Mr. Speaker, one of the tax credits in this second act on the budget has to do with public transit passes. This is an issue which has been linked somewhat to the whole idea of reducing harmful emissions into the air and get more people using the transit system.
Since the member is on the finance committee, I wonder if she can tell the House whether or not there was an objective analysis or appraisal of the potential effectiveness under Treasury Board guidelines. A program would be in violation of those guidelines if it does not have a reasonable prospect of being successful in achieving its objectives.
It would appear to me that the tax credit will certainly benefit all of the people who currently buy transit passes, but very small numbers of people would take out transit passes. Even then, it would appear that many of our major urban transit systems have infrastructure deficiencies right now which will require substantial investments to expand the system to be able to get any kind of reasonable expansion to handle any more passengers in any event.
I wonder if the member could advise the House if there was any insight into the potential effectiveness of this transit pass credit.