Finance Committee on Oct. 20th, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Great. Thank you.

We'll go to Ms. Glover, please.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Here's a speed round. I'm going to ask three questions and I'm going to give you a heads up on them.

I'm going to ask the CMA about free trade agreements and how you feel those benefit the country or don't benefit the country.

I'm going to ask the pharmaceutical representatives about the report of the expert panel on federal support to research and development that was released this week. I'd like to know your assessment of the report.

And I'm going to ask the Canadian Taxpayers Federation about the proposition by the NDP for a new tax, the daily financial transactions tax, and what your organization's position is on that.

We'll start with the Certified Management Accountants of Canada on the free trade question.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Ms. Nash.

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

On a point of order, we don't have a proposal on a financial transaction tax, so I'm questioning the.... I just want to make sure we're all operating on the same set of facts.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Okay. That's a point of debate, as you well know.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

I'll clarify it as “support for”, as opposed to “a proposal for”—just in the interest of collaboration.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Mr. Monk, please.

[Richard Monk]

If you're asking us whether or not we support free trade agreements, the answer is yes, we do. It's a global economy we're in right now and a global marketplace. Businesses must compete not only in Canada but across the world. We're in favour of any opportunity to allow businesses to trade freely and openly in the global economy.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

And how does free trade affect innovation and productivity, sir?

[Richard Monk]

It gives the business person, the innovator, more access to resources, to ideas, and to markets.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Very good. Thank you.

Now we'll go to the pharmaceutical representatives on the question about the expert panel report.

[Russell Williams]

We're still going through it, but it goes in a pretty good direction. Frankly, I think they've highlighted a lot of what we know and it's now time for action.

If I can use the time of the answer, I would call this a very urgent issue. It's time to take some of those recommendations and move forward. They highlighted that Canada needs to be more competitive in IP, and we have a huge opportunity to do that. The benefit is that we can bring many more dollars into our research community. Our Canadian health care system is really solid for this, our sciences are good, and our scientists are great. So if we can seize the opportunity in some of those recommendations, we have a lot of the heavy lifting done. It's now a question of putting a comprehensive package together. But it's urgent.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Would you be able to say that we should put a priority on any of the recommendations? Are there any that really deserve some special attention?

[Russell Williams]

I think the report deserves further analysis. What I'll do is write to you with the answer to that question.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

That would be very helpful. Thank you.

[Russell Williams]

But the overall package, I think, is in a good direction. It's now time for action.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Very good.

And to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the NDP support a new tax called the daily financial transactions tax—people are calling it that. What do you think of that tax? How do you think it will affect us?

[Gregory Thomas]

We haven't studied the proposal in any detail. We keep our hands full with what the government is doing with spending and taxing and the upcoming budget.

Generally speaking, we believe there are serious problems with the world financial system. We believe that many of the world's financial institutions are over-leveraged and under-regulated and that Canada has steered clear of most of these things.

The whole business of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation's being encouraged in the early stages of the minority Parliament to get young couples into debt with up to 35- or 40-year amortizations was troublesome.

Adding a transactional tax isn't going to help the world economy, and you don't solve the debt crisis by adding more debt. So we're strongly in favour of de-leveraging, but we don't believe a transactional tax as a general concept is helpful.

[Shelly Glover, Conservative, Saint Boniface, MB]

Okay, very good.

I'm just going to make a comment to this gentleman, Mr. Thomas. You referred to sitting members of Parliament and said that you might not be able to convince them.

You might be surprised to know that some of us actually believe that we need to move towards adjustments in pensions and what not. Some of us actually, when we got elected, tried to waive the federal pension, but we're not allowed to because of prior decisions by previous governments. So be careful about painting us all with the same brush, because some of us have some pretty innovative ideas. I hope you will put some faith in us as we move forward.

Aside from that, I probably have 30 seconds.

On commercialization of new technologies, Mr. Monk, thank you for bringing this to our attention. I think that was very valuable information.

And perhaps the Rick Hansen Foundation could advise us, even afterwards, on this matter. You mentioned that the private sector has some money coming towards your foundation. I'd be very interested in knowing the amount of private sector contributions. I think it's valuable information for this committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Okay, thank you.

We're going to have to move on to Mr. Brison now.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

You make that sound like such a terrible thing.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Gazzard, you made a specific proposal--and I just want it for the clerk and as we get closer to our report--on a U.S. low-income housing tax credit. It was in the Conservative platform. Governing parties always embrace fully their platform commitments, and I suspect the opposition parties would find this proposal compelling as well. So that's something I want to mention to the committee.

Mr. Williams, we're on the eve of--and hopefully the discussions have advanced somewhat with the provincial governments--the health care accord, the deadline for which is in 2014. Other organizations meeting with the committee have recommended a national pharmacare plan. Provincial governments and territorial governments are calling for a national pharmacare strategy, working with the federal government. Would your organization as well see the benefit and merit of a national pharmacare strategy?

[Russell Williams]

I think we have to work very hard to increase equitable access to innovative medicines and vaccines across this country. I don't think a national plan is the way to do it, and I don't think it's the way you will be most effective. I do believe in a pan-Canadian approach, but I also do believe that the provincial governments should help set that direction.

Unfortunately, a lot of Canadians—and thank you for asking the question—think we have wonderful access to innovative medicines. Compared to 30 countries around the world, we rank in the bottom third. In the first in class medicines, we rank at the very bottom of that. So I think it's our responsibility to find the best way to do it. I don't believe a national program would be the right answer. I think you need to have that regional diversity.

I do believe we can all work together to make better access. If you do better access, I think that will actually be a solution in part of the sustainability debate we're having in this country.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Thank you very much.

The whole issue of tourism is so incredibly important as an industry. Australia has done a good job of linking tourism with education in promoting its universities and schools globally. I used to talk about how Australia attracted a lot more Chinese students to Australia than we were doing in Canada, and people used to say “Well, that's geography, that's not public policy”. But that doesn't explain why last year Australia started attracting more students from Mexico to Australia than Canada did. Well, we brought in, of course, a new visa requirement.

In any case, has your organization looked at and studied the potential to promote our world-class universities in Canada as part of an integrated tourism strategy and long-term competitiveness? These people represent natural bridges to fast-growing economies.