e-1311 (Income tax system)

Petition to the House of Commons in Parliament assembled

• Cancer treatment centres and major medical and recuperative centres are located in densely populated cities in Canada. Everyone living in rural areas must travel long distances for cancer treatment, surgery, or injury rehabilitation and often incur crippling travel and accommodation costs. This affects 18 to 20 million people in all provinces and territories;
• Travel costs are deductible from taxes payable only in the year the costs are incurred. If a patient is unable to work during the treatment period, he or she pays lower taxes and therefore cannot recover travel expenses. No taxes payable, no deduction allowable;
• Medical travel costs cannot be brought forward to the following years when the patient is hopefully healed, back to work and paying taxes again;
• Canadians living in large communities within daily reach of major medical centres do not incur medical travel expenses but rural people do; and
• Seniors who work part time to enhance income, seasonal workers, self-employed workers and many others who cannot continue to work while ill, fall between the cracks. This leaves some of our most vulnerable citizens without recourse. Their medical travel costs are often a direct loss and unrecoverable.