Finance committee  I can try. It would be defined as all of the financial institutions other than banks--i.e., trust companies, provincially regulated institutions, credit unions--that deal in financial transactions.

Finance committee  Absolutely. I worked on that when I was a minister. I didn't get anywhere. I would wish the finance minister luck in his attempts to deal with that.

Finance committee  If there are any additional measures needed to help the Bank of Canada in that area, then I think the bank should bring that up to Parliament. But most of the items that are needed are already there. I believe the quote from the Bank of Canada Act goes something along the lines

Finance committee  We may indeed; the Ontario government has a pension guarantee fund. They probably look after far more pensions than the federal government does. That's a question that I think members of Parliament should carefully consider, and carefully consider in relation to the pensions th

Finance committee  I might just add that we did have regulated rates at one point. There was a 6% ceiling by bank interest rates. Where would we have been in 1980, when we had a 22.5% prime rate? When you get interest rates set at a ceiling, nobody wants to lend the money at that rate. That's the m

Finance committee  You're quite right, there are two factors: there's credit availability and there's the price of credit. That is a real problem. When the central bank interest rates get to zero, there is very little more the central bank can do except to get into the quantitative easing fit, and

Finance committee  Yes. Let me just quote from the budget papers. The personal income tax measures, in the first year--that's 2009--have a 0.4 impact. For every dollar spent, you get 40¢. In the second year it's 0.9. Infrastructure spending in the first year is 1.0, two and a half times as much ban

Finance committee  I will be very brief, then, thank you, Mr. Chairman. We're going to have to call Ms. Dickson “Rosy”, I guess, for her forecasts. We were talking about different things, not just the banks, but the whole market, and the market for medium- and long-term bonds and things like that

Finance committee  So that's the question...sorry.

Finance committee  Yes. You were mentioning that it's very difficult to obtain credit in a recession. Consumers are reluctant to spend, and we've seen that. Bankers are reluctant to lend, as they should be. The risks are higher. You wouldn't want your bankers to go out recklessly spending. Ms. Dick

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members. Dr. Donner and I are pleased to be asked for our views on the very important subjects under review by your committee at this time. We do not need to emphasize the extremely fragile world economic situation, about which all are aware. That world