Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Toronto—Danforth.
The real shame of today's motion is that the work of the subcommittee on persons with disabilities is really the best of Parliament.
A constituent of mine, Lembi Buchanan, came to me with her concerns about the restrictive nature of the form and the fact that it really did not deal with mental illness. We then had a huge administrative problem with the CCRA, such that all members of Parliament ended up quite galvanized, that this was not the way to administer an audit and that people were being seriously put out in terms of having to go to the doctor to re-qualify.
As chair of the subcommittee, I want to point out that it was not just an all party support. This was the unanimous report of the subcommittee with the unanimous support of the parent HRDC committee. It was very clear that we wanted the government to act.
If we draw attention to the Library of Parliament document, which compared what we asked for in the report, and the paucity of specific responses in the government response that was tabled in August, it is a shame that this many months later we are still here today commenting on the subcommittee report and on the proposed changes to the disability.
We need to point out that the finance department seems to think that its job is to interpret the Income Tax Act and the CCRA's job is to administer it. I think we need to now understand that we, as Parliament, want the job of interpreting the Income Tax Act back.
There is no question that the disability community does not want people to be getting the disability tax credit if they do not deserve it. They want the money to go to the people who deserve it. That is why, when we look at some of the recommendations of our committee, we actually suggested some very clear solutions.
We wanted an immediate moratorium on the way that the audit was carried on, but mainly we asked for an advisory committee, such that the medical community and the disability community could come together to interpret various things and could be called when there was a court decision that seemed difficult or whatever. It would be a way to get citizens involved in the democracy between elections that we think Parliament represents.
We also asked the finance department to have a look at all disability related measures of the Income Tax Act and to do an audit review of that. There is a lot of confusion right now, not only in terms of the receiptable expenses and the non-receiptable expenses but everything to do with persons with disabilities.
We asked for an appropriate response to the DTC subcommittee report, which we still have not yet received but which, thankfully, will be reviewed at the HRDC committee on Thursday morning with finance officials and CCRA officials.
Let us go to the proposed changes to the Income Tax Act and to the reasons they are so misguided.
The Department of Finance has taken an approach to the disability tax credit. The reverse is the line of all modern judicial interpretation of the Income Tax Act. It contradicts the intentions of Parliament when it passed the act while it is saying it is actually the intentions of Parliament that it is acting out.
The courts and the subcommittee have taken the same approach and argued that the decisions regarding the eligibility should be made on a case by case basis after applying a human and compassionate set of criteria.
The Department of Finance, on the other hand, is trying to exclude whole classes of people with disabilities, for example those with celiac disease, regardless of the degree of their impairment. While it is doing this, the department claims it is carrying out the will and intentions of Parliament when Parliament passed the Income Tax Act measures related to the disability tax credit. This is wrong both in fact and interpretation. The department has never provided any evidence for its claim to know what parliament intended.
Unlike the static view of the Department of Finance, the courts have taken a much more dynamic approach and aim to adapt the legislation to respond to social change and modern thinking about the issues such as disability.
The Supreme Court of Canada has pronounced its views regarding social benefits for Canadians. Justice Bertha Wilson pointed out that in the court's view “any doubt arising from the difficulties of the language should be resolved in favour of the claimant”.
It is entirely reasonable to apply Justice Wilson's logic to the disability tax credit. The courts have done this by stating that where the Income Tax Act is vague or ambiguous, the best approach is to take a “humane and compassionate” approach that achieves “the object of Parliament”.
When we consider the proposed legislation, members of Parliament expect that those who administer it will operate in a sensible and effective way to achieve its purposes. We also expect that those who interpret the legislation will adapt to its involving circumstances.
How is it possible to know, as the Department of Finance claims, what Parliament intended? Parliament did not even consider many of the complex and interrelated conditions associated with the DTC.
We do know that Parliament intended to create a tax measure that would provide some compensation to those with serious disabilities. We do know that the Income Tax Act does not deal exhaustively with the list of disabilities that Canadians have. We do not know that Parliament meant this list to be exhaustive and frozen in time.
As a family physician, the fact that breathing is not viewed as an act of daily living has always been a bit surprising to me but we believe that this section should be interpreted or even expanded in a broad and humane way. I do not believe, nor do my colleagues on the subcommittee, that Parliament intended the statute to disqualify this whole group of disabled people. Knowing my fellow parliamentarians as I do, there is overwhelming evidence that Parliament intended the bureaucratic decisions about the DTC should be dealt with in a humane and compassionate way and with the consultation of the disability community and the medical community. That is what the courts have decided and what three parliamentary committees have recommended in the past 10 years after studying the tax system.
When the Minister of Finance and the Minister of National Revenue commissioned the hon. member for Fredericton in 1996 to look at tax issues, he asked the ministers exactly the same thing: Where is the evidence of the Department of Finance that it knows what Parliament decided?
One principle of law is formal equality, which is that laws must be applied fairly and in a consistent and even-handed manner. This means treating different cases differently and like cases alike. Similarly, the concept of horizontal equity requires equal tax treatment of those with equal ability to pay.
The Department of Finance is not applying either of those principles. It is interpreting the Income Tax Act in a manner that treats some people who are disabled differently from other people who are disabled. The act does not mention the cause of disability. It only talks about the effect, the impairment, but the department is focusing on the cost.
Why does the department want to treat people differently? Does the department want to exclude all those with chronic bronchitis, and all those towing their oxygen machines around but technically are not disabled according to its interpretation of the Income Tax Act? Why not all those with dietary restrictions? Why not all those who can get out of bed? Why not all those who even have a minuscule ability to see or hear?
The idea that somebody must be 90% impaired was appalling to the committee. How can people not be disabled if they are only confused 50% of the time? This type of restriction is an ultimate destination where the department is leading us. If we are trying to apply different standards to some groups of Canadians with disabilities, so much for equality and equity. If Parliament had intended to take this approach, it would have passed a statute that said exactly that.
Is that what Parliament decided when it passed the disability tax measures. Absolutely not. If we look at the act closely, Parliament intended exactly the approach that had been taken in the subcommittee's report, that is a case by case approach and not one that excludes entire groups of claimants based on the cause of their disability.
The department, therefore, is directly contradicting the wishes of Parliament as explained in the plain words of the Income Tax Act.
I urge the Department of Finance to interpret the statute in a way that is consistent with existing laws and principles of justice, and the way that Parliament intended and still intends, and will continue to be vigilant on this.
