Mr. Chairman, the only right we would be violating would be if we tried to levy a tax on people who lived elsewhere and worked here, on their mobility rights. We cannot do that. If we are going to have a tax, it has to apply to everyone.

The issue around increasing payroll tax to three or five percent is more a matter of how do we compensate people in the North that is going to be a fair way for them? We cannot have a rebate program or a program that is directly linked to the payroll tax that they pay, otherwise we would be challenged. So we have to come up with a system that gives people tax credit. The difficulty for people who have a very tight income, tight budgets to have another three or five percent taken off their cheques every two weeks or every month is painful given the cost of living.

To them, once a year when they do their income tax, to have a tax credit refund of whatever that amount might be, is not, in most cases, money that is budgeted throughout the year and used up every two weeks or every month.

More often than not, people will use it to make one-time purchases and so on. So it is hard for lower income people. The way the program is structured, we would not be taxing business income. We would be taxing wage income.

I guess there are also questions about whether or not that is fair. To be clear, I certainly have not given up on the notion of a payroll tax, just how to work it out in a way that is not going to be too onerous on our Northwest Territories residents, especially the lower income people. So as we go along, if there is a way of doing it, then we would appreciate recommendations. We will continue to work on that one.