Evidence of meeting #81 for Finance in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cra.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Roch Huppé  Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
Ted Gallivan  Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Compliance Programs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
Rick Stewart  Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

10:05 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

Thank you to all the officials who are here this morning.

I was very interested when I heard through various sources that our Minister of National Revenue, Kerry-Lynne Findlay, had received the Golden Scissors Award. This is something that I'm always hearing about from business people in my riding, that there's so much red tape and it's so hard to deal with these large bureaucracies. I'd like to hear why she got that award and what it was for. Also, I'd like to hear what other red tape reduction initiatives you have in place.

10:05 a.m.

Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Rick Stewart

Thank you for the question.

Mr. Chair, I think in the interest of time, I won't repeat all the things we have changed, but to focus on the Golden Scissors Award, I believe that was awarded to the minister specifically for the remittance threshold reduction change that the government implemented that had such a significant reduction in the reporting burden.

10:05 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

How many times did a small business person have to remit previously and how many times now?

10:05 a.m.

Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Rick Stewart

I think it depended on whether it was payroll tax, EI, income tax, but the aggregate effect of that change in remittance thresholds was to reduce the number of remittance transactions across the entire small business community from about 800,000 down to about 500,000.

10:05 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

Okay. That's a great—

10:10 a.m.

Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Rick Stewart

It's a significant change.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

That's a significant first step.

You spoke earlier, Mr. Stewart, in your comments to my colleague Mr. Van Kesteren, that you're working in partnership with professional organizations, a number of people, but the bottom line is small business doesn't know what options are available. You did indicate that you think you have more work to do. What kind of work? To serve small business is very important for us. Small business is the backbone of job creation in this country.

10:10 a.m.

Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Rick Stewart

I'd say there are probably three elements to that.

One is to, if you will, better work with those key partners we have been working with, and obviously not significantly enough, to better communicate the information we've been trying to communicate on the improvements and changes we have made to date. That's kind of working with what we already have, if I can characterize it that way.

Second, last fall we conducted our second round of consultations with the small business community about what more we need to be doing to reduce red tape. We did a first round in 2012 and another round last fall. We're committed to doing these on a regular basis so that we get ongoing regular feedback on the changes we have been making: are they effective; are they working to reduce the burden; what more do we need to be doing?

Also, the minister and the government will be coming forth with an action plan in the coming months. They're in the process of finalizing that now. It will lay out our commitments of the further steps we will be taking over the next two years. We will be focused on ensuring that the action plan is effectively and comprehensively broad-based communication, so that people are aware that we have an action plan and of what's in it.

Third is to continue working on an ongoing basis, ensuring we have an open door to feedback. As I said, we've already been working with some of our key stakeholder partners, like CFIB and CPA Canada, the tax professionals. We'll be using that as a more active avenue for soliciting feedback on an ongoing basis, so that we get that continual feedback about the improvements we're making, so we don't have to rely solely on a biannual consultation process.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

Now that the officials are here, I have to ask this, because I've had a lot of feedback on the issue of this tax-filing system in my constituency.

In small business, if you have three people on your payroll, you are required to file the T4 slips by the end of February. Meanwhile, the banks that are issuing T3s have a significantly greater period of time, and by the way, they have a whole bunch more people working for them and a little bit more capacity than your normal small business with three people on the payroll.

There's an enormous problem for people who get a T3 slip and then have to file it after the fact. We have a situation where we have small business people and just normal consumers and clients being massively inconvenienced, which brings me to your online system, because they can't do the T1 adjustment request easily. What's the solution for that? Is it maybe making the banks comply with the same thing that small business does?

10:10 a.m.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Compliance Programs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Ted Gallivan

The agency is really focused on electronic services and real-time data. Not that it's a silver bullet, but the hope is to have real-time data exchange and have people use the electronic services to help decrease the pressure those deadlines create.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

What do you mean by “decrease the pressure”?

10:10 a.m.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Compliance Programs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Ted Gallivan

In other words, if somebody's able to file electronically easily, then it's not so cumbersome for them to meet the deadline, because it's a simple click of the mouse—

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

But could the banks have the same deadline as small businesses?

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

Sorry, you are well over your time.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Joyce Bateman Conservative Winnipeg South Centre, MB

Okay. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. We'll follow up after.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

I just want to follow up on a point by Mr. Keddy.

I think you said that in terms of electronic filings, you've gone from 55% to 80%, and then 82%. Can you give us the numbers for personal and for business?

10:10 a.m.

Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Roch Huppé

Actually the numbers I referred to were for personal taxes.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

They were for personal. What are they for business?

May 12th, 2015 / 10:10 a.m.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner, Compliance Programs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Ted Gallivan

For both corporations and GST, and GST would have just caught up to individuals, it would be in the range of 84% to 85%. We can confirm that off-line. For corporations, T2 would be close to 90% this year, if not over.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

Here's a very quick question. As a taxpayer, I actually find the CRA My Account very helpful, but how many Canadians use that service? You can respond off-line if you want, as well.

10:10 a.m.

Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Roch Huppé

The numbers I have here are for last year, not this year, which I think grew quite a bit. We had 2.7 million individuals and 1.9 million businesses registered.

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

They were registered for the CRA My Account.

10:15 a.m.

Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative James Rajotte

All right. Well, I encourage everyone to get their own, because it is an incredibly helpful service.

My final point may be as much a comment as a question, involving some of my colleagues' questions. The comment I get most often that's critical of CRA is about when someone is being audited either as a person or as a business and the auditors change through that audit. It's very hard on the person who's being audited in terms of having to re-educate someone all over again regarding their particular situation. I think that has improved over time, but that's the biggest comment I get from taxpayers in my constituency.

I don't know if you have a comment on that.

10:15 a.m.

Assistant Commissioner, Legislative Policy and Regulatory Affairs Branch, Canada Revenue Agency

Rick Stewart

I guess as a general comment I would say two things. We're cognizant of the challenges that poses, and at the end of the day, we're taxpayers as well, so I can recognize that challenge.