Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the concern of the member that I am answering questions. I believe it is an honour to stand in the House and promote the budget implementation act of 2014.
On this FATCA, without an agreement in place our financial institutions would still have had to comply with FATCA. That is the problem. It is not whether or not our financial institutions would have had to comply with the rule of law dealing with those American citizens who are abiding here in Canada. Every financial institution in Canada, except the very small ones, would have had to comply with the Americans, and if they did not, there would have been huge consequences to their being involved in the United States, to their activity in the United States. It would have required banks to report information to the IRS. Canadian banks would have been reporting to the IRS.
The agreement we were able to negotiate says that those financial institutions can disclose information on American citizens living in Canada and their finances to the Canada Revenue Agency, which is then responsible for moving the information forward.
If that had not happened, banks would have had to deny basic banking services to clients. That is one of the major concerns that banks had, that they would in effect have to say no to American citizens or those who may be dual citizens, saying that they could not do business in Canada.