a faster pace in 2018 than they had in 2017. That trend was particularly apparent when it came to mortgage holders in Toronto and Vancouver, the two most expensive housing markets in the country.

The other group for whom the debt statistics are notable are those aged 55 and older. The CMHC report notes that the share of mortgage holders aged 55 or older continued to grow during 2018. In addition, mortgage delinquency rates for those aged 65 and older have been increasing — that age group has had, since late 2015, the highest mortgage delinquency rate.

For most Canadians, the size of their overall debt load is, on a day-to-day basis, likekly less significant than the monthly cost of servicing that debt out of current cash flow. Unfortunately, the news in that respect was also not good. As reported by CMHC “average monthly obligations per consumer increased by 4.5% in the fourth quarter of 2018 compared to a year earlier. Over the same period average disposable income rose by 2.5%. Therefore, for the average Canadian, the monthly obligation burden has increased from last year relative to their income”. That’s especially not good news for older Canadians, many of whom are retired or semi-retired, with limited ability to generate the additional income to meet higher debt-servicing costs.

If there is good news in the CMHC report, it’s that despite high levels, loan delinquency rates, including mortgage delinquency rates, remain low. It seems that, despite ever-increasing debt loads, most Canadians are still managing to keep their lines of credit, car loans, and credit cards in good standing.

The full CMCH report can be found on the Agency’s website at https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/housing-observer-online/2019-housing-observer/mortgage-consumer-credit-trends-q4-2018.

The information presented is only of a general nature, may omit many details and special rules, is current only as of its published date, and accordingly cannot be regarded as legal or tax advice. Please contact our office for more information on this subject and how it pertains to your specific tax or financial situation.

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