Finance committee  We did not do that calculation. As we said before, we certainly did not determine what the middle class is either. Since we did not define the middle class in our reports, we did not come up with that figure.

Finance committee  Our report takes into consideration all of the tax measures announced in the budget. What you see in our report today is an aggregate measure. It includes that part of the tax cut but not just that amount.

Finance committee  All of the measures that were announced in the budget are included in what you just quoted me as saying. All of the measures in question are set out in table 3 of the summary of our report.

Finance committee  The seven measures or the main commitments that we are talking about that were announced for the next two years are those that were taken into consideration in our report.

Finance committee  It is actually 31% of the population.

Finance committee  That is exactly what we wrote in our report. Lowering the first bracket rate from 15% to 14% would benefit 83% of taxpayers. Obviously, starting at a lower level, we would capture certain taxpayers and that also implies that the other brackets would be affected.

Finance committee  If I remember correctly, in our report the 83% referred to the first bracket. In our report, we said that if we started with the second bracket, as proposed by Bill C-2, 43% of taxpayers would be affected. Once again, those 43% do not just include taxpayers in the second bracket, but also those in the third bracket and others.

Finance committee  Thank you for your question. I would ask one of our colleagues, Helen or Carleigh, to answer that question.

Finance committee  That's what we said. What we said is that in terms of fiscal sustainability in the long term, if everything stays as it is right now and you don't introduce new measures, what we know right now and what you see as maintained over the long term is exactly the graph you have in figure 6.

Finance committee  Chris, go ahead.

Finance committee  Thank you for your support to the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Also, we are very happy to see that, in your election platform, you spoke of a clearer and stronger mandate. We appreciate that. I will ask Mr. Matier to speak about prudence. He is Mr. Prudence in the parliamentary budget office.

Finance committee  Thank you for your question on transparency. That is a good question. I would like to take 30 seconds to explain what we went through regarding transparency during that time. When we saw that the budget contained only a two-year plan and not a five-year plan, as is normally the case, we were surprised.

Finance committee  Thank you for the question. In our case, we are not saying that it is deliberate, but rather that it is excessive. I understand your point. As I said before, that created certain expectations. It is quite clear that inordinately underplaying GDP growth for the next five years will create lower expectations.

Finance committee  You'll see them in the next part of the meeting today.

Finance committee  I will not make any comments about the previous government. I will talk about the report. We found that being prudent is a good thing. However, excessive prudence is undesirable because it creates expectations or a certain long-term outlook, which could be just as harmful as not being prudent at all.