Thank you.
I also very much appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today and share my thoughts. I'm someone who was raised in Alberta, and I have lived in Quebec for 25 years. I'm a lawyer who has practised human rights and employment law in Ontario for close to 30 years now. I'll make it very clear: I don't practise tax law, so I am by no means a tax expert, unlike my colleague here to my right. I also want to make it clear that these are my personal views.
I was prompted to engage myself in this tax debate on a more public level, in response to an email that I received from the president of the Canadian Bar Association a couple of weeks ago—three weeks ago, perhaps—basically encouraging members of the CBA such as me to write to their MPs in opposition to these tax reforms, and also informing us as members that the CBA was going to take a public position in opposition to these tax reforms. That got my attention, and I immediately responded to the CBA president, as well as copying my MP, to ensure that it was known that the CBA does not speak for me. I'm a lawyer, and I very much support the tax reforms that are currently being proposed.
I think it's important to speak up, and so that's what I've done. I'm joined in that by a number of physicians as well, many of whom are young female doctors who, I'm sure you are aware, have published a very public and articulate letter that similarly supports the tax reforms being proposed, and also states publicly that they are not in agreement with the position being taken by their professional representative in that situation, the CMA. The author of that letter—I heard her being interviewed on The Current a couple of weeks ago—is a very articulate young woman who is currently on maternity leave.
My starting premise is that it's a good thing to build a society in Canada where we all have access to a solid education, health care, housing, safe and vibrant communities, recreation and sports opportunities, and a clean environment. Perhaps it's misguided on my part to believe that the revenues generated by these tax reforms will funnel down toward the collective good, but certainly that's my hope.
The bottom line for me is that it obviously requires tax revenues to sustain and improve the public institutions and social programs that Canadians, I think in general, support. My view is that the most effective and just means to generate those revenues is through a fair, transparent, and actually progressive tax system. To me it doesn't make sense that those individuals most financially and otherwise privileged in Canadian society—including me—who've had access to publicly subsidized post-secondary education, are further advantaged by the tax system.
I do, however, think that tax reform should be comprehensive, and in that regard I think we need to start with the private corporations, as the government is currently doing, but I also think we need to revisit those other aspects of the tax system that are similarly regressive, for example, income splitting of pensions. There has been some criticism, I think justifiable criticism, by small businesses saying that, look, recipients of federal government pensions, for example, are entitled to split those pension incomes. I agree. That's not consistent in terms of giving, effectively, an income splitting benefit to pension recipients.
Turning to RRSPs, why should it be that the more money I make, the greater access I have to RRSP contributions? It's up to a maximum cap, I appreciate, but it is fundamentally based on a percentage of income up to a cap.
Why should it be that someone like me, who can most afford to send my kids to university and pay for them, has access to government grants through an RESP system, whereas others earning family incomes of $49,000, the average in Canada, are barely able to pay their mortgages or rent, let alone put monies into an RESP to help fund their kids' education with the support of government grants? The tuition rates are going up because we're lacking public resources to adequately fund those public post-secondary institutions.
The last couple of comments I'd make relate to gender. I've heard a lot of spin around the subject of gender and that these tax reforms are somehow damaging to women. I don't buy that for a moment.
I don't have the data to prove it, but I think somewhere the government could improve upon coming up with data that answers the question of whether this tax reform is going to disproportionately adversely impact women. My intuitive sense is that women, single mothers in particular, who I believe are disproportionately represented in terms of the poverty figures in this country, will be the beneficiaries of added tax revenue, assuming, of course, that those revenues are used to fund social programs and public institutions on which these women and their children rely.
Finally, in response to a comment that was made earlier that I heard in the gallery about the risk that small business people are taking, I appreciate that risk, the theory being that you need to save within a corporation and your business so you can fund the years that are not so great. As a lawyer who works daily with employees who have been laid off from their jobs, many of whom don't have pensions or benefits once their employment is terminated, I can say that those individuals are left with having to rely on their personal savings, just like everybody else, to fund them through difficult times. They also work very hard for the money they save.
As I say, I feel there should be a more level and equitable treatment of all working people in Canada. Thank you.