The credit was a critical tax credit for the smallest of businesses especially. It allowed them to in some cases keep their staff on hand.
Mr. Flaherty said in his most recent economic update that payroll taxes are job killers. Increases in payroll taxes, whether they are EI, CPP, or others, really limit growth for small businesses. They are not able to hire and they are not able to increase salaries.
The EI hiring credit, especially during a time of economic difficulty, did play a huge role in letting our members keep their own employees or absorb the increased EI rates that were occurring; we spoke about that difficulty in rate setting previously. It allowed some stability, for especially the smallest businesses to maintain their payroll.