Hoang Mai

[Canada Revenue Agency, June 19th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the scandals keep on coming at the Canada Revenue Agency. Former senior managers in the Montreal office went to meet with business owners to propose an exchange: for $1 million, they would erase tax bills. Business owner Jacky Schryver is an honest man; he refused.

But who knows how many of these kinds of offers were accepted? How much money did this government lose? What are the Conservatives doing to try to recover this lost money?

[Canada Revenue Agency, June 7th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the report of the Taxpayers' Ombudsman that was released yesterday highlights the Conservatives' lack of transparency. According to the report, the Canada Revenue Agency's backlog of access to information requests has risen from 25% to nearly 40% of total requests since the Conservatives came to power. The Canada Revenue Agency received the most complaints of all government entities. The Conservatives' solution: $250 million in cuts.

How are the Conservatives going to correct this pathetic record?

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, June 7th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague for her speech.

However, I want to make it clear that this product will merely encourage people to save; it will not guarantee anyone's retirement income.

My colleague said that people can invest in these pension plans. But consider TFSAs, which are a similar product to help people save tax-free. Only 41% of Canadians have a TFSA, and nearly half of them earn $100,000 or more per year. Only 24% of those surveyed said they are using their TFSA to save for retirement. The product envisaged in Bill C-25 is the same as an existing retirement product.

Why does my colleague say that people will invest more if they are not required to, even though he knows that people who do not have money do not invest for their retirement?

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, June 7th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his question. In terms of the options to be considered, why look elsewhere when we have a program that works?

The Canada pension plan and the Quebec pension plan work. They help those who are eligible. Accessibility can be changed and expanded, but that is a discussion to be had with the provinces. If a product is working and helping those who benefit from it, then we have to invest in that product. That is why in the NDP, we have said that this program works. It has been shown to have lower costs and higher profits. Who benefits from those profits? People taking their retirement; that is who. The program works.

We have heard the government say that it has to negotiate these things with the provinces. However, when we look at the government's current approach to negotiating with the provinces, we see that it is less about negotiating and more about imposing things. Just look at the health transfers to the provinces. This government makes unilateral decisions. The same goes for employment insurance. The government imposes its decisions, end of discussion. Then it turns around and says it consulted the provinces. When the federal government imposes its way of doing things and tells the provinces what they are going to receive, where is the opportunity to negotiate?

We think this should be discussed with the provinces. There are ways to improve the pension plan and I agree that there are ways to go about it. However, above all, we have to talk to the provinces, which the government is not doing.

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, June 7th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for the very good question. That is really at the core of this bill and it is truly what we oppose.

Generally speaking, the bill looks good. However, upon closer examination something very important stands out. It is not mandatory for the employer to contribute, and therefore the employee is told to set aside some money and maybe the employer will contribute. If the objective is to protect employers rather than employees—the people who will be retiring—it is not mandatory for employers to contribute. In that case, the employee assumes all the risk.

That is why I repeated that it is the same as an RRSP. It is about putting money aside. The employer does not have to contribute.

I would like to read a statement by Michel Lizée, coordinator of UQAM's Service aux collectivités, who sits on the Université du Québec retirement committee:

We should first expand the Quebec pension plan in order to increase universality and income security. An enhanced QPP could reduce employers' current service costs, and consequently their funding risk and administrative burden, while levelling the playing field with respect to competition among businesses.

Clearly, the government is not even going with what makes the most sense.

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, June 7th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased today to speak to Bill C-25, An Act relating to pooled registered pension plans and making related amendments to other Acts.

At first glance, this measure seems to be a good one. However, it turns out to be a half measure when we take a closer look. That is exactly what was done by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance and even more so by the NDP in the House. This bill really has holes and problems. It has to be studied in its entirety, and we must figure out why the government has introduced this bill.

In Bill C-38 , the Conservatives attack seniors. That is clear. Just look at the provisions concerning the old age security program and the guaranteed income supplement.

The government has decided to increase the retirement age from 65 to 67 without providing any explanation. We posed questions to the Minister of Finance at the Standing Committee on Finance. The opposition was very insistent and, in the end, the government admitted that the savings would amount to $10.8 billion in 2030. The government is therefore balancing its budget at the expense of seniors and future generations, and that is a problem. We must understand where the government is coming from when we study this bill.

One of the first things that is obvious about the RPPP is that this product is very similar to an existing product, the RRSP.

In fact, RPPPs are more comparable to RRSPs—because they are administered by banks and financial institutions that will invest the money in the markets—than to a pension plan for seniors or future retirees.

On the weekend, one of my constituents told me that when he was younger, people talked about retiring at 55. They believed that if they invested as much as their advisor told them to into a retirement plan or their RRSP, they would be able to retire at 55, no problem. Today, that constituent is still working even though he is over 55 because these retirement investment products fluctuate with the market and the market has been turbulent lately. The investor's retirement income depends on the market.

What we are talking about today is exactly the same thing. It seems like the government has learned nothing from past mistakes and is doomed to repeat them. It claims it is introducing a product for the people who need it. Obviously everyone wants to have a stable and guaranteed retirement. However, this product does not offer such guarantees.

I would say it is like an RRSP because the employee is told to invest in this plan, but the employer is in no way forced to contribute to it. Therefore it is the employee who assumes all the risk. Of course, the employer might contribute, but that depends on his goodwill.

The government currently has tools such as the Canada pension plan and, in Quebec, the Quebec pension plan. These are solid plans.

No one across the way can deny that the Canada pension plan works, that it is well run and ensures a good retirement for those who are lucky enough to benefit from it: workers, self-employed workers, and people in the public and private sectors.

This plan exists and that is why we are saying that instead of creating a product that is similar to RRSPs or TFSAs, which we already have, the government should be investing in a plan that works. According to witnesses at the Standing Committee on Finance, the cost-benefit ratio for taxpayers is very high. It costs less to administer the CPP than to create a new product.

One problem is that this product is administered by financial institutions that want to generate profits. We know this; it is normal. At whose expense are these financial institutions going to make their profits? At the expense of those who have invested in this product. In this case, there is no guarantee. We talked about the fact that regulations might be brought in to ensure that the fees are not too high. However, there can be no guarantee that those fees will not go up over time. And when those fees go up, who loses? Who will have less money in the end? The people who paid in will lose. In this case, it will mainly be employees.

Rather than helping employees and people who are going to retire, the government is helping financial institutions, which, clearly, are already at an advantage thanks to the choices this government has made with previous budgets and the most recent budget. All the government is doing is continuing to reduce their tax rate so they can generate more profits. However, those profits do not go back to the common people. They do not go to those who want to retire with dignity and prepare for their future. Once again, clearly, this government does not have the best interests of seniors at heart.

My colleague from Thunder Bay—Rainy River introduced a bill to protect pension plans in case of bankruptcy. During the last election campaign, I met people. One person came to see me to say that we had come up with a very good idea, something that would protect them. He had spent a good part of his life working for Nortel, investing, working hard and keeping the economy going. Money was invested in his pension for the future. He was promised that he would be protected when he retired. We all know what happened in the end. Nortel went bankrupt. Because pensions were not protected, he is now living in misery. That is what he told me. This man's plight touched me deeply. He had tears in his eyes when he said that he had worked, he had invested, he had done everything he was expected to do, and yet the government failed to protect him.

What I find so difficult to understand is why the government does not really want to protect seniors, the people who truly helped build this country, who worked very hard. Thanks to these people, Canada has made progress in terms of the economy and quality of life. The government should be thanking them and telling them that they have worked hard, but what is it doing instead? It is giving them the cold shoulder. Not only that, but it is also attacking them. They worked hard and set money aside, but the government does not even want to protect them. What a shame to see that kind of attitude from the government.

As I said, that is what we are seeing in the budget, in Bill C-38. All of that and various changes have resulted in a record gap between rich and poor. That gap has been growing steadily since the Second World War. Of course, former Liberal governments have to take some of the blame, but so does the Conservative government.

The Conservative government is aware of the situation. The Conference Board of Canada and the OECD are saying it. The facts are there. The gap between the rich and poor is growing wider and wider, particularly in Canada, where it is growing more rapidly than in the United States. Imagine that. The United States has always seemed to be the prime example when it comes to this gap. Of the industrialized countries, Canada has surpassed the United States and other countries in how fast this gap is widening. It is because of measures like the budget and this bill that we are seeing these differences. Why? It is because the government is not helping those who need it most.

When we talk about old age security and the guaranteed income supplement, we are talking about people— seniors who are living on the edge of poverty. This government's solution is to tell them to work two years longer—to increase the age of retirement from 65 to 67—and that things might be better for them later. This is a completely ideological way of doing things. As the OECD said, there is no problem; this is purely a government decision.

[Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act, June 7th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, the first thing I must say is that this is a time allocation motion. Once again, this is an attack on democracy, which is a big problem.

We had a chance to hear the minister of state answer questions. He talked about how there were consultations with the provinces to improve the federal pension plan and the Quebec pension plan.

In light of these discussions, we can see that the government is acting unilaterally. The government is imposing its decision regarding transfers to the provinces without any discussion. With respect to employment insurance, the government is once again making a unilateral decision that affects the Atlantic provinces in particular.

My questions are for the minister of state. How can the government say that it will negotiate in good faith and talk with the provinces when it is acting unilaterally? When the government does this, how can it expect to sit down as equals with the provinces, to benefit the retirees who worked for Canada and who built the country we know today?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, May 11th, 2012]

With regard to the government’s strategy for combating tax havens: (a) does the government plan to reform the arm’s-length principles under section 247 of the Income Tax Act; (b) has the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) or any department studied the impact of replacing Canadian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in terms of (i) taxable impact, (ii) reporting, (iii) tax fraud; (c) has the government studied the possibility of requiring multinational corporations to report on a country-by-country basis on all their transactions, including, (i) labour costs and number of employees, (ii) finance costs, third-party and intra-group transactions, (iii) profits before taxes, (iv) provisions for taxes, (v) taxes actually paid; (d) has the government studied the possibility of providing disclosed information available within federal institutions to provincial Attorneys General for the purpose of civil forfeitures; (e) has the government studied the possibility of lengthening the detention-accountability regime found in section 490 of the Criminal Code; (f) has the government studied the possibility of modernizing the Canada Evidence Act; and (g) what will be the effect of cuts on the CRA auditor capacity to investigate offshore bank accounts and tax havens?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, May 11th, 2012]

With regard to tax evasion and its effects on the Canadian economy: (a) does the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) publish estimates of the tax gap caused by offshore tax avoidance, and, (i) if so, which method does the government utilize to calculate this gap, (ii) if not, why not; (b) what is the 10-year trend for (i) the number of transfer pricing audits, (ii) the budgeting for and Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) staffing of auditors dealing with transfer pricing audit; (c) what is the amount of annual capital flow from Canada to the United States resulting from bilateral trade mispricing (i) per capital flow, (ii) by proportion of total trade, (iii) per tax loss; (d) what is the amount of annual capital flow from Canada to the European Union resulting from bilateral trade mispricing (i) per capital flow, (ii) by proportion of total trade, (iii) per tax loss; (e) what is the amount of annual capital flow resulting from multilateral trade mispricing (i) per capital flow, (ii) by proportion of total trade, (iii) per tax loss; (f) what are the internal deadlines set by the Exchange of Information (EOI) Services (CRA) as concerns responses to EOI requests received, (i) how many EOI requests received does the CRA deal with per year, (ii) what is the 10-year trend for EOI requests received by the CRA, (iii) what is the median response time for an EOI request received by the CRA, (iv) from which jurisdiction does the CRA receive the most EOI requests, (v) from which jurisdiction does the CRA request the most EOIs; (g) does Canada collaborate with its EOI partners to ensure the EOI provisions are not restricted, and, if so, (i) with which jurisdictions, (ii) to what specific ends, (iii) have there been any changes to the CRA approach as a result of these collaborations; (h) how prevalent are bearer shares in Canada, (i) what measures exist to ensure that ownership information is available with no exceptions, (ii) are all nominees obliged to maintain relevant ownership information when they act as legal owners on behalf of any other person, (iii) has the government studied the possibility of subjecting nominees to anti-money-laundering laws, and, if not, why not; (i) are credit card, ATM, and stored-value cards defined as monetary instruments in the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act; (j) do law enforcement and customs services have, or has the government studied extending to them, card reading capacities aimed at catching suspected brief-case bankers; (k) how many Canadian financial institutions operate in lower tax jurisdictions and what are their names; (l) how many Canadian financial institutions engage in capital arbitrage by allocating capital to lower tax jurisdictions and thereby lowering their effective tax rate; (m) does the government calculate the effects of Canadian financial institutions operating in lower tax jurisdictions on (i) Canadian financial institutions tax rate, (ii) increases in after-tax earnings, (iii) net income; (n) what is the percentage of auditors and numbers of FTE auditors (i) working on individual tax evasion, (ii) working on corporate tax evasion, (iii) working on corporate transfer mispricing, (iv) what is the 10-year trend for the budgeting for and staffing of these auditors; and (o) what is the percentage of auditors and numbers of FTE auditors (i) auditing individuals using tax havens, (ii) auditing corporations using tax havens, (iii) what is the 10-year trend for the budgeting for and staffing of these auditors?

[The Environment, May 8th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, Tides Canada is a respected organization that does tremendous work in environmental and social causes, but the Conservatives are targeting Tides Canada and treating people who disagree with their reckless environmental policies like criminals. The government is using the Canada Revenue Agency to attack charities that disagree with the Conservative Party line.

When are the Conservatives are going to stop this outrageous war on Canada's environmental groups?