Finance committee  The policy that has been put in place--in fact it is not a policy, it's a management decision that has been put in place in order to reduce expenditures--is to transform what we refer to as our cash counters. The decision that has been taken is that all revenue cash counters will be able to accept payments in various forms, but not in the cash form.

Finance committee  Payment counters.

Finance committee  That's absolutely the case, and in fact, if I may, Mr. Chair, this measure, depending on how one presents it, has a very different meaning. We see this measure as an improvement in the service to taxpayers. In other words, at this point in time, the member is right, anybody can walk into any office and sit down for half an hour or more, waiting for an agent to be available.

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If you're referring to an incident that took place 18 months ago, then that was probably before I arrived at the CRA. I'm not very familiar with the case. But based on your description of the events, this is a clear case of fraud. In cases like this, our colleagues at the RCMP and the CRA conduct a hard-nosed investigation.

Finance committee  Thank you.

Finance committee  I have no instruction to the contrary. The first two years of expenditure reduction have been taken out of the base of the agency and we fully expect that the next year's base will be affected similarly, unless the government decides otherwise.

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll answer your first question concerning spending cuts. As was mentioned earlier, the CRA has reduced costs. Next year, $110 million will be trimmed from our budget. I wouldn't qualify this exercise as easy. On the contrary, the task is a very difficult one for the CRA.

Finance committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Let me introduce my team. Brian McCauley is responsible for legislative and regulatory affairs. Jim Ralston is the chief financial officer for the Canada Revenue Agency. Barbara Slater handles most of our operation. All of the returns and the service to taxpayers associated with the returns are handled through Barbara.