Mr. Speaker, Thomas Jefferson said that there are two things certain in life: death and taxes. Another thing that is certain is that a tax never dies. This new $24 per round trip tax is a punitive penalty on those who travel.
There are many smaller airlines that fly smaller routes and their fares may be only $50. All of a sudden, the cost of a ticket on those airlines will increase by 50%. It is completely insensitive to price. The cost of this new tax is the same whether one flies business class from Halifax to Victoria for $4,000 or takes a $50, 10-minute flight from Victoria to Vancouver. It is a terribly designed way to pay for this.
I have every anticipation that the revenues from this will end up in a slush fund, much like those from the EI fund which have now furnished the government with a $40 notional surplus to pad its budget.