You made the statement earlier that we're not bringing enough money in. Well, that's a fact. The government has cut the tax rate. In the year 2000, Paul Martin cut it from 38% to 20% so that...and now they've cut it to 15%. This government has taken $16 billion a year out of the income for the government.
It's exactly the point you just made; it's the money that would have been there to invest.
So I think on some of these points, we're just going to disagree. I don't think that's a great surprise.
Ms. Ralph, you raised a point that's really troubling. I was the seniors critic for a time. We talked about the fact that seniors on GIS and OAS got $15,000 a year, and the poverty line is $22,000 a year.
You're talking to us about half being below the poverty line. That's....
Well, I'll bite my tongue. I was going to say something in Hamiltonese, and we're not supposed to use that language in Parliament.
But that is just horrible. It's a horrible thought. Thank you for bringing that to us.
In my riding, I hold disability tax credit seminars. A lot of the time, the people who come in are veterans. As you know, it's a limited type of ability; for instance, if you can't walk the length of a football field without the use of a cane, you would qualify for this. Then you have folks who have a more substantial disabilities who don't qualify because of the income problem.
What would you think of two-tiering it--leaving it as is for people with income, and then having a second tier for those who don't have the qualifying income?