Good morning, Mr. Chair and members.
I'm Martin Salloum, the president of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce and the World Trade Centre Edmonton.
With me today is James Merkosky. He's an associate partner in tax services with PricewaterhouseCoopers, and he's also the volunteer chair of our finance and taxation committee. He'll probably be answering all of the questions you ask.
On behalf of our nearly 3,000 business members, the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce is once again pleased to have this opportunity to provide you with our most important federal tax and program spending priorities as they are related to the upcoming budget.
Since submitting our pre-budget brief to you in August of this year, global economic circumstances have become even more tenuous, and I'm sure we'll all be watching today to see if the market soars or crashes or does nothing in response to the EU announcements last night.
Given these circumstances, and to uphold Canada's so far stellar performance and reputation in fiscal management, the Edmonton Chamber believes it's even more important now that the Government of Canada stay the course with respect to targets and initiatives announced in last year's federal budget relating to deficit reduction and savings via program spending reviews.
Chambers of Commerce have called on the federal government to balance its books by 2015, and to do so by limiting program spending growth to about 1.6% per year, on average, through fiscal 2015-16. It was also recommended that savings could be realized by improving the efficiency and the effectiveness of government programs.
Similarly, it is crucial that we do not undermine the progress that has been achieved to date with respect to income tax reductions. The government must proceed with the legislated 1.5% reduction in the federal general corporate income tax rate, taking it to 15% as of January 1, 2012, and the government must also continue to review and make improvements to capital cost allowances.
However, it is with respect to minimizing tax administration and compliance costs that our members have focused their recommendations for this year's federal budget.
We have three tax recommendations that would essentially be cost-neutral to the government and yet would improve business efficiency and profitability and help to ensure the continuation of job-creating small and medium-sized enterprises that are so essential to our economic stability, recovery, and growth.
The first recommendation is that the federal government introduce legislation requiring the timely assessment of income tax returns, wherein taxpayers' returns are automatically deemed to be assessed as filed and are duly processed after 120 days of filing, thereby initiating the statute-barred period after which reassessment could be issued.
Recommendation two is that the federal government undertake a comprehensive review of the tax provisions affecting estate and succession planning in the next 24 months to determine whether the existing tax regime appropriately considers transfer of family-owned businesses.
The third recommendation is that the federal government establish an expert committee--I've even had it suggested to me by one of your own ministers--and possibly a royal commission that includes key internal and external stakeholders to, within a 36-month period, undertake a comprehensive review of taxing statutes, with the objective of identifying, recommending, and ensuring the implementation of ways and means to simplify tax legislation, to reduce compliance costs, to ensure all taxpayers are treated fairly, and to continuously monitor changes and publicly report progress at least annually.
I will not at this time go into more detail concerning these recommendations. The full background and justification for them was forwarded to you in our August brief to your committee, and it has also been attached as an appendix to my speaking notes, which we brought here for you.
In closing, I'd like to thank you, James, for inviting us to come to speak to your committee today. The Edmonton business community is appreciative of this opportunity to have its voice heard by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance. Mr. Merkosky and I are eager to respond to your questions.
Thank you.