From: AlanBaggett@volcanomail.com   
      
   Canada Revenue Agency Stonewalls Access to Information Request: CRA SOTW   
      
   Tax expert says Ottawa should mind the gap   
   March 8, 2013 - 12:24pm By PAUL McLEOD Ottawa Bureau    
      
   Canada does not calculate money lost through fraud    
   OTTAWA — Ottawa says it can’t tell you how many billions of dollars are lost   
   in tax fraud each year, and cites an international expert to show   
   parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page is wasting his time trying to study it.   
      
   But it turns out that same international expert agrees with Page.   
      
   For about five weeks the Canada Revenue Agency has been stonewalling Page’s   
   attempt to study Canada’s tax gap — the amount of money the country loses to   
   tax fraud.   
      
   The revenue agency first told Page it didn’t calculate the tax gap. Page’s   
   office then found a way to do it themselves, but so far the agency has not   
   handed over the data they need for the calculations.   
      
   The government said this week it is considering Page’s request. But it also   
   spread the idea there was no value in trying to calculate the tax gap.   
      
   Government staff quoted Pascal Saint-Amans, director of Paris-based OECD’s   
   Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, who recently told Parliament’s   
   finance committee it is “almost impossible to calculate” the tax gap.   
      
   But reached this week via email, Saint-Amans supported the idea of studying   
   how much money is lost to fraud.   
      
   He did say it is “very hard to identify the tax gap, in particular if it is   
   limited to international tax.”   
      
   But that doesn’t mean governments shouldn’t try.   
      
   “There is a value in trying to do so. … In short, I think that each country   
   should decide, as long as people are aware that there is no magic number and   
   that the tax gap is taken broadly and not limited to international tax   
   issues,” said Saint-Amans.   
      
   Page plans to base his projections on the models used by countries that do   
   calculate tax gaps, such as the United States, the United Kingdom and Sweden.   
      
   He said the government rarely issues solid numbers, but instead prefers to   
   offer ranges of probabilities. The tax gap study would be no different.   
      
   He’s hoping increased media attention will put pressure on the revenue agency   
   to release the information he needs.   
      
   “I think the reaction of ‘you can’t really get to it, so why bother,’ to me,   
   that doesn’t cut it,” said Page.   
      
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