Pierre Dionne Labelle

[Tax Evasion, February 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his question.

In my speech, I gave an overview of all the data that the Canada Revenue Agency has at its disposal to undertake legal action and the meagre results it has gotten. We are being lax. The information is not being used systematically. There are no reports on what is happening. The Auditor General will eventually have to look at how the Canada Revenue Agency is managing and using the data and what is being done with the information gathered.

Other information will come to light. International leaks seem to happen every six or seven years, and we can expect more. However, we have no idea what the Canada Revenue Agency will do with that information. It received 450 names in 2013. Where is the legal action? Where are those people? What are they doing? How much money are we losing? We have to resort to the Access to Information Act just to get tidbits of information. When we do get something, it is not what we had hoped. We want convictions. There have only been six convictions since 2006. What a joke.

[Tax Evasion, February 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague.

At this time, internationally, within the International Monetary Fund, the G20 and the OECD, Canada has committed to fighting tax havens. It has signed agreements and supported final declarations. For instance, at the summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, Canada signed the final declaration pledging to fight hard against tax havens.

My greatest fear, in light of the cuts that have been made and what we are seeing now, is that those commitments become the new Kyoto. Canada promises to do all kinds of things, which makes it look good on the international stage, but in reality, it amends Canadian legislation to promote tax corridors between Canada and the Caribbean. I am quite afraid that, without concrete measures and without the vigilance of both parliamentarians and the civil society groups that watch these people in action, this system will continue. We need to take meaningful action against tax havens. That is not the case right now.

[Tax Evasion, February 27th, 2014]

moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should: (a) study and measure Canadian tax losses to international tax havens and tax evasion, in order to determine the Canadian federal “tax gap”; (b) order the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) to provide the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) with the information necessary to provide an independent estimate of the Canadian federal tax gap arising from tax evasion and tax avoidance through the use of tax havens; (c) mandate the Auditor General or the PBO to provide estimates of the marginal revenue of additional CRA resources (i.e. auditors) in the areas of tax evasion and tax avoidance; and (d) mandate the Auditor General to evaluate, on a regular basis, the success of the CRA in prosecuting and settling cases of tax evasion.

Mr. Speaker, today I am pleased to move in the House Motion No. 485 on combating the use of tax havens.

At a time when wealthy countries are desperately looking for revenue to reduce their deficits, tax evasion results in annual losses of 100 billion Euro in Europe, and, according to some estimates, up to $30,000 billion worldwide.

We often think of tax havens as pertaining strictly to taxes. Let us not forget, however, that they also play an essential role in business investment strategies. According to data from the United Nations conference on trade and development, a third of offshore direct investments by multinational companies are made in tax havens, a trend that has been on the rise since the 1990s.

According to a 2005 study by Statistics Canada, Canadian assets in offshore financial centres increased eight-fold between 1990 and 2003, increasing from $11 billion to $88 billion. Today, they represent more than double that, at $170 billion. The strongest growth in direct Canadian investment during that period was observed in Barbados, Ireland, Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, and the Bahamas. That 2005 study on offshore financial centres was the last of its kind conducted by Statistics Canada.

In 2009, Statistics Canada suggested that Canadian entities had invested up to $146 billion in tax havens. We learned that this represented 25% of direct investments by Canadians abroad. Among the tax havens blessed by Canadian investors we have the Cayman Islands, Ireland, Luxembourg, Bermuda, Hungary and Barbados. In 2012, Canadian business people injected $60 billion in Barbados, an 80% increase since 2007.

The first time I heard of Barbados being used as a tax haven was when we found out that former prime minister Paul Martin registered his ships there to avoid paying taxes in Canada. What a prime minister.

His example led the way for other Canadian business leaders who, like him, wanted to evade taxes. Former prime minister Paul Martin's decision in 1995 kicked off a veritable race offshore for wealthy taxpayers and Canadian businesses.

After that date, the increase in Canadian investment in Barbados was somewhere in the order of 3,600% in a few years. Nothing else can explain this interest in a small island where this is no oil or gold mines to be found. Barbados seems to have become the bridgehead that gives Canadians access to other tax havens.

How much tax revenue is Canada losing because our businesses and wealthy individuals are using tax havens? Unfortunately, there are currently no reliable studies that assess that tax gap. While Canadian families are struggling and trying to make ends meet, while small and medium-sized businesses are dealing with increased global competition, while the government is gutting social programs to bring down the deficit, rich Canadians and major Canadian companies are investing billions of dollars in tax havens, tax-free, and the government is not even making a serious attempt to determine how much tax revenue it is losing out on. According to some independent estimates, the Canadian tax system is losing between $5.3 billion and $7.8 billion in revenue per year to tax evasion.

The NDP strongly believes that the federal government has an obligation to determine, as best it possibly can, how much tax revenue Canada is losing to international tax havens and tax evasion. We need to determine how big the tax gap is. Without that kind of estimate, it is impossible to determine how serious the issue of tax erosion is or how effective the adopted corrective measures are.

Accordingly, the motion that I am moving today urges the federal government to take serious measures to determine the federal tax gap arising from the use of tax havens. In order to obtain reliable numbers on the tax gap, the motion also calls on the Canada Revenue Agency to provide the Parliamentary Budget Officer with the information necessary to provide an independent estimate.

My motion also calls on the Auditor General or the Parliamentary Budget Officer to provide estimates of the marginal revenue of additional CRA resources in the area of tax evasion.

According to an OECD report, providing additional resources is remarkably cost effective. The United Kingdom invested £4 million in the fight against tax evasion and ended up recouping £7 billion.

Lastly, my motion asks that the Auditor General be given a mandate to evaluate, on a regular basis, the success of the CRA in prosecuting and settling cases of tax evasion. Canadians are entitled to wonder whether the Conservative government really wants to pull out all the stops to combat tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance.

Let us take a look at some numbers. First, since 2011, the Conservatives have cut $220 million from the Canada Revenue Agency's budget, and they will cut the equivalent of 3,000 full-time positions by 2015. The government's actions do not indicate that it is taking this issue seriously.

According to Le Devoir, in May 2003, 422 employees were responsible for the international audit program. Even though that number has risen slightly over the past three or four years, it is still lower than the 512 employees in the program in 2008. Since then, the use of offshore accounts has skyrocketed. In 2012, the Canada Revenue Agency estimated, conservatively, that it failed to collect $4 billion worth of tax on funds hidden in tax havens.

The 2010 audit conducted by the agency's own management confirmed that the agency is unable to track complex files involving multi-million-dollar bank accounts in tax havens. According to a leaked internal document, it would rather take aim at easy targets, such as small businesses, self-employed workers, the corner hairdresser and the small restaurant owner. When it comes to billions of dollars, the agency is afraid to take on the big guys.

The Conservative government tried to convince people of its supposed intent to combat tax havens. The government likes to talk about how it has implemented 75 measures to combat tax evasion since 2006, yet only 44 people were convicted of tax evasion between 2006 and 2012.

These numbers are truly fascinating. Thanks to the Access to Information Act, CBC recently obtained the names of 25 people who were convicted. Of those 25, only eight were found guilty of hiding income or assets in a tax haven. Of those eight, two were found not by the Canada Revenue Agency, but by Project Colisée, which identified Rizzuto as one of the people who had an account in a tax haven.

From 2006 to 2012, CRA managed to lay charges in six cases. That number seems rather low to me. That means one case per year. However, since 2007, CRA has received a lot of information thanks to major leaks of offshore financial data. That is how it was able to get the names of many Canadians who hold foreign accounts.

In 2007, Canada Revenue Agency got its hands on a list of 106 Canadians who had accounts with the LGT bank in Liechtenstein, and another list of 1,785 Canadians who had accounts with HSBC in Switzerland. In 2010, an international leak revealed the names of 2,000 Canadians once again associated with HSBC. Lastly, in April 2013, recently, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists identified 450 Canadians linked to firms or trusts established in countries known for their low tax rates and lack of transparency.

Many countries, such as Germany and the United States, have agreed in recent years to pay compensation to informants who allow them to recover money. It seems that this government is now willing to pay for information. As someone else said, “it is about time”.

If I do the math, by adding up the 106 names from 2007, the 1,785 names from 2000, the 2,000 names from 2010 and the 450 names obtained recently, in April 2013, that adds up to 4,341 names of people who have accounts in tax havens.

The Canada Revenue Agency has the names of 4,341 people. How many have been charged and found guilty? Six. I would say that more effort is required.

I will go back to Barbados, which is a textbook case. The Government of Canada, during Joe Clark's short Conservative reign, signed a controversial agreement to prevent double taxation. This made it possible for Canadians to register their assets in Barbados and pay virtually no taxes, and then transfer the assets to Canada without being taxed.

Repealing the agreement between this Caribbean island and Canada would put an end to this problem. Today, the opposite is happening. As of 2012, business people had invested $60 billion in Barbados.

Instead of repealing this agreement, the Conservatives are looking to sign similar agreements, called tax information exchange agreements, with other tax havens, which is even more hypocritical. In June 2010, Canada signed this type of agreement with eight other countries: Bahamas, Bermuda, Dominica, the Cayman Islands, Turks and Caicos, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. The government then presented them as agreements to obtain information about Canadian taxpayers who are hiding their money from the tax man.

Today, there are 19 countries or tax havens on this list. Aruba, Antigua, Costa Rica, Uruguay, Guernsey and others were added to the list.

I will quote Professor Alain Deneault:

...The agreements exist in principle to allow tax authorities of the countries involved to investigate potential fraudsters in the countries that have signed the agreements, under certain conditions. However, compared to other international agreements in effect, the Canadian TIEA has a distinct feature. The [Conservative] government's 2007 budget inserted a clause to the effect that Canadian investors who place their assets in one of the tax havens signatory to an agreement with Canada can repatriate their assets as dividends without having to pay taxes....

At the same time that it was signing tax information exchange agreements with tax havens, the Conservative government made legislative changes that watered down these agreements. They no longer cover just the exchange of information; they also exempt subsidiaries located in the countries concerned from paying income tax.

This is what accounting firm Deloitte had to say:

...the Income Tax Regulations were amended in 2008 to extend to countries with which Canada has a TIEA certain favourable corporate tax provisions that had previously only been available to countries with which Canada has concluded a tax treaty. These incentives provide that if a jurisdiction enters into a TIEA with Canada, active business income earned by a foreign affiliate of a Canadian corporation that is resident in that jurisdiction and carrying on business there will be included in “exempt surplus” and, consequently, dividends paid to the Canadian corporation from the affiliate will not be subject to Canadian tax.

We need to do away with duplicity in Canada. Other measures could be put in place to put an end to this. The Canada Revenue Agency could require Canadian corporations, including their subsidiaries, to disclose all taxes paid abroad, broken down by country, to provide increased transparency of the activities of Canadian companies that use tax havens. It could require that the government create an effective system to identify the people who facilitate tax evasion, including accountants, lawyers and other professionals. It could require that the government conduct a quantitative re-assessment of whether the bilateral model of those famous information exchange agreements is effective. It could require that the federal government focus more on multilateral co-operation. It could require that the Standing Committee on Finance study the issue of transfer pricing by multinationals, including a study of the international best practices in this field.

I am prepared to answer questions.

[Taxation, February 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives claim that they are serious about cracking down on tax evasion. However, they decided to abolish 3,000 jobs and cut $250 million from the Canada Revenue Agency's total budget.

That is why I tabled a motion proposing concrete measures to fight tax evasion, with the first step being a study of how much money is being lost to tax havens.

Will the Conservatives make the fight against tax evasion a priority and support my motion?

[Canadian Democracy, February 11th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, last week, the Minister of State for Democratic Reform introduced a bill tailor made to protect the Conservatives. This bill is the next front in the war against Elections Canada that the Conservatives have been waging for years before the courts.

As with every other hyper-partisan bill they introduce in the House, the Conservatives are using the same parliamentary procedures: time allocation and time constraints.

Our electoral system, which is the cornerstone of our democracy, should not be used for partisan purposes, even though that seems to be the only approach the Conservatives understand. It is not in the interest of Canadians to muzzle the Chief Electoral Officer, control the commissioner's investigative powers, impede research into voter behaviours and, above all, try to strip thousands of people of their right to vote.

By not allowing Elections Canada to communicate freely with Canadians, the Conservatives are weakening the very nature of our democracy. That is why we will not support measures that are designed to restrict voter participation. Canadian democracy deserves better than this Conservative government.

[Business of Supply, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, we are talking about post-traumatic stress disorder and human interaction with people who served their country and who are having a hard time. Machines cannot replace direct contact with professionals. Clearly, that will not work.

If a person who is considering committing suicide phones this service and gets voice mail, that individual will not get help in making the best decision about protecting his or her life and getting the care needed.

[Business of Supply, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I completely agree with my colleague's statements.

The minister should resign in the wake of his unacceptable behaviour yesterday. The government cannot admit that though because he represents the government on this file and acts on its behalf. It is despicable that when veterans come to meet with the minister, he refuses to speak with them and literally pushes them. He should resign.

[Business of Supply, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, what stands out the most about the way the Conservatives are dealing with this issue, and many others, is the lack of humanity.

There is a lack of humanity when it comes to the unemployed, veterans and immigrants, to name a few. When people are struggling, we need to be there for them, especially since these are employees of the government who were sent to fight for us.

We must ensure that when they come home, military personnel have access to all the services they need to lead an active and healthy life and reintegrate into civilian society.

The Conservative government did not have to cut the Veterans Affairs Canada budget by 10%, but that is what it decided to do. That is too bad. It says it is making budget cuts without any impact on services to Canadians, but here we have a good example of the opposite.

[Business of Supply, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, there is an old French song called Tout va très bien Madame la Marquise. The marquise, a noblewoman, is travelling and calls her castle, only to be told by her butler that her horse is dead. When she asks why, he responds that the barn caught fire. When she asks him why the barn caught fire, he says that the castle had caught fire, but not to worry, because everything was just fine.

Veterans affairs is one file where everything is definitely not fine. Every year since I was elected, I have participated in Remembrance Day activities and I regularly meet UN-NATO veterans from the Laurentides and members of the Royal Canada Legion in Saint-Jérôme. I want to say a quick hello to them, since I know that they are listening.

On several occasions, I have met with these proud men and women who have recently returned from the front lines, where they were sent to fight for our freedoms and the values we believe in, and to protect democracy. I talked to them about the problems they have getting assistance from Veterans Affairs.

It is always overwhelming to see a massive, tattooed, 6-foot-3-inch man, bedecked with medals, who has come back from Somalia, Bosnia-Herzegovina or Afghanistan and who breaks down crying right in front of you. Why? Because he is suffering. I have witnessed a lot of suffering and worry among veterans, but I have also seen a lot of solidarity and people helping each other.

At a time when thousands of soldiers are or will be returning from their mission in Afghanistan, an unprecedented wave of suicides is sweeping the Canadian Forces. Clearly, they are now facing a significant mental health crisis. In the past two months, there have been eight suspected suicides in the Canadian Forces. I say “suspected” because these cases are still under investigation.

In the past five years, there have been 50 boards of inquiry on suspected cases of suicide, and some reports have not yet been released. Out of respect for the eight individuals who died, I will not mention their names. Suffice it to say that two of them were master corporals, one was a master bombardier, one was a warrant officer, one was a soldier and three were corporals.

Clearly, no one in the military is immune. What is happening here? The Surgeon General for the Canadian Forces does not believe that there is any connection between the suspected suicides and overseas missions. He even added that, “Suicide among Canadian Forces members is caused by the same factors as suicide among members of the general public”. At least he had the decency to admit that overseas missions cause Canadian Forces members extreme stress.

Like all the members here today, I follow the news closely, and I have not noticed eight suicides in two months in any other occupational group in Canada where workers operate in conditions of extreme stress, such as firefighters, police officers, paramedics and nurses.

Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire gave an unequivocal response to the comments made by the Surgeon General: “I find it ridiculous that he is saying that the Canadian Forces do not have more suicides than the civilian world.” He went on to say:

Do not tell me that when soldiers experience combat and are in a different environment over the holidays and are feeling isolated, that they are not more inclined to make a drastic decision.

Suicide is always a drastic decision, an immediate solution to a temporary problem. I am asking all members opposite to honestly recognize that we are experiencing a crisis and to accept the fact that the existing situation is not normal, that there is a deep malaise, and that we need to take urgent measures to counteract this phenomenon and prevent any further loss of human life.

When they come back from Afghanistan, many of our soldiers will have to deal with symptoms of PTSD, and there is a chance that the number of suicides will increase. In spite of the recommendations made by the National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman, the Department of National Defence has yet to create a national data base that would indicate exactly how many members of the military have PTSD-related issues. Between 6,000 and 10,000 members will be released from duty for medical reasons between 2011 and 2016.

Based on prevalence rates, it is estimated that 5,900 veterans will have mental health issues, 2,700 of them being serious cases of PTSD. The army's mental health needs are both clear and urgent. In recent months, this issue has been brought before two separate House of Commons committees. Veterans and veterans' advocates have spoken out against the lack of assistance provided to physically injured soldiers and those suffering from PTSD to transition back into civilian life.

Jason MacDonald, the Conservative government's spokesperson, reiterated that the army and the Department of Veterans Affairs are taking the suicides and the stress of current and former soldiers seriously. He said that the government is making every effort to support them. Is that really the case? How can the government say that it is taking this situation seriously when it is getting ready to close eight regional Veterans Affairs Canada offices between now and January 31? Those offices process 17,223 files. How can the government claim to be taking the situation and the Department of Veterans Affairs' allegations seriously when we know that it has slashed the Veterans Affairs Canada budget by $129 million since 2011 and that additional cuts of $132 million are planned for between now and 2016? A total of 784 positions are being cut, yet the government claims to be taking the situation seriously.

The government is closing offices that provide assistance to veterans and retired RCMP officers. They provide personalized, essential services for people with mental health issues. They provide personal crisis intervention and support so that older veterans can live independently. Veterans will have to go to other cities. They will have to travel eight, nine or ten hours to get front-line services, or they can get help through Service Canada offices, which will offer a hodge-podge of services. The employees who serve these veterans will not necessarily have a lot of real experience with the programs available to them.

Veterans will no longer have access to the specialized offices that were created for them in response to their needs. Those offices had private interview rooms for scheduled appointments with client service officers and case managers. There were other rooms where veterans could see nursing and other staff. For people considering putting an end to their lives, quick access to nearby resources can make a big difference as to whether they go through with it or not. Those resources will no longer be available in a timely fashion; they will no longer be available immediately.

There is a staffing shortage. Soldiers will come back to the country in the midst of a staffing shortage. In 2003, the previous government promised to give National Defence 447 mental health workers. By December 2013, only 388 of those positions were occupied. According to the Ombudsman for the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces, Pierre Daigle, one of the main concerns is the chronic shortage of mental health professionals, currently 15% to 22% below what is required by the Canadian Forces. This continues to be the biggest obstacle to the delivery of universal care to veterans.

We want the government to reverse its absurd decision to close regional Veterans Affairs Canada offices that provide front-line services to soldiers, immediately hire the mental health professionals that were promised to meet soldiers' and veterans' mental health needs, and prioritize and quickly conclude the over 50 outstanding boards of inquiry on military suicides so that grieving families can get answers to their questions.

[Consumer Protection, December 9th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, October's throne speech was quite clear: companies would no longer be allowed to charge customers an additional fee for a paper copy of their bills. Two months later, nothing has been done. Canadians still have to pay $2 to get a paper copy of their bills. These additional fees are unacceptable because they mainly penalize seniors and low-income people.

When will the government put words into action and put an end to this practice?