Study on Income Inequality  Order, please. I would like to give the hon. member for Kings—Hants time to respond.

Finance committee  You said, “You've had a big increase in the ratio of CEO earnings to workers on the shop floor and then on top of that, a financial crisis”. How important an issue do you believe income inequality is for Canada?

Finance committee  Should Parliament study and address the issue of income inequality?

Employment  Speaker, Conservatives just do not seem to care, and what are the results? Canadian income inequality is growing faster than ever before. Since September 2008, 700,000 more Canadians have seen their situation worsen under the Conservatives. The Conservatives have abandoned manufacturing.

Financial System Review Act  When we have a government that is hell bent on basically listening to its friends and paving the way, sometimes through deregulation and sometimes legislation that actually helps these financial institutions, then we can see that it is just ordinary Canadians and consumers who get left behind. I think that is very worrying. Again, I think the pattern of that, with the income inequality involved and the people feeling they have fewer and fewer resources and information to actually deal with the marketplace and to have a sense of integrity about what is going on, is very concerning.

Subcommittee on Private Members' Business committee  This motion would instruct the Standing Committee on Finance to undertake a study on income inequality in Canada. This matter seems to fall under federal jurisdiction; it does not clearly violate the Constitution; no similar motion has already been voted on by the House of Commons in a private member's bill; and there are no government motions on the same subject currently on the Order Paper.

Committees of the House  Families are struggling to keep their head above water, struggling to pay the expenses, all because the government simply does not know how to manage the economy. At the same time, we have also seen record levels of income inequality that take us back to the years of the Great Depression. We are now seeing a small minority of Canadians earning most of the real income in this country. Those are shocking statistics but those are realities.

Business of Supply  People like the ones in my riding are in dire need of support from programs such as old age security and the guaranteed income supplement. Income inequality continues to grow in Canada. No one can really predict what type of long-term damage the economic crisis will cause for Canadians. We absolutely must not play sorcerer's apprentice with social solidarity programs because they have been helping retirees with modest incomes since the 1960s.

Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act  It likes to put forward proposals that drive people into a marketplace situation, saying that they should go out there and fend for themselves, but if their savings get wrapped up in some kind of volatile market and they lose it, that it is not its problem. That is not our approach. We do not want to see income inequality grow in our country. What was announced at Davos was nothing more than a further step to huge corporate interests such as we have seen with the corporate tax cuts. We have to be very clear for Canadians that there is an alternative.

House debate  In the article, “Rising Inequality, Declining Democracy”, put out by Bruce Campbell on December 12, 2011, he states that the income gap in Canada has: --risen to levels not seen since the 1920s, and by some measures it is the worst it's ever been. The Conference Board notes that since the mid-1990s, income inequality in Canada grew at one of the fastest rates in the industrial world; faster than in the US. He further states: The average top 100 CEOs' compensation was $6.6 million in 2009, 155 times the average worker's wage.

House debate  This is not a complicated situation. We are talking about providing women with the tools they need to overcome income inequality in Canada. The past four decades of inaction in the matter of equal pay for equal work is directly related to the Liberals' and the Conservatives' lack of political will. Pay equity ensures that Canadians with jobs of equal or comparable value receive comparable pay.

Business of Supply  It shows us how, when we do not deal with the fundamental issues of the environment, of climate change, of income inequality, of poverty and of the growing gap between the north and the south, we can see that it comes right down to something called a mosquito that actually kills people. If we cannot solve those kinds of problems in our sophisticated world, then I think we have all failed.

Keeping Canada's Economy and Jobs Growing Act  I thank them for that. However, they did it wrong. They did it in such a way as to undermine income inequality in their own communities. Those volunteer firefighters who need it the most are watching the bus drive by, bringing taxpayer funding to those volunteer firefighters who already have a good, decent income.

Finance committee  A lot of families in my area of the country are really struggling. They're struggling with record debt loads. They're struggling with the increasing income inequality we're seeing in this country. I want to ask Mr. Stanford and Mr. Seccareccia whether they feel there's a role for monetary policy in addressing some of those issues or whether this is just primarily a fiscal failure, that governments have not put in place the fiscal policies to address all of those issues the middle class are living through.

Finance committee  We believe that excluding the poorest Canadians--the Canadians who have the greatest need--from these tax credits is wrong, morally wrong, and that it will worsen the growing income inequality in Canada. So in an effort to address this constructively, my office has worked with the House of Commons legislative counsel to draft an amendment that would make these tax credits refundable, so that low-income Canadians could qualify for the benefits of these programs.