Finance Committee on Nov. 23rd, 2017

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I don't think that's a point of order.

The floor is yours, Madam Minister.

[Diane Lebouthillier, Liberal, Gaspésie—Les-Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

What I am saying is that, at the Canada Revenue Agency, we are working to improve our communications with all Canadians so that they are much more respectful and do a good job of explaining the legislation to Canadians. Whether we decline or accept, we are trying to be much more human in our communications. Humanizing the Canada Revenue Agency's services is part of my mandate letter.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You are talking about showing a lot more humanity. I wonder whether the words that I am going to read, and that you write yourself, Minister, show humanity.

You wrote at the end of July, with your own hand, that “adults who independently manage their insulin therapy on a regular basis are unlikely to meet the 14-hours-per-week requirement.” You made a judgment in those words to overrule hundreds of doctors who have validated that these suffering people qualify for the tax credit.

How can you sit here and tell us about your humanity when you wrote a letter like that and rejected all those people, when you personally interfered and overpowered the decisions of doctors right across this country?

[Diane Lebouthillier, Liberal, Gaspésie—Les-Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

I can tell you that, between 2015 and 2017, the number of approved tax credit claims has increased by 20%. We have made the tax credit much more accessible. We have simplified the forms. We rehired nurses. We also give people access to specialized nurse practitioners who can answer questions and complete forms.

That's what we are doing at the Canada Revenue Agency so that people receive the tax credits they are entitled to.

I will ask Mr. Hamilton to elaborate on the technical aspects.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Hamilton, thank you very much for agreeing to take my questions on this issue.

I've read the language twice now: once in the rejection letters that thousands of diabetics have received, and once in the letter written by that minister, who personally interfered to override the recommendation of doctors across this country.

Here's my question for you: is it still the policy of CRA that someone who self-administers insulin treatment to treat their diabetes does not qualify for the disability tax credit? Is that CRA's policy, yes or no?

[Bob Hamilton]

Our policy is to administer the provision as the act provides, so that may not be yes or no, but I'm telling you that the act says, as you indicated, that it must require 14 hours per week. The factual question is, does that person, in their particular circumstances, take that amount of time?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Who decides that?

[Bob Hamilton]

I'll outline the process for the disability tax credit.

First of all, the person submits a form, T2201—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Who decides that? I'm not asking for the process.

[Bob Hamilton]

No, but it's part of.... The process tells you part of how the decision is made—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Excuse me. I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[Bob Hamilton]

—and then the medical practitioner—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

I do have a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

You have to give the commissioner time to answer your question. What's your point of order?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

I'm simply asking for who decides whether someone meets the criteria. I'm not asking for the lengthy process. Who is the decision-maker?

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

That's not a point of order.

Go ahead, Mr. Commissioner.

[Bob Hamilton]

Yes, it's not a lengthy process, but I think it's important to understand the process. You submit the form. The medical practitioner fills in the section of the form that says this person has diabetes and has life-sustaining therapy and makes an attempt at saying whether he or she thinks that it meets the requirements of the act, but we do not give the doctor the responsibility to determine whether it qualifies for the act. We might go back to the doctor with further questions, for example, and ask them to tell us a bit more about this and about that person's particular circumstances, as they may have a combination of afflictions.

At the end of the day, we have to decide if it conforms with the act, but we do so in taking on board what the doctor has said. Oftentimes we have to ask more questions, and that can be some of the correspondence that you may be referring to in terms of what that follow-up with the doctor says, so that we can get the best information—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Will you be using—

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

You're well over time in this round. I'm going to go to Mr. Fergus. We'll be coming back to Mr. Albas or you and you can go further with those questions then.

Go ahead, Mr. Fergus.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

My question is for Mr. Hamilton. It's along the same lines as Mr. Poilievre's question.

Mr. Hamilton, you indicated that there were 765,000 applicants last year. This is an 8% increase over the previous year year and represents a total of about $1.3 billion worth of disability tax credit value.

For at least a month now, there's been a public controversy over what Canadians who usually avail themselves of this tax credit have been concerned about since they heard about it in the month of May. You've assured us before this committee that the legislation hasn't changed and you've assured us that no regulations have changed, but something has changed.

Given your deputy minister type of role as the commissioner, can you give us an educated guess as to what has changed in terms of the procedures?

[Bob Hamilton]

What I can tell you, based on what I know right now.... I think I indicated earlier that we are going back and looking at some of the specific files to try to get the data to make an assessment of what's there. Not everybody who applies is eligible, so there is a process of deciding on eligibility. We would need to look at the particular cases in both this year and previous years to form a judgment on whether the right things are happening, whether the provision is being administered in accordance with the act.

The one thing I should say, which I wanted to add on to the previous answer and is relevant, is that if someone feels that we've made an incorrect decision, that we haven't accounted for all the information or we haven't considered it properly, you can always appeal to us, in addition to the normal appeals process that I mentioned earlier. We have a separate entity that takes appeals. You can just send us back new information and come back to us.

We make sure that people are aware of that, and I would say it here today. If somebody feels that we have incorrectly judged the material that's in front of us or didn't take it into account, or if we didn't have some information, they can always come back to us. Then, if that fails, they can appeal, but at the moment I would say that there are a variety of reasons that someone might not be eligible. I just really can't comment on specific cases.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

I appreciate and understand that. Something has changed this year, however, from last year. If this were a minor increase or if it happened to a few people, I don't think we would have heard about it, but the fact is that it seems to have happened to a lot of people. It seems as though some people who have been regular beneficiaries of this tax credit in previous years have found themselves not eligible for it starting in May 2017.

We know the separation between the minister and the commissioner. We know that the agency has an arm's-length perspective. I'm not asking you to talk about specific cases, but surely there has been some systemic change. I don't know if it was just a new way of looking at things, but it seems that there's been a significant and noticeable increase in rejection letters.

I don't know what percentage that is. I don't know what number that represents. We'll happily receive that information from you as you go through the files one by one, but something somewhere, or someone, has changed the way they look at these files. Do we not have an inkling of where that is happening?

[Bob Hamilton]

Without having all of the information—

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

I'm looking for a best guess.

[Bob Hamilton]

I will offer up two things that might be contributing. One is more gradual, and it has to do with technology changes. This might mean that disabilities now have less impact on day-to-day lives. Diabetes could be an example. That's a general trend. There are new technologies becoming available that make it easier, and since the disability tax credit is based on how much a disability is affecting your day-to-day life, that's one possibility. I'll put that in.

The second thing is that we are always, as the minister said, trying to work with the medical community and the disability community to make sure that we're making the forms simpler and that we're getting the information we need. We have communications with doctors, for example, where we're asking them to tell us why this person is eligible for the credit. They've asked us to make the letter a little simpler for them, because sometimes they have a difficult time forming a basis for that judgment, so we changed those.

Could something like that have changed it? That'll be something we'll have to look at, but I want to take a look at the actual numbers. At the end of the day, the question for us is whether it's being administered fairly and in accordance with the act. That will be how we—