Evidence of meeting #16 for Canadian Heritage in the 39th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was museums.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
I was not part of that study which compared figures for all needs—
Liberal
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
Yes, but I cannot begin to describe to you what these $75 million would translate into.
Liberal
Mauril Bélanger Liberal Ottawa—Vanier, ON
Nor can I, but if someone who did the math and tell us that the museum community—
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
The amount is representative of the needs.
Liberal
Mauril Bélanger Liberal Ottawa—Vanier, ON
Representatives from the country's museum community told us that they would be happy with a given amount of money, which is just much higher than it has currently been. I acknowledge this, but I am not telling you that I am opposed to it. However, if you think that this amount is acceptable, that it would allow things to move forward, well, in speaking with individual museums, the same alarm it is not being sounded; therefore, I am a bit confused.
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
We are not sounding a different alarm; we are simply saying that the needs of railroad museums must be known for their particularities, and if the total amount of $75 million is sufficient, that is perfect.
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
If not, we are going to find ourselves with the same problem we currently have. The problem will not go away, we are responsible for preserving our national collection. It is very specific to our institution.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Schellenberger
There was a question put to the chair. Number one, let's get to a couple of inaccuracies that have been floated around here today. It was just mentioned that if you take $11 million, you take off $4.6 million. Again, I have to go back to the fact that everyone received this today, and this has been on the website of the small museums of Canada. This is our parliamentary thing, and it says:
According to the Estimates, MAP spending is forecast to be $9.4 million in 2005-2006. However, in September 2006 the government announced that $4.6 million would be cut from the program over the next two years.
That's over the next two years. It is $2.3 million, and it's forecasted to be $9.4 million. It's my understanding, it's my belief, that there will be $9.5 million in the MAP program in the upcoming year.
It was mentioned that there was $11.8 million in the fund per year, and there will be $2.3 million less next time. So there will be, in the coming year, $9.5 million. That is my understanding. To be clear on this, there will be no cut to the program as it was proposed in 2005-06. As far as actual spending is concerned, it will be the same.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Schellenberger
Just a minute. I am the chair, sitting here, and I will take the responsibility.
We are interested in a new museum policy, a policy that works for all museums, big and small. I know I have gone over some of the MAP programs over the last while, and I see nothing small in those particular estimates.
I do have a rail museum in my riding. It's a very small museum and it has gotten no government funding over the years. It does have a caboose and it does have a station. They work very hard, as you do, and I give you those accolades.
I come from a little place called Sebringville, just outside of Stratford, Ontario, and one of our biggest nemeses is the old CN shops that are still there. They are in the downtown heart of the city and they've been just a pain in the rear for everybody. A person bought them and they're still there, half torn down and half not torn down. I think your rail museum is super. It's special, because these things do have to be preserved.
We are looking forward to a museum policy that will be good for all museums, big or small. But again, we have some questions, and some of those questions have been asked here today in regard to where the government should go. I must say that I have sat on this committee for the last two years, and I was one of the first people who brought up small museums three years ago. I was told by the president at that time when he was here that it was the first time he had heard small museums mentioned in a heritage committee meeting in the last ten years.
So yes, we as a government are very interested in small museums and in a small museum policy, but policy that is not only talking in dollars that can't be accessed. We want to have good policy that can be accessed somewhere down the road.
We're going to finish with someone over on this side, because we have to complete here quickly.
Mr. Angus has a point of order.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
I appreciate you giving us the government perspective on this, but we don't have a lot of time. If we're going to be talking about museums, we have other dates set up. We asked to hear from the railway museums. I have a motion on the table. I want to have that discussed. If there's time after that, I'm more than willing to sit until 5:30 and talk about people's political viewpoints on the spending cuts. But we have a motion on the table and I would like that addressed.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Schellenberger
Okay, we'll take five minutes for questions and answers, and then we'll go to your motion, Mr. Angus.
Mr. Warkentin.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
Thank you very much for coming. I certainly appreciate not only your presentation today, but also the work you have been doing, and I look forward to actually visiting your museum. Mr. Scarpaleggia talked to me about the museum about a month ago, and he just inspired me to take a real interest in this particular field. I am very interested in old trains. I've had the opportunity to ride on some, and I do look forward to visiting at your place.
You talked about your 125,000 square feet. In practical terms, that's just a huge undertaking in terms of trying to keep up and maintain into the long term. Of course, there are a lot of practical challenges that come along with that.
When the project was first conceptualized, of course there was obviously a need to house these things. Certainly there would have been a plan at that time as to how big the museum would get and what types of different artifacts you'd collect and that type of thing. I'm just curious. As you've had the evolution of your particular museum, how have you seen your original plans unfold? What can we take away from that when we're looking at a new museum policy, specifically about how you would address differently, possibly, things like expansion of your museum? How would you limit it from getting too big, where it was completely unmanageable? I don't think you've reached that point, but there's always the concern for any museum that, as artifacts are collected, eventually the collection gets to the point where it's unmanageable.
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
A collection has to reflect a society's evolution. We believe it is important for the collection to continue to be developed. However, that does not mean it must develop exponentially, quite the contrary. Because the collection is made up of large and very expensive objects, the collection committee has always ensured that the development of the collection was strictly monitored. But if a collection is to represent the evolution of society, it is important to develop it and to do it right, which is what we have always done.
A collection of historic objects requires smaller warehouses than a collection of a railway cars, but it just happens that railway cars make up our collection. We have chosen to build a wing which can hold 12 tracks, which will allow us to add more tracks. We had always planned on having additional space in order to expand our collection. Of course, our collection is much more expensive than many others.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
Have you ever considered an endowment fund or some type of partnership with a foundation that would address some of the issues as you grow, so that some of those issues would be dealt with in the financial respect?
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
We had already thought about creating a foundation, but we just never had enough resources. Aside from funding campaigns which have enable us to maintain our capitalization and our regular activities, the organization, even though it generates a lot of money each year, could not generate the five or six million dollars needed to create a foundation, nor as it received generous donations of $20 or $25 million.
Donors have given amounts of $50,000, $100,000, $150,000 and $200,000, which have helped us maintained the museum activities repair or add new buildings. But up until now, we have not been able to create a foundation which would generate enough money. We issue receipts for income tax purposes and have to spend the money we raise in the course of a year.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
Do you believe an endowment-type situation would be good as you move forward? Would that be part of a policy that you would adopt?
Director General, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
Yes, that is what the association would like.
President, Exporail, Canadian Railway Museum, Canadian Railroad Historical Association
If I may add, Mr. Chairman, because it's an interesting question--you talked about the collection growing and so on--one of the things we have been able to do over the past few years is distribute our collection to other places, such as Revelstoke, and we have equipment in New Brunswick, Smiths Falls, Edmonton, British Columbia--right across the country. That's part of it. You don't have to have all of your collection in one place. Art galleries have their things out around all the time--except these are big. But they do have the advantage of being able to be moved on their own wheels, so that's one thing we have going for us.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Schellenberger
I must thank you very much for your insight and your revelations to let us know of your great museum and your hard work to make things work. I know museums across the country, the small museums, have their noses to the grindstone every day. They're out selling potato chips and calendars. In our local museum, a lot of the elderly ladies in the museum got together and did a calendar like they did in England. They've gone to great expense and through trials and tribulations to make sure that the museums do carry on. So thank you again for your answers. We appreciate your coming today.
We'll just take about a two-minute recess, and then we'll come back quickly for Mr. Angus's motion.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Schellenberger
Let's get this meeting back to order, because we have only about 13 minutes.
Conservative
Jim Abbott Conservative Kootenay—Columbia, BC
Mr. Chair, if you would recognize me, I have just a small correction to the minutes of the proceedings, and it's an important correction.
At the bottom of page 1, the third paragraph above the bottom says: “After debate the question was put on the motion and it was agreed to”. I think my colleagues on the other side will agree that in fact the vote was the same on Mr. Bélanger's motion as it was on Mr. Kotto's and Mr. Angus's motions, which was yeas 7, nays 3. On both of those, I think you'll find that Mr. Bélanger's motion did pass. That isn't the question. I would just like it noted in the minutes that in fact the vote was the same--yeas 7, nays 3--on Mr. Bélanger's motion, as well. It's important from the point of view that “was agreed to” would make it appear as though the government side agreed to Mr. Bélanger's motion, which we did not. So I would just like that corrected.