Mr. Speaker, on behalf of Canadians, what we are trying to do is to link the very real damage done to employment by payroll taxes and the fact that payroll taxes have to come down.
We all understand that the Canada pension plan is a basket case. Everybody knows that. The problem is that for new people coming into the plan it must be fair. For businesses that now have to try to maintain a payroll we have to keep them from going broke. For the vast majority of businesses there is only one place the money can come from. According to the same CFIB survey, 49 per cent of small businesses with five employees are operating at break even or loss positions which means that the last person hired will be the first person fired.
How many small businesses will be forced to close as a direct result of this payroll tax increase? That is the problem.