Bill C-13 (Historical)

Keeping Canada's Economy and Jobs Growing Act

An Act to implement certain provisions of the 2011 budget as updated on June 6, 2011 and other measures

Part 1 of this enactment implements income tax measures and related measures proposed in the 2011 budget. Most notably, it
(a) introduces the family caregiver tax credit for caregivers of infirm dependent relatives;
(b) introduces the children’s arts tax credit of up to $500 per child of eligible fees associated with children’s artistic, cultural, recreational and developmental activities;
(c) introduces a volunteer firefighters tax credit to allow eligible volunteer firefighters to claim a 15% non-refundable tax credit based on an amount of $3,000;
(d) eliminates the rule that limits the number of claimants for the child tax credit to one per domestic establishment;
(e) removes the $10,000 limit on eligible expenses that can be claimed under the medical expense tax credit in respect of a dependent relative;
(f) increases the advance payment threshold for the Canada child tax benefit to $20 per month and for the GST/HST credit to $50 per quarter;
(g) aligns the notification requirements related to marital status changes for an individual who receives the Canada child tax benefit with the notification requirements for the GST/HST credit;
(h) reduces the minimum course-duration requirements for the tuition, education and textbook tax credits, and for educational assistance payments from registered education savings plans, that apply to students enrolled at foreign universities;
(i) allows the tuition tax credit to be claimed for eligible occupational, trade and professional examination fees;
(j) allows the reallocation of assets in registered education savings plans for siblings without incurring tax penalties;
(k) extends to the end of 2013 the temporary accelerated capital cost allowance treatment for investment in machinery and equipment in the manufacturing and processing sector;
(l) expands eligibility for the accelerated capital cost allowance for clean energy generation and conservation equipment;
(m) extends eligibility for the mineral exploration tax credit by one year to flow-through share agreements entered into before March 31, 2012;
(n) expands the eligibility rules for qualifying environmental trusts;
(o) amends the deduction rates for intangible capital costs in the oil sands sector;
(p) aligns the tax treatment to investments made under the Agri-Québec program with that of investments under AgriInvest;
(q) introduces rules to strengthen the tax regime for charitable donations;
(r) introduces anti-avoidance rules for registered retirement savings plans and registered retirement income funds;
(s) introduces rules to limit tax deferral opportunities for individual pension plans;
(t) introduces rules to limit tax deferral opportunities for corporations with significant interests in partnerships;
(u) extends the tax on split income to capital gains realized by a minor child; and
(v) extends the dividend stop-loss rules to dividends deemed to be received on the redemption of shares held by certain corporations.
Part 1 also implements other selected income tax measures and related measures. Most of these measures were referred to in the 2011 budget as previously announced measures. Most notably, it
(a) accommodates an increase in the annual contribution limit to the Saskatchewan Pension Plan and aligns its tax treatment with that of other tax-assisted retirement vehicles;
(b) clarifies that the “financially dependent” test applies for the purposes of provisions that permit rollovers of the assets of a deceased taxpayer’s registered retirement savings plan or registered retirement income fund to an infirm child or grandchild’s registered disability savings plan;
(c) ensures that the alternative minimum tax does not apply in respect of securities that are subject to the election under section 180.01 of the Income Tax Act;
(d) clarifies the rules applicable to the scholarship exemption for post-secondary scholarships, fellowships and bursaries; and
(e) amends the pension-to-registered retirement savings plan transfer limits in situations where the accrued pension amount was reduced due to the insolvency of the employer and underfunding of the employer’s registered pension plan.
Part 2 amends the Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006 to implement the softwood lumber ruling rendered by the London Court of International Arbitration on January 21, 2011.
Part 3 amends the Customs Tariff in order to simplify it and reduce the customs processing burden for Canadians by consolidating similar tariff items that have the same tariff rates and removing end-use provisions where appropriate. The amendments also simplify the structure of some provisions and remove obsolete provisions.
Part 4 amends the Customs Tariff to introduce new tariff items to facilitate the processing of low value non-commercial imports arriving by post or by courier.
Part 5 amends the Canada Education Savings Act to make the additional amount of a Canada Education Savings grant that is available under subsection 5(4) of that Act available to more than one of the beneficiary’s parents, if they share custody of the beneficiary, they are eligible individuals as defined in section 122.6 of the Income Tax Act and the beneficiary is a qualified dependant of each of them.
Part 6 amends the Children’s Special Allowances Act and a regulation made under that Act respecting payments relating to children under care.
Part 7 amends the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act to provide that the maximum aggregate amount of outstanding student loans is to be determined by regulation, to remove the power of the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development to deny certificates of eligibility, and to change the limitation period for the Minister to take administrative measures. It also authorizes the Minister to forgive portions of family physicians’, nurses’ and nurse practitioners’ student loans if they begin to work in under-served rural or remote communities.
Part 7 also amends the Canada Student Loans Act to authorize the Minister to forgive portions of family physicians’, nurses’ and nurse practitioners’ guaranteed student loans if they begin to work in under-served rural or remote communities.
Part 8 amends Part IV of the Employment Insurance Act to provide a temporary measure to refund a portion of employer premiums for small business. An employer whose premiums were $10,000 or less in 2010 will be refunded the increase in 2011 premiums over those paid in 2010, to a maximum of $1,000.
Part 9 provides for payments to be made to provinces, territories, municipalities, First Nations and other entities for municipal infrastructure improvements.
Part 10 amends the Canadian Securities Regulation Regime Transition Office Act so that funding for the Canadian Securities Regulation Regime Transition Office may be fixed through an appropriation Act.
Part 11 amends the Wage Earner Protection Program Act to extend in certain circumstances the period during which wages earned by individuals but not paid to them by their employers who are bankrupt or subject to receivership may be the subject of a payment under that Act.
Part 12 amends the Canadian Human Rights Act to repeal certain provisions that provide for mandatory retirement. It also amends the Canada Labour Code to repeal a provision that denies employees the right to severance pay for involuntary termination if they are entitled to a pension. Finally, it amends the Conflict of Interest Act.
Part 13 amends the Judges Act to permit the appointment of two additional judges to the Nunavut Court of Justice.
Part 14 provides for the retroactive coming into force of section 9 of the Nordion and Theratronics Divestiture Authorization Act in order to ensure the validity of pension regulations made under that section.
Part 15 amends the Canada Pension Plan to include amounts received by an employee under an employer-funded disability plan in contributory salary and wages.
Part 16 amends the Jobs and Economic Growth Act to replace the reference to the Treasury Board Secretariat with a reference to the Chief Human Resources Officer in subsections 10(4) and 38.1(1) of the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act.
Part 17 amends the Department of Veterans Affairs Act to include a definition of dependant and to provide express regulation-making authority for the provision of certain benefits in non-institutional locations.
Part 18 amends the Canada Elections Act to phase out quarterly allowances to registered parties.
Part 19 amends the Special Retirement Arrangements Act to permit the reservation of pension contributions from any benefit that is or becomes payable to a person. It also deems certain provisions of An Act to amend certain Acts in relation to pensions and to enact the Special Retirement Arrangements Act and the Pension Benefits Division Act to have come into force on December 14 or 15, 1994, as the case may be.
Part 20 amends the Motor Vehicle Safety Act to allow residents of Canada to temporarily import a rental vehicle from the United States for up to 30 days, or for any other prescribed period, for non-commercial use. It also authorizes the Governor in Council to make regulations respecting imported rental vehicles, as well as their importation into and removal from Canada, and makes other changes to the Act.
Part 21 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to clarify the legislative framework pertaining to payments under tax agreements entered into with provinces under Part III.1 of that Act.
Part 22 amends the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development Act to change the residency requirements of certain commissioners.

Bill C-13—Notice of Time Allocation Motion

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Madam Speaker, I love my colleague's question.

I am not so sure about the exact argument. We would like to see this government use the budget to show some concern for economic recovery, naturally, and some concern as well for social justice and for improving social programs and social housing. This budget should ensure that Canadians who lose their jobs or become ill do not end up in extreme poverty. We would like to see measures in this budget to make Canada a more generous country where there is more solidarity. That is not the case.

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

When we resume this debate, the hon. member will have three minutes for questions and comments.

Bill C-13—Time Allocation Motion

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

moved:

That, in relation to Bill C-13, An Act to implement certain provisions of the 2011 budget as updated on June 6, 2011 and other measures, not more than three further sitting days shall be allotted to the consideration of the second reading stage of the bill; and

that, 15 minutes before the expiry of the time provided for government orders on the third day allotted to the consideration at second reading stage of the said bill, any proceedings before the House shall be interrupted, if required for the purpose of this order, and, in turn, every question necessary for the disposal of the said stage of the bill shall be put forthwith and successively, without further debate or amendment.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Pursuant to Standing Order 67.1 there will now be a 30 minute question period. I invite hon. members who wish to ask questions to stand in their places so the Chair has some idea of the number of members who wish to participate in this question period.

Given the number of people interested, I would encourage members to limit their questions to perhaps about a minute or minute and a half and, as in previous incidents of this, the Chair will give priority to members of the opposition during the question and comment period.

I recognize the hon. member for Outremont.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, a French philosopher once said that while once is philosophy, twice is perversion. That is what we have here today with the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, who is demonstrating the majority Conservative government's utter contempt for Parliament and our democratic institutions.

We know that 39% of the Canadians who voted in the last election chose the Conservatives. That was 39% of 60% of the eligible voters, because 40% of the voters stayed home. This means that they were elected by less than 25% of eligible Canadians. We have very clear rules, and that is one reason why, since its creation, Canada has always enjoyed peace, order and good government. We must all defend our democratic institutions.

But instead of defending our democratic institutions, the government is ignoring them and treating them with contempt. It is telling us that since we made the mistake of giving them a majority, it will now do whatever it wants, gagging us and bringing out the guillotine every time we start to debate a bill. According to the Conservatives, no one has the right to question their priorities or to ask any questions about their bills.

Madam Speaker, you are here to enforce the regulations that we have set for ourselves, and I urge you to take note of the Conservative government's latest affront to Canadian democracy and to defend the rights of parliamentarians to deliberately, carefully and meticulously debate bills. That is why we were elected. This shows contempt not only for Parliament, but also for the voters of the Canadian electorate.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, I do not think, in my lifetime, that there has been a budget that has received as much debate as this one. The budget was introduced in the previous Parliament and it was rejected by the opposition. We had an election and the main platform on which we ran was essentially the budget. After we won a majority government, confidence from Canadian voters, that budget was reintroduced in virtually the identical form and that budget was adopted by this House and is now being implemented through this budget implementation bill.

The amount of debate that has happened and the consultation with the public is unprecedented for this type of a bill. On top of that, we are proposing for this debate an entire four days of debate, which is more time than has typically happened, on average, for any budget implementation bill in the past 20 years. For all the budget implementation bills the average is certainly less than four days.

Therefore, we have ample opportunity to debate in this House following an unprecedented amount of public debate on this matter.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is unfortunate that we are beginning to see a trend here with government bills with the new majority government. Unfortunately, it will stifle the proper debates that need to happen.

I would like to draw attention to the fact that one of the big shortcomings in this budget implementation plan, Bill C-13, is the fact that, once again, the government is discriminating against those who are poor, those who have less than the average Canadian. I will give an example. It has to do with the fact that some of the tax measures that the government talks about are non-refundable. This is something that perhaps escapes many Canadians but, unfortunately, it has a very real effect on those who are poor in this country.

I will talk about the example of the volunteer firemen who will have the opportunity to have a non-refundable tax credit. We, in the Liberal Party, gave a refundable tax credit. However, the reality is that if they are well off as volunteer firemen, they will be able to take full advantage of that tax credit against their imposable tax. If they are not, they will not have that opportunity to take advantage of it. That means again that it is the poor in this country who will be discriminated again, and we need to talk about that.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, this is an important bill to proceed with quickly because it has important measures that would address what I think, and certainly what this government thinks, is the biggest challenge, but apparently not the opposition, and that is jobs and economic growth. We have that in this bill with a proposal for a hiring tax credit for the creation of new jobs by small businesses in Canada. It is very important for job creation. We need that measure in place now.

The opposition members asked for a jobs plan and we have it for them. First, they voted against it the other night and now they want to delay and obstruct it further. That is why we want to move forward with it quickly.

We also want to move forward with additional measures, such as our accelerated capital cost allowance so that businesses can continue to invest and improve productivity to ensure that Canadians stay at the cutting edge of being able to produce and grow to innovate and so that businesses would have the capacity to hire and create jobs and compete successfully.

We are in a context of a global economic downturn and being able to compete successfully globally is critically important for creating jobs here in Canada. That is what a measure like that would do and that is why we want to see that measure put in place without delay.

We have had unprecedented debate, a general election on--

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. Questions and comments. The hon. member for Outremont.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, finally, some lucidity on the government side. We are in the middle of a world economic downturn. We are about to live the second Conservative recession since 2008. In three years, we will have lived through two consecutive Conservative recessions. Precisely because the world economic situation is degrading so rapidly, he does not realize the contradiction in his argument.

Last spring's budget no longer pertains in that context. We need vigorous, robust intervention to create jobs, to stimulate the economy and to hold on to what we have. Instead, we are being served these old bromides, doctrinaire Conservative approach. This is Herbert Hoover redux. This is the Conservative approach. That is not what Canada needs right now. We need stimulating expenditures on infrastructure. We need to keep the economy going. We need to create jobs. The situation has changed. That debate has to take place. The Conservatives are shutting down debate on the very subject that they do not want to hear about. It is the impending recession. It is what is over the horizon. They do not want Canadians to know that they are sitting on their hands like usual and they are using last year's remedies for this year's problems. We want to discuss that. Parliament exists to debate these issues. They are shutting down debate. That is what is going on here today.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Minister of State (Finance)]

Madam Speaker, I am actually quite proud to stand and support this motion that has been put forward. I think we need to put this in perspective. We had a very thorough debate on this budget bill. It comes in two forms, as that hon. member and every member in this House should know. We would have moved this forward more quickly if we had not been forced into an election.

However, we had a debate, a debate that was very fulsome, probably the best debate that one could ever have, and that was with all Canadians for 37 days in the election campaign.

We tabled this budget on March 22. We had 37 days of fulsome debate. This is great debate in here, and there will be more debate on the economy as we move forward, but Canadians have spoken and they have spoken loudly by giving our government a strong and stable mandate and showing support for the budget that we tabled.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Madam Speaker, this is completely mind-boggling to me. The government says that it had the economic action plan and that it went to the people with it, but things have changed. Even the Minister of Finance recognizes that things have changed because he was in the media as late as yesterday saying that the government needed to be flexible and pragmatic. If we want to be flexible and pragmatic in addressing the recent economic downturn, then we need to take another look at what the government proposed last spring when the economic situation was entirely different.

We need to take the Minister of Finance at his word. It is not just the New Democrats who are saying that the government's approach is flawed and that we need to revisit it. I will read a list of people. Sherry Cooper, the chief economist at BMO Nesbitt Burns; TD Economics; Scotiabank; the Conference Board of Canada; the International Monetary Fund; and the Bank of Canada. Even the Department of Finance itself recognizes that we need to do things differently. The Toronto Board of Trade also thinks we are now in a unique situation where we need to do things differently.

We started debate on this bill only yesterday and today the government is bringing a motion to shut down the debate. People in Canada need to be heard on this issue. It affects hard-working Canadians and seniors whose retirement savings are once again going up in smoke. The Minister of Finance agrees that we should be flexible and pragmatic, so let us bring the debate to the floor of the chamber. That is what Parliament is for and that is why we will be opposing this motion.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is no surprise that the New Democrats will be opposing this motion to move forward with the continuation of Canada's economic action plan, a plan for jobs and growth, because they have voted against every other phase of it.

The New Democrats stand in the House now and say that we need to stimulate the economy. When we put forward a budget to stimulate the economy, they voted against it. They voted against every phase of both budget implementation acts 1 and 2 of the 2010 budget and, in fact, if I recall correctly, in 2009 as well when we put forward the first phase of our economic action plan that has worked. Why is it working? It is working because 600,000 Canadians are working. That is more jobs than we lost. We gained more output than we lost. They want to belabour this legislation that would actually provide more stimulus to the Canadian economy and more tax credits to families that need it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I find it most interesting that the government House leader introduces a motion in the House and then kind of turns his back to the whole debate on the issue and will not even stand up to answer specific questions.

It is very noteworthy that we recognize why it is we are here. We are here to hold government to account. We have has major bills introduced in the last few weeks. In this case, just yesterday the government introduced a bill and yesterday the minister said that he would be bringing in time allocation. Bill C-10, a crime bill, would do nothing in terms of preventing crimes from taking place and yet we are spending hundreds of millions of dollars. Bill C-4 would victimize refugees. The government put time allocation on these major bills.

Just so members across the way can say that they have actually seen the bill, this is the bill that we are supposed to be talking about. The government House leader and the Prime Minister see it fit to limit the debate on substantial pieces of legislation.

I would look to the government House leader to stand in his place and tell Canadians how he justifies bringing in this type of legislation and then saying, on the day it is introduced, that there will be only three days to debate it, not to mention the other bills that he—

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. The hon. Minister of State for Finance.