Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to have the opportunity to speak to this motion.
During debate of this bill in committee a lot of the discussion centred around the same thoughts as put forward by this motion. The motion says very clearly that the burden of proof will now be on small businesses to prove that they have gone elsewhere and were totally rejected. From my understanding, only those who have been totally rejected will then be able to apply under the program.
At the present time we have an incremental amount of about 56%. This was talked about in the report and in the auditor general's report.
The wording of the proposed amendment would create a program of 100% incrementality. I know we continue to move in that direction. There is always a desire that the Canada Small Business Financing Act be applied to small businesses in high risk areas in order to start new types of businesses and expand small businesses. I have a concern about this motion making it 100%.
The auditor general on numerous occasions has expressed the fact that the more the program is opened up and the more we insist on incrementality, the greater the losses are going to be. A balance is required to be struck when we have a program like the Canada Small Business Financing Act and the intention of the government to have a full cost recovery over time. The proposed amendment would limit the goal of achieving cost recovery over the 10 year life of loans under the program established in 1995.
Industry Canada will continue to monitor the incrementality and the cost recovery through independent studies to ensure that these two elements remain in balance.
I know the members of the standing committee who have debated this bill very thoroughly are very concerned about having proper statistics and data on an ongoing basis. Although the bill insists on a review every five years, the Standing Committee on Industry will be bringing this up on an annual basis in order to make sure we have good reports and understand what needs to be done.
Approving Motion No. 1 which would force 100% incrementality starting with this bill next April would not be fair to the small businesses across Canada that continue to seek small business loans because of their high risk factor. We want to protect the new small businesses coming on stream and those that want to expand.
I would suggest that my colleagues not support Motion No. 1.