Mr. Speaker, one of the key issues in the budget has to do with the broken promise related to income trusts. I noted that the chair of the Conservative caucus spoke earlier. He said that, yes, the Conservatives did hurt seniors, but that they promised them pension income splitting and that would offset all the problems.
The problem with this argument is that 70% of seniors do not have pension plans. It is those seniors who invest in income trusts so they can emulate a pension plan. Any benefit to pension plan holders to split their income, if they qualify, and only 12% to 14% of pensioners qualify for splitting, would not be an offset to the people who were harmed by the broken income trust promise.
Is the hon. member aware of the facts related to the income trust broken promise and would he concede that the methodology was wrong since the legislated tax increases were not included in the calculation of the finance minister's tax leakage calculation?