Thank you, Patrick.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm a little surprised with the intent of this bill and frankly with the critique of utilizing tax expenditures such as tax credits as a way to improve access for students.
With the exception of Mr. Merasty, all the Liberal members on this committee were members of the previous government. In the mid-1990s, they dramatically reduced the Canada health and social transfer, which was the transfer that was utilized to assist universities and colleges throughout Canada. It had a direct impact on provincially regulated tuition rates throughout the country. As a result, tuition in the mid-1990s started to skyrocket.
We understand why those cuts were made to the CHST. It was part of an effort to attack the deficit, and that's understandable. But in the late 1990s and in the early years of this century, when finances improved so that the government had surpluses to invest and to improve access, it chose not to improve it through direct financial assistance to students. It instead chose to do it through tax expenditures.
As a matter of fact, between 1996 and 2005, which was the tenure of your previous government, tax expenditures rose from approximately $500 million a year to almost $1.5 billion a year. It was an increase of close to 200%.
The method you used to restore some of the cuts you had made in the 1990s was not direct financial assistance and was not improving programs such as the Canada access grants, but rather it was the utilization of instruments such as tax credits, tax deferrals, tax deductions, and the like. It was the primary method through which your government improved access for students.
You have now come in front of our committee only 18 months after having left government. To ridicule the use of tax credits, tax deductions, tax deferrals, and the like as a method to improve access, in my view, is a little hypocritical.
That's the point I'd make, Mr. Chair, to the members on this committee and to the witness.