International Trade committee  Absolutely, because we have existing agreements. Some of them are a bit on the older side, but they're not extremely old. The deal with Chile has recently been modernized. There's a good baseline in terms of what we've already negotiated, and now, really, this is about improving

International Trade committee  Good morning. Thank you. Mr. Chair, committee members, thank you for the invitation to take part in your study on a potential free trade agreement between Canada and the Pacific Alliance. The Business Council of Canada represents the chief executives and entrepreneurs of 150 le

Finance committee  We're by no means advocating for the elimination of the corporate tax, and I do appreciate that there are jurisdictions that have gone to that extreme. But I think that Canada should compare itself to its OECD competitors. I think that's a fair comparison, and it's one that we ne

Finance committee  Yes. That is something that we worry about. We want to see neutrality in the system, particularly when you're comparing large, private corporations...if this does apply to them, because it's unclear in the proposal. If you have a situation where a large, private corporation is n

Finance committee  Yes, I agree with that statement. It's been characterized as “passive”, and a lot of people assume, then, that the money is just sitting there not doing anything. However, as you note, that money is invested in corporations that are actively investing in communities and employing

Finance committee  I would just say that if someone is facing a 70% or higher tax rate, which is what we've heard from some of our large private corporations on their passive investments, I think that's a pretty clear disincentive to make any investments whatsoever. So that's very concerning.

Finance committee  I haven't seen that as a concern. I don't want to create a situation through the tax system, though, where small and medium-sized enterprises are not encouraged to grow into large companies. The objective of any small business should be to become a large business eventually, so i

Finance committee  It does not sit dead. When money is invested into public corporations, of course, they'll hold on to money depending on the business cycle, but they deploy that money as required to take advantage of new opportunities. I'll also note that while we represent a majority of public

Finance committee  They definitely do not bring neutrality. One concern we have is that large, private corporations will now be on unequal footing with public corporations that are allowed to hold cash reserves as required to take advantage of new opportunities. You suddenly have a situation whereb

Finance committee  Regarding the recommendation for female labour force participation, the idea was that you have an income-tested system that supports child care. The stats show that we are only spending between 0.2% and 0.34% of GDP on early child care education, which is below the OECD average

Finance committee  Absolutely. Just because it wasn't in this pre-budget submission doesn't mean it's not a priority. We covered this in our last pre-budget submission. It's a huge priority, particularly for companies in our membership that are in the resource sector that have locations or operati

Finance committee  I think the number one thing the government can do is to create more regulatory certainty for that industry to bring that investment back. We witnessed that declining capital investment that occurred in Alberta. It was shocking when the price of oil—and resource prices more broad

Finance committee  Given how recent that change was, the increase under the previous government and now the decrease, we don't have any up-to-date data on whether it is influencing decisions on people right now to stay or leave the workforce. However, when you look at OECD countries, the trend is

Finance committee  Yes. Canada is absolutely a stable investment environment. That's not to be debated, but tax is a major consideration when large companies are thinking about whether or not to invest in Canada. As I noted in the survey that I highlighted and will be releasing tomorrow, tax is b

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members. Thank you for the invitation as always to take part in your pre-budget consultations. The Business Council of Canada represents the chief executives and entrepreneurs of 150 leading Canadian companies in all sectors and regions of the