Mr. Speaker, I listened very intently to the hon. colleagues from all three parties and want to address a couple of issues they brought forward.
Canadians have said that they want governments to work together. Canadians recognize that we are overgoverned. Canadians recognize that a lot of overlap and duplication exists in the country. We have listened to Canadians and we responded.
One thing I want to point out is that the provinces have an option. This does not in any way force the provinces to let us collect more of their taxes. We already collect a lot of their taxes. In fact in some provinces we collect 80% of their revenue; in other provinces we collect 50%. The agency is a vehicle to create new options and new opportunities for provinces, territories and Canadians.
The hon. member for the NDP talked about the auditor general's report. That report was before some of the changes I made to give full accountability to parliament and full accountability to the Minister of National Revenue. The comments the auditor general made were regarding the older model without the changes I have made.
Small businesses know the paper burden they have to go through. They know about overlap and duplication. They are asking the government to respond.
There is only one taxpayer in the country. If we could have one tax administration, a single window, we would be better off. Canadians do not want us to build parallel systems in every province as the member from the Bloc Quebecois wants. His view is that it is good but the provinces must collect all taxes.
Small business people would respond to that because they do not want to be dealing with 10 different jurisdictions across the country. They do not want a different system of tax collection in every province. They want a single window approach. They want to reduce paperwork. They want to make sure there is less burden on the business people. Why? It is because we want them to do what they do best, which is run their businesses. We want an organization that can respond to the new needs.
We have electronic commerce now. Someone can sell a good from Quebec into British Columbia. How are we to respond to that? How are we to respond to changes? We need a national agency that can work with all provinces.
The hon. member talked about co-operative federalism. This is in co-operation with the provinces. The provinces say in some cases we are collecting 80% of their taxes but in some cases they do not have any say. This will provide them with a real say by ensuring they can nominate people to the board of the agency. They do not have that now. In some provinces are collecting 50% or more of their taxes. It is really about creating new options.
The hon. member also said this was another way to harmonize. Absolutely not. We are saying that we can collect taxes for the provinces which are not harmonized. Recently I had a discussion with the minister of finance from British Columbia who said “That is a very good idea. We should look at how we can reduce the burden to small business”.
I have had meetings with ministers of finance across the country. We have officials working right now to identify those areas in which we can work together co-operatively when it is a benefit to the province, to the business community and to Canadians. That is what this vehicle is about. It is about creating options and better service for Canadians. It is about providing better service to our small business people.
We are a trading nation. We need to ensure that we are efficient. If we are efficient we can be more competitive in the new global economy. This is about reaching a new vision. This is about working together. This is about responding to Canadians. We will continue to do that as a government.