Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I'm sorry about that.

Finance committee  The agency acts on the basis of the ways and means motion to change the marginal tax rate. My understanding is that part of the budget bill would establish it at 15% for the past year, and I think at 15.5% for the years to come. That would be in the budget bill.

Finance committee  Yes. It's not uncommon. There is a reference to it in Beauchesne’s. When a government tables a set of budget measures, we don't have any choice; we have to start getting ready.

Finance committee  It was not.

Finance committee  I do not think their concerns are well founded. We have discussed cost-cutting measures at great length with the unions. In fact, we even made some changes further to suggestions received from the unions. For example, our plans were to do away completely with the payments desk, but after hearing from the unions, we decided only to do away with the cash payment option.

Finance committee  That's not quite what I said. Some Department of Finance colleagues are in contact with CRA officials to ensure that the government's planned budgetary measures can in fact be implemented.

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The member has asked a very important question. I've been concerned about this very subject since I started working at the CRA. I've begun to look into this matter and to initiate some changes. Canadians invest substantially abroad. As a rule, the level of investment abroad is a positive indicator for a nation's economy.

Finance committee  There's a lot of meat in those three questions, obviously, and I think--

Finance committee  It shows the member's experience with the agency or the department, if I'm not mistaken, at that time. I will leave some time for my colleague, Mr. McCauley, to think about the compliance cost question, but let me briefly address the two others. I think when the member mentioned the amnesty program he was referring to the voluntary disclosure program.

Finance committee  There are a lot of numbers. They are very important numbers for the members, and I can see there is some confusion here. With your permission, Mr.Chair, I would like to table the numbers with the committee so they are the right ones.

Finance committee  We have that number somewhere; I just don't want to quote it by heart.

Finance committee  This is a good question, Mr. Chairman. The member is very observant. The agency has the ability to receive payments for service. This relates very specifically to the Canada Border Services Agency. As you know, they left the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency at that time. The first year after they left, the services were left on our estimates, and then in the second year we charged them for that, because we provide all the computer services for the border agency.

Finance committee  It's not a new operation, except that it was on our base before and now it's being paid to us. So it's an accounting change.

Finance committee  Barbara, do you know?

Finance committee  We're pretty proud, frankly, Mr. Chairman, of our record on this. On general inquiries, the average in the year is an 83% response rate, which is above private sector standards, and for business inquiries it's 91%. Hopefully people don't have to wait. In the peak period, in the weeks that just preceded today, there are times during the day when the waiting time can be longer, obviously, because we're peaking sometimes at 35 calls per second, as I said.