I think that's a valid point.
First of all, we have a bit of history. Back in 1997 the federal government gave a billion dollars to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador to harmonize their sales taxes with the federal GST and to eliminate the provincial tax. This was a grant to offset revenue losses that were going to rise because the retail sales tax rates were quite high and the federal government wanted them to go to an 8% rate.
I think today you can make a case that a similar type of grant should be provided to other provinces, as was done ten years ago, in part because that would really help improve the system and allow better growth, which the federal government will make up for in terms of getting their own higher taxes, especially when you get some of the very large provinces, particularly Ontario, to move towards a value-added tax.