Finance Committee on Sept. 28th, 2006

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Good morning. I would like to get started so that we can stick to the schedule.

The House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance has received from the House the mandate to review on an annual basis proposals concerning the government's budget policy and to report on the issue.

This year, the pre-budget consultations revolve around the following theme: "Canada's place in a competitive world". Since the economic future of our country is partly related to rapid technological change and new trading partners, the committee would like to hear the point of view of Canadians on how to foster economic prosperity, be it by acquiring state of the art technology, by having a well-trained workforce, by taking advantage of business opportunities or by making the tax system more attractive in order to attract workers and foreign capital so that Canada may reach its full potential. Our long-term productivity depends on short-term decisions.

We're going to allow the witnesses five minutes.

We're going to go in the order I have here, and the first group I have is the Canadian Conference of the Arts, Mr. Alain Pineau.

[Robert Spickler, President, Canadian Conference of the Arts]

Mr. Chairman, I am Robert Spickler, the President of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Conference of the Arts. I will be testifying this morning. It seems that there was a misunderstanding: two names were mentioned. Mr. Pineau is the Director General, and he is with me.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

You have the floor; you have five minutes.

[Robert Spickler]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning to committee members. I would like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to appear today.

The Canadian Conference of the Arts, or CCA, is the oldest and biggest forum of reflection, analysis and intervention on federal policies that affect Canadian culture. The CCA has contributed greatly to the public debate among artists, creators, cultural institutions and industries, public servants and parliamentarians, concerning policies to promote the development and diffusion of culture to the benefit of all Canadians.

For over 20 years now, the CCA has participated in pre-budget consultations, and gives priority to ideas and recommendations which aim to promote effective cooperation between the government and the arts and culture sector.

Despite stereotypes Canada's arts and culture sector is not a rarefied or disconnected element of society. In 2001 the cultural industries were responsible for directly employing 611,000 Canadians, as much as agriculture, forestry, mining, and oil and gas combined.

In 2002 the cultural industries contributed $40 billion to Canada's GDP, more than mining and oil and gas extraction and twice as much as agriculture and forestry.

Artists, creators, and arts professionals are regarded as living indicators of the quality of life within cities, towns, and villages. The arts play a critical role in economic renewal in communities, particularly in the urban centres, but this phenomenon can also be seen in smaller communities. This is clearly demonstrated by places like Stratford, Ontario; Chemainus, British Columbia; Caraquet, New Brunswick; and Banff, Alberta--just to name a few.

The recommendations which the CCA is making this year reflect the fundamental changes that are currently taking place in Canada's labour market. It is time to review many labour policies and regulations. The current reality is that there are more and more self-employed workers in every sector of the Canadian economy, including in the cultural sector.

The federal government must treat self-employed workers fairly. These people are entrepreneurs and creators. In its brief, the CCA describes economic and social changes which characterize every sector of activity in the country at the start of the 20^th century.

However, the CCA is encouraged by certain measures announced in the last budget. Based on these commitments, the CCA is asking the federal government to maintain and increase its support for arts and culture, and it is asking the government to show leadership and responsibility to promote the vitality of our national culture.

It is for this reason that the CCA must voice its disappointment with the September 25 announcement of the results of the government's expenditure reallocation exercise. We are dismayed, because the specifics in this decision run counter to the nine recommendations that we are presenting to you today, particularly with respect to the need for increased fiscal and policy support for Canada's museums and civil non-profit society as a whole.

The CCA is also disappointed by the government's cancellation of the federal Commercial Heritage Properties Incentive Fund as a wasteful program. CCA considers that the early end of this program is only acceptable if it is replaced immediately with a tax incentive that encourages preservation of heritage buildings, an approach that has proved extremely successful in the U.S.

Finally, we think the way the budget cuts are planned and executed runs counter to the government's own priority, a commitment to an accountability and transparency it demands of organizations like ours. We also strongly encourage the Government of Canada to not use the full revenue surplus to pay down the national debt, but instead to apply some of its money to a substantial balanced investment in key aspects of our economy and society, including, of course, the arts and the cultural sector.

To conclude, I would like to quickly list nine recommendations which are included in our brief. First, we recommend that the $500 tax credit for children's sports activities also apply to children involved in artistic activities. The CCA believes this is a logical extension of the policy supporting families espoused by the government.

Second, the CCA recommends that the Standing Committee on Finance support measures—

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Sorry. I thought you were going to wind up. You're not going to have time to go through the nine, so could you just make a concluding statement? It's only five minutes.

[Robert Spickler]

How much have I done?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

You're over five minutes.

[Robert Spickler]

I'm already over five minutes.

You have my brief and you have nine recommendations. They all pertain to a government needing to be extremely aware of new working conditions for the labour force in Canada in the 21st century.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you.

From Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, Mr. Joanasie Akumalik, go ahead for five minutes, please.

[Joanasie Akumalik, Director, Government and Public Relations, Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Our president, Paul Kaludjak, could not be here because his plane went mechanical up in the north. It's a three-hour flight, so he could not be here, but I'm here on his behalf.

I am pleased to appear before you today. My name is Joanasie Akumalik. I am here on behalf of Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated. NTI represents the Inuit of Nunavut. We have three regional Inuit organizations. Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, or ITK, is our national Inuit organization. Our president is a board member of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, and ICC represents Inuit from Greenland, Canada, Alaska, and Chukotka.

In Nunavut, we number more than 25,000 Inuit. The total Nunavut population is about 29,000 people. This may seem few compared to Canada's 33 million, but all the provinces have small beginnings.

NTI was established in 1993 when the Nunavut land claims agreement was signed. Our mission is Inuit economic, social, and cultural well-being through the implementation of the Nunavut land claims agreement. We first filed our claim in 1976. It took 17 years to negotiate our agreement. It was signed by then-Prime Minister Mulroney. All the political parties in Parliament supported it. It is the biggest land claims agreement in Canadian history or in the world. It attracted international attention. It was seen as a benchmark, as a standard against which to measure other agreements.

Nunavut was created in 1999 through article 4 of that agreement, but the land claims agreement was not simply a legal transaction. It was not just a transfer of cash for aboriginal title. The job was not done when the agreement was signed, sealed, and delivered. This was a living agreement. It set out the terms for a future relationship between the Inuit and the government. That relationship has constitutional status. It includes legal obligations, but these obligations are not an end in themselves. They are the means to accomplish the broader objectives of the agreement.

This is not simply the way I put it. In 2003 the Auditor General said that achieving the objectives of the agreement is more important than just carrying out the legal obligation in a narrow sense. In 2006 Justice Thomas Berger referred to the “Nunavut project”; “project” means something that is not yet complete.

Our brief summarizes some of the challenges that Nunavut faces. Some of these are directly related to the objectives of our agreement. Others are of a broader socio-economic nature. They still affect the well-being of the Inuit in Nunavut.

To summarize some of the challenges we face, Nunavut's real economic growth has stagnated since 2003. Forty per cent of our population is under age fifteen, and there is an official unemployment rate of 17%, compared to 7% for Canada. Our violent crime rate is seven times higher than the Canadian average, and the suicide rate is almost eight times the Canadian average. The infant mortality rate is almost four times the Canadian average. We make up about a third of federal public servants and less than half of those in the Nunavut government.

PricewaterhouseCoopers calculated that we lose about $123 million a year in government salaries because positions are staffed from the outside. A further $65 million a year is paid to hire, train, and relocate non-Inuit public servants.

At the same time, we have strengths and opportunities. Our regional Inuit associations own about 350,000 square kilometres of Nunavut, which is a surface title, and NTI holds the mineral rights to a further 2%. We are entitled to 50% of the first $2 million in crown royalties on minerals. Above $2 million we are entitled to a further 5% on crown royalties. There is a lot of mining potential, and impact benefit agreements can bring benefits to the Inuit from developments.

Nunavut Trust will receive $1.148 billion to invest for the future of all Nunavut Inuit by 2007. From the trust we have capitalized Aturtuavik, a company that has loaned $36 million to Inuit firms since 2000. We have established territorial and regional development corporations, and we have negotiated an agreement with the Department of National Defence for the cleanup of old DEW line sites.

Over 70% Inuit employment and 70% of Inuit contracting content has been achieved to date. The co-op movement, which started in the 1960s, operates stores, hotels, and other businesses in every community in Nunavut.

Our art has become a part of the Canadian identity. Cape Dorset was recently found to have the highest number of artists per capita of any community in Canada. We have produced internationally recognized films, especially Atanarjuat and The Journals of Knud Rasmussen--

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Mr. Akumalik, you're going to have to wrap it up. Could you just go to your conclusion?

[Joanasie Akumalik]

Okay.

I'd like to conclude, Mr. Chairman. We would suggest the following recommendations: that the committee consider hearing witnesses who are informed on the cost to government and to Inuit of failure to implement article 23 of the Nunavut land claim. I would especially recommend hearing from Thomas Berger on the need to address Nunavut's educational requirements. Secondly, the Auditor General should be asked to appear regarding her findings on the shortcomings and recommendations of the Government of Canada on implementing land claims.

We would also recommend, Mr. Chairman, that PricewaterhouseCoopers be heard on the difficulties they have reported on in terms of implementing the Nunavut land claims agreement and the cost to Inuit and government of not implementing article 23.

Lastly, I will conclude that in order to meet the objectives of the land claims agreements and to act on criticism and suggestions, both of the Auditor General and of the Land Claim Agreement Coalition, it is recommended that this committee call on the Government of Canada to initiate and implement a full-scale review and reform of its land claims implementation policies and to carry out this work in partnership with the coalition.

Those are the resolutions that I would suggest.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you.

Mr. Riddell, from the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation, five minutes, please.

[Norman Riddell, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation]

Good morning, and thank you for the opportunity to appear before you this morning.

You've already received a brief from the foundation, so I will attempt briefly to summarize the points in that brief.

The foundation believes that Canada requires a highly educated workforce to be competitive in an increasingly global and knowledge-based economy. It also notes that it will not be easy to do that in the coming years for two principal reasons: first, we will see the retirement of the baby boom generation, and secondly, the number of young people between ages 18 and 25 will decline by roughly 400,000 people in the next decade.

So if we are to keep the same number of educated people as we currently have, we're going to have to maintain the currently very high participation rates of the middle class in higher education, and those are roughly 77% and one of the highest in the OECD. Not only will we have to maintain their participation in higher education, but we're going to have to get people into higher education who traditionally are not there, and these are students from the bottom quartile of income, aboriginal Canadians, and in some cases the children of immigrants--and of course there's an overlap between the groups.

Given the rising cost of obtaining a higher education, middle-class students are going to have to continue to borrow, and they're going to need non-repayable grants to help keep them in school. Research is showing that the presence of grants greatly increases the chances that the student will complete the program for which he borrows.

We will also need new and better forms of student financial assistance that are targeted to low-income Canadians, the Canadians who do not currently participate in higher education.

In its seven years of existence, the Canadian Millenium Scholarship Foundation has disbursed nearly $ 2 billion in the form of non-refundable financial support to about 650,000 needy students from low income families. The Foundation therefore limited the growth of student debt, helped middle class and low-income students continue with their post-secondary studies, and kept its administration costs as low as possible, namely at about 4.5 per cent, and worked in cooperation with its provincial partners to develop grant programs based on local needs and in accordance with provincial government priorities.

The foundation also rigorously evaluated the impact these programs have while striving continuously to improve them. Lastly, the foundation conducted state-of-the-art research on government best practices to increase the participation rate of students in post-secondary education.

Given the approaching end of the foundation's mandate, scheduled for the end of the academic year 2008-09, these achievements are now at risk.

Decisions must be taken in the near future, preferably in the 2007 budget or at the least in the 2008 budget, to ensure that there is uninterrupted delivery of non-repayable grants to needy middle-class and low-income students, and, secondly, that there is continued administration of these programs that respects provincial jurisdiction and priorities and keeps administrative costs to an absolute minimum.

Thank you very much.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you, Mr. Riddell.

Mr. Lewis, from l'Association des distributeurs de REÉÉ du Canada.

[Peter Lewis, Chair, Government Relations, RESP Dealers Association of Canada]

Thank you.

I'm here this morning as the chair of government relations for the Registered Education Savings Plan Dealers Association of Canada. We recognize the important work this committee does, and we're thrilled to be back again this year to present our recommendations to build on the success of previous initiatives.

I'm also here as a Canadian parent. With six children, ages four to fifteen, I'm well aware of the importance of higher education in enabling my children to achieve their full potential. In fact, with the fifteen-year-old, I'm only three years away from my first university tuition bill. The good thing is that for my children I've been planning for that day from the time they were born.

The unfortunate reality is that for far too many Canadians, that's simply not the case. In fact, 67% of Canadians under the age of 18 don't have a registered education savings plan today. Why is it important? Registered education savings plans, we believe, provide two distinctive benefits.

First, they provide a financial benefit. Clearly, any dollar that a family is able to set aside today is a dollar they're not going to have to find from some other place when their child is ready to go to trade school, university, or college.

Second is a less tangible but perhaps an equally important benefit, and that's the motivational benefit. Having a savings plan for a child's education is a powerful communicator to that child of the value the family places on higher education and of the expectation the parents have that the child is going to go. We believe that will translate into the likelihood of that child going on.

From 1961 until 1997, RESPs existed in Canada and grew to the point where 700,000 Canadian children had $2.5 billion saved for them. With a single legislative change in 1998, the introduction of the Canada education savings grant, the landscape changed. Today, eight years later, $20 billion is set aside for roughly 2.2 million Canadian young people. This is clear and compelling evidence that with the right incentives, families will save for the future education of their children. That being said, we all know that savings incentives have the greatest benefit for those who are most able to save.

In 2004 the Canada Education Savings Act, with the support of all parties, with the exception of the New Democratic Party, added a unique twist to the RESP by creating the Canada Learning Bond and changing the grant program to increase the benefit to lower- and moderate-income families. We don't yet have official statistics on the take-up rate of the learning bond. As promoters, we are encouraged to see more families taking advantage of it, but we believe there is more to do.

In fact, the Canada Education Savings Act specifically contemplated that the government would make the necessary investments in promoting awareness of this program. That awareness is a critical component of the program. The families the learning bond and enhanced grant were designed for typically have lower financial capability. The programs need to be promoted to them in a strategic way to not only give them the benefits that I referred to previously but also to contribute to an overall strategy to improve financial capability.

There are five things we want to recommend today.

First, we want to recommend a greater investment in an outreach strategy for the learning bonds and the enhanced grants. Mailing eligible families a letter was a good first step, but we need to do far more than that. We need to invest strategically in outreach programs to ensure that families who will benefit from these programs are aware of the existence of the programs and know what they have to do to take advantage of them.

Second, we believe that RESP contribution limits should be revisited. The current contribution limit is $4,000 per year, unchanged since 1997. Since 1997, tuition fees at Canadian universities have increased by 50%. It would seem logical to us as that the education savings programs for education should keep pace with the cost of that education.

Third, as the government increases its efforts to encourage modest-income families to save for higher education, it seems inconsistent to us that the bankruptcy and insolvency legislation doesn't contemplate some form of protection for those assets.

Fourth, if the learning bond is going to be successful, the government needs to work with the provinces towards a strategy to harmonize the birth registration process with the social insurance registration process, and thus remove a potential barrier to getting the program started.

Finally, we believe that the federal government should actively be encouraging all provinces to join Alberta in the partnership with parents by creating provincial savings incentives.

We're dedicated to improving access for all Canadians by encouraging them to plan for the eventual cost of higher learning, and we look forward to continuing to work with government in expanding the success of these important programs in the future.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you, Mr. Lewis.

From the Canadian Public Health Association, Ms. Wilson.

[Dr. Elinor Wilson, Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Public Health Association]

Thank you very much for the opportunity to appear in front of the committee.

The Canadian Public Health Association is a registered charity, a non-profit association, which is membership-based. We are not a professional association. We were established by an act of Parliament in 1910, so since then have been actively engaged in the public health issues of the day.

Public health is defined as the organized efforts of society to improve health and thus is distinguished from health care by its focus on populations rather than on individuals. There are many functions of public health, such as health protection, health promotion, chronic disease and injury prevention, and now emergency preparedness.

We believe that economic productivity is affected by both the corporate bottom line and by the well-being of individuals and communities. Our view is that a healthy population and resilient communities reinforce the availability of a strong workforce and lower costs for employers and to the health system. So by preventing illness and disease, and by government investment in communities, the economy is more resilient, able to plan for the future, and able respond to unforeseen events.

This breadth and depth of responsibility requires both a whole-of-government approach and an interjurisdictional approach. Canada, as a result of SARS and the recommendations from the report Learning from SARS: Renewal of Public Health in Canada, has started the process of public health renewal at all levels. We commend the government for the legislation creating the Public Health Agency of Canada and for recognizing the interjurisdictional nature of public health. The major investment in pandemic planning is also appreciated. However, more needs to be done to build on this foundation.

Recommendations 1 and 2 in our brief deal with the complicated issue of funding for public health. It's difficult to generate a precise estimate of how much of our total health system funding goes to public health, but in 2003 it was estimated that only 3% of our total health investment is focused on public health. Therefore, we would urge the Government of Canada to continue to enhance funding by focusing on increasing its core funding for public health functions, as advised by the Naylor report, to $1.1 billion per year, including the establishment and ongoing operation of the Public Health Agency of Canada, public health partnerships, and the prevention and control of communicable and non-communicable diseases.

As well, we would encourage dialogue between the federal government and provincial-territorial governments to look at the allocations provided in the ten-year plan and what part of those allocations could be utilized for public health activities. We would also see it necessary for an agency, such as the Canadian Institute for Health Information, to do a comprehensive examination of how the public health system in Canada is funded and how that funding is being allocated.

Ongoing challenges will also need to focus on enhancing public health human resources at all levels. We have recommended that through HRSDC a multidisciplinary sectoral study be done of the public health workforce and its sustainability.

In closing, as the Public Health Agency of Canada completes a pan-Canadian public health strategy, public health remains an interjurisdictional issue requiring close working relationships between all levels of government and the NGO sector to provide the seamlessness that public health emergencies and other public health issues will require. We must link local to regional, to provincial, to federal, to international bodies. That is why our last recommendation deals with overseas development and the need to reach 0.7% of GDP by 2015. We do live in a global village when it comes to public health.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you, Ms. Wilson.

Mr. Moist, from the Canadian Union of Public Employees, for five minutes, please.

[Paul Moist, National President, Canadian Union of Public Employees]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

We're quite privileged to represent just over half a million Canadians who work all across Canada, and we think this opportunity to speak on federal finances and our budget is very, very important.

We note that last year enhancing productivity growth was one of the themes. Along with the theme you have this year, we think these are goals and not ends in themselves, but they are very important in determining whether they improve our overall quality of life.

We were distressed this week that, between budgets, spending cuts were announced in the midst of a $13 billion surplus.

I'm quite privileged to serve on the board of the Canadian Labour and Business Centre. This afternoon our board will meet for the purposes of closing the centre, a centre created by the Mulroney government and funded by government. I can't believe at a time in our history when we talk about productivity that we're closing a centre that is a cooperative venture between labour and management. Mr. Georgetti, from the CLC, and Mr. Perrin Beatty will chair our conference call today. We have obligations to our staff, and the motion before our board is to close the Canadian Labour and Business Centre, which I think is a shame.

According to KPMG, Canada has already the lowest business costs amongst all G-7 countries. We're the fourth easiest place to do business. Last year, KPMG's report, in talking about Nordic countries, said:

...the high levels of government tax revenue have delivered world-class educational establishments, an extensive safety net, and a highly motivated and skilled labour force....

We think there are many determinants of productivity and competitiveness, and we'll just mention three, Mr. Chairman.

With respect to child care, it's well established in the OECD that investments in child care provide economic returns of at least $2 for every $1 invested. Compared to the rest of the developed world, which spends 1% to 2% of their GDP on early childhood learning, Canada is spending about 0.25%.

With increasing international competition, high-quality, affordable, publicly funded post-secondary training is becoming more and more important. The leading countries--Finland, Denmark, Germany, France, Sweden, and Ireland--charge little or no tuition fees. We strongly recommend that the federal government establish a separate post-secondary education transfer with increased funding. Further, and more specifically, we recommend that the federal government continue to play an active role in supporting workplace-based skills through labour market partnership agreements with provinces and by embarking on a pilot project, an EI project for training unemployed workers.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, with respect to health care, some fixing has been done at the federal level, but we absolutely believe that the Canada Health Act provides a framework for the enforcement of a huge economic advantage our country has, a federal universal health care system. The report by the federal advisor on wait times was released the day before Canada Day. He has not been reappointed. We think that's a shame. His report is well worth reading. It talks about pharmacare and other things in addition to wait times.

Finally, 150,000 of our members are municipal employees. We know the state of the infrastructure. We support the big city mayors of the FCM and their calls to government.

We ask for three things: commit to long-term permanent and sustainable funding to eliminate the municipal infrastructure deficit and reduce the growing reliance on property taxes and user fees; create a national public transit strategy and program in collaboration with provinces and municipalities; and continue and enhance support for the FCM green municipal fund.

There is a vertical fiscal imbalance in Canada. The greatest fiscal imbalance is among senior levels of government, including the federal and municipal governments.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Massimo Pacetti]

Thank you.

We're going to go to the members for seven-minute rounds.

If I can remind the witnesses, the members have seven minutes for the questions and the answers. So if you can keep your answers precise, I think some of them would appreciate it.

We are going to start with Mr. Savage.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you, Chair, and I would like to thank all of the people who presented today for their presentations.

I would like to start with my friend, Elinor Wilson. Elinor has been a champion of public health and I guess what's part of public health, population health.

I'd like to talk a little about how we go about having an impact on population health. The Public Health Agency of Canada has done I think a very good job and in some ways came about as a reaction to SARS and those kinds of issues. Part of its mandate is in fact to have an impact on chronic disease, which in the part of the world I come from, Atlantic Canada, is particularly prevalent. Diabetes is out of control. There are high incidences of cardiovascular disease, cancer, and arthritis.

In terms of the social determinants of health, I wonder whether Canada has really addressed the social determinants of health from a population health point of view. Where are we on the scale of actually getting out in front of chronic disease?

[Dr. Elinor Wilson]

That's an excellent question, and I think the answer is that we're lagging behind. This is mainly because our attention is always focused downstream, once people have a disease and how we can cure them. That's the immediate necessity. The investments upstream are very difficult to come by, and you've pointed them out. It's not merely the risk factors of healthy eating and active living, but it's those social determinants of health that many of my colleagues have spoken about: poverty, lack of education, municipal infrastructure, etc.

I think one of the examples we have in Canada that is going to be an interesting experiment is the Government of B.C.'s ActNow program. They have taken out of the premier's office a whole-of-government approach, where every ministry has to account to the premier's office for what they are doing in their ministry, be it agriculture, housing, etc., to help prevent disease in the population. As I mentioned earlier, there's not only that interjurisdictional piece, but this is going to take a whole-of-government approach. And even though public health might have a public health agency, the levers for health are in many other parts of government.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Carolyn Bennett used to speak a lot about that when she set up the Public Health Agency. The Minister of Housing has as much to do with health as the Minister of Health, in many ways. Certainly the Minister of Education.... My own province of Nova Scotia has set up a Department of Health Promotion, and they're doing some very good stuff, in my view. And I do think the future of the health care system is getting out in front of illness and actually focusing on health. I also think it involves keeping people out of hospital once they've had an intervention: home care, palliative care, and things like that. I think that's great.

I want to ask you another question, again on the prevention of illness point of view. We've heard a lot about the national immunization strategy, and I expect the committee will be recommending a continuation and an expansion of this, from the number of people who've mentioned it. Everybody who comes to the committee has a case to make: invest in us and we will save you money. I believe, for example, investment in the arts will pay in huge ways to the community.

You have a number here that indicates that for every dollar spent on vaccines, we save $27 in downstream costs. That's a very stunning number, and I'd be interested in getting that. You mentioned it's the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Somebody else mentioned that recently. That's a stunning number.

Let me ask you, what is the potential? We've heard about the papilloma vaccine for cervical cancer. What is the potential for vaccinations? Is there a lot out there? Could we spend $10 billion in vaccines and reduce our health care costs accordingly?

[Dr. Elinor Wilson]

I think that depends on how our infectious diseases and other diseases emerge. As you've mentioned, we now have an HPV vaccine for cervical cancer. That's only the start of the investigations into vaccines for other types of cancers, and that's being actively pursued. We have a new vaccine that has come on the market for Rotavirus, an infection that really produces severe problems in very young children, and in fact through dehydration can often kill them.

So as we move forward, I think we're going to see more and more vaccines as a prevention measure. Again, one of the issues about the vaccinations is that this is another example of how we can't just have one province spending money on vaccines and vaccinating their population and the province next door not doing it. It's infectious disease, and we have to have a herd immunity in the entire population in Canada.