Finance committee  We did think that it would be slightly less than the initial sell-off, but the market very quickly prices these in. If you had put a 31.5% tax on bond income the next day, you would have seen the same kind of sell-off. My view is that if they had said it was a problem and they didn't want to see companies in key sectors, the very large corporations, converting, and that we had to study it, it would have caused some nervousness, but I don't think you would have seen the reaction that we did see on November 1.

Finance committee  I'm sorry--could you say that again?

Finance committee  No, I don't believe it would have. If there was no tax being.... If there's really a way to study the issue and put a moratorium on these trusts, if there's a way to study the issue without immediately introducing the 31.5% tax, if that's the best way to go, then no, it wouldn't have been as damaging.

Finance committee  No, I haven't. We've done our own studies. We've made our own estimates, but I haven't seen studies from others that might have assessed what it could be before. Is that the question?

Finance committee  Yes, we did put a number on that. It's just a fairly simple present value calculation. We estimated that if you extended the time period when you would implement this proposed tax, it would probably bring back about $9 billion or $10 billion worth of value to the trust sector.

Finance committee  To be honest, I don't think there was an easy way to do it.

Finance committee  I think they would, and as I say, it only eliminates it in the public markets. Non-public players can use this, in fact, and that's going to be a problem, which we can touch on later. To be honest, I don't think there was an easy way to do it, because even a hint that you're going to change tax rules has an impact.

Finance committee  It certainly would. By simply extending the time period, the present value of that tax would be minimized. I think what it would do is buy more time. It would mitigate the impact of the current proposal that still has some problems in it. Also, it would provide more time for people to study this and maybe come up with a solution that would work better and wouldn't discriminate against small, ordinary Canadians, versus big institutions.

Finance committee  Thank you for the opportunity to address the committee. I've been a royalty and income trust analyst for over ten years, and as an independent analyst, the views I express are my own. There are a couple of areas I want to highlight that I think are quite relevant to the discussion.