Finance Committee on Oct. 5th, 2018

[Laura Tamblyn Watts]

We're doing very little. Under a previous government, there were national awareness campaigns and so on, but response to elder abuse falls under the provinces and territories. There is no sustained funding for any organization in Canada to focus on elder abuse and neglect. The data from a national prevalence study, which you also referred to, by Statistics Canada under-represents the problem because most elder abuse and neglect is not reported. I speak with great respect to my colleagues in the women's movement. We know very well that people don't report abuse and neglect.

If we had an opportunity for people to at least find out about the community-based resources which do exist thinly on the ground, a 1-800 number with someone answering the phone to help direct them would be a very specific, doable measure that this government could implement. We also need an awareness campaign and supports for organizations on a sustained basis to respond.

[Peter Fragiskatos]

The previous government had introduced an awareness campaign. Are you saying that it wasn't effective?

[Laura Tamblyn Watts]

It was extremely effective. We have statistics which indicate that when the national awareness campaign was invested in—and with investment also, like my colleagues were mentioning, in the research and development field within universities in knowledge mobilization, funding that had priorities and tri-council funding combined with awareness—we saw jumps in reporting of between 27% to 43%.

[Peter Fragiskatos]

Well, that's encouraging.

I only have about 20 seconds left.

Are you worried about jurisdictional issues? When you say that elder abuse right now is under the purview of the provinces and the territories, are you worried that the federal government's coming in and doing what you're suggesting would raise jurisdictional challenges?

[Laura Tamblyn Watts]

No, the provinces and territories are begging for help.

[Peter Fragiskatos]

Okay. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you all.

We'll turn now to Mr. Kelly for seven minutes.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Thank you.

Ms. Marrone, thank you for raising the issue of the way the CRA's clawing back of benefits can affect the income security of vulnerable Canadians. This is an important issue. In fact, the CRA recently did a study of focus groups, where it was reported that single parents who have income supports clawed back have found the processes to confirm status as a single parent to be humiliating, riddled with anxiety, and altogether unduly onerous.

Do you have anything that you may want to comment on the process by which single parents must comply in order to file a return and not have their CCB, for example, clawed back?

[Mary Marrone]

I think there are two issues.

One is the original eligibility process and the filing of taxes. There has to be support available to people in filing tax returns. Many low-income people think they don't need to file tax returns because they don't owe taxes. This means they miss out on things like this benefit and other refundable tax credits.

The second issue is what happens when, out of the blue, you get a letter from CRA saying that it needs to confirm that you're a single parent and that it needs a list of information. It's usually a page and a half long and impossible to comply with, and there's no one to call to find out what's the issue, what you actually need to do.

What we actually need is a different appeals process. We haven't tried to design that. It's an important technical issue. I was part of a provincial process where we recommended that either an academic institution or a think tank look into what would be a better way of having an accessible and transparent appeals process. When the CRA cuts off your benefits and you're left without any, there should be a place that you can go for the possibility of interim benefits while you have the fight and that is actually accessible to people.

Right now you have the internal appeals process at the CRA. If you're unsuccessful there, you have to go to tax court. That's a difficult forum, even for lawyers.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Do you have any evidence right now or from the groups of people that you looked at around simply the CRA's even acknowledging receipt of a return? We have cases that I'm aware of where seniors who receive the guaranteed income supplement are being told that they haven't filed a return, even if they have filed a return. The immediate non-filing triggers the clawback of income supports that these Canadians rely on to get through the month. Do you have anything you want to add on that?

[Mary Marrone]

I have no doubt that happens. As legal clinics, what we usually see is when someone is in receipt of benefits and then suddenly there's a demand for information that's impossible to comply with, and those benefits are terminated.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

I'm going to turn now to Mr. Kingston.

In your brief, you spoke a little about competitiveness in the energy sector, and you maybe didn't have enough time. It's a very short time that you have to present.

I represent the constituency of Calgary Rocky Ridge, where there are many thousands of workers who rely on this sector, either directly or indirectly, thousands of whom have lost their jobs or their businesses over the last number of years. I was told via a trader in Calgary yesterday that we are up close to $40 in discount right now. This discount that we lose is worth billions of dollars annually. Being able to get our products to market would generate tax revenue. All the suggestions we've heard today for new program expenditure could be funded many times over if we were not losing this differential.

Could you comment on the competitiveness of our energy sector?

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

The discount was $39.47 a barrel.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Multiplied by a million and a half barrels exporting that day, that's $60 million in one day.

[Brian Kingston]

The discount has been a huge concern for us and for our members. We've been recommending for years that infrastructure be built to get oil and gas to foreign markets. We've advocated for a process of one project, one review. That still is not the case in Canada. Much work needs to be done to get there to enable projects like that.

In addition to just access to markets, tax is extremely important for this sector. In the study I referenced, because of U.S. tax reform, you now see a significant gap in average and marginal tax rates when you compare Alberta to, for example, Texas and Louisiana. The average tax right now in Alberta for the oil and gas sector is 23.9%. If you look at Texas, it's gone from 26% down to 15.8%. We had a small advantage, and now we have a significant disadvantage for new investment in Alberta in that sector. We estimate that this could affect up to 45,000 jobs in Alberta, specifically in that sector.

I'm concerned about the sector. It faces many challenges, and it's not just infrastructure; it's also the tax factor.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

On capital flight, do you have any specific numbers or data that you would like to add on this? The number we've heard is coming up to $100 billion that has been lost. Can you add anything to help us understand the scope and scale of the capital flight and the corresponding job loss and tax revenue erosion?

[Brian Kingston]

Sure. I don't have the exact numbers on me, but we know that last year was the worst year for FDI inflows into Canada since the financial crisis. In addition, a lot of that has been driven by a lack of capital investment since 2015 and the oil price shock in the energy industry. We're witnessing a very negative trend in investment in Canada. It's partly due to U.S. tax reform but also to lower oil prices.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Is FDI foreign direct investment? Is that what you're saying, Brian?

[Brian Kingston]

Yes, I was talking about FDI flows, foreign direct investment inflows.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Julian.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses.

I was a financial administrator before I was elected to Parliament and I always balanced my budget, paid down debts and enhanced services. I always found it's a question of priorities; it's about making the right decisions.

As Mr. Smith mentioned when he spoke at the microphone earlier, we're wasting tens of billions of dollars in overseas tax havens. The federal government bought an old leaky pipeline for $4.5 billion and is going to spend $10 billion or $11 billion trying to put it through, and in my province of British Columbia that results ultimately in the creation of 50 full-time positions. Massive amounts of money are being spent in the wrong places. It seems to me when I look at each of the priorities you've enumerated, they would have a profound impact on the quality of life of Canadians, and you're looking for crumbs. You're looking for incredibly small amounts compared to the billions that Ottawa seems to want to waste.

Ms. Watts, I think you raised some important priorities about seniors. First was the fact that so many seniors lose their pensions, and you mentioned Nortel and there are the Sears pensioners, because of lack of pension protection. You also flagged the fact that many seniors become homeless after hospital stays. In my riding I know of a number of cases of seniors who went into the hospital and lost their housing as a result and they're now on the street in a country as wealthy as Canada.

What happens to seniors when pensions are not prioritized, when the banks get the money before the pensioners do? What happens when we don't have in place any sort of infrastructure to protect seniors' housing when they're forced to go into a hospital?

[Laura Tamblyn Watts]

What we see is that older adults are living in poverty. We see particularly older women disproportionately affected. We see poverty across the women's life course.

We see challenges with housing security in particular where they may have to go into a hospital and they may have been in some form of housing like long-term care and they'll lose that. We see challenges with filing tax returns and benefits because they're unwell or unstable, so they can't actually get the support they need to file their income tax returns, which would then allow them to get benefits. The knock-on effect with regard to health cannot be underestimated.

When we're talking about financial security, I'm also talking about social security. I haven't had too much of an opportunity to say that, but perhaps what I can do is take what you're asking and pivot from the impact of the financial loss into the health loss. Right now without a national pharmacare program, without funding for vaccines like Shingrix and high-dose flu equally across the country on a preventative basis, we see huge downflow effects of the loss of that pension. It then means the breakdown of the family's financial structure, which means they don't have the social ability to get the resources they need, which means the health loss is profound. What we see is people dying as a result.

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

Thank you very much.

Ms. Marrone and Ms. Laidley, you flagged the fact that we put people, particularly women, in impossible positions where they're forced to choose between staying in an abusive relationship or going into utter poverty or losing custody of the children. What an impossible nightmarish scenario that is, where they have to make these choices.

What would change if we actually put in place these protections to ensure that the child benefit was accessible to people regardless of their immigration status? Can you give us a couple of examples of what has happened as a result of the current policy? Are women and children being found on the street? Are they being forced to rely on money lenders? What are the impacts of that?

[Jennefer Laidley, Research and Policy Analyst, Income Security Advocacy Centre]

We would really encourage all of the members to have a look at our report. We have included not just facts, figures, and an exploration of the evidence, but a lot of stories of women who are experiencing this very difficulty. For example, as you say, and as my colleague has illustrated, there are mothers who have first had to stay in an abusive relationship. When that becomes untenable, they have had to leave that relationship and thus lose eligibility for the Canada child benefit. They and their children are then exposed to having difficulties with securing enough income to pay the bills, frankly.

We do see, as do the legal clinics across Ontario, situations where women lose their housing, where they're unable to pay for food and the regular necessities of life, and where children have to go without. For a lot of children, it's extremely difficult.

People talk about poverty in a couple of different ways. Poverty is both a relative thing and an absolute thing. You're in a situation, particularly as a child, when your parents can't afford to pay for the trip to Wonderland, for example, or when they can't afford to pay for a healthy lunch for you to bring to school. You're not only exposed to the health and social development difficulties that this brings with it, but also the difficulty of feeling like an outsider in your own community. There are a lot of impacts that we see for children and families in a variety of ways.

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

Thank you very much.

I have a final question for Ms. Lenton.

You've been extraordinarily successful at York University to have undergraduates represent the diversity of Canada: 70% are Canadians of colour. We know that Canadians of colour in Canada have a much lower income than Canadians of European origin.

How has York University succeeded in bringing that diversity to bear in the university? What kinds of policies could we put in place nationally that would allow Canadians of diverse origins to succeed in the economy, which is largely not happening now?