Mr. Speaker, there are at least two components to this program. The first is the initial contribution of $500 at birth for the child is a grant. The family has no need to have disposable income. If it opens an RESP account, it will have $500 in it.
My colleague is right. Some of these families are not used to opening accounts of any sort. As a result, each family will receive $25 to assist them in setting up and opening an account, which will last the child's lifetime. Once that is done, each year $100 will go into that account from the Government of Canada.
Now it is true, where families do not have disposable income, they cannot take advantage of the second aspect of the program. If the family puts in, for example. $100 at any time in the first 15 years of a child's life, it will receive $40 from the Government of Canada and the accumulated interest from it. He is right. Some families will be unable to do that. However, at the very base, they will have in this account, at no cost, $2,000 when the child reaches the age of 15.
His colleague mentioned tuition. We keep thinking of college and university and tuition fees. Those moneys could be used for any form of lifelong learning. In fact, if the children concerned, say at the age of 18, had just the $2,000 and rolled it into an RESP, they would have another 20 years with the accumulated proceeds of the $2,000 to decide what to do. They might decide to take a computer course or to move from one trade to another and take some training.
I understand the point that it is only $2,000 plus the accumulated interest. However, I would say it is something, and throughout that child's life, the family would have been thinking about post-secondary education.