Public Safety committee  Yes, I believe they are taking a significant risk. In many cases, they're accepting more risk than they would for a similar return in the commercial marketplace, but it's because they're socially motivated and concerned about generating positive social outcomes in their communiti

Public Safety committee  I'd be happy to. We were advisors to the province on a very small, by international standards, impact bond in the low seven figure area. But the social objective was, particularly among first nations, to help at-risk mothers and their families to be safe, to support them while i

Public Safety committee  The timeframe is I believe five years. There might be an additional timeframe of perhaps another year or so to make sure the outcome is properly measured; but it's in that range of a timeframe, say five to six years or so.

Public Safety committee  Yes I believe it is public information. The investors, I believe, were a Canadian credit union and a private family from that community, and they came together and split the investment, I think half and half.

Public Safety committee  I think it's really important to assess the situation and analyze the situation to make sure that it makes sense from a financial perspective and that it's very likely to have a strong positive business case from a financial standpoint. But the actual outcome is impactful and has

Public Safety committee  Those are good questions, but I apologize. For some reason, the translation didn't come forward on the first component of your question. You have my apologies, but I'll answer it to the best of my ability. Your observation is astute, that at this point in time there is not a gre

Public Safety committee  That's a very good question. The private investor may be looking for only commercial returns. It's possible that a commercial bank could fund such an instrument. But it might—and probably would—get the most value out of the social benefit that occurs: the contribution to commun

Public Safety committee  The payment mechanism and performance thresholds are established on a transaction-by-transaction basis. But at the highest level, if the thresholds are not met, some lower amount of payment is required by government. I think that's commercially reasonable. I would encourage gover

Public Safety committee  If you look at what is involved at the highest level, you see that private finance is involved. I have been involved in perhaps 50 to 60 government transactions that involve procurement of infrastructure, whether it be transit systems, highways, schools, airports, or the like. It

Public Safety committee  For social finance, I have been involved in a social impact bond in Canada, in the province of Saskatchewan, that recently reached financial close. Canada doesn't have many examples.

Public Safety committee  Yes. Acknowledging that Canada is a very conservative financial country—and we've done well by that, in my view—there is definitely appetite in the broader investor community that I spoke of earlier to invest in opportunities of this type. For example, of the 80 investors we surv

Public Safety committee  That really depends on the specific situation. I think a social impact bond pilot project in Canada that would be viable, sustainable, and well-constructed would have a reasonable rate of return that would reflect the underlying risk of the investment—or the loan, in fact. I be

Public Safety committee  For me there's no connection between a social impact bond and privatization of public services. That's not the intent of the vehicle.

Public Safety committee  Prisons in the United States were privatized, I would say and submit, long before social impact bonds were on the horizon. I don't associate the two. You can make potential linkages in a variety of ways, but I see them somewhat independently. I do see your point of view, but I

Public Safety committee  I do think that would be a fair characterization. In working with public sector clients, I try hard to define value in several ways: value in terms of dollars and cents, value in terms of risk mitigation, value in terms of economic impact, and value in terms of social benefit. Wh