Mr. Speaker, the $100,000 lifetime capital gain exemption was introduced two Parliaments ago by the previous government. It was sold to Canadians on the basis that it was going to stimulate investment and job creation in Canada. I think that Canadians embraced those principles as being honourable.
However, the government in its implementation made two fundamental errors in that exemption. First of all, it did not establish a V-day value for investments and so allowed investments which were already made and had holding capital gains on them which were eligible for that exemption. It forewent the opportunity to direct this exemption to new investment.
Second, the government did not specify or restrict the nature of investments that could be made under this program. As such, investments even such as Florida vacation properties became eligible for that exemption. Under the circumstances I think the hon. member would agree that this particular exemption, although honourable in its roots, was very poorly implemented. The optics are very bad to the Canadian taxpayers and the dollars that the government is foregoing by permitting that exemption would be much better spent by investing in job creation initiatives.