Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak on Bill C-2 today. It is an initiative that New Democrats support going to committee. The reason we are doing so is because there are so many issues related to the incomes of Canadians.
The debate itself is healthy, because we have seen in society, during the years that I have been here, a movement away from the middle class, in two directions. One direction has been that some have become more affluent and are able to take advantage of certain government changes in laws, like the tax-free savings account and other types of measures put in place over the last decade. In the opposite direction, there are people with challenging circumstances, such as their wages being frozen, having their working hours reduced, a reduction in benefits taking place as collective agreements have been stretched to the limit, or benefits staying the same and cutting the workforce. That has very much been a priority of unions across this country, because they want to keep the same benefits and wages. However, there has been a stagnation with that.
We have also witnessed, on the other end against personal income taxes, massive corporate tax reductions that were supported by the Liberals originally, and then later by the Conservatives. That has left our economy without a lot of the tools that we normally would have had. There are a number of different industries, like the banks and so forth, that have benefited from a lot of tax reductions. Their response to those tax reductions has been historic layoffs and closures of facilities that actually cost Canadians more. There has also been a reward for them related to the products and services that they provide to customers on the other end. Therefore, there are those who are less affluent and cannot take advantage of their different circumstances.
Before I get into the connection to Bill C-2, I will take, for example, my bank, which I will not mention the name of; I also deal with a credit union. My bank allows its customers free banking services if they maintain a minimum of $1,000 in their accounts. It continues for the duration of a month. If customers go below that amount, then they pay a series of charges. In the riding I represent, Windsor West, there are a lot of people who do not have $1,000 in their accounts, especially if they are students or working-class families. They pay those additional fees, whereas people with the money do not have to. We have lost the income stream from the government's tax reductions and a whole bunch of dead money in our economy, and then, on top of that, service charges continue to grow.
The tax-free savings account, in Bill C-2, is something that New Democrats are happy to see the eventual reduction of. The parliamentary budget officer and others have raised the caution flag with regard to the way that this expanded. I know from representing my area and travelling to other parts of Canada over the years, whether it be for my seniors charter of rights bill or other initiatives on auto fairness, that there are a series of things I have run into. The common thing is that a lot of people do not even have enough money to save for their current school year, let alone the next one.
There is a fine college, St. Clair College, in my riding, as well as the University of Windsor, that have done their part in expanding services and competitiveness, and attracting international students and other Canadians to go there. In many respects, it revitalized some of our innovation. However, the reality is that most people who go to school there are just getting by or taking out loans to get by, let alone putting money in a tax-free savings account. Perhaps some of their family members are doing so with their help, but the ordinary Canadians I represent do not have that luxury.
The squeeze is on the middle class and those who are unemployed. As I mentioned, in the job service sector many people are moving to part-time or precarious work and basically just getting by. Unfortunately with this bill, we know from third-party experts and economists that 60% of this plan for a reduction in taxes for Canadians will not be enjoyed by the middle class or people with less earnings. Therefore, there is a series of Canadians who will be left out. Because of the way this scheme works, the wealthiest will have the benefit. That is a real problem that New Democrats want to address at committee. It is an issue that we have raised before.
There will be a vote later tonight on employment insurance, where there are many people paying into a system that does not provide them with any benefit whatsoever. In the example that I used in speaking about this issue earlier in the House, there are persons with disabilities. They only have a certain number of hours to do their jobs because of health restrictions. They pay into the system, and to my knowledge would never benefit from it because they would not qualify at the end of the day.
We have to be careful. People are still getting their heads around it. To this day, I run into people who say they do not want to go on employment insurance because they do not want to feel they are taking taxpayers' money. They like to get by on their own. However, what people forget is that employment insurance is their money that comes off their paycheques, and the companies' money. That has nothing to do with the government, aside from the government deciding how that is disbursed, how it is actually given back to workers.
We set rules that disadvantage those who are in more precarious and part-time positions, and that includes women. We have a systemic issue within our culture and our society, even on the government programming side. We make lots of noise about being equality driven, but we still have rules in place that do not allow that to happen.
Who would not benefit from this bill? It is important for Canadians to realize some of the comparisons and who would not benefit whatsoever from this plan in terms of tax reductions. They are office workers who make an annual salary of less than $40,000 per year; they would receive nothing under this scheme. They are hairstylists, who in Canada basically earn around $28,000 annually. They will get zero. They are social workers, which I used to be in my previous working life. I worked for two organizations, on behalf of persons with disabilities and on behalf of youth at risk. Their annual salary today is around $44,000. They would get nothing. Some people in the process of trying to buy a home, who are trying to raise families and trying to get forward, would not be able to benefit from this plan.
We have cashiers. When we go to stores and see the people working there, they work hard doing what they need to do. In our economy in some places, we have had challenges with the retail sector and so forth. They earn $21,424 on average. Cashiers would get nothing back. That is a classic example. All of the people working in department stores, in retail shops, in drive-throughs, in fast-food chains, and all of these different businesses, would receive zero from the plan. To me, they are the people we should be rewarding with a tax reduction. These are the people who do not have the equity to easily afford some of the tax deductions that wealthier Canadians get. They do not earn income at the level to take advantage of some of the policies that have been put in place over the last couple of decades.
Waiters and waitresses earn less than $22,000 as an average wage. They would get zero. That is another group of individuals I would argue would not benefit from this tax reduction. They would get nothing at all. Nannies are another good example, and chefs and assistant chefs as well. They would not get anything.
Who would get income from this legislation? Our bank managers, who earn around $82,000 a year, would receive $555 in their tax season from this. They would receive that and also be eligible for the tax-free savings account. They would be in an income stream where they might be able to take advantage of it. It would be beneficial for them and their families. A lawyer, earning around $108,000 a year on average in Canada, would get $679. Members of Parliament in that same wage amount would get the cap, at around $680, as well.
I know my time is running out, but I want to hopefully create an opportunity at committee so we can work on some of the measures to ensure that all Canadians are included in this proposed tax reduction. We know it is going to come from the cost of borrowing, as the Liberals do not have the money coming in that they thought they had for this bill. Interest and payments on that money in the future are paid for by all Canadians, so all Canadians should be part of a tax reduction.