Finance Committee on Sept. 25th, 2006

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you, Mr. Gordon. I think my time is up.

Mr. Dykstra, are you ready? Thank you.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thanks.

My first question is actually for the CPJ, and that just relates to the comment Mr. Gordon made, in response to Mr. Turner's question, about the $2 billion investment in affordable housing. I wonder how the $800 million investment that we made in this budget will have an impact, obviously in the short term, but on the longer-term solutions as well. I would think that based on the fact that it almost gets to half of what you're suggesting, we've done a reasonably good job of committing ourselves in this budget to affordable housing in our country.

[Greg deGroot-Maggetti]

I would agree that for the year that the money was allocated for it, that's a helpful sum of money. The need, then, on an ongoing basis is to build the stock of affordable housing. So it would be really welcome if that kind of funding were continued on in the next budget. It would get us part of the way.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I'd love to get into the discussions around the minimum wage, but I think we're going to have to take a whole day to do that.

One of the comments I have is for Mr. Gordon, which would obviously lead into a question. First, I was interested in the Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness quote you used from the former president. It certainly makes me think about what we're doing in Afghanistan right now. I know we're not here to talk about that, but I certainly will keep that in mind in terms of the debate around emergency preparedness and what we need to do to prevent things like that from happening in our country.

One of the earliest pieces of legislation this government moved was Bill C-5, which actually implemented, under the direction of Dr. David Butler-Jones, the Canadian Public Health Association. A big part of their responsibilities--and he reports directly to the Minister of Health--is emergency preparedness, prevention, and being proactive with respective to any type of pandemic that might hit the country, as it did somewhat with the SARS outbreak.

I wonder what your relationship is with the CPHO and if that relationship actually has a strength that can be bonded.

[Adrian Gordon]

We are a pretty small non-profit organization, and our relationships with the federal government are primarily through the offices of PSEPC. We do have contacts with Public Health Agency of Canada, and the committee may be aware that we run an annual conference, the World Conference on Disaster Management. The Minister of Health actually opened the conference this year, and Dr. Butler-Jones was a speaker.

So through the conference we have connections with other government departments, but primarily we deal with PSEPC.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you. I did have a couple of questions. I am going to be quick here for Ms. Russell. They deal with a couple of portions of the report. I'm not here to get into the discussion. I certainly listen and appreciate that we may have a disagreement in terms of opinion, but I respect the fact that you have an opinion and a position that you'd like to hold.

One thing that concerns me is when I see part of your report talking about how government spending can be a powerful source to enhance Canada's competitiveness and that the slashing of transfer payments has led to the undermining of post-secondary education.

Could you comment on the fact that according to Stats Canada—which you use later in your report—from 1991 to 2000, the proportion of adult Canadians with university credentials actually grew from 15% to 20%, and basically 49% of the folks who did the census in 1991 were between 25 and 34 years of age and now have advanced post-secondary credentials?

So I'm finding an inconsistency in terms of what you state is happening, versus what Stats Canada has actually stated.

[Ellen Russell]

Sorry, I'm struggling with the question.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

You're actually educating more people in post-secondary education than you claim to do in your report. You're suggesting it has had a negative impact, when we've educated more people in the last 10 years at the post-secondary level than we did in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

[Ellen Russell]

So are you having a cause and effect relationship there, that you cut the transfer and therefore more people get educated?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

No, I'm just trying to clarify that you suggest we're going to be worse off, when we actually improved the number of people getting post-secondary education in the last ten years.

[Ellen Russell]

I think we need—

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

I'm sorry to cut you off, Madam Russell, but the time has elapsed, and the time for this round has elapsed as well.

I want to thank all of you very much for participating in our pre-budget consultative process. We appreciate the time you put into preparing your reports and your briefs, and in participating today. Thank you again on behalf of the committee.

Committee members, we just had a notice of a point of order from Madam Ablonczy.

Feel free, panel, to be comfortable in your departure, and we'll continue with some internal committee business at this point. Thank you again.

Madam Ablonczy, did you have a point of order?

[Diane Ablonczy, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is just a scheduling item. I notice that the National Arts Centre has a function tomorrow night that will conflict somewhat with our committee meeting. I wonder how many members this might affect and whether we need to make a scheduling change because of it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

I believe it's Wednesday evening.

[Diane Ablonczy, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Sorry, it's not tomorrow night; it's Wednesday night.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Of course, this will be relevant to our sitting times, because as you know, we're scheduled to sit from 3:30 to 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday and apparently this has a starting time of 6:30 p.m.

How many members are affected by the National Arts Centre gala event on Wednesday evening? Raise your hand if you are. There are two. So getting a substitute or leaving early without one is the alternative.

Yes, Mr. Turner.

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

I'd like clarification from the clerk on a point that we've been trying to figure out about scheduling. We've run into some problems because my office was unaware of the meeting this afternoon until 12:18 or 12:20 p.m. today—Mr. Del Mastro also and, Diane, you had the same problem.

I checked with the clerk who informed us that a notice of meetings for today went out at 4:47 p.m. on Friday.

None of us can find that notice; it doesn't seem to have existed. I have a number of commitments this afternoon. I'll try to break them, but it's very difficult for us to schedule meetings on the day of. I'm wondering if we can get some clarification as to whether we had a communications problem, or exactly what was the genesis of this. What did go wrong?

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

First of all, the notice that went out at 4:47 Friday was to say they can't technically tell you about the meeting this afternoon because there has to be a chair elected before they can technically tell you.

But I did address the committee at our first meeting, last Monday, and said this is the schedule that we'll be following for meetings. So no one should be confused by that. You were all notified and your offices were all notified that we were going to be meeting today at 3:30.

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

My office was not notified of that. I know the clerk showed me the e-mail, but we did not receive it. We've done an audit of our computer; it's not there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Okay. We'll have to--

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

And I'm not the only member of the committee for whom it's not there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Okay. The clerk informs me that she'll be addressing the technical issue before the next meeting begins at 3:30 so that it doesn't recur. We do want to make sure as much as possible, given the unpredictability around here, that you all know of meetings well in advance, as much as is possible.

So we'll adjourn unless--

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

I know some of us have some pretty substantial conflicts this afternoon.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Well, we need one member from each side for a quorum this afternoon. Short of proceeding to notify everybody not to show up in an hour and a half or two, I think we'd best proceed this way today.

How we'll get this answer back to you I'll leave with the clerk, Garth. If you're not going to be here this afternoon, we want to get the answer.

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

I'll try.