Evidence of meeting #6 for Finance in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cities.
A recording is available from Parliament.
National Director, Public Affairs, Advocacy, and Strategic Communications, March of Dimes Canada
The questions are out there in the community around whether it should be a refundable tax credit or a deduction, as you talked about. Right now, we're living with the system we have, the Canada disability—
Conservative
William Stevenson Conservative Yellowhead, AB
It's okay if you don't have the actual answer for that one. That's fine.
National Director, Public Affairs, Advocacy, and Strategic Communications, March of Dimes Canada
It's chatted about.
Conservative
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Quickly, Mr. Lee, you talked about urban sprawl and the burbs versus the core.
Where is the more valuable land?
Associate Professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, As an Individual
The most expensive land in any city is in the downtown area.
Conservative
Associate Professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, As an Individual
That's right.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
It's a crisis because of downtown zoning. Land speculation is a large part of that. Municipal fees are the other large part of that, as far as the increase in land....
Who profits in land speculation? It's land speculators.
Associate Professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, As an Individual
Okay.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
There you go. Thank you.
This being the case, follow the money. Who's making money in the process, other than municipalities, governments and speculators? It's not the Canadian public that's being messed around with here. It is effectively the public that's paying money to certain people.
Do you think the government understands the notion of how speculators make money?
Associate Professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, As an Individual
I don't think any government does. I really don't.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you very much.
The last thing I want to ask you about is the withdrawal of the carbon tax.
The carbon tax withdrawn in this budget is the consumer carbon tax.
Does it matter if you have a consumer carbon tax or an industrial carbon tax built into the cost of everything in government?
Associate Professor, Sprott School of Business, Carleton University, As an Individual
No. That's because it gets passed down through the value chains of all the companies in the industry. Ultimately, there's only one taxpayer and they're called the end-user, which is us. We pay all taxes, including corporate income tax. That's been studied to death by the OECD.
Liberal
Liberal
Ryan Turnbull Liberal Whitby, ON
All right.
Thanks to all the witnesses.
Ms. MacKenzie, I want to say thanks again for your advocacy. I don't know if you had a chance to hear the previous panel, but we had Inclusion Canada here, which I think represented some of the views you probably share.
I just want to make sure you were aware that Minister Champagne, the Minister of Finance, was at committee on Monday. In his comments, I think he attempted to be reassuring to the disability community regarding the Department of Finance looking at options to solve an issue we take very seriously, which your organization has rightfully pointed out, the income tax cut in this bill.
I want to reiterate something I said earlier. I think many stakeholders.... I confess that, before I entered federal politics, I had very basic knowledge on how legislation is done. I did not know the intimate details. The result is what I think the disability community is advocating for, which is to be made whole and not to be worse off after historic gains, such as finally getting the Canada disability benefit.
Are you ambivalent about how the government makes the disability community whole, or are you tied to a very specific measure?
National Director, Public Affairs, Advocacy, and Strategic Communications, March of Dimes Canada
That's a very good question.
As long as people with disabilities who are accessing these two credits are not worse off as a result of a very well-intended tax cut, I'm not particularly wedded to any method of doing so. I think that making sure it stands the test of time is the thing we're most concerned about. We don't have to go through this all over again with any subsequent tax cuts.
Altering the method by which the DTC is calculated is probably the best way to go in order to make sure there aren't any further issues. Proactivity is a nice thing.
Liberal
Liberal
Ryan Turnbull Liberal Whitby, ON
I really enjoyed the comment Ms. Whitzman made about duelling professors. I was excited to get you two sparring a little bit here, but unfortunately, we're out of time.
Ms. Whitzman, I think you were on one of the pre-budget consultations that I did on housing. I want to thank you for the great feedback you provided in that process. I really appreciate your expertise.
To you, Mr. Lee, as well, I appreciate your comments today. I don't agree with everything you said, but we don't have time to interrogate you now.
I really enjoyed having both of you.
Thank you very much.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Karina Gould
Thank you very much, Mr. Turnbull.
I will also add my gratitude to the three witnesses we had for this hour. Thank you for taking time to be with us and share your perspectives.
Before we adjourn, I'd like to wish all members a very happy Thanksgiving. I hope you enjoy time with your families, and I look forward to seeing you when we come back.
Do we have agreement to adjourn the meeting?