Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has again called on Canada's corporate community to use their massive cash reserves to invest in the future, only to have his message rebuffed Tuesday by the president of Canada's largest business lobby.
Flaherty told a conference attended by some of the country's most influential business leaders that the government has done its part to create conditions for growth and job creation.
John Manley, the former Liberal finance minister who now heads the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, was in the crowd and didn't quite care for what he heard.
Rather than sit on corporate profits, Manley said his members - among Canada's largest 150 firms - are getting ready to make big investments in the next three years.
"In fact, the anticipated spending on capital investment in Canada from our members alone exceeds all of the federal and provincial stimulus spending during the last downturn," he said.
"That's pretty considerable and I think it's going to pay off in terms of jobs and economic opportunity going forward."
Flaherty in essence was repeating sentiments he and Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney have expressed before. The bank governor drew some push-back recently when he upped the ante by accusing firms of sitting on "dead money" rather than putting it to use to grow their firms, or return to investors.
In his speech, the minister conceded that business investment had picked up of late, but "more needs to be done," he told the audience.
He noted that government had done its part, slashing corporate taxes, eliminating tariffs, reducing red tape and concluding some 20 free trade and investment agreements around the world.
