Finance Committee on Nov. 1st, 2011

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

I'm a little disheartened, because these fine folks who are waiting spent hours at a budget implementation act briefing specifically for MPs and senators. And I know that most of the opposition members who are asking questions didn't send staff and didn't ask any questions during that budget implementation act briefing. This was supposed to be for brief clarifications, and unfortunately Mr. Peter Julian wasn't part of that.

But in the interest of collaborating with this committee, I am going to make a suggestion that because they missed the briefing—unfortunately, and that's their own choice—they could suggest questions or they could pose questions through written form and they can get answers later.

But we intend to get through this bill, as we suggested earlier, so I would suggest that to them. And I'm not sure why they didn't show up for the briefing, but these fine folks did and already went through this once.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Mai, please.

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Maybe I can explain why.

You're speaking about working together. We were in committee. As you know, we were on the pre-budget tour when you—

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

I came back.

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

You came back, but that's the thing. We have a bill of some hundred pages. You're doing everything together. You know that we have a pre-budget tour and you called the briefing at the same time, and you say you want to work with us? Do you want us to cancel the pre-budget tour and come here to listen to the briefing?

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Not at all. You have staff.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Okay, we're getting into a debate here.

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

That's not collaboration. I don't call that working together.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Here is what the chair is going to recommend in the interest of generosity and good fellowship. I'm going to push the officials.... We'll keep them here until 7 p.m, or maybe a little beyond. But at that point I'm going to call the witnesses who we, as a committee, have invited to appear before us here tonight.

I'm going to ask members to try to get through the eight sections in this bill very quickly, and to be very quick with their questions. The political debate is between the political parties. Let's not involve the officials in the political debate; let's just get through it.

Do members still have questions with respect to part 1?

Mr. Giguère.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

My question is for the officials.

I have carefully read section 118.031 regarding children's arts and I see a problem with it. Arts is such a broad term that it covers recreational and development activities.

I have a very simple question. I will use a hypothetical situation. Let's imagine that there are 300,000 children in daycares. If all daycare owners were to increase their fees by $500 and justify that increase by saying that they would become educational daycares, the government would be footing quite a bill.

What do you think about that?

[Ted Cook]

In response to the question about the nature of the activities covered by the new children's arts tax credit, I would point out that in clause 98 of the bill, there is a provision that defines artistic, cultural, recreational, and developmental activities, and the eligible programs for the purpose of the credit. It specifically refers to the types of activities involved: literary, arts, visual arts, performing arts, music, etc., and then as well, in terms of the eligible expense, it requires that it be separate from the school curriculum, and also that 50% of the activities offered to the children by the organization include a significant amount of the artistic, cultural, recreational, or developmental activities. So in addition to the cost of day care, it would have to satisfy any of the requirements of the regulations related to the credit.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

So you are confirming that a daycare claiming to have an educational component could be allowed to increase its fees by $500. That way, parents could be leaving their children in educational daycares. That's exactly how I had understood it.

In the French, this is on page 65 of your document on finance and on page 55 of your document on Bill C-13.

[Ted Cook]

I'm sorry. Is that the clause-by-clause explanation that was provided to the committee?

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Yes.

I have a question about the $500 tax credit.

Someone who earns $12,000 and has two children won't be able to afford the $500. No tax credit is possible in that case. Is there a social exclusion for the poor when it comes to arts.

Would it have been possible to apply the refundable tax credit to everyone earning under $15,000 to some extent? Has that been calculated?

[Gérard Lalonde]

I think this is probably at least the third time we've had a question about the refundable tax credit, and I think I would refer back to the comments of the chair that our responses here are really about how the legislation and the proposals in the budget are put forth.

Now, in terms of what the government might have done differently, again, that's a decision of the government of the day, and I would ask the chair—

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

The notion of informal caregiver now has a family connotation. In other words, an informal caregiver must be a blood relative to be entitled to benefits.

I have a bit of a problem with that. In my riding, there is a Canadian legion association where the older people are supported by the younger ones, who act as informal caregivers. Unless I am mistaken, if the informal caregivers are not related by blood to the 90-year-old veterans, they will not be considered as family caregivers? Did I understand correctly?

[Ted Cook]

I think your understanding is correct in the sense that the caregiver credit is not available where there is no relationship, no familial relationship at all between the parties.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you very much. That's exactly how I understood the legislation.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Merci.

Can I move on to another part? The priorities, I'm understanding now, are parts 8, 10, and 18. Is that correct, or is that not correct? It's not correct?

Mr. Julian, do you have a comment?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

To clarify, Mr. Chair, we're going to be doing clause-by-clause on Thursday, and evidently there will be questions on many of those clauses and parts at that time.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

There will also be amendments and debate.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I've been speaking to my colleagues just to understand what the purpose was this evening. It almost looks as if there were two things scheduled at once: a technical briefing or general questions on the parts of the act, and witnesses speaking more generally to Bill C-13. Would it be correct that we're actually looking at two agendas for one evening of meetings?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Yes. The thinking was to have the minister and officials for political dialogue and questions generated by the members' reading or briefings, and then to hear from witnesses tonight and tomorrow.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I can understand your challenge and your dilemma.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

I didn't decide that. We had a discussion, and the two vice-chairs were there, as was Ms. Glover and Ms. McLeod and the clerk. That's the agenda we came up with.