Conservatives, Liberals spar on taxes

Conservative leader Stephen Harper is already calling the Liberal Party's as yet unveiled election platform a "high-tax agenda that will stall our recovery, kill jobs and set families back."

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff shot back this morning on Parliament Hill, "We've had so many falsehoods from Mr. Harper. He wouldn't recognize the truth if it walked up and shook his hand."

Now Ignatieff has been pretty clear that a Liberal government would not raise taxes for Canadian families.

On corporate tax cuts though, the issue has been murkier.

Ignatieff has, on several occasions, said the Liberals would keep corporate taxes at 18 per cent.

But that was last year's corporate tax rate. In January it moved to 16.5 per cent.

Today, Ignatieff repeated his 18 per cent promise, saying that with a record deficit, Canada can not afford tax giveaways for the country's most profitable corporations when their tax rate is already competitive.

"We stick it at 18 per cent, you save $6 billion, you pay down the deficit and you make the specific targeted investments in our platform."

Conservative spokespeople wasted little time to spam reporters with a short news release saying Ignatieff must "come clean about his tax hike agenda."