Thank you, Madam Chair.
The subject of income splitting has come up, and I know there has been some consideration and thought given to it, so I did a little background reading. One of the things I discovered was that approximately 18.7 million Canadians live in families with two or more earners. These households couldn't take advantage of income splitting unless there was a great disparity in terms of the income of one spouse compared to the other. By contrast, 2.8 million Canadians live in single-earner families, and they're the ones, of course, who would be most likely to gain from income splitting. If you look at those incomes, if the family is making $36,000 a year or less, they'd save about $200, but if they're making $230,000 a year, they'd save $9,000. It seems that again we're into a real inequity. We have this proposal to fiddle with the tax system, and once we do, we discover that it benefits those at the high end far more than people who are at the lower end. It would cost about $5 million in government revenues to do that.
I'm wondering, would it make more sense to invest that $5 million in something that is more universal? If we're talking about families needing to have choices, choices with regard to extending employment insurance benefits, so there can be longer parental leave, so those families can benefit that way, or making sure there's a national child care system, so there is choice, where both partners wish to work and contribute and enjoy the benefits, they can....
I'm wondering if you would care to comment on that.