Brian Masse

[February 12th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to talk again about a very important issue. It is a follow up to a question that I asked on December 4, 2007, in the House of Commons related to privacy and passports.

I had asked about the security breach at Passport Canada's offices. In fact, it almost wished it had a security breach. It allowed passport information to be provided to the public without being hacked into. A simple keystroke by an Ontario man led to the access of information of Canadians, information related to their social insurance numbers, their driver's licences, their addresses, people they knew and their information and their passport information, information important for the security and vetting of that passport. We know the United States, for example, will be requiring more Canadians to have passports and looking at the security of it.

What happened? I guess the government procured a computer program with a major flaw and that flaw has subsequently led to passport information being made available and not only in Canada. This was on the worldwide web. People had the opportunity to view the personal and private information of Canadians.

My question for the government was very straightforward. Had it ensured that the breach was stopped? Would it deal with the company that created the program? Would it apologize to Canadians for handling their personal information in such a manner? We can only assume that the information of all Canadians in the passport system at that time was vulnerable. Those are important steps.

We have seen personal information and privacy issues emerge in other countries. They have apologized and have been accountable.

Apparently the government, which is supposed to be tough on crime and security and all those different things, does not feel it has any onus or responsibility when it has the trust of people's sensitive information. The information on the web could have been used to take out a mortgage in somebody else's name. The government could have at least apologized. More important, it could have made sure that everybody affected by the problem was notified.

Instead, I received a response from the minister at that time, which was interesting. He talked about communicating with the department that morning, but the incident had taken place the week before. There was no apparent need, or it was a lack or interest or he was not informed. We do not know which it was, but the situation had festered over a period of time and the minister apparently indicated that in his response to me.

It is important to talk about some of the things that are happening with regard to privacy and passports. Mr. Jamie Laning of Huntsville tried a couple different keystrokes on his computer. He stated:

I'm just curious about these things so I tried it, and boom, there was somebody else's name and somebody else's data.

Another Canadian's information popped up on the screen, which included home and business numbers, federal ID card numbers and firearms licence numbers, which should interest the government.

It is important to note that the government, on November 21, 2007, introduced legislation to make it illegal to obtain this information, but it has not brought the bill forward. At the same time, it was making noise about having more protection for Canadians against identity theft. This is becoming a rampant problem in our country.

I would like to provide the government this opportunity to apologize to Canadians.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, February 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, one of the important things about the bill and the challenge we have with it is perhaps the consequence of taking some of the progressive elements out of the criminal justice system that need to be worked on, such as prevention. Despite the government not bringing forward the prevention strategies, part of the Youth Criminal Justice Act has it as its core now that the content of declaration of principles include prevention of crime. It also talks about help for young people who have committed crimes to make the right decisions.

Does my colleague have some specific examples in Quebec about those types of programs?

Ontario has been successful on a series of community based programs that help youth fix the mistakes they have made by either getting retraining, or ensuring they are getting proper counselling and also even going back to school and having that type of a comprehensive program.

A number of those organizations have suffered from lack of funds. They have been able to get at issues related to gang violence or issues in the community related to their specific problems out of the way because they have had that support.

Does my hon. colleague have other ones in Quebec that need the same support?

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, February 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is right in his intervention when he says there are all kinds of issues out there, such as capital punishment and the current court challenges situation.

He mentioned one issue, though, that I think needs some attention and that I did not get into due to lack of time, but I do want to read for members a little research on the issue of the aboriginal population. I think it is an important connection to prevention and also to the systemic issues we have. The research states that currently:

Aboriginal youth are overrepresented in the youth criminal justice system. While aboriginal young people comprised only 8% of Canada's youth population in 2002-2003, they made up “44% of admissions to remand, 46% of sentenced custody admissions and 32% of probation admissions, and 21% of alternative measure cases reaching agreement”.

The point is that we know just from this evidence that there are systemic problems in dealing with our aboriginal youth and that we in this House collectively have failed in many regards to resolve this situation.

On an issue like that, we would hope to find non-partisan ground to change things around. Quite frankly, this is an international embarrassment to our country. It is well known outside our borders what we have done in Canada with regard to our aboriginal people. Although there has been some recent success on some issues with regard to residential schools and the apology, at the same time we know we have systemic issues.

I would offer to my hon. colleague as a suggestion to the House that we support those programs that work with youth. From my perspective of formerly doing this type of work, we should make sure to have regular and routine funding. We always had a problem with that. We were always going after a small amount of funding to keep the program going as opposed to having long term, stable funding that is accountable and fully reviewed. That has great expectations attached to it, but it also has a measure of stability so that the professionals involved can make sure there is going to be continuity. That, and working with the youth in local populations, is how to provide opportunities for people to make better decisions, because there is that connection.

It is something I would like to see and which we can control. When we provide funding we must make sure it is long term, stable and predictable. The community organizations providing this work will have no problem whatsoever with being accountable and being reviewed, but at the same time they need to be supported appropriately.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, February 4th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today and speak to Bill C-25, An Act to amend the Youth Criminal Justice Act. The bill has two potential consequences to the Youth Criminal Justice Act. In particular, I want to focus on the possibility of a pre-trial detention for a young person. The bill also adds denunciation and deterrence of unlawful conduct to the act's principles in sentencing.

The New Democratic Party has concerns about these two elements and also the vacancy of other public policies to prevent crime and in particular issues facing youth.

Our party is supporting the bill. We are indicating though that we do want to see amendments prior to the bill being passed. These two issues are very significant and have several consequences that relate to youth and justice in our society. We believe that the bill in its current state does not address those issues.

I want to touch now on a couple of those issues. The first one is with regard to the first part of the bill which is a little bit different in the sense of treating young people and making sure that they are detained longer. At the present time the judicial system has that capability. What this legislation will do is codify existing practices.

The concern that the NDP has around this is that it could to some degree also take away the opportunity or impose a structure for judges that we believe would be a step backward. We think that this is one of the things that should be looked at.

As well, one of the things that is going to be happening with regard to this issue is really a deterrence as a principle of sentencing. This issue is very debatable in terms of the justice file right now and also in terms of how to prevent crimes and provide an opportunity for restorative justice.

I have spent four years and was involved in five programs with helping youth who were at risk. These youths either had some type of issue with regard to the law, committed crimes and were punished, or alternatively they were viewed at risk because they were out of school and unemployed. These youths were seen as persons who would eventually end up in those circumstances if they did not either decide to go back to school or find a job.

What I have found is that to this day those programs are not supported enough, not only in terms of the federal programs but also provincially. We heard some discussion about Quebec and that province deserves some kudos in terms of the way it has led the way in many respects in this country on making sure that youth and youth issues are looked at in a preventive style.

In my community it can be said that those programs, whether it is St. Leonard's House or New Beginnings, have been very successful because they were designed so that street level youth would have an opportunity to be able to turn their lives around.

Some of those programs I ran and still being run today. This was done with a philosophy of a small investment of the correct prevention strategy. The programs made sure that people had choices in front of them, as opposed to feeling that they had closed doors. This led to greater decision making and resulted in either finding employment or going back to school and obtaining the skills and training that would provide employment. What we see with Bill C-25 is a deterrence to sentencing.

The Supreme Court looked at this in Regina v. B.W.P. I want to read a small excerpt in terms of the discussion that came out of that decision, so people will understand what this mode is going to do. It said:

When general deterrence is factored in the determination of the sentence, the offender is punished more severely, not because he or she deserves it, but because the court decides to send a message to others who may be inclined to engage in similar criminal activity.

It is not necessarily what a person has done that is going to increase the sentence for a particular crime, but it is to send a message to others. This has generally been a philosophy adopted in the United States. Quite frankly, I am not sure that it has worked successfully there. Perhaps in some jurisdictions there may have been some modest improvements, but overall in terms of North America we actually have higher rates of incarceration of youth. One of the things that is interesting about this debate is that we do have some issues related to that in our own country.

One has to wonder whether that is going to be the way to ensure that youth are not going to make subsequent decisions or other poor choices that are going to lead to criminal activity and that will have consequences for them and society.

One can lay out programs and services like the ones I provided at the multicultural council or New Beginnings in my riding of Windsor West where individuals can be successfully unplugged from the wrong people they are hanging around or even from gangs. They can also be provided with a host of opportunities that undermine the person's attraction or so-called easy decisions at the moment that lead to poor choices and get them in subsequent trouble. They have the opportunity to turn things around.

These programs will not get to everybody. There is no doubt about that. There are some individuals who will have to face the justice system straight on. The fact of the matter is that this country has not done enough for the programs to make sure youth will make the right decisions.

I can think of a few individuals who went through the program in my riding. They had been involved with the wrong people and had been in and out of custody numerous times but, at the same time, when they were provided the stability of counselling, an opportunity to feel that they would be constructive in their place in society, as well as the economy, they became successful.

This is what I cannot understand. The government is not acting on those opportunities. It has talked about announced funding and so forth, but it has very rarely delivered.

This bill is not as comprehensive as it probably could be because there are some outstanding legal court challenges coming forth that will affect the way the government can go forward, but it is important to note that prevention still is not at the top of the order by the government.

The fact of the matter is there are supposed to be police officers in different municipalities and the government has yet to deliver on that. I recently spoke to the chief of police in my riding about this issue and there is still no support that was promised by this administration. It said it was going to put more police officers on the streets of this country and has yet to deliver on it.

That is interesting. The government makes these announcements, but they never come to fruition and it never delivers on them. The government does it in all kinds of fashions, whether it be this issue or other simple issues like infrastructure projects, where it does not sign agreements with its partners, be it the provinces or other municipalities, to get the money flowing.

These are problems because the government is not providing a vision on how we should move forward. We also lack the opportunity to uproot some of the most important issues that centre around youth criminal justice and that is to make youth feel that they are going to have a good future, engage in good choices and, most importantly, feel like productive members of society.

There are individuals who are going through troubled times in their lives and I have not even touched on the issue of mental illness and the lack of supports. In my province of Ontario there are individuals who are not getting the proper medical and psychological support which would enable them to maintain productivity in terms of being citizens and not engaging in activities that harm other individuals or making bad decisions that have significant consequences. This is really important. With every dollar that we put toward prevention, we can save double or triple that when it comes to incarceration later on.

This is an important bill. The act has been amended several times. It has been debated hotly politically, but at the end of the day we have to do something that is going to be an improvement for youth, so that those who have to go through our justice system, and create victims who are affected by these poor decisions, are going to receive the penalties through the justice system in a full and accountable way.

At the same time, the government and society have to do a lot more to provide opportunities to help youth make the right decisions or, if they have made wrong decisions and are willing to turn things around, have the opportunity to do so. That comes with support and a community that is inclusive.

[Automotive Industry, January 29th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, Ford Motors is warning that the opportunity in Windsor is fleeting unless action is taken now. To get the Essex engine plant up and operating, it will need a partnership with the federal government. The Minister of Finance says no but the Minister of Industry says that the money is in the blackmail billion.

Let us get this straight. They are willing to fund the project after it is lost. I am sure that when the plant is developed in China, they will probably get an invitation to the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

It is important to note that the Conservative tax cuts have not worked. What has happened is that industry leaders and unions have called for action right now. When will the government take action to prevent these job losses and have investment in our country as opposed to losses?

[Canada-United States Tax Convention Act, 1984, December 13th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, that is an important question because it sheds some light on a charade that is happening here; that is, the Prime Minister's campaign to reform the Senate.

Here we have a bill where the member for Timmins—James Bay did a good job of outlining some of the conflict issues. Yes, we can drive a truck through it. I am familiar with trucks in my riding. There are 10,000 of them per day that go through, and they would all go through in a single day.

I can tell members that it is really important to connect the dots on this one because we have a Prime Minister who seems to be fighting with the Senate, proposing reform and wanting greater accountability. Yet, when we have a bill that comes from the Senate the government immediately adopts it. It does not amend it, and then it blocks witnesses from actually coming forth. That is the really interesting aspect of it.

So, when we apply what has happened in this particular case to Bill S-2 and the rhetoric of the Prime Minister on wanting to actually reform the Senate, it does not match up.

He can have his tirades here in the House all he wants about the Senate, but it does not really apply to actual practical work taking place here. What is really frustrating about this is that we do not have that level of accountability that we should on this tax treaty bill. It does not matter who gets caught in the crossfire; it is just a matter of expediency to get this off the table and to move it forward.

That is what is really unacceptable. We have a small group of citizens in particular who are really getting hammered by this not addressing the social security issue and the double taxation, and sending them to some arbitration system. Many Canadians out there are thinking that it is great. They get to go to some government arbitrations to fight for something that should have been fixed for them. That is actually terrible. On top of that is the fact that these are seniors.

The Conservatives are going to create a whole new system. It is ironic. They are creating a whole new system as opposed to just fixing a simple problem. Why are they doing it? Their motivation is hard to believe. We know the bill is going to cost around $500 million in three years. That is the estimate from the department. We know that to fix a simple problem for seniors would cost $60 million but the government refuses. I do not understand that logic.

[Canada-United States Tax Convention Act, 1984, December 13th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, if the government wants to appoint me as minister and if it would actually table its documents, maybe I would reciprocate. That is part of the privilege of the House: to keep democracy going in this process. I am going to finish reading the document. The end of the quotation is very important:

Thus, business profits associated with service activities could be subject to taxation for many Canadian companies. These rules are currently set to take effect January 1, 2010 if ratification occurs during 2008.

Therefore, what we have here is the situation of a service industry that could have new taxation added to it through this process. We know that right now there are some concerns with the service sector and the economy and we do not have a full economic analysis of it. That is what is troubling about this bill being brought forth in this manner.

There could be some very valuable elements to the treaty. I think there are. There are some general things that are very good, but at the same time, why do we not have those answers? I find that very difficult to accept, especially given that this is an opportunity to correct historically significant problems.

I also want to touch on the issue of social security and Canadians who have paid in the U.S., are doing so now and face extra taxation. I am going to read another very important letter that talks about the history of this change.

Once again, this bill is not going to address the issue of those Canadians who had the tax treaty altered on them. The government is going to send them to some arbitration process, which is not even described. It could take literally years. We have no idea. And that is if they win, let alone having to go through that and relive the whole situation. That is a real concern, because the government has a private member's bill from its own member for Essex, who has been pushing that issue, and the government has not even listened to him.

Why the government is not adjusting that specifically in the bill, I do not know. Why it is turning its back on many residents of Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick, I cannot understand. I want to read the letter for members because it describes, for the record, what has been happening to these ordinary Canadians. It describes what took place with the tax treaty and how it affects them and their lives. The letter comes from Mr. Craig Ridsdale and is entitled “Unfair Tax Laws Burden Seniors”. It states:

Many Canadian seniors across Canada have been sitting on their hands since 1997 waiting for the Liberal government to move forward on a pledge made to them to rectify a system of taxation that threatens to leave many of them, particularly low income seniors, in a very difficult financial situation.

In 1984, the Canada-U.S. Tax Convention Act was implemented, primarily to protect the citizens of both countries from being taxed twice on their pensions, be they Social Security in the States or the Canada (and Quebec) Pension Plan here in Canada. However, differences in our taxation systems (Canadians pay taxes when collecting benefits while Americans pay the taxes on their contributions) has meant that Canadians receiving Social Security benefits were being taxed twice.

A series of protocols to amend this bill have made matters even worse for many retirees. Specifically, the third protocol, implemented in 1995 and applicable for the 1996 fiscal year allowed the United States government to charge what amounted to a more than 25% withholding tax on Canadians' pensions. Previously, the second protocol to this treaty allowed only the country of residence to tax social security benefits. For many retired Canadians who paid into the American system over the span of their working lives, what this meant was that over one quarter of their income essentially disappeared overnight.

The fourth protocol, implemented after the disastrous third protocol, allows the Canadian government to tax 85 per cent of Social Security, an increase from the 50 per cent agreed upon in the 1984 act. It also provided the government with the latitude to reduce the 85 per cent limit which it has refused to do.

Since 2001, Canadians Asking for Social Security Equity (CASSE) have been lobbying the federal government to either restore the Second Protocol or at the least grandfather its provisions to include all seniors who were negatively affected by the Third Protocol. To this date nothing has been done.

It is also important that the current Secretary of State for Multiculturalism had a private member's bill on this back in 1998, so what is really troubling about this is that we have a pattern between the Liberals and Conservatives, who all have said that they want to fix the tax treaty.

Once again we are talking about pensioners, seniors, who are living in Canada. They worked abroad, they paid their taxes there and they paid their taxes at home, but when they actually got their social security benefits things changed and they now get taxed even more on those benefits. That is why the private member's bill to correct this would have been a more equitable situation. Why the government has not done that is unacceptable. This is a real hardship for many people.

We have had testimony at the House finance committee by individuals affected by this. They have come forward and talked about people in their circle who have been fighting this and who have died and about how others have had to sell their homes and how others are having a hard time getting back to the quality of life they thought they were going to enjoy when they retired. That is important, because the human dignity aspect has been lost with regard to this taxation bill.

We were talking earlier about the member for LaSalle—Émard and his issues related to his steamships, to his company and the flag and so forth. This issue is so important. I remember that in Windsor when the member for LaSalle—Émard, as finance minister, was attending the Caboto club, one of the most memorable moments was the fact that he had to slip into the kitchen to avoid the demonstrations out front. He used the back door and walked through the kitchen to go to the event as opposed to meeting with the individuals who were affected by this taxation policy that had been changed.

There have been many statements made by Liberals and Conservatives both, who are fighting over this. Members of the NDP have been consistent on it. What is unfortunate is that it has not led to any changes. I cannot understand that. I cannot understand who in their right mind would want to create an arbitration process for seniors at a time when they need their issue addressed now.

The member for Burnaby—New Westminster was right to ask the government and its officials how much this tax treaty is going to cost. What they estimate is half a billion dollars over three years. That is what is going to be lost in terms of government revenue.

We do not know whether the banks are going to enjoy that money. We do not know who is going to be the real net beneficiary of that arrangement. What we do know is that to fix this historic problem related to seniors who had double taxation, and who were caught in this crossfire of tax treaty analysis and neglect through the United States negotiations, it would cost around $60 million.

Thus, we have $1 billion for that sector, which we do not even have a prescribed analysis from. The department said it would come back with more information. At the same time, it would cost around $60 million if we did not tax at an increased rate seniors who paid their social security in the United States.

That is bizarre, because we know from the evidence presented to us that those individuals are going to spend that money in this country. They are going to use it to get by. They are going to continue to renovate homes and to be in our communities more, and they are going to be able to pay off some of their debts. That is important, because that economic push comes to that collective group.

I cannot understand this. Maybe it has been the hostility. I went on a national campaign for a seniors' charter of rights, which passed in the House of Commons. The member for Hamilton Mountain did a terrific job and pushed the issue through, but we have not had full implementation of the charter. The House and the government have ignored seniors in many respects.

I do not know why they are motivated to move in this direction. In conclusion, I find it really frustrating that the Liberals have joined with the Conservatives on this issue to prevent debate, analysis and full due diligence.

We do want to see our tax treaties updated. We are not opposed to that. They are very beneficial in many respects. Living on the Canada-U.S. border as I do, I have spoken at length in the House of Commons about the Windsor-Detroit border and its importance. We are not opposed to going forward on this, but why, for heaven's sake, are we not doing it properly? Why is it so convenient to let this group of seniors be basically thrust to the side, forgotten and left out of the whole picture? Why is that being contemplated? Why is that being allowed?

Why have the Liberals joined with the Conservatives to prevent the debate about this to even take place? I do not understand that logic. I do not understand why they could not at least have some hearings to get to the root of this structure or maybe move an amendment to fix the situation.

It really shows the lack of influence, I think, of the member for Chatham-Kent—Essex and the whole area around there and of the Conservatives in southern Ontario. When they have a tax treaty this significant and an issue that has been a thorn in the side of the Liberals because they broke promise after promise on it, an issue that has been politically manipulated over the years, they have chosen not to do anything on it in this bill. That is remarkable in itself. It speaks to why the ineffective Conservative caucus of southern Ontario is basically being swallowed up by the oil companies, because the petroleum club is served only by the government.

The Conservatives could not even get a minor tax treaty agreement passed to protect seniors as they had promised in their campaign. This shows disinterest. It also shows arrogance, which they have quickly adopted from the previous government. They are going to have to explain to people why they have to go through arbitration to get this fixed. This is going to be very traumatic.

It is a shame that we did not do the proper due diligence. The member for Burnaby—New Westminster wanted to bring forth witnesses to vet this so it could be a better bill and give us a better tax treaty. Most important, it would give us the chance to address historical problems that the House has never dealt with before.

[Canada-United States Tax Convention Act, 1984, December 13th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise to speak to Bill S-2, which is an act to amend the Canada-U.S. tax treaty.

It is interesting to listen to my Liberal colleagues' defence of the member for LaSalle—Émard and his tax avoidance scheme in the Barbados. It is kind of like listening to the captain of the Titanic describe how well things went. It is unbelievable not to address the fundamental problems of reflagging and so forth.

I do want to segue a little into this tax treaty bill. It is tempting to spend half an hour or 20 minutes of our time on reflagging ships and also on the consequences to workers and so forth in the avoidance of taxation, but I do want to focus on Bill S-2 in particular.

There are some concerns in this process and in this actual tax treaty that do not resolve significant issues for my riding of Windsor West as well as Essex County and, greater than that, for individuals living in Quebec, New Brunswick and other places, where significant numbers of pensioners collecting U.S. social security and making contributions in the United States had the tax treaty changed on them.

This process still leaves them in limbo and is actually still counter to the private member's bill of the government's own member, the member for Essex. The government has made sure that the bill is basically squirreled away at the finance committee. It has not resurfaced, despite it having one hearing in the last session of Parliament, in which I participated. It has not seen the light of day. Jimmy Hoffa has probably seen more light of day than this bill in the last number of years.

It is very disturbing, because some seniors are being taxed extra. That is different to what they expected. They have had their lives put on hold. They have suffered significant consequences. In fact, some of them are dying. This is very shameful. We should be addressing it. However, this bill will only add an arbitration element for those particular victims of poor taxation policy. The shift happened and they got whacked twice. The private member's bill would rectify that by allowing the taxation system to be for only 50%. Without getting into technical details, it would have provided some equity.

I do want to touch on process, because I think it is important. I know that right now probably only a handful of Canadians are watching this as opposed to the Mulroney-Schreiber affair and the meeting going on right now, but this does affect people. It is important to set out for the record the concerns that we in the New Democratic Party have about why the Liberals and the Conservatives have rammed this through so quickly.

First of all, it is important to recognize that the bill originated in the unelected Senate. Senators are not elected. They are appointed by the Prime Minister, and in fact were by the former prime minister, who is having to explain right now how many bags of cash he took and why. If members recall, he actually loaded up the Senate at one particular point to force through the GST. The party that created the GST needed the Senate to push it forward. It is ironic that he is here today.

However, we have this bill today coming from an unelected house. Our side of the House, the New Democratic Party, has a concern about that.

What happened subsequently is really troubling. When the bill went to the international trade committee, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster, who represents our caucus, asked for witnesses to be brought forth and for some type of study related to the bill, which is normally what would happen on most committees.

I have been part of a number of different committees where we have moved quickly through clause by clause and so forth when there was a will and the support to do so, but when we have witnesses requested, we almost always have that consultation. That never happened. The Liberals joined with the Conservatives to block that.

The government does have some issues with regard to the tax treaty and we do want to have some of those things improved here, but there are some major unknowns and questions out there. I want to read from a communication I received. It was sent in confidence to me, so I cannot say from which legal firm it came, but it is a reputable Canadian legal firm that is giving its opinion on the tax treaty. I want to read what it has provided me in terms of the new protocol:

On September 21, 2007, a new protocol to the Treaty was signed between the federal governments of Canada and the United States and is expected to be ratified by both countries in 2008. The protocol adds a new provision under Article V of the Treaty (the “permanent establishment” article described above) to implement rules with respect to service income. Once ratified, under the protocol a Canadian company may create a permanent establishment if it provides services within the United States and meets certain thresholds. Thus, business profits associated with service activities could be subject to taxation--

[Canada-United States Tax Convention Act, 1984, December 13th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is quite right that there probably should have been some witnesses to come forward and speak about this tax treaty. Also, the bill went to the international trade committee and not the finance committee.

I would ask the member why, at that committee, did the Liberals join with the Conservatives to block witnesses? The NDP member for Burnaby—New Westminster asked for witnesses to be brought forward and the Liberals and the Conservatives blocked that from happening. Why did his party take that position?

[Canada-United States Tax Convention Act, 1984, December 13th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the parliamentary secretary to be clear on this because we are getting mixed information from research. Is it the government's interpretation that this bill would eliminate all double taxation of U.S. social security recipients who are living in Canada but who have worked in the United States? Would this bill eliminate the double taxation that historically has taken place? Would it meet the provisions in Bill C-265, the private member's bill put forward by the member for Essex?

I want the parliamentary secretary to be on the record for the government . Would Bill S-2 achieve that goal?