Finance committee  Certainly we've had lots of questions on all kinds of issues. With respect to the policy and the treatment of seasonal businesses, I'd turn to the Department of Finance.

Finance committee  Certainly, there is information that is being made available in a transparent way on a number of these programs in terms of the distribution by province, so we at the CRA would have information on the programs that we're administering. I can probably say the same for each of the departments that is administering the program.

Finance committee  Certainly we can provide you with the distribution with respect to the wage subsidy, which is a program we administer, and the same thing with the CERB. We're certainly aware of that issue and trying to work with indigenous businesses to ensure that if they are eligible they can apply.

Government Operations committee  I'd be happy to speak to that.

Government Operations committee  I think we're doing a lot. We have a lot of systems in place to ensure that the right people are getting the money. We are the CRA. We have a lot of information that we collect regularly on people, such as the amount of money they have earned and the amount of money they're going to earn this year.

Finance committee  I'd be happy to answer that. The CCB and GST see increases. In fact, they are based on the 2018 taxation year with respect to people's information. As long as we have that information on file, people are getting the CCB and GST based on that. That said, we encourage people to file because you are thinking ahead to the next entitlement year, which will be 2021, and those payments, the July payments, are typically based on the tax returns of 2019.

Finance committee  I'd be happy to respond to that. The Canada child benefit payment will be coming out on May 20. We try to orchestrate it so that everyone gets it at the same time. The cheques are sent a little bit earlier than the direct deposit so that they'll all arrive roughly on May 20, so that's pretty soon.

Finance committee  Those are correct. Virtually everybody will receive $300, and on the income scale those amounts are gradually reduced only at the higher end. Certainly those at the low, middle and higher middle income class will all be getting the $300, and then, as you said, on average the payments will be significantly higher.

Finance committee  We do. So far we have around 78,000 businesses that applied in the first few days. I think we'll see that gradually accelerate as businesses look at their own situation, and they do the calculations. Certainly, they have many technical questions, so we think this is a really good beginning and we'll be in place to send out those payments next week.

Finance committee  Yes, we're definitely on target for that. It will be important for businesses to sign up for direct deposit in order to get that money as quickly as possible if they're in need of that. We're really pleased to say that we work with financial institutions, and a lot of the major banks now will be offering an opportunity for the businesses to go to their banking portal and sign up for direct deposit through their banking portal.

Finance committee  Thanks for that question. We're certainly monitoring very closely and have very good data on CERB applications and also those receiving the CERB. The same can be said for CEWS. As people are subsidized by CEWS, employers will be providing, of course, T4 information and everything with respect to the earnings of those people.

Finance committee  I'm sorry. I didn't hear that question on tax returns. The volume wasn't working. Could you please repeat it?

Finance committee  Yes, I did. Thank you for the question. Right now, we have delayed the filing deadline to June 1 and payment until August, so I think we've made a significant accommodation. The reason why we're reluctant to push the filing date past June 1 is that the information we receive from taxpayers is important for calculating benefits.

Finance committee  I'm happy to answer that question. I think you're right, in that there have been a number of programs, a number of reports, and they've been quite critical of our call centres. I think we've done a lot to try to respond to that. One of the challenges we had in the past was the technology.

Finance committee  We definitely have been working very hard to stand up the portal. It is a significant undertaking. It's much more complex than the CERB, for example, but we are making excellent progress. Our plan is to open the portal on April 27, if everything goes according to plan, and so far everything has.