Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to be able to respond to the speeches made by members of one of the opposition parties, to inform the House and the general public of exactly what has happened, and what the government's initiative has been regarding the guaranteed income supplement.
First, I would like to say a word or two about the concern of the government and the Minister of Human Resources Development to respond to the needs of the poor, not only in Quebec, but throughout Canada, and I include Quebec in Canada.
In fact, this government has created several programs to help them. One of them, being discussed today, is the guaranteed income supplement. It is an amount given by the government to help people who have an extremely small income. This amount is added to the benefits paid out by the Canada pension plan.
The purpose of the guaranteed income supplement is, as its name indicates, to help reduce the poverty rate among seniors. This is a purpose that is important to highlight, because this government is committed to this.
For the benefit of those listening, I would like to add that the percentage of low income seniors is decreasing. This is partly due to the fact that the Canadian economy is doing better and better. Allow me to provide some figures.
One senior in 12 needed the guaranteed income supplement in 1999, compared to one in five in 1980. This is a figure that demonstrates that seniors are better off today than they were 20 years ago.
This is not to say that seniors do not have problems. That is not what I am saying, to the contrary. We know that some people need this supplement. This is why the supplement exists, and it will continue to exist as long as it is needed.
The government wants all seniors who are eligible for the guaranteed income supplement to receive the benefits. We know that there was a lack of information among the general public, and we acted very swiftly to meet this information need.
Let me take a few minutes to clearly explain to the House what this government did to inform the people. The government is required to do so and it met that requirement.
For example, since February, more than 30,000 documents have been sent to the eligible seniors in Quebec, to inform them about the guaranteed income supplement; I am talking about Quebec since all the members who have raised the issue up until now were from that province. Of these 30,000 documents, 23,500 were application forms sent by the department and 6,300 were letters sent by the the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency, for Quebec.
This is why I say that two departments are responsible. Thanks to the co-operation, thet partnership with the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency, we can identify seniors with a very low income, since the agency gives us data on the income tax paid by these individuals.
However, and that is extremely important, we abide by the law, which prevents us from intruding into the private lives of citizens. This is why it was hard to get the information. Until now, we have been unable to match the data from Human Resources Development Canada to the data from the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency, in order to know how much income tax was paid by certain individuals. However, we have been able to find out about the income tax without contravening the Privacy Act. So that is one measure we took. I must say that 30,000 documents is no mean feat.
Second, and this is very important, we obtained the partnership, co-operation and help of the Conseil régional de l'âge d'or, not only through its main office but also through its regional branches throughout Quebec, to organize conferences given either by the minister, myself or officials of the Department of Human Resources Development of Canada who work in those regions.
So we used what Americans call the outreach approach, which means that there were special, particular and specific initiatives to go into all the regions of Quebec to allow people to get the information.
We also distributed the information at various activities, in community health centres, to senior organizations and volunteers who help these people to fill out their income tax return. Clearly, some people have difficulty understanding all the details contained in these returns, which can be complicated for certain people.
However, we specifically sought the co-operation of people who do this kind of volunteer work and organizations that work with these persons, so that they could pass the information on to those who need it. I am thinking here not only of seniors who may already be sick or in dire straits, but also the illiterate who have trouble reading an income tax return.
We also contacted some 2,000 service providers and senior groups. I will name only two, since the list is very long. There was the Fédération des centres d'action bénévole du Québec and the Conseil des aînés du Québec. The list being quite long, I will not read it in the House.
All of that to say that the Canadian government assumed its responsibilities. It is aware that there are difficulties with the guaranteed income supplement and with the information that must be given to the public. The government acted rapidly and took steps so that the information could reach people and that they could understand how the system operates and file their own applications.
Second, I would like to remind my colleagues on the other side that when those efforts were made by the minister, the member for Champlain stated, and I quote:
The minister has made efforts to locate these people.
That is, people who did not know about the guaranteed income supplement. Let me continue:
For example, she sends letters to those who are not collecting the guaranteed income supplement, or even the old age pension.
There are some 65,000 people not even collecting the old age pension, and the minister has made an effort.
That is what the MP for Champlain had to say. Clearly, in spite of their invective, even the party opposite recognizes--grudgingly, but this is normal--that this government made an effort and succeeded in its effort to reach the public, since most people now know what they can do to get the guaranteed income supplement.
My colleague also spoke about retroactivity. IIf I may, I shall say a few words about this very important point.
The problem is that my colleague would like retroactivity to go back, obviously--as the term indicates--ad vitam aeternam. Clearly, that is not possible. We suggested that retroactivity be for 11 months before the application, plus the month in which the application was submitted, for a total of 12 months.
As my colleagues pride themselves on representing a certain government here in the House, I would like to bring to their attention several programs of the Quebec government.
For example, there are no retroactive payments in the employment assistance program, the provincial program run by the Quebec government.
Second, there are no retroactive payments in the Quebec rent subsidy program.
Third, there are no retroactive payments in the low cost housing program.
Fourth, there are no retroactive payments in the housing allowance program.
I am not saying that we should not make any retroactive payments, on the contrary. I think that the government has acted properly. It showed how much it cared for the seniors and recognized the difficult situation they were in and it granted 11 months of retroactive payments, which is 11 months more than what the provincial government is giving, this government that is so close to the member opposite who represents a riding from Quebec, where I also come from.
Finally, I would add that the fact that the individuals had no access to the information or did not know how to request the guaranteed income supplement is not a problem unique to Quebec. The members opposite who are from Quebec should not think that there is a movement against them. On the contrary, this was a weakness in the system. We admit it. This weakness has had an impact across Canada.
To give the House a couple of bits of information, we have sent all across Canada 4.5 million information sheets with the T4 statements. I do not want to bother the members with figures, but I do want to emphasize that this is now a thing of the past. We have recognized that there was a flaw in the system. Unfortunately, this happens in any system. We have reacted. We reacted quickly and we wanted to show once more how concerned the government was about the economic well-being of Canadians. This is what we have done.