Well, it's important that it comes back, firstly. There was no consultation. Initially it was a decision that was made that surprised us all. Obviously it is important. We're one of the only countries in the world with a value-added tax that doesn't give it back to their visitors.
Tourism is an export industry. All other exports have their foreign end user not pay GST. But in tourism you decided to penalize us at the worst possible time by having our foreign customer pay the GST.
It's just wrong. In principle, it's wrong. So it is important.
I talked to a Montreal storekeeper who sells Inuit carvings. His business is down dramatically, because foreign visitors don't come in and buy product anymore because they don't get the GST rebate back again.
The government did give us back the volume ones--the convention--which is working perfectly, and it's fine. We congratulate the government for at least hearing us and giving us the convention side back.
The tour operator or tour package side was given back to us, but the program to manage that is too difficult, too bureaucratic, too administrative, so that most tour operators are just charging the GST. So the FCTIP, the government program, is meant to be an incentive program, but it's a disincentive for foreign tour operators. That has to be fixed, and Diane Ablonczy is aware of that, and she's committed to helping us fix that.
It's the individual program. We need that back again as well. We should look at broadening it. We should go beyond products and hotels. Let's do what other countries are doing and look at other ways to incent people to come to Canada.