You do?
Evidence of meeting #26 for Finance in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was region.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #26 for Finance in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was region.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
You want to believe it.
Hi. It's good to see you again.
I only have seven minutes, so let's move.
The first question is on the $100,000 that's being transferred from western economic diversification for costs related to supporting the minister's regional office in Saskatchewan. It's probably a straight-up answer, if you could just give it to me.
5 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
During the period of time that I referenced, Minister Skelton was responsible for both the agency and WED, so we shared the costs, basically.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
You wouldn't have known that at the time? Are these past costs? I'm trying to catch up with the timing. Is this being done as a supplemental, as opposed to...? You didn't have it in your original estimates, so why did it come up after the fact? Just help me understand the chronology.
5 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
I'm being told it's just the timing of the preparation to fit things into the supply cycle.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Yes, okay.
Your answer's on Hansard here.
This is absolutely straightforward in terms of a shift of ministers and making sure that the proper costs are in the right place? What I'm getting at is that this is not an increase in anybody's budget that came after the estimates?
5 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
No.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Okay. That's what I wanted to get clear. Thank you.
Secondly, last year, if you recall, during the estimates process, I raised a lot of concern about the fact that the revenue agency was no longer going to allow Canadian citizens to pay tax bills with Canadian currency at their local counters. I was quite concerned about it. I raised it in the House. I raised it here. I raised it in my meeting with the minister a few weeks ago. I had a private meeting, and I was given assurances that the policy had now been looked at and that there was a change. I just want to hear from you--the rubber on the road part--that indeed if a Canadian citizen shows up with cash money, Canadian currency, to pay an outstanding tax bill, they can use that said currency at the counter and it will be accepted. Is that correct?
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
That is correct.
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
That is correct.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Thank you very much. I appreciate that.
I have another one.
When the party that's government now was in opposition, it had demanded--and rightly so, because it was a good position--that you stop charging GST on provincial gas tax. It was GST on the PST of gas. Has that changed now? They've been around a couple of years.
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
I'm sorry, sir, I don't know the answer to that question.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
No, I don't.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
Yes, I will.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Good.
I have another issue. I understand this is being looked at by the committee, and I accept that, Chair, but I'm not a normal member of this committee, and I may or may not get a chance to be a part of that.
I want to have a brief discussion about this JDS stock. I don't pretend to understand all the ins and outs of it, because most of us don't deal with this. There was a stock option plan allowed to these employees, and upon accepting it they now have assumed legal ownership, and they are responsible for any tax on capital gain that might result from their owning it.
In the case of those who sold the stocks as soon as they got them, the difference was that they were worth $300 and you could buy them for $3. It looked like a pretty good deal. Those who actually completed the transaction and sold the stock had the profit from that to pay the resulting tax bill. But there were a number of employees who did not sell it but kept it. On paper they now were worth the value of all those stocks and the difference between buying them at $3 and selling them at $300. Before they did, the tech bubble blew up, and they were worth much less.
These were just ordinary working people. We were not dealing with people who were major investors and who were dealing with big money or who had accountants and all that. We're talking about ordinary working people making $35,000 to $45,000 a year. If they said yes and took ownership of the stock but didn't sell it, they then ended up with a resulting tax bill--and in the case of some of them it was over $100,000--for stock that was not worth the money on which the formula was based.
You allowed an exemption of some sort that allowed that to be reversed, and that's, on a practical level, a good thing, but it's raised a whole lot of problems about equal treatment for others.
Number one, how much of the story do I have right? If it needs to be straightened out, please do so. Secondly, was it the position of your agency that this not take place? Was that a recommendation that you would have made?
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
I'm sorry, sir; once again you've asked a question I don't know the answer to, and I would have to again take it under advisement and have my colleagues look at it.
5:05 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
I don't want to be unfair to the gentleman, but I do want to make a point that normally when people roll in here they've got the whole Russian army with them, and I've asked three questions and I didn't get an answer to any of them.
I leave that with you, Chair. Thank you, sir.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rob Merrifield
Thank you very much.
Next is Mr. McCallum--oh, you're going to go first.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
Yes. It's just for 30 seconds. It's just to answer.
For that last motion, we requested the minister to appear so that he could answer those questions, and then we were going to ask the CRA. That was just to provide that information.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
John McCallum Liberal Markham—Unionville, ON
I might have missed something, as I wasn't listening to every word, but I had a question about this new tax-free savings account. This may have been one of the ones he answered.
I would have thought, since I know a bit about this as a former revenue minister, that when a new tax measure comes in, the finance department basically decides on the policy and CRA administers it. My question is about the administration of this tax-free savings account. Can you tell us anything about whether work has been done on that, and whether there's any information about the cost of administration?
5:05 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Commissioner, Finance and Administration Branch, Canada Revenue Agency
My response was that for every budget, every time there are measures that will affect the cost to the agency, following the announcement we work within our own agency to determine what we believe the incremental costs of the measure would be. Not all measures will involve costs. Some do; some don't.
In my branch, the finance branch, we work with my operational colleagues to make estimates of those costs. Then we ultimately present them to the Treasury Board for consideration. Ultimately, after all the due diligence is done, they will appear in estimates. They will most likely appear initially in supplementary estimates, and then ultimately in main estimates.