Finance Committee on Oct. 16th, 2006

[Barry Blake]

No, we're not recommending that. We're talking about a $25,000-a-year floor.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

So you have a cap?

[Barry Blake]

Yes, but my personal preference would be for a higher level.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Yes, I see.

Recommendation number 7 is a system of income averaging over five years for self-employed artists.

What's the argument to say that a self-employed farmer, fisherman, or a self-employed whatever should receive inferior tax treatment to a self-employed artist?

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

We'll assume that Mr. McKay has made his point and move to Mr. Crête.

You have five minutes.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My question is to Mr. Fisher of the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Last week, during the parliamentary recess, I met a number of groups working in literacy. These people work with those who have problems reading and writing. Their budgets were recently cut by the federal government.

In your brief, you quoted an excerpt from a report of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada:

...even a one per cent improvement in literacy levels could increase Canada's GDP by more than $19 billion a year.

Given the current labour shortage, is there not in fact a pool of workers there who could meet our needs if we trained them properly? I see a clear connection there. You talk about university research, but this goes all the way to the people on the ground.

Your recommendation 2 states:

That the government of Canada provide an additional, asymmetrical funding increase for the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

What are your needs to improve literacy and also to improve the effectiveness of your research? We know there is a very clear impact on society. In fact, it might even be the science sector which is the poor cousin when it comes to federal government activity.

[Dr. Donald Fisher]

Thank you for both questions.

On the literacy side, it's absolutely clear that if we look at the international surveys of adult literacy, Canada lags far behind. I would say that investments in basic adult literacy are foundational to the public interest and also to the economic development of Canada. There's no doubt about it.

The leading OECD nations are the Scandinavian nations that score the highest on those international surveys. Again I would hope that we would want to be number one alongside those nations with respect to adult literacy, but that clearly means investment.

On the second point, when Marc Renaud was president of SSHRC, we estimated what the increase should be. Now we have a new president, Dr. Chad Gaffield, who I believe will be presenting to you on Wednesday. As he takes on this new task, he's trying to come up with a new estimate, and I think we want to wait for his assessment before putting a figure on it.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Have you had an opportunity to meet with the Industry Minister, since the department of industry is responsible for funding research groups in the humanities as well as in other fields. Have you had an opportunity to form an opinion on how he sees your growing needs?

[Dr. Donald Fisher]

We have not as yet. We've certainly been in contact with the civil servants, and we have a request in for just such a meeting. We hope to have that soon.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Did you request the meeting long time ago?

[Dr. Donald Fisher]

Actually, no.

In a sense, the SSHRC research community is in transition, and we were waiting until the announcement came before we began our own lobbying campaign. But the request went in recently, and we hope things will be favourable in terms of seeing the minister.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you.

I have a question for Mr. Van Iterson.

In your brief, you recommend that:

the government restore and enhance the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence's region.

I agree that there are indeed significant needs there. The ZIP committees — the committees dealing with Areas of Prime Concern in terms of local environment— have shown it very clearly. However, you do not have cost estimates of the investments required. I do not know whether you have this information. I know that in one of your recommendations, you gave figures for the Mackenzie valley. Have you assessed the amount of investment that would be needed for the St. Lawrence and Great Lakes region?

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

You have approximately three seconds remaining to give your answer, Mr. Iterson.

[Andrew Van Iterson]

No, I do not have a specific amount for the Great Lakes.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Is that still a priority for you?

[Andrew Van Iterson]

It does remain a priority, yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Thank you.

To continue, we go to Mr. Del Mastro for five minutes.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to start by asking a question of Mr. Brant.

Mr. Brant, obviously a key goal for me is to have an economy that is more inclusive of a major workforce that I don't believe we've utilized very well, and that's our aboriginal workforce. You mentioned a specific program I've never heard of, actually. You mentioned that there are about 55 or so branches operating. Is this something we need to market a little bit more, as well as invest in? I've just never been made aware of it.

[Chief Daniel Brant]

Let me clarify. It's not a department. These are aboriginal institutions that, for all intents and purposes, act as cooperatives. They are generally established and owned by local communities, and a group of communities in a geographic area has development corporations and is on the boards of those development corporations. Each one of them received initial allocation capitalization from the federal government through Industry Canada ten years ago, and that initial capitalization served as a startup. They were then expected to survive on their own and just turn the money around. They have in fact turned the money over about six times and have been very successful. As I said, the loan loss rate in this high-risk area has been around 5%.

It's that kind of thing. The success that I see comes because of the local control. They have been able to work in an area and be successful in it when numerous government programs that have tried to do that over the years have not been successful. So the local control is the absolute key.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I appreciate that. Thank you.

Mr. Blake, I want to go back to point number 8 of your submission, which Mr. McKay mentioned as well.

There are various types of creation in our society. There are those who create artistic pieces and there are those who create jobs. I would argue that one is not more significant than the other. I think a well-rounded society needs both. Can you make any kind of compelling case for why one should have a tax advantage over the other?

[Barry Blake]

When you talk about the creation of jobs, you're talking about industrial models, you're talking about the larger society, correct? I think the mechanisms are in place to support that kind of creation. I'm not an expert in that area; I'm a working actor, and I'm not even an expert in the area I'm presenting.

What we're talking about here is dealing with, in the case of income averaging, lumpy income that comes in at, we hope, a higher level in one year and drops down over time.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

It sounds like small business.

[Barry Blake]

It is. All actors in this country are small-business persons. We're entrepreneurs.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

I just wanted to make the point that selling that to small-business people, for example, would be a real tough sell because their income tends to be cyclical as well, and they're in the business of creating a lion's share of the jobs in Canada.

Mr. Van Iterson, yesterday there was a lot made about the new sulphur content in diesel fuel, the reduced-sulphur or low-sulphur diesel; the fact that one-third of our fuel burnt is diesel fuel; and that these new diesel requirements are going to significantly improve the air we breathe and, over time, significantly reduce smog. I just thought you might like to make a comment on that and what we might do to further enhance that.

[Andrew Van Iterson]

We were very happy to see that. We also wanted to commend the Minister of the Environment last week for the progress in developing a plan for reducing mercury emissions across Canada. We'd like to see adoption of the California vehicle standards for automobile production, with lower emissions from vehicle production and vehicle use across Canada.