Evidence of meeting #222 for Finance in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was million.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Darlene Bess  Chief Financial Officer, Department of Finance
Andrew Marsland  Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Paul Samson  Associate Assistant Deputy Minister, International Trade and Finance Branch, Department of Finance
Leah Anderson  Assistant Deputy Minister, Financial Sector Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Michele Bridges  Managing Director, Finance and Corporate Planning, Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions
Marc Desautels  Chief Financial Officer, Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions
Lynn Hemmings  Acting Director General, Financial Systems Division, Financial Sector Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Christopher Veilleux  Manager, Finance and Administration, Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada
Suzy McDonald  Assistant Deputy Minister, Opioid Response Team, Department of Health
Pierre Leblanc  Director, Personal Income Tax Division, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Clerk of the Committee  Mr. David Gagnon

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Please.

12:15 p.m.

Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

Andrew Marsland

We would expect that there would be an impact, because the two don't match in this sense.

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Right.

12:15 p.m.

Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

Andrew Marsland

Where the option is subject to the cap, the intent is to treat it as—

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

What is the impact, then? Do you know? If you don't know, we can move on, but what is the financial impact of the measure in each of the next five years? Maybe you could come back to us with that by the end of the day.

12:15 p.m.

Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Will it be by the end of the day?

12:15 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter

There may be somebody in the back of the room who hasn't answered. They can think about it, and you can go to Ms. McDonald while that's happening.

12:15 p.m.

Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

Andrew Marsland

I'll commit, Mr. Chair. We'll come back with that by the end of the day.

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Ms. McDonald, you were talking about the constant review of the inputs to measure fiscal capacity of various provinces for the purposes of calculating the constitutional obligation of providing comparable services, of comparable tax rates. Is the list of inputs into that calculation defined in law, or are they done by some sort of executive order?

12:15 p.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Opioid Response Team, Department of Health

Suzy McDonald

I don't know the answer to that question. I'd need one of my experts here.

There is a lot of information on what is legislated and regulated on equalization that lays out how the calculations move forward. I think your question is whether or not every single input is in legislation and regulation. Is that correct?

12:15 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Yes. You said in your earlier testimony that the government constantly reviews economic inputs to calculate the fiscal capacity of each province and the national average. I just want to know if that's done in legislation or if it's done by an executive order.

12:15 p.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Opioid Response Team, Department of Health

Suzy McDonald

Let me clarify.

When I was talking about the various inputs, there are two kinds of inputs we are looking at. The first kind of input is information, really, around the legislated piece in terms of updated data for the population, provincial revenues, tax bases and other information. The second piece that I maybe referred to in passing is that because it grows based on the GDP data, we also continually update and look at what the GDP growth track looks like in order to create our overall estimates.

As to your question on OIC, orders in council, I don't know if a colleague here can answer it, but I do need to confirm that with the six people in Canada who truly understand equalization.

12:20 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

You said six people. We have—what, 36 million Canadians?—and six of them understand equalization.

12:20 p.m.

Voices

Oh, oh!

12:20 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Can we have the names of those six people? We don't want to give out their phone numbers publicly, but....

12:20 p.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Opioid Response Team, Department of Health

Suzy McDonald

They're top secret.

12:20 p.m.

Voices

Oh, oh!

12:20 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

They're top secret. Okay. Thank you.

12:20 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter

Pierre, we have Mr. Leblanc coming up here now. We'll see if we can put a little clarity around the ways and means stock option question you had. Then we'll go to Mr. Sorbara.

12:20 p.m.

Pierre Leblanc Director, Personal Income Tax Division, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

Thank you.

On your question on the revenue impact, if you look at the current fiscal planning period, you will see that the last year is 2023-24. As Andrew explained, since this is something that would apply on a go-forward basis, you're looking at a net revenue increase at the federal level in the range of $10 million in the fiscal year 2023-24. It's something that would go up over time to some extent, but as Andrew explained, it will have a fairly modest revenue impact.

12:20 p.m.

Conservative

Pierre Poilievre Conservative Carleton, ON

Ten million dollars is about the amount of money the government has spent during the time I've asked my questions here.

Mr. Kmiec had some more questions, so I'll hand over the rest of my time to him.

12:20 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter

Your time is substantially over. When you get on a roll, I know you lose track of time.

We'll go to Mr. Sorbara and then we'll come back to Mr. Kmiec.

12:20 p.m.

Liberal

Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Pierre, for joining the table.

With regard to the ways and means motion, obviously the issue is about making the tax system fair, which is something our government has done since day one with the introduction of the middle-class tax cuts and asking the 1% of wealthiest Canadians, the highest income earners, to pay a little bit more.

With regard to the consultations on stock options, fundamentally we would be removing a tax-advantaged method of granting compensation to individuals in what are called “mature firms” on a go-forward basis. Is that correct?

12:20 p.m.

Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance

Andrew Marsland

That is correct, yes.