Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Fraser might be interested in what I am going to say, because she has already studied this file, as did her predecessor.
About a year and a half ago, I tabled a motion before the finance committee requesting that a special committee be struck in order to study the Canada-Barbados Tax Convention. Barbados is a tax haven for Canadian investors, and their investments continue to grow.
Formerly, the Department of Finance even promoted Barbados on its website, as the best place where Canadian investors can avoid paying Canadian taxes. In 1994, Mr. Martin, who was then the Minister of Finance, tabled a bill in order to clean up the tax conventions between Canada and countries deemed to be tax havens. He did not want either the Auditor General at the time nor his successor to say that Canada's tax base was harmed by too much permissiveness regarding the transfer of capital.
Mr. Martin then tabled a bill that dealt with all tax conventions, with the exception of Barbados. Afterward, he adopted some amendments that we will have the opportunity to deal with later if my colleagues accept to strike such a special committee. Time and time again he proposed fiscal provisions whereby companies like his company, Canada Steamship Lines — an international marine transportation company, which was inactive and based in Barbados following the decision not to amend the tax convention with Barbados — might benefit from a made-to-measure tax system. We estimate, as does ATTAC-Quebec, an international organization for fiscal fairness, that this made-to-order fiscal system allowed Mr. Martin and his family to benefit from tax savings amounting to nearly $100 million since 1998.
Mr. Chairman, I know that you do not want us to vote on this matter immediately, but I will ask my colleagues to discuss this motion later on. Let me remind you that last year, the Conservatives had supported the idea of such a commission, not in order to attack Mr. Martin's family directly, but mainly to regulate fiscal relations with Barbados and the growth of direct investments in that country. The Conservatives also wanted to look into the fact that a customized tax system had been set up so as to favour a specific kind of economic activity — international marine transportation — for Barbados, and that CSL international's head office had been set up shortly after Mr. Martin brought in the first fiscal amendments.
The analysis will yield further details, but many tax experts from Quebec and from all over Canada raise questions about Mr. Martin's doings, and about this made-to-measure tax system. In my motion, there is a list of people whom we could invite, which includes recognized specialists who would be ready to testify before the special committee.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for your attention. Also, thank you for having allowed me to be the first intervenor, and I apologize to the Auditor General for having taken five minutes of her time.