Mr. Speaker, I will point out a couple of things.
We have heard time and time again that Canadians have no extra money to put aside for savings, so the government is going to step in and take more from the non-existent savings they have. There are a couple of things about this so-called pension crisis.
Again, Conservatives have great faith in Canadians and one thing the bill does not address is that for every $1 of the trillions of dollars in RRSPs or pensions, there are $3, that means $9.5 trillion, in other assets outside of pensions, so we need to take the holistic picture before deciding to punish small businesses and low-income workers with this added tax. That is one issue.
The other part is that, again, Canadians have been very successful saving their own money. Saying that they do not have any money now so the government is going to take it away does not help. We are making people more reliant on government when that is not the answer.
I found a great quote by pension expert Paul Williams. Thinking about making people more reliant on government, he stated, “Think of our gang of politicians—Dalton McGuinty...Rob Ford. Think of other government projects—gas plants—”