Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, to increase it by 10%.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I couldn't comment on that.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The purpose of the northern residents tax deduction is to assist employers in attracting skilled labour to northern and isolated communities by providing some recognition for the additional costs they would incur. With respect to the GST, the GST credit is available for low-income individuals across Canada.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  No.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The increase by 10% was the first increase that had ever actually occurred in the northern residents deduction. That was a decision taken by the government to increase it.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The northern resident selection has not been indexed, but it was increased by 10% in budget 2008. I couldn't speculate on--

Health committee  No, but our provincial and municipal partners will use the funds according to their priorities. There is a sizeable envelope they can use to build sports facilities in partnership with the private sector.

Health committee  I am not an expert on infrastructure, but I know that in Budget 2007, the government increased funding to the provinces and territories.

Health committee  With respect to the tax credit, the expert panel recommended that where activities don't involve supervision, these not be covered by the credit, because their recommendation was that supervision was required to encourage active participation, and also for a safety reason, that essentially organized activities would require an adult.

Health committee  The recommendation was for five years, so we will have more than one year in about four years' time. So we would be able to meet the benchmark timelines established by the committee.

Health committee  With respect to the recommendations on the children's fitness tax credit, as I mentioned earlier, there was a question on establishing a benchmark for participation in sports by children and youth, which is not really a tax question, but there are some data via the Canadian Fitness and Lifestyle Research Institute's physical activity monitor, Statistics Canada's general social survey, and Sport Canada.

Health committee  I am responsible for the children's fitness tax credit, but I do not have the numbers for how much of that is allocated for aboriginals. I can provide them to the committee later.

Health committee  The tax credit itself is only one component. It is a single initiative to encourage families to enrol their children in physical fitness activities. Following Budget 2006, there was a committee that was formed, the Expert Panel for the Children's Fitness Tax Credit, and they recommended additional changes to the fitness tax credit that was introduced in Budget 2006.

Health committee  The tax credit itself was introduced to encourage families to enrol their children in activities, physical activities that comprise a high level of cardiovascular activity, to encourage them to provide them with some funding. By itself, the tax credit will provide an additional incentive for those families, but we wouldn't be able to surmise, from the tax information we receive, the changes in the weights, how that has an impact on individual children, but we'll be able to tell from the credit and from the information we receive on the uptake of the credit what the value of the credit is and what that means in terms of an increase in children participating in physical fitness activities.