Evidence of meeting #79 for Public Accounts in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was industry.
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4:55 p.m.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Very well.
You're pretty much done, unless you can do something in six seconds.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
Malcolm Allen NDP Welland, ON
I suppose I should stop while I'm ahead—while I'm still saying something nice, the department would probably tell me—quit while you're ahead, as they say.
Thank you both very much.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Thank you.
That rounds it out nicely.
To close off our rounds of discussion, Mr. Kramp.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Thank you, Chair.
Again, thanks to our witnesses. It's great when we have quality witnesses here, forthcoming and well prepared; that's all I can suggest at this particular point. Thank you very, very kindly, all of the participants. It certainly makes our job much easier.
I was very fortunate; I had the opportunity to sit on the finance committee, and of course we're always in budget deliberations and pre-budget deliberations. There's always a demand for government dollars. Every program comes wanting and needing.
In particular with SADI—the budget—I'd like to have an indication from industry at this particular point about whether or not your request for dollars for SADI has been adequate, and/or whether it has met the demands that industry has put forward.
4:55 p.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Industry
The SADI budget has been adequate to meet the demand that we've seen from the industry over the last number of years. We adjust it according to the demand we expect to see.
Mr. Emerson, in his report, did recommend some changes to the SADI program. Those are being considered right now by the government, looking forward, through the budget process and beyond, as to whether that would be advisable.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Okay, fine.
Looking forward one, three, five years—obviously, we all like to plan ahead a little bit, if at all possible. It doesn't always work out; reality sometimes kicks in with some different options. What are you doing with this budget right now for SADI? Do you think it's going to have greater demand, where there might be more expectations to pull more from? Do you think we could potentially be reducing that budget? What are your thoughts right now? Does the status quo appear to be the answer?
4:55 p.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Industry
It's a little bit hard to predict. What we've seen in the last few years is that demand was a little bit below the budget that was available. We've adjusted the budget to put that into more of a steady state and to see how it goes going forward. We'll just need to monitor that. I think it will depend on the state of the industry and the plans of individual companies.
Many of our projects are quite large, sort of lumpy, so it can be quite variable from one year to the next. I expect over time we'll have a bit better sense, especially since the first five years have been through the recession and then the rebound, so it's been a bit of an unusual time.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Okay.
One of the challenges that I see moving forward...you need information in order to be able to make intelligent decisions and to verify, but the industry you're dealing with is highly competitive. It's strategic, and certainly confidentiality is tremendously important. You might want some information, but if that information becomes public, it can certainly put competitors in an advantageous position and/or adversely affect our own domestic suppliers.
How do you balance both the confidentiality and the transparency?
4:55 p.m.
Associate Assistant Deputy Minister, Science and Innovation Sector, Department of Industry
I don't want to look like I'm excusing our February 8 performance on something we committed to do by December 31, but I would use this question to provide you with some information.
As we provided a considerable amount of information on each of the companies that we've supported in the program in that most recent report, we had to vet each of those releases. We're talking about a paragraph that long, but we had to work those through with each of those companies to ensure that the information we were releasing was not sensitive to their commercial interests. That does take time. We'll have to build further lead time into doing that report in the future so that we can make sure we have that in. That's part of the reason it kind of pushed us beyond the timeframe that we have to participate—
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Is that as a result of a contractual arrangement you have with that company and the demands you place on them, or is that an industry standard? There's probably not a cookie-cutter approach to this because all those companies are different. Do they negotiate that with you, or are they in such a competitive market that, really, they almost have to dictate that?
5 p.m.
Associate Assistant Deputy Minister, Science and Innovation Sector, Department of Industry
In the case of a private company, they would be essentially providing us completely proprietary information that they wouldn't release to anyone, particularly to anyone who would be a competitor. We would hold that in our records because we have to undertake due diligence on the file. In such cases, of course, obviously, we ensure we have clearance when we do include information that they've provided us, particularly with respect to the benefit reports or how far along they are in their R and D. Each of these things could well be a sensitivity in respect of other companies that are also pursuing similar lines of R and D activity. They're all trying to aim at selling their products.
Our agreements allow us to have access to information that the companies would have, but not necessarily to release it publicly. Of course, we ensure that we have clearance from them before we aggregate it or consolidate it, in order to balance that with the need for us to explain to Canadians what we're doing with the funds we're investing. So there is a trade-off that has to be taken into account.
5 p.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
I'm just going to turn my time over to my colleague.
5 p.m.
NDP
The Chair NDP David Christopherson
Actually, time has expired.
I appreciate your good intent, but it ain't going to happen. Thank you, Mr. Kramp.
With that, colleagues, unless there is a motion or a request to continue any further, I will extend our thanks to our witnesses today.
We appreciate your being here and appreciate the answers you've given. There were a couple of undertakings, I believe, for information to come to the committee. We'll expect to see that in the timely fashion that you committed to.
Many thanks to all of you and good luck until we see you again.
With that, I will suspend this meeting for two minutes, and we'll move in camera to deal with committee business.
[Proceedings continue in camera]