Thank you for the question.
WITB, which is a lovely acronym, given that I represent Whitby—Oshawa in the House of Commons, is an important program. It is a program that was looked at over the years by others, but it wasn't implemented. What it's designed to do is help people who are relying on social benefits, social assistance, to get back into the workforce, because we had a system that discouraged people from doing that.
It was true to say that there was very little and sometimes no advantage to getting off social assistance and getting a job. That is self-defeating, particularly given the demographic challenge we are facing in Canada going forward.
These are a lot of people. About 1.5 million individuals and families benefit from WITB annually. We brought it in for Budget 2007. We doubled the tax relief in Budget 2009. In this bill, which comes out of this year's budget of 2010, we want to index certain personal income tax and benefits amounts to inflation under the Consumer Price Index. That would be done on an annual basis.
Assuming that this legislation gets royal assent, WITB amounts payable in 2010 and subsequent years will be indexed to inflation on an annual basis, which will provide some extra dollars to Canadian families that need it most and will further encourage able-bodied people and others, who perhaps have some disabilities, if they are able to join the workforce, to do that.