Finance committee  I shouldn't generalize and say often, but it seems to be often that they're not able to return. I don't have any employment background, but I have a degree in mathematics. After my brain injury, I couldn't add two and two together, and to use a calculator was a problem. Short-term memory most often is one of the problems that follows a brain injury, so to say two plus three plus seven, divided by six...I would forget which numbers I had punched and whether I had punched the “add” sign on the calculator.

Finance committee  Yes, and as I say, the inroads program that the Brain Injury Association offers.... There was a conference on October 20 and 21 in Peterborough about re-teaching and what areas the brain injured should be led into. So once you re-teach somebody how to read.... I sent in my full brief in September, and I think I had an example in there of an accountant who lost the ability to do multiplication tables.

Finance committee  The Brain Injury Association of Nova Scotia has had an inroads program going for the last eight years, and, as I say, it's from donations from the public and a literacy grant occasionally. And they calculated that $70,000, which is a pitiful amount, would enable them to offer inroads classes, which re-teaches reading and writing, and socialization to a certain point, and gets people up to being work ready.

Finance committee  I think I'm perhaps going to agree with Spencer. The GST was only supposed to be on essentials or necessities, and it's not. The rearranging of the whole program is preferable to cutting it.

Finance committee  There are two topics I would like to discuss today, and I welcome everybody to listen. Topic number one on the web page was, what specific federal tax and/or program spending measures should be implemented? Program spending on brain injury rehabilitation will ensure that those disabled with a brain injury are as healthy as possible.