During work hours, Jennifer Tomas of Ottawa and Martin Smith of Winnipeg can usually be found under the hood of a car. Late last year, however, the two dealership technicians exchanged their work coats for business suits when they addressed the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance in Ottawa.

Their subject was the unfairness of a tax system that prevents automotive and heavy-duty vehicle technicians from writing off the cost of their tools. They say it’s a hardship for current technicians-and a deterrent for prospective ones, who face an initial investment of tens of thousands of dollars to start a reasonable tool collection and thousands more in annual upgrade and replacement costs. The tools are required as a condition of their employment, are critical to their productivity, and aren’t provided by their employer.

Yet, while lumberjacks write off their chainsaws and musicians write off their instruments, mechanics must pay for all of their tools in after-tax dollars.

“The MPs were supportive,” says Tomas, an employee at Turpin Pontiac-Buick in Ottawa. “They were asking us why this hadn’t gone through yet. We just threw it right back at them, because we can’t imagine what’s holding it up.”

Tomas and Smith, a technician at Park Pontiac in Winnipeg, were invited to speak by the Canadian Automotive Dealers’ Association (CADA), which figured it was time to let politicians see the real faces behind this issue. “We’ve never really gotten past the bureaucratic levels,” says Rick Gauthier, president of CADA, which represents 3500 dealerships throughout Canada. “We were fortunate to find two technicians who felt comfortable enough to come to Ottawa and do this.”

Tomas, a technician for more than five years, says she’s spent over $15,000 on tools since she started. That’s not a lot, given what some in this industry have spent. But it’s been a challenge to build up her tool box, considering her salary-particularly in the first couple of years.

“Every tool serves a purpose,” she says. “I don’t spend money on tools because I like tools; I buy tools because if I don’t I can’t make a living.” Tomas says under the flat-rate system, she loses money every time she has to go looking for a tool. She says if technicians give up now, they’ll never get a tool tax concession.

“The biggest thing that hurts technicians is that we don’t have a single, unified voice,” she says. “Our numbers are incredible but we haven’t unified enough on this.”

For a government that is highly sensitive to job-creation projects and youth unemployment, the tool tax issue should get more attention than it has. “We’re not just talking about a tax break,” Gauthier says, “we’re talking about creating jobs for young people who want to get into this industry but can’t because the investment is just too high.”

Federal Finance Minister Paul Martin says giving a tax break to technicians who buy their own tools isn’t as simple as it might seem. In an interview with Today’s Trucking’s sister publication, Automotive Parts & Technology (sidebar, page 38), Paul Martin suggests that the situation faced by technicians is just one of many “distortions built into the tax system,” and changing it is going to take time.

He says one of his main concerns is the floodgate of requests that could follow any concessions to automotive technicians. “There are a lot of individuals who have large employment expenses and who would expect similar treatment,” he notes.

Meanwhile, aftermarket organizations like the Automotive Industries Association and the Canadian Automotive Repair & Service Council, and companies like Snap-on Tools of Canada, are supporting a new lobbying effort which has seen more than 330,000 protest cards delivered to technicians across Canada.

“I believe the government has an obligation to deal with this,” says Monte Solberg, chief finance critic for The Reform Party. “Thirty or forty thousand dollars worth of tools is not unheard of for automotive technicians, and if that’s what people have to come up with in order to get a job, I think that needs to be recognized somewhere in the tax system.”

But judging by the defeat of two private members bills on the matter last year, and from what’s being said in the corridors of power around Ottawa, he’s not optimistic that a tool break will come anytime soon, especially as the government tries to put in place broader-based tax cuts.

Al Tucker, managing director of the Heavy Duty Distributors Council and general manager of the Canadian Transportation Equipment Association, says the cost of tooling up is so prohibitive that it has already become a deterrent to new people entering the industry. “The thinking seems to be, ‘Why should I go to school to become a mechanic if it’s going to cost me $20,000 for tools-that I don’t have?’ ”

Tucker says the periodic replacement of tools is also a safety issue. “Tools wear out,” he explains. “A worn-out socket can’t achieve proper clamping forces. Now, if a guy has a whole set of sockets that is wearing out but he hasn’t got the cash to replace them, he’s likely to continue to use them. If you try to make do with a worn or improper tool, you can damage the equipment you’re working on, and you could hurt yourself.”

Craig Owen, who works at Cochrane Automotive in Etobicoke, Ont., has at least $125,000 tied up in tools amassed over a long career as an automotive technician-mostly in the United States where the tax laws are friendlier. Even by technician standards, that’s a huge investment. And to keep many of his tools relevant, he spends about $5000 a year on software, upgrades, and replacement tools.

Owen believes the reluctance to grant a tax break to technicians is rooted in ignorance.

“The politician has no comprehension about what this job is all about,” he says. “A simple experiment would be to get the legislators to go to their garage and get the technician to work on their car without any of the tools he bought on his own. Let them see if they can get the car fixed. It just won’t happen.”

Dave Read, a heavy-duty mechanic in Langley, B.C., has already had one encounter with Revenue Canada over this issue. His victory in that case has led him to believe it is inevitable technicians will eventually win tax concessions.

“They told me I owed them $36,000 because I’ve been writing off my tools,” he says. “I disputed this, on the basis that it was unjust.”

He contacted a top tax attorney who supplied a copy of his employment contract which stipulates he must supply all his own hand and air tools. Eventually a court date was set, but a week before the case was to be heard, Revenue Canada backed down, saying the exemption would be allowed in his case.

Read believes Revenue Canada wanted to avoid an unfavorable verdict in tax court, which would have set a precedent for all technicians.

“I would like to have gone to tax court. Even though it would have cost me a few dollars, I think I would have won it hands down,” he says. “I told them fairly belligerently that I am going to continue writing off my tools, and because they allowed it this year, I don’t assume I’ll have a problem with it in future.”

His accountant has advised him to claim the tools as consumable business supplies. “I’ve got $100,000 sitting in my toolbox. There’s no way I should have to eat that all by myself. If we have to buy our tools in order to work, there should be some recognition of that.”