Public Accounts committee  To help you better understand the estimates, I would prefer to provide a cost breakdown, because different numbers reflect errors and payment recovery.

Public Accounts committee  That's correct. It would have been relevant for our accounts receivable folks to have a heads-up around how much debt they would have to collect and how much debt would have been uncollectible. What we were trying to do with these early estimates was decide how much of a workforc

Public Accounts committee  If I could clarify through the chair, at this point we would probably have the accounts receivable, the gross amount. Usually it takes several years until we start to do writeoffs or writedowns, but we can absolutely get you the numbers as they stand today.

Public Accounts committee  That's correct. That document was dated August 2020. I think we were still before the second wave, still unsure of how long the programs might last, and I think also still trapped in the twin pressures of sustaining Canadians and the Canadian economy and making quick payments, an

Public Accounts committee  Madam Chair, what I would say is that this is an internal document that we produced based on a number of assumptions. Our own internal analytics folks would have made a number of assumptions to produce that analysis. That is an estimate to help guide the level of effort that was

Public Accounts committee  That's correct. Returns still continue to be processed and reassessed, so it would be a number that we could provide through the clerk of the committee to the members.

Public Accounts committee  I'm not sure if the commissioner wants to come back or if he wants me to take this one.

Public Accounts committee  This information that we would have provided to the OAG again reflects again our planning. We would have looked at the historic behaviour of people at these income ratios in terms of their ability or propensity to pay, and run it through analysis. In other words, as we gained ex

Public Accounts committee  If the chair allows it, just briefly, I don't want to leave the impression there were no front-end controls. We had historical data on the size of businesses' payrolls, and we found that sufficient to flag businesses for risk. If there was a significant discrepancy between the hi

Public Accounts committee  I'd like to clarify one point. The fact that more GST was collected wasn't necessarily a negative point. The accounting methods were varied, since the wage subsidy program made both cash and accrual accounting methods possible. It was a matter of dates. You mustn't think that 42%

Finance committee  As my colleague alluded to, until we get their tax returns for 2019 and for 2020, we can't say that with precision, because some of that eligibility relates to their income for returns that are not yet due.

Finance committee  I think it would be that the vast majority were not covered by the scenario of the gross versus net, and again, I take the point on the letter from the CRA being intimidating. I think the intent was to put people who may be in a position to pay back the government on notice as so

Public Accounts committee  Yes. I think we try a progressive approach at the CRA. Some in this space are quite young. Their skills are perhaps not in accountancy. That's not what they studied at university. We would lead with education first. We would explain certain provisions of the act. Then we'd watc

Public Accounts committee  Sure. I'll start, and my commissioner might want to come in. I would say that for us, it was to understand the sectors and the specific problems. For example, social influencers are generating a lot of money. In online gaming, if you can imagine it, people are paid to play video

Public Accounts committee  Yes. In some cases, with the social influencers, first of all, the income ranges are quite surprising. We started in the one-million or half-million-dollar income range. Yes, they receive compensation from the people whose products they support. That's correct.