March 23 (Reuters) - The following are the top stories from
selected Canadian newspapers. Reuters has not verified these
stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.
THE GLOBE AND MAIL
** The Liberal government has frozen the small business tax
rate, despite an election promise to reduce it over the next
three years. In the budget Tuesday, Finance Minister Bill
Morneau indicated the tax rate on businesses earning less than
C$500,000 ($382,263) a year will remain at 10.5 percent.
The federal Liberals say they will inject more than
C$2.3-billion into a series of affordable-housing measures,
including a new program to offer low-cost loans to developers to
build as many as 10,000 rental units.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corp will get a C$150-million
boost to its bottom line after enduring years of deep cuts, as
Tuesday's federal budget earmarked cash to help drive the public
broadcaster's continuing shift to digital platforms.
POST
** The Liberal government claims its new two-phase
infrastructure spending program will boost Canada's GDP by 0.2
percent this year and 0.4 percent next year. Phase one consists
of C$11.9 billion for a mix of "green," social and transit
projects over the next two years. Phase two will focus on the
construction of projects over the next eight years that will go
"hand in hand with the transition to a low-carbon economy," the
government said.
Facebook, the world's most popular mobile app, is
dropping its support of the BlackBerry BB.TO and BBOS
platforms. BlackBerry App Ecosystem lead Lou Gazzola announced
the change in a blog post, saying Facebook FB.O would
discontinue support of their essential APIs for BlackBerry.
The makers of French's ketchup is getting ready to
announce plans to begin bottling some of it in Ontario. The
announcement follows an uproar over the past two weeks that
triggered a consumer movement to buy French's ketchup, which
contains tomatoes grown and processed in Leamington. That forced
one of the largest grocery chains in the country to backtrack on
an announcement it would stop stocking the product, after
claiming low sales. = 1.31 Canadian dollars)