Mr. Speaker, at my constituency office, I receive letters, emails, and calls from Canadians who tell me how offended they are that Canada still has agreements with so many tax havens.
Despite everything my colleague said, it has been shown that, as a country, we are letting $8 billion slip through our fingers because we are not taking the strong measures that other countries are taking. That is $8 billion that never makes it into our coffers.
My colleague mentioned how proud she was of the agreements we have with other countries. I would like her to explain how she can be proud of the fact that, in the past year, we signed agreements with the Cook Islands, Antigua and Barbuda, and Grenada. What is there to be proud of in signing agreements with new tax havens, adding still more to the already long list? Canada even created some of the tax havens. Lawyers here made sure that those countries became tax havens.
How can my colleague justify that we are not doing everything possible to do away with the system?