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June 17, 2019

RE: Consultation on Draft Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax Legislation

To Whom It May Concern: I appreciate this opportunity to offer feedback on the Department of Finance’s draft legislation amending the Excise Tax Act. My brief comments today will focus on the proposal to treat virtual currency as a financial instrument. Given that these proposed changes are likely to simplify the registration, reporting and remittance requirements for suppliers, we should be mindful of the wider socioeconomic and environmental impacts of facilitating the use of cryptocurrency.

The draft legislation leaves unanswered the question of how industry participants, namely crypto-mining, will be treated with respect to GST/HST. For instance, were zero-rating to be applied in lieu of exemptions, would it benefit non-residents disproportionately to resident Canadians, and how can we determine that with any certainty given the anonymity of the platform?

We should ensure that any tax incentives to establish crypto-mining in a Canadian jurisdiction is attended by energy regulations, similar to what Quebec has done this spring. There should be requirements that the company use green energy sources, like Iceland’s Genesis Mining, and that they engage in efficient blockchain systems like “Proof of Stake,” which reduces duplication in effort and resources. All these activities should be further constrained within Canada’s international obligations in respect of climate change. Keeping down the high energy demands of any blockchain industry in Canada is essential if we are serious about reaching the Paris Target. Not to mention, doing so will prevent costs from trickling down to the consumer.

Meetings of the House Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security regarding cybersecurity in the financial sector make clear that we need solutions to reduce the incidence of fraud and to protect sensitive data. Cryptocurrency may be part of this, bringing with it the additional benefit of integrating people into the market without need of a bank account. More broadly speaking, distributed ledger technologies could also help to prevent vote tampering during elections, facilitate government services like visa applications, and protect information in government registries as B.C. is now doing with land titles. I support moving in this direction as long as we proceed cautiously and with an eye towards protecting people’s privacy.

Thank you in advance for your consideration.

Best regards,

Elizabeth May, O.C.
Member of Parliament
Saanich-Gulf Islands
Leader of the Green Party of Canada

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These measures, about which my hon. friend is so happy, are ones that I am very concerned about, such as the changes to the Canada Labour Code, changes to the public service act, changes to the Supreme Court Act. These have nothing to do with one another or with the budget. Would they not have been better handled as separate bills?

Rick Norlock: Mr. Speaker, let me begin by saying that during the lead-up to the last election, the Green Party candidate in my riding said that the economic policies of the Green Party were very conservative in nature, yet I noticed the voting record of the only member of the Green Party is pretty close to 95% to 100% of that of the New Democratic Party. The policies of the Green Party are very democratic socialist in nature.

She mentioned that we have these omnibus bills and we need to talk at length about all the things that happen. My constituents tell me they are tired of a bunch of politicians who talk and talk, and very little gets done. I tell my constituents that we are getting things done, that we have had more private members’ bills in the history of this country happen under this government, that we get things done such as the economic action plan, that our place in the world, especially in the G7, is at the top of the heap and not where we want it to be quite yet but getting there. They tell me that they want to see action taken, not more talk from a bunch of politicians here in Ottawa.

I am happy that we get things done and that we do not sit here babbling ad infinitum about things that are not really of interest to average Canadians. They want action, and that is what they are getting from our government.

Elizabeth May:  Mr. Speaker, I have a serious economics question for the member. A lot of us in this place talk about economics. The member for Markham—Unionville is one of those who is actually qualified to speak to it, having achieved a Ph.D., having taught at four universities, and having been the former chief economist at the Royal Bank.

I am curious about his views. We keep hearing the mantra that cutting corporate tax rates, so that Canada now has the lowest corporate tax rate in the OECD, is helping the job creators. However, we are also seeing that our job creation rate is very low. Youth unemployment is 14%.
Current RBC staff are telling us, as Mark Carney from the Bank of Canada pointed out, that low corporate tax rates are resulting in a large accumulated pile of what Carney called “dead money”. It is not going into the economy. It is not stimulating jobs. A current RBC economist says that it is now $600 billion. I believe that is 32% of our current GDP. I wonder if my friend from Markham—Unionville has any comments on this.

John McCallum: Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her reciting of my various credentials.

I believe that Canada already has a very low corporate tax rate on the largest corporations. I believe that it is something in the order of 25%, when we include both the federal government and the provinces, whereas in the United States, it is something in the order of 39%. There is a huge gap.

In previous election campaigns, we in the Liberal Party said that we did not want to go back to super high corporate tax rates, but we thought that given other needs of the economy, this gap was larger than it needed to be. At the time, we wished to freeze corporate tax rates rather than allow them to go down further.

That was in the past. If we look to the future, I take her point about the proceeds from these lower taxes not always being used to advantage the Canadian economy through investment. There is a lot of what Mark Carney called dead money. Personally, if one thinks of all the possible tax cuts, it seems to me that the cut in corporate tax rates to the low level it is at today would not be among my top priorities. I do not think there is a great deal of evidence that the cuts we have seen to date have had a major positive effect on investment and jobs in the country.

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That summary of what the Auditor General found is quite astonishing. It is a much larger amount of money that is missing, although the Conservatives, we know, will say, as they have in question period, that the Auditor General did not say there had been any wrongdoing. Obviously, the Auditor General cannot figure out where the money has gone. It is going to be a difficult forensic exercise.

I wonder if the hon. member would comment on whether he believes that the motion from the official opposition will allow us to get to the bottom of the matter.

Mathieu Ravignat: Mr. Speaker, indeed, it is a forensic exercise, and that is why our motion proposes access to information that would allow us, as parliamentarians, to find out what happened to this $3.1 billion in missing money. It is a scandal. It is incredible that the President of the Treasury Board is absolutely incapable of saying what happened or of even indicating what might have happened. That is worrisome. The responsibility of a government is first, to take care of taxpayers’ money, and this is a clear violation of that pact with the Canadian people.

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On April 16th, the committee heard testimony from representatives of Canada 2020, C.D. Howe Institute, Frasier Institute, First Nations Tax Commission, TD Bank Financial Group, Canadian Taxpayers Federation, Centres for Tax and Budget Policy and Studies in Economic Prosperity, and Montreal Economic Institute regarding income inequality. Some testimony indicated that education is of particular importance, while other testimony indicated that many studies overstate the severity of inequality based on variables utilized.

Murray Rankin’s motion for minister of revenue and officials to come before committee to explain upcoming budget’s effects on CRA attempting to target tax evasion was defeated.

On April 18th, FINA Meeting 114 was held in-camera regarding Bill C-48.

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As a member of a country that has roughly a one-third majority party leading the federal government, I would expect that roughly one-third of the actions they take would be supported by Canadians.

As recently as last week, and many times before, our federal government has given me reason to believe they do not care about Canadians’ concerns outside of fiscal management.

As a result of the strong economy we emerged from the recession with, we Canadians would have expected proper conduct regarding our commitments. Instead, we get Bill C-38, a budget implementation bill that will, “attempt to hide changes to over 70 laws under the guise of an omnibus budget bill,” says Green Party leader Elizabeth May.

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The debate at Third Reading continued to reveal that Conservative Members of Parliament had no grasp of the act, so as a last attempt to shake them into integrity, I challenged all Conservatives to a small quiz to test their knowledge of the act — open-book, 15 minutes long, and multiple choice. I offered a tree planting ceremony with them in their riding to anyone who passed.

Sadly, none of them showed up.  The law of averages suggests that at least one MP would give it a shot.  The failure of even one Conservative MP to show up persuades me that they were ordered by the Prime Minister’s Office to stay away.  One Independent MP, former NDP MP, Bruce Hyer took the test and got 100%.  (He was quite relieved.)

Stephen Harper’s legislative strategy can be described as “might makes right.”  It was a foregone conclusion that if the Prime Minister maintained maximum pressure on his MPs and rejected any possible compromise, the bill would be passed.  Introduced for First Reading on April 26, moving like a freight train through hearings before the Finance Committee and its sub-committees, it went to Report Stage without so much as a semi-colon removed.  And then unchanged through Report Stage.   It goes against every aspect of  Parliamentary democracy that even helpful amendments must be crushed.  The process is no longer about public policy or good legislation.  It is all a war. Stephen Harper clearly believes that allowing MPs to improve legislation is a sign of weakness.

While Mr. Harper won this battle, it was a pyrrhic victory. All major national media, even Canada’s most conservative paper, the National Post, has condemned the omnibus approach as illegitimate:

…the contempt that the Tories have shown for the democratic process is unacceptable, and inexplicable. Such a hardball tactic might have been justifiable when the Conservatives held only a minority, but now, it seems simply like a bad habit the Conservatives are in need of shaking.

Perhaps they will. As was reported in last Friday’s National Post, there are reports that Conservative insiders are as unhappy with how the government has behaved as is the opposition, and rumours that the Tories are facing a grassroots backlash. There is reportedly concern that such tactics will ultimately damage the Conservative brand, alienating voters well ahead of the next election. (National Post editorial, June 17, 2012)

The unhappy backbenchers showed more signs of the strain than has occurred to date in this government.  Meanwhile, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has promised a second omnibus budget bill for the fall. 

In some good news, I tabled a private members bill on June 19: A Genuine Progress Indicators Measurement Act.  And in putting it forward, I was able to read into the record the following from the late Senator Bobby Kennedy, from 1968, with a quality of ideas so rarely heard on Parliament Hill:

“Too much and too long, we have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things….The (GDP) counts air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country. It measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.”

The Genuine Progress Indicator Measurement Act, Bill C-436, will attempt to measure those things that make life worthwhile. It will require Parliament to determine a set of meaningful indicators of natural capital and human well-being.  These measurements will then form the basis of an annual report from the Commissioner on Environment and Sustainable Development, within the office of the Auditor General.

Which has a certain irony as I witness a Prime Minister determined to undermine all those critical elements of our legislation and regulations that ensure healthy ecosystems, while removing statistical measurements, eliminating scientific monitoring and silencing critics. 

As Canada marches backward, we desperately need to assess the cost.  We need to know how to chart a course to genuine progress.

The post As Parliament rises for the summer… appeared first on Elizabeth May.

The debate at Third Reading continued to reveal that Conservative Members of Parliament had no grasp of the act, so as a last attempt to shake them into integrity, I challenged all Conservatives to a small quiz to test their knowledge of the act — open-book, 15 minutes long, and multiple choice. I offered a tree planting ceremony with them in their riding to anyone who passed.

Sadly, none of them showed up.  The law of averages suggests that at least one MP would give it a shot.  The failure of even one Conservative MP to show up persuades me that they were ordered by the Prime Minister’s Office to stay away.  One Independent MP, former NDP MP, Bruce Hyer took the test and got 100%.  (He was quite relieved.).

Stephen Harper’s legislative strategy can be described as “might makes right.”  It was a foregone conclusion that if the Prime Minister maintained maximum pressure on his MPs and rejected any possible compromise, the bill would be passed.  Introduced for First Reading on April 26, moving like a freight train through hearings before the Finance Committee and its sub-committees, it went to Report Stage without so much as a semi-colon removed.  And then unchanged through Report Stage.   It goes against every aspect of  Parliamentary democracy that even helpful amendments must be crushed.  The process is no longer about public policy or good legislation.  It is all a war. Stephen Harper clearly believes that allowing MPs to improve legislation is a sign of weakness.

While Mr. Harper won this battle, it was a Pyrrhic victory. All major national media, even Canada’s most conservative paper, the National Post, has condemned the omnibus approach as illegitimate:

…the contempt that the Tories have shown for the democratic process is unacceptable, and inexplicable. Such a hardball tactic might have been justifiable when the Conservatives held only a minority, but now, it seems simply like a bad habit the Conservatives are in need of shaking.

Perhaps they will. As was reported in last Friday’s National Post, there are reports that Conservative insiders are as unhappy with how the government has behaved as is the opposition, and rumours that the Tories are facing a grassroots backlash. There is reportedly concern that such tactics will ultimately damage the Conservative brand, alienating voters well ahead of the next election. (National Post editorial, June 17, 2012)

 The unhappy backbenchers showed more signs of the strain than has occurred to date in this government.  Meanwhile, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has promised a second omnibus budget bill for the fall.

In some good news, I tabled two private members bills just before adjournment. On June 19, I tabled  A Genuine Progress Indicators Measurement Act and on the very last day of the session, June 21, my bill to create a National Lyme Disease Strategy got First Reading.

In putting forward the bill for Genuine Progress Indicators, I read into the record the following from the late Senator Bobby Kennedy, from 1968:

“Too much and too long, we have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things….The (GDP) counts air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country. It measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.”

The Genuine Progress Indicator Measurement Act, Bill C-436, will attempt to measure those things that make life worthwhile. It will require Parliament to determine a set of meaningful indicators of natural capital and human well-being.  These measurements will then form the basis of an annual report from the Commissioner on Environment and Sustainable Development, within the office of the Auditor General.

Which has a certain irony as I witness a Prime Minister determined to undermine all those critical elements of our legislation and regulations that ensure healthy ecosystems, while removing statistical measurements, eliminating scientific monitoring and silencing critics.

As Canada marches backward, we desperately need to assess the cost.  We need to know how to chart a course to genuine progress.

The post As Parliament rises for the summer… appeared first on Elizabeth May.