Pierre Leblanc
Director General, Personal Income Tax Division, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. Is that in part 4 or part 5 of the bill?
Meeting 19 · January 26, 2026 · 15:36–17:35 (1h 59m)
45-114 witnesses · 239 interventions · 12,707 words
The House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance met to study Parts 1 to 4 of Bill C-15, the budget implementation act, focusing on tax and financial measures from the November 2025 budget. Officials from the Department of Finance appeared, including Pierre Leblanc, Maximilian Baylor, Ingrid De Freitas, Stefania Bartucci, Gervais Coulombe, Kïrsten Fraser, Khusro Saeedi, Erin Hunt, Judith Hamel, Gloria Wong, Mark Radley, Matthew Emde, Riley McDonald, and Barbara Russell.
Maximilian Baylor discussed tax measures aimed at boosting productivity and investment, including the productivity superdeduction, which he said would reduce taxes by about $17 billion and generate up to $9 billion in annual economic output over 10 years. He noted the measures were partly a response to U.S. investment incentives, and confirmed that provincial Crown corporations like Hydro-Québec would be eligible for the clean electricity investment tax credit, though he could not provide a provincial breakdown of expected payouts without follow-up.
Ingrid De Freitas addressed the repeal of the digital services tax, stating that projected revenue was $2.3 billion for 2024-25 and $900 million annually thereafter, and that any payments already made would be refunded under the bill. She clarified that the tax revenue was not earmarked for media companies, and when asked about costs to prepare the tax, she said a breakdown was not available due to shared resources across files.
Stefania Bartucci explained the automatic federal benefits initiative, under which the Canada Revenue Agency will offer prefilled tax returns to one million lower-income Canadians starting in spring 2027, scaling to five million by spring 2029. She said individuals could modify fields and submit returns directly, enabling quicker assessment and benefit determination.
Pierre Leblanc confirmed that the lifetime capital gains exemption would increase to $1.25 million in 2024 and 2025, with indexation beginning in 2026 at 2% based on the consumer price index, reaching $1.275 million. He also explained that the Canada disability benefit would be fully exempted from income calculations for income-tested benefits, ensuring recipients receive the full amount without affecting entitlements like the Canada child benefit.
Gervais Coulombe noted that questions about carbon tax rebates for fuel marketers were not part of Bill C-15, as the repeal of the federal fuel charge is in Bill C-4, currently before the Senate.
Kïrsten Fraser described the consumer-driven banking framework, which aims to allow Canadians to securely share financial data with accredited entities through API technology, replacing screen scraping. She said the legislation sets accreditation paths and rules on privacy, liability, and security, and that the government has committed to a second phase enabling payment initiation by mid-2027, which would put Canada ahead of some G7 peers.
Khusro Saeedi explained that the equity threshold for financial institutions requiring a 35% public share float would rise from $2 billion to $4 billion, affecting five to 10 firms. He said the update reflects economic growth and inflation since the last adjustment in 2006, giving smaller institutions more flexibility in ownership structure.
Gloria Wong outlined the stablecoin framework, which requires issuers to register with the Bank of Canada and hold one-to-one liquid asset reserves to back the stablecoin's value, with regulations to specify asset location and disclosure requirements. She said stablecoins are not insured by the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation, and that the framework aims to provide regulatory certainty for issuers and support innovation in digital payments, with consultations including Quebec's finance department and securities authority.
Mark Radley noted that the bill would increase the immediate amount available from a deposited cheque from $100 to $150, with further regulatory changes planned to shorten the overall hold period. He also said the bill requires banks to have policies and procedures for fraud prevention, and that a national anti-fraud strategy is under development.
Matthew Emde confirmed that the borrowing authority limit would increase from $1.8 trillion to $2.126 trillion, noting that such increases typically occur every three years, though the last was in spring 2024.
Riley McDonald said the proposed Canada Development Investment Corporation Act is intended to provide enabling legislation for the Crown corporation, which currently operates under the Canada Business Corporations Act, without changing its mandate or structure.
Barbara Russell explained that amendments to support federal credit union growth include simplified amalgamation for small acquisitions, transitional relief for asset transactions, and clarification on deposit insurance, all designed to help credit unions compete with chartered banks without affecting provincial credit unions.
At the close of the meeting, the committee approved a budget for the Bill C-15 study and the chair noted that some topics raised by members fell under other committees' mandates, with ministers' appearances being finalized for the coming weeks.
AI-generated summary — may contain errors; verify against the official evidence.
Pierre Leblanc
Director General, Personal Income Tax Division, Tax Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. Is that in part 4 or part 5 of the bill?
Maximilian Baylor
Director General, Business Income Tax Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
You mentioned two measures. I can respond to certain tax measures aimed at encouraging productivity and growth. There are probably three. A number of the measures are in the bill. The first is referred to as the productivity superdeduction; it is basically a series of accelerated depreciation measures. They accelerate the rate at which firms can claim depreciation, which encourages investment and is broad-based, applied to most investment assets in the economy.
Ingrid De Freitas
Director, International Inbound Investment, Tax Legislation Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. I will answer in English, to make sure I'm accurate. The projected revenue for the DST, which was an estimate, was $2.3 billion for 2024-25. That reflects three years' worth of revenue due to the nature of the history of that measure. It would be $900 million in each subsequent year.
Stefania Bartucci
Director, Strategic Projects, Personal Income Tax Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
You're right. Budget 2025 announced a couple of measures on automatic federal benefits, the predominant one being that the CRA will start to offer prefilled returns for the 2026 tax year—in spring 2027—to one million lower-income Canadians. This will scale up to five million lower-income Canadians for the 2028 tax year—in spring 2029. Basically, an individual will be able to go into their CRA My Account, and the CRA will present them with a simplified version of their tax return that includes the information the CRA has on file for them. The individual will be able to modify certain fields as necessary and then submit the return directly to the CRA. In that way, it'll be a quick assessment, hopefully. The CRA will determine benefit entitlements upon that filing.
Gervais Coulombe
Director General, Legislation, Sales Tax Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Madam Chair, the legislative repeal of the federal fuel charge is currently at the Senate in Bill C-4. I think Bill C-4 received the approval of the House shortly before the break, so the matters the member is raising here are not part of Bill C-15. They were part of Bill C-4, and I'm not aware of any such rebate that either has been announced by the government in the budget or included in Bill C-15 before us. Thank you.
Kïrsten Fraser
Director, Financial Services Innovation, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you very much for the question. The legislative pieces in the bill include the ones that will get the framework going and off the ground. They are accreditation, which is the path to entry for entities that need to participate in the system, and the common rules governing privacy, liability, security and privacy, including consent. As you mentioned, the government introduced the first part of this bill in 2024, including the scope. This sets out the types of accounts and types of data included in the scope of the framework, as well as the technical standards elements, which are effectively the instructions for how entities will communicate with each other. The pieces included in the bill are really the active elements of the framework. These are the path to entry and the rules under which entities will be required to comply to participate in the framework.
Khusro Saeedi
Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. I'm happy to respond.
Erin Hunt
Director General, Financial Crimes and Security Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Unfortunately, I have to say that no one from the Department of Finance is here to speak about that section of the bill today. That's not one of the areas that we're covering. Unfortunately, we don't have the experts here. We can take your question back with us, but the experts aren't here.
Judith Hamel
Director General, Financial Services Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
The officials from the Department of Finance in attendance today are here to talk about legislative changes or new legislation that falls under the authority of the Minister of Finance. The questions you asked that deal with parts of the bill that fall under the authority of other ministers or other departments would probably be better put to officials in those departments.
Gloria Wong
Director, Digital Assets, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. The goal of this measure is to provide a regulated space for issuers to issue stablecoins with certainty. Prior to this, there was no comprehensive regulation in Canada to regulate the issuance of stablecoins that flow across interprovincial and international borders. The goal of the act is to provide certainty for issuers who want to do this. Ultimately, this would support innovation and people's confidence in the instrument and the use of it in digital payments.
Mark Radley
Director, Consumer Affairs, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Yes, that's right. There's one main thing in the BIA, and that is to increase the amount of available funds. Typically, when a consumer deposits a cheque at a bank, they have immediate access to $100, and the rest.... There are a few different time periods, but it will be held for several days. What the BIA proposes here is to increase that first available amount to $150.
Matthew Emde
Director General, Funds Management Division, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
The limit was increased in spring 2024. That was the last time.
Riley McDonald
Economist, Asset Management, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
Thank you for the question. To be more precise, I will answer in English. The purpose of the proposed CDEV act—as I'll call it for short—doesn't pertain specifically to the Trans Mountain Corporation. The rationale behind introducing it through the BIA is that CDEV is an enterprise Crown corporation that has been in operation for decades now. It was incorporated in 1982. The fact that it doesn't have its own enabling legislation makes it anomalous among other enterprise Crown corporations under the federal government's umbrella, such as Export Development Canada, the Business Development Bank of Canada—
Barbara Russell
Director, Framework Policy, Department of Finance
Opening remarks
These amendments support credit union growth in a number of ways. The first way is through creating a simplified form of amalgamation. When a federal credit union is buying a very small provincial credit union—a credit union with 25% or less of its assets—it's a more simplified and efficient process in which the federal credit union won't have to go through all the steps, including that of seeking membership votes. Another way is through transitional relief. The framework sets out transitional relief to allow for asset transactions. Right now, transitional relief helps a provincial credit union that's becoming federal so that it does not have to meet all the federal requirements on day one. These changes add those transitional relief aspects for an asset transaction, as opposed to just an amalgamation. It also clarifies how deposit insurance would apply. This is the CDIC coverage for deposits. As well, it eases entry for allowing additional market conduct transition. A provincial credit union that's entering into the federal credit union space will have additional time to meet the federal requirements for market conduct.