Mr. Speaker, I take this opportunity to speak on Bill C-4 today. We have heard a lot of good conversations and the benefits of what Bill C-4 would do for our country.
What is the importance of the bill, some may ask. Over time and particularly over this summer, I was able to visit many of the businesses, farms and constituents in my riding of Lambton—Kent—Middlesex. Just so that the viewers and you, Mr. Speaker, may have a handle on what Lambton—Kent—Middlesex is in terms of a constituency, it is a riding that is a little bigger than the province of Prince Edward Island. It is a very rural riding, made up of small communities. My largest urban area is made up of 14,000 people. The next largest urban area is somewhere around 12,500. It is made up of agriculture and small businesses within our towns and communities.
I travelled across the riding and met with businesses, individuals and people in agriculture with the main purpose of finding out what they thought about our budget and what we were doing for business. One of the things that they told us is that they trust our Conservative government to maintain a stable economy. That is actually the main purpose of budget 2013, and consequently, of the implementation bills that followed to support and grow our Canadian economy.
We can see how we are on track, for example, to balance the budget. It has been talked about a number of times. The annual financial report of the Government of Canada for fiscal year 2012-13 shows the continued downward track of Canada's annual deficit. In 2013, the deficit fell by $18.9 billion. The deficit was $26.3 billion in 2011-12. The new number now, quite honestly, is more than one-quarter less than previously determined, $7.14 billion, and down by nearly two-thirds from the $55.6 billion deficit recorded in 2009 and 2010.
These are big numbers, but I can tell the House that, big numbers or not, we remain committed to continuing this downward trend in our deficit.
We can also see the economic growth in the creation of jobs. We are leading the G7 with more than one million net new jobs having been created. These jobs were not created by the government. The government prefers an environment in which businesses create these jobs. Approximately 90% of those jobs are full-time and over 80% are in the private sector.
What does that actually mean to the businesses in my riding and ridings across this great country of Canada? It means that we are creating sustainable growth. We are not just pumping money into a system that may get lost again if the global economy turns. We are creating jobs for the long-term. We are creating a stable economy. We want to stay focused. As the Minister of Finance put it:
...we are not immune from the challenges beyond our borders. We cannot afford to become complacent.
We will not do so.
We heard the measures in economic action plan 2013 no. 2 that are aimed at providing support for job creators being talked about before. They include the extension and expansion of the hiring credit for small businesses, which will benefit an estimated 560,000 employers. That is 560,000 employers. If only 50% of them tap into that hiring credit, it means a benefit to our small businesses of $225 million, should they use it.
The measures also include indexing the lifetime capital gains exemption to make investing in small businesses more rewarding. This is so important. It is moving from $500,000 to $750,000, but it is now indexed. That means that it is now indexed to keep up with the traffic that is in the economy.
The measures also include expanding the accelerated capital cost allowance to further encourage investments in small businesses, whether they are clean energy businesses or others.
A proposal in budget 2013, which many of the businesses in my riding are looking forward to seeing implemented, is the changes to the Employment Insurance Act. Freezing employment insurance premium rates for three years will leave approximately $660 million in the pockets of job-creators and workers in 2014 alone.
Sometimes we sort of wonder what these numbers mean. I remember the day we were talking about moving the GST from 7% to 6% to 5%. Quite honestly, we are the only government that said we were going to do it and have actually done it. I used to get comments about how if someone buys jeans, it is only going to mean a few cents here and a dollar or so there.
In my riding, every 1% left $18 million in the pockets of people in Lambton—Kent—Middlesex. That 2% left $36 million in my rural riding of small towns and small businesses. We never want to underestimate. Sometimes when we say we are going to take these small steps, they seem small; however, they mean a great benefit to the people in our ridings.
Going back to employment insurance, we know this will put money back into the pockets of small businesses that are the cornerstone of many of our communities in rural areas. In turn, that means more money they can invest back in their business. It almost means job creation and economic prosperity for them, and then that rolls out. If it is good for them, it is good for the community; and it is obviously good for governments when they collect taxes.
These are only a few examples of what we are doing to ensure Canadians have available jobs for themselves and their children, and that benefits the Canadian economy.
We can also see our support for economic prosperity in the reduction of taxes. It is twofold, in closing the tax loopholes and combatting tax evasion. We are going to introduce new administrative monetary penalties and criminal offences to deter the use, possession, sale and development of electronic suppression of sales software designed to falsify records for the purpose of tax evasion.
Other members have had that discussion today. We know there are some difficulties. It is easier to say it than to actually implement it. However, we know that if we do not implement, then we will never move down the road. That is an important part of being able to deal with that suppression part.
We will be closing tax loopholes to make sure that everyone pays their fair share of taxes. On the other hand, the period during which Canada Revenue Agency can reassess a taxpayer who fails to report income from foreign property will be longer, to ensure that when the examinations happen they are exact, accurate and are carried out in a responsible manner.
Second, we always want to respect taxpayers' dollars, but we also want to give the benefit to some of our young people; so we will be modernizing the Canada student loan program and the temporary foreign worker program by expanding electronic service delivery.
In the short time I have left I want to talk about CETA and the importance that agreement has, not only in my riding of Lambton—Kent—Middlesex because of the small businesses and agriculture but for the economy. We know it is going to create about $12 billion annually and a 20% increase in bilateral trade. Out of that $12 billion, agriculture is going to gain the benefit of $1.3 billion. I am glad to take questions and move on that.
Canada is a leader around the world in terms of economic growth. On this side, we plan to keep it this way.