Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Just a couple of points of clarification.... Mr. Brison in his question stated “Canadian citizens”, and I think what he meant was American citizens living in Canada. If they're American citizens by default because they happen to be born in the United States but had never officially taken out citizenship and moved to Canada at a very young age, that's immaterial really to this discussion.
The difficulty here is that the Americans have engaged in a far-reaching tax policy that taxes American citizens who live outside of the geographical boundaries of the United States. However, there are a number of things that this person can do. They can renounce their American citizenship if they don't want to pay American taxes. That's not been suggested here, but that's the reality of this situation. There are many American citizens living in Canada and many that I know who have been paying taxes for years in the States on U.S. investments and on any investments they have that pertain to America.
A lot of people have been following the rules. We have an intergovernmental agreement. We have a situation where because of this, Canadian financial institutions will not have to report directly to the IRS. This protects Canadian privacy, and I think that's what most of us here are really worried about, protecting that financial privacy of Canadian citizens. As for American citizens living in Canada, they have some tough decisions to make on whether or not they want to continue to be American citizens and pay American taxes when they're living offshore.
How far does this go to protect the financial information of American citizens living in Canada and dual citizens?