Ministère de l’Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport – More transparency needed in applying a program

The complaint

A citizen complained about a tax claim he considered unjustified stemming from his participation in a measure. It was the Ministère de l’Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport (Department) that had determined he qualified for it.

This foreign citizen had done a postdoctoral internship in Québec (September 2006 to August 2007) under a program that entitled him to a tax deduction. Four years later, when he was back in his home country, he received a claim from Revenu Québec for the part of the internship carried out in 2007, as if the exemption had only applied to the first part of the internship.

The investigation

• Québec has financial incentives, including tax exemptions, enabling employers to recruit foreign experts (university professors and postdoctoral fellows) in fields where there is a shortage of local resources.
• For the education sector, only employers are authorized to apply for an eligibility certificate for their employees. In the case at hand, that employee was the citizen in question.
• The Department determines whether a candidate qualifies for the tax measure and then issues the employer a certificate valid for only one fiscal year. The certificate has to be renewed every year.
• When the Department informs employers of its decision, they must inform the employees that they have to apply for the exemption when they file their annual tax return.
• The Department never contacts candidates because the employers are supposed to convey the required information.
• An examination of the Revenu Québec claim for the tax deduction for 2007 showed that the employer had been late in submitting the application for renewing the eligibility certificate for 2007.

The Québec Ombudsman's conclusions

Since the citizen had not been informed about how the program worked and had no reason to suspect that his ex-employer had been negligent and, therefore, had no way of rectifying the situation, the Québec Ombudsman asked the Ministère de l’Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport to:

• issue a written notice confirming the citizen's 2007 eligibility so that Revenu Québec could be given a copy.

The Department agreed to act on the Québec Ombudsman's request. As soon as Revenu Québec received the notice, it agreed to cancel the claim of more than $4000.