Ms. Lisa MacLeod: My question is for the Minister of Revenue. Yesterday, we cited a May 2009 KPMG Canada report that says Dalton McGuinty's HST will make Ontario patients pay more to get less health care. When the Premier struggled for the answer on his HST, he handed the question off to Minister Wilkinson, who said he had read the KPMG report. I'm glad he's got it in his hand right now because then he can answer this question: Why would you make up that the KPMG report said the net impact of the HST on doctors will be small when the report says no such thing?
Hon. John Wilkinson: I want to thank my friend for the question.
I do have the report, and I say to the member from Whitby-Oshawa-she was talking about an analysis done by someone who worked for KPMG, and I was referring to the report prepared by KPMG dated June 29, 2009, which I read when it came out, I might add. What it says is that for a typical, unincorporated family physician, the tax costs of operating a practice will increase by $1,488 when the income that they report for taxes of that practice-that's just their income, the profit to the doctor; not the total cost-was $157,000. On $157,000, if we're talking about $1,400, that doesn't seem to be a large increase to me.
So what it says here is that there is an impact-because we don't charge HST, GST or PST on health services that are provided by the public system, that are funded by the public system-and that doctors understand we need to do something to ensure that we have the revenue base to afford the finest-
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): Thank you. Supplementary.
Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I'll stick with the analysis that was given to the member for Whitby-Oshawa than the analysis given by the Minister of Revenue any day. He should stick to the report.
Minister Wilkinson has been hanging around with Dalton McGuinty a little too long. The Premier's bad habits are starting to rub off on you, my friend.
You said-
Interjections.
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): Order. Minister of Community and Social Services.
Please continue.
Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I apologize, Mr. Speaker, for getting under their skin so early on a Thursday morning.
You said KPMG reported on the net impact of the HST for doctors when they did not. You said the report is dated; it is less than a year old. You said KPMG found that the overall impact of the HST will be "somewhere in the neighbourhood of 1.6%," but the report did not say that.
No wonder the Liberal caucus is worried over there. If Dalton McGuinty and his top HST salesmen are making up KPMG findings on the HST, the big question is, what else are they making up?
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): I'd just ask the honourable member to withdraw that comment.
Interjection.
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): Thank you.
Minister?
Hon. John Wilkinson: I want to correct the record. I thought yesterday it was 1.6%; it's actually less than 1%. So, absolutely, I thought I'd be a bit conservative in my estimate and make sure I was a bit on the high side when I had to remember something that I had read in July of last year.
You have to understand, on this side of the House we have a plan to attract $47 billion worth of more investment and get 591,000 people back to work. On the other side, they have no plan. Their plan is, don't change-
Interjections.
The Speaker (Hon. Steve Peters): The member from Oxford will please come to order. The member from Renfrew knows the rules.
Minister.
Hon. John Wilkinson: We reject the twins of the status quo over there who say that we should just hang on to the status quo though the world has changed. We reject your leader, who I've said is "Two-tax Tim." He believes there should be two taxes in this province when it comes to sales tax. There should just be one.
I want to thank John Baird, Prime Minister Harper, Jim Flaherty and so many Conservatives who understand that this is the right thing to do-
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