Mr. Speaker, a few weeks ago I raised with the Minister of Finance the question of an inheritance tax.
I refer to that now very well quoted StatsCan report that examined the basic causes of the accumulated debt of the country and found that 44 per cent of the debt was the result of the compounding effect of a record high interest rate or monetary policy. Fifty per cent of the debt was the result of forgone revenue due to a series of tax concessions. One could call a number of these tax loopholes.
A member of the government, when he wrote to the Department of National Revenue recently, asked whether someone entertaining clients as a business person, whether their hotel expenses, a massage at a fitness club, a dinner at a posh restaurant, the cost of an escort service, night club shows, floor shows, dinners including $200 bottles of wine and a cruise on the river, would be included as a legitimate tax deduction.
The report back from the revenue department said yes, they would be, including the escort service. It was suggested the way the escort service was described ought to be changed, that they were essentially tour guides, body guards or interpreters. To describe them to be for sexual purposes would not be considered acceptable by Revenue Canada but they could be considered under these other categories.
The point I was making was if so much of our debt is as a result of the number of tax loopholes, why do we not close the loophole of the inheritance aspect?
I pointed out to the Minister of Finance that virtually every OECD country, with the exception of two, has an inheritance tax for those people who inherit large amounts of money. I am not talking about a home or a family farm or a family business. I am talking about someone who receives an inheritance, let us say, in excess of $1 million. Virtually every country in the world would ask that a tax be paid on that vast inheritance. We could consider a ceiling of $1 million.
The Minister of Finance spoke around the issue. In this desperate time when we are seeking to find ways and means of eliminating the deficit and the debt, when every other country in the world virtually has a tax on the inheritance of large amounts of money, why would we not?
It is fair to say that the primary benefactors of this tax loophole are the very wealthy, people who inherit $20 million or $50 million through their families at the time of death. We do not have that tax.
I asked the Minister of Finance to explain why we would not have such a tax at a time when we are cutting back on every social program imaginable, every environmental program imaginable, on health care, on post-secondary education, on vocational training and so on. I have yet to receive an answer.
Perhaps when I sit down the person responding on behalf of the government will clarify why Canada is rather unique in this aspect and has chosen not to tax those individuals that inherit vast amounts of money.