Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm looking forward to actually getting to some factual information here.
Let's talk about the payments task force, which did some great work. I know the CFIB was part of that. So were the Canadian Payments Association, PIAC, FCAC, and the Consumers' Association of Canada. They introduced that report. They gave it to the Minister of Finance. It was introduced in the House in December 2011.
The task force for the payments system review called for this legislation, which could potentially save the Canadian economy $32 billion in productivity gains through the modernization of Canada's payment system. Now according to the task force, Canadian payment regulation is being quickly outpaced by countries like Romania and Peru. This comes from that task force report. We're a G-8 country; they are not.
The task force also indicated “that unless Canada develops a modern digital payments system, Canadians will be unable to fully engage in the digital economy of the 21st Century”, of course “leading to a lower standard of living across the country and a loss in international competitiveness”. Since this was introduced in the House, nothing has come from this government to address the payment systems report.
I'll give you a “for instance” on this:
Small businesses are frustrated by the lack of digital alternatives to paper cheques. (Eighty per cent of small business payments are made by cheque because there is no accessible, reasonably priced electronic payment alternative.)
Industry has indicated that it “has not implemented change due in part to uncertainty and lack of coordination”, which the government should be leading on by example, both in terms of adopting new practices and coordinating efficiencies in the private sector.
So I'd like to ask this question of both the CFIB and to the Chamber: in your view or opinion, what role should government take to encourage small and medium-sized enterprises to digitize their payment and invoicing systems? Should the government solely be leading by example, or should it be playing an active role assisting SMEs in modernizing their payment and invoicing practices? I'll start from there.