Finance committee  As I mentioned in one of the earlier questions, to the extent that a measure.... For instance, if you introduce a new tax credit, that represents some additional workload in perpetuity. If it's an additional line on the return, we need to capture that information, and it adds somewhat to the complexity of the processing system.

Finance committee  In a situation like that, unless we had information to suggest that the individual was attempting to mislead us or was forging receipts of some sort, we would normally take those on the value for what they're presented.

Finance committee  Perhaps, Mr. Chair, I'll make one comment and then I will ask my colleague, Mr. Ralston, to respond further. This agreement with the private collection agents is strictly with respect to outstanding student loans. We do not use private collection agents for other types of activity.

Finance committee  Mr. Chair, the private collection agencies were already performing this function for Human Resources and Social Development Canada. When the transfer came to the Canada Revenue Agency, which included the people in that department, they were using private collection agents at that time.

Finance committee  Mr. Chair, I wouldn't want to leave the committee with the impression that there's a mass exodus, but there is a demand for these people. If you were to look at just about any of the major accounting firms, and, for that matter, legal firms in the country, many of their top people who are working in this field, such as transfer pricing, which is a huge specialization, come from the Canada Revenue Agency.

Finance committee  We're continuing to work, as the member might be aware, with the Department of Finance to flesh out all of the parameters around the proper application of the fitness tax credit. I can't provide any more specific details on that today, but certainly if the committee were interested, we'd be pleased to provide information, either in a meeting or offline, with respect to the state of development on that.

Finance committee  It wouldn't generally rise. Whenever we have a new tax measure, the first year is always higher, because that's when we have to do the reprogramming and so on. After that, to the extent that a new tax credit adds another line to a return or adds another calculation, there is some continued downstream cost, but it's never as great as the first year.

Finance committee  Mr. Chair, as I said earlier, the specific activities that would qualify are still being worked on with the tax policy folks in the Department of Finance. I can say that we would not audit this type of activity. We would seek to get a determination to clarify which activities qualify, and as long as the taxpayer can provide evidence of payment, that would satisfy us.

Finance committee  Mr. Chair, I think there are two parts to your question. This particular initiative is not designed to identify tax avoidance, but rather to make sure that individual provinces are getting their proper share. For instance, when we are auditing a large corporation that is doing business in many provinces, it's important that, whichever province you're in--and we're doing that on behalf of the province--they get the proper amount credited to the province--

Finance committee  This is designed to make sure the pie is correctly cut, and--

Finance committee  It doesn't make the pie bigger. I do not have the adjustments with me, but they're relatively minor year over year. We collect about $300 billion a year--actually more than that in total receipts--and we're only talking about a few million dollars a year. If you're a province, a million dollars is a million dollars, and it's important that we can get it right.

Finance committee  This is to set us up to increase our capacity for a long time. The area of provincial income allocation was not a particularly sophisticated part of our audit programs. Provinces have asked that we make investments in this, and this is exactly what this is designed to do.

Finance committee  Certainly. You're referring, of course, to the latest Auditor General's report—

Finance committee  —on international tax. If I could provide a point of clarification, the observation from the Auditor General was that people working in the international tax area of the Canada Revenue Agency have, on average, only two years' experience. I should point out that refers to two years' experience doing international tax work, but they have many, many years experience as auditors working for the Canada Revenue Agency.

Finance committee  It is.