Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak to the motion presented by the right hon. member for Kings—Hants. The motion reads:
That, in the opinion of this House, the Income Tax Act should be amended to provide a tax credit of $500 to all emergency service volunteers.
It was not too long ago, in my riding of Markham, that we had volunteer firefighters, and I appreciated the services they provided for Markham. If we had to at that point in time bring them on, even as part time workers, it would have created considerable hardship on the municipality and would have driven taxes up. Like myself, the hon. parliamentary secretary who spoke and other members who live in urban ridings, we recognize that this is not a problem for most ridings because they have full time firefighters and it is incorporated into their tax base. However, in small and more rural type ridings if they had to pay for this type of service they could not afford it.
What we are talking about here is a $500 tax credit. If a small urban riding had to pay for a full time firefighter we would be talking about 60 to 100 times more in cost to the municipality. These people give of their service willingly and do a tremendous job. They volunteer not only as firefighters but in many other ways for their municipalities. When they are putting their lives at risk right beside full time firefighters, then it is important that we honour their services.
From that standpoint, I will recommend to my party that we support the motion put forward by the hon. member for Kings—Hants. I think it is a great motion.