Industry committee  There are two perspectives to this--the administrative perspective at the agency and then the perspective from us, at the Department of Finance, who are responsible for the policy and the legislation. Where things relate to the administrative policies, the agency is always interested in hearing from stakeholders about where the administrative burden is difficult.

Industry committee  We've met with the printing sector and we've done our own analysis specifically related to printing assets. We've been doing that.

Industry committee  It's really not for me to say. For any analysis that we would do, it would be up to the minister to decide whether to make a change.

Industry committee  We're continuing to evaluate the concerns they've raised. One of the questions we are interested in discussing with them is whether the separate class election provisions, which we talked about earlier, are of assistance to them, and, if not, why they wouldn't help. Our analysis suggests that a separate class election can cover a large part of the gap that would result if our CCA rates are too low for a particular piece of equipment.

Industry committee  We're not going to deny that filling out a nine-page form or whatever can be a bit of a burden. Unfortunately, because research and development is a very complicated question, and verifying that is difficult and the incentives are so generous, certain administrative processes need to be in place that the Canada Revenue Agency has decided to put into effect.

Industry committee  We have been engaged in discussions with the printing industry in recent years. As I understand their arguments, they talk about the technological change that has occurred in their sector such that certain processes, which used to be much more mechanical, let's say, have now become more digitized and computerized.

Industry committee  I was referring to statutory rates, but we can certainly address both those questions.

Industry committee  The useful life for a class of assets is intended to be roughly a weighted average of the assets that are included there. We typically define our assets by the asset itself, rather than by the industry in which it's used. There would be an assumption that there should be some comparability to the lives of particular assets whether they're used in industry A or sector B.

Industry committee  We can make that judgment just by looking at the criteria used in various countries. We haven't quantified it in detail. Studies have been undertaken by, for example, the OECD, using measures that try to roll up the various components into a single number.

Industry committee  To give you a sense of what we provide in Canada relative to what the typical treatment would be, the treatment provided in Canada currently for efficient and renewable energy generation is an accelerated CCA rate of 30%. That's been temporarily increased to 50% until the end of 2012, I believe.

Industry committee  It's a question of how the tax estimate system can be most conducive to economic growth. In recent years in Canada we've taken the approach that the tax system can best facilitate economic growth, investment, and advancements in productivity by providing an efficient tax system that is broadly neutral and by lowering tax rates, to the extent we can afford to do so.

Industry committee  The request many industry groups have been advancing for accelerating capital cost allowance.... Because they are not making, and we haven't been hearing, the argument that the capital cost allowance rate for manufacturing needs to be higher in order to reflect useful life, it hasn't come to the kind of dialogue we were talking about earlier, wherein they would want to try to convince us, based on a useful life argument, of their position.

Industry committee  The international comparison data suggest that we are one of the most generous countries—in the top handful. It's difficult to provide an accurate comparison across countries, because the criteria differs so much. There are so many variables to take into account. But when we look at the rate at which the credit is offered here and the base on which the credit is provided, both of these compare very favourably with virtually every other industrialized country.

Industry committee  The Canadian R and D tax credits support a much larger proportion of business expenditures on R and D than the comparable U.S. R and D tax credit.

Industry committee  We accept the Organization for Economic Development and Cooperation's definition of research and development. This definition is used by the majority of the world's countries. No one sector has a monopoly on activities eligible for tax incentives. Quite simply, R&D; must be carried out in accordance with certain criteria, one of which is ensuring scientific and technological continuity.