Absolutely not clear at all. The legislation, if you read it, goes as far as the CRA took it in their bulletin. It taxes almost every form of financial intermediation, and there has been no retraction.
All we have is legislation that stands as originally proposed. We have the CRA notice from February, which gives a number of U-turn examples that say that mutual fund commissions, formerly exempt, are now taxable; finance commissions paid to auto dealers, formerly exempt, are now taxable; certain commissions paid to other financial intermediaries, formerly exempt, are now taxable. That's what created the huge alarm. The life insurance sector estimated the additional tax they would bear would be about half a billion a year.
There has been no retraction. All we have now, planted on top of that CRA notice but still with the original legislation before this committee, is a statement that the CRA will embark on a review. So if you make one of these endangered supplies.... And these days everybody is an intermediary, because whether it's a retail or wholesale product, whether you're buying a couch or a jet engine, the vendor will arrange for the financing and will receive a commission. It was also suggested to the CRA that equity brokerage was affected by this taxation as well. If you are in that zone you have legislation that taxes you, you have the CRA notice in February that taxes you, and you have this woolly statement from the minister and an endorsement that the CRA will now conduct a review.
So there has been no retraction, and many supplies are clearly taxable under the legislation in front of you.