Finance Committee on Oct. 17th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

We must continue now with Madam Ablonczy, six minutes.

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

Thank you.

We do very much appreciate you coming and sharing your thoughts, advice, and concerns with us. We can see there's a wide range of issues to balance and deal with and you've done a very good job of helping us.

I'm going to start with literacy, because as a former teacher that's something I care about very much. I was surprised too at the numbers, with nearly half of Canadians being able to read only simple material. And as a former teacher I'm embarrassed by that. How can it be that children get out of 12 years of compulsory education, or at least until the age of 16, 10 years, without either being able to read or write or doing so in only a minimal way? Have your studies or your discussions disclosed what can be done at that end? Because that's really where it all begins; it's much harder to learn later than earlier.

[Margaret Eaton]

The provinces have done a fantastic job of actually improving test scores in literacy and numeracy across the board, and we are seeing increases in those students who are graduating from high school in terms of their literacy and numeracy.

In a lot of cases, people actually end up having to leave school sooner than they would have liked because of economic reasons, family reasons, health reasons. There was a person whose story was told on the cover of the Globe and Mail two weeks ago, who at the age of seven had to work on the family farm and couldn't actually finish his education. That's more common than you would think.

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

That's illegal in this country.

[Margaret Eaton]

Yes, now it is.

We are encouraged by the fact that the education system is actually improving across the country, but the bigger block of Canadians, demographically, are the adult group. And if we are really going to see encouragement in literacy levels we have to address the issue with adults who unfortunately did not get those skills through the system or had to leave early.

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

That's not really an answer--because things are improving; 42% is hardly an improvement, one would think, so it's really an appalling figure.

How do you actually interface with adults who may need assistance with literacy? Do they come forward and say please send me back to school, or do you seek them out? What happens there?

[Margaret Eaton]

We have a wonderful program called Look Under LEARN, where ABC actually holds the rights to the word “learn” in the yellow pages. Adults who are interested in upgrading their skills can look in the yellow pages under “learn” and access a provincial or territorial coalition, which will then direct them to a literacy organization. One of the reasons we're concerned about these cuts is that there may not be someone at the other end of the phone to direct them to a literacy organization.

The second and very important area where people get training is in the workplace. There are some outstanding workplace literacy programs across the country, but they are few and far between. One of our rules at ABC is to try to encourage the development of workplace programs.

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

I would point out that this government will continue to spend over $80 million a year on literacy. Any reductions were not to direct literacy programs or services to people, they were for things like round tables and other activities that weren't delivering services directly to Canadians. We want to make sure Canadians find out about these programs and can access them. I'm not sure the yellow pages is a very good way, but maybe you and I can discuss that later.

I wanted to move on to Mr. Golombek, because I think you've hit on a key point. Not too many have raised this. That is, the incredible importance of helping people save for their retirement and for other things, because when you have savings, you have so much more freedom and so much more ability to make your own choices and not depend on the generosity of future taxpayers, which may or may not be there. I wonder if you could recommend just one measure for the government to take in the next budget that you would think would be the most important. Could you tell the committee what that would be?

[Jamie Golombek]

Yes, of the five recommendations, I would say our first one, which was to further explore or perhaps introduce some kind of tax-prepaid savings program, with modest amounts that would allow all Canadians to be able to save on a tax-deferred basis.

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

You mentioned that. Have other jurisdictions done this, and can you tell me how this has worked elsewhere?

[Jamie Golombek]

An ample amount of research has been done in the United States; they have a program called the IRA, individual retirement account. It's been well studied and statistics are available in terms of take-up rights and stuff like that. It's certainly a program that's been well tested in the United States.

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

I think that is something the committee would want to look at. I'm very interested in it.

On co-op housing, because housing is a real concern--it keeps coming up over and over again--co-op housing, as I understand, is like joint ownership of a particular building or complex. Am I correct in that?

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Mr. Elliott, about 20 seconds.

[Ken Elliott]

Yes and no. It's jointly administered. We all have purchased a share in the co-op while we're a member there and we jointly administer the activities of the co-op.

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

But you don't own it?

[Ken Elliott]

No. Each co-op is a corporation in its own right, and the units are owned by the corporation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

We'll continue with Ms. Wasylycia-Leis, for six minutes.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairperson.

I'd like to come back to literacy. I wouldn't want the impression left on the record that the $17 million the government is cutting out of literacy is simply administrative or there to create round tables. Just for you to clarify, Margaret, you indicated that a number of important groups lost all their funding, making it impossible to provide the direct service that helps people get the skills they need. Just as one example, I will put on the record the following:

As Learner Outreach Coordinator for Literacy Partners of Manitoba (one of the coalitions that recently lost all of their federal funding), I answer all incoming calls on the LEARN line from adult learners seeking help with reading and writing. My job is to assess their needs and refer them to a literacy program or adult learning centre that best suit their needs. I am often the first person that they reach out to for help. Here is a sampling of a few of the calls I received....

A 40 year old male who needs to upgrade his math skills in order to pass a test for a new job.

A 45 year old male who wants to improve his reading and writing skills because he is embarrassed by his inability to read....

I could go on and on. I think you need to put on the record, Margaret, what is being lost by these cuts and say that it is not simply extra administrative, round tables, loosey-goosey stuff. This is real, hard programming that helps people better themselves.

[Margaret Eaton]

Thank you so much.

You're absolutely right, and it would be remiss of me not to explain that these coalitions really are the backbone of literacy programs in the country. As you mentioned, they are generally the first point of referral for someone seeking help, often through our own LEARN Lines. The coalitions also run their own 1-800 numbers for people seeking help.

In Nunavut, all of the training programs for adult educators are going to be gone, and the training programs are provided by the coalition. Literacy programming in the Nunavut Arctic College is at risk because of this.

These are hard programs, either for literacy instructors or for learners, that are managed, run, and supported by these coalitions across the country.

Thank you.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

One other thing, and maybe this is for everybody on the panel. Ken Georgetti, the head of the Canadian Labour Congress, has said the following: “Raising the basic numeracy and literacy of these workers”--who lack basic skills and cannot access training—“which means investing in adult learning and literacy programs, would do more to raise overall productivity and address the shortage of skilled workers than any tax cut in the next budget.”

Would anyone disagree with that?

I think it's important, because we are told that there's this high illiteracy rate, that the education system must have done something wrong. Therefore we're going to cut our investment in adult learning and basically at the same time not increase transfers to the provinces for education, creating an enormous problem.

I represent a constituency that is one of the most hard-pressed in this country, where people are working hard to help themselves by accessing literacy programs, or groups using the volunteer support program, or the social economy initiative, or they're developing co-op housing. They're finding their lifeblood cut out from under them. I look to all of you to help us reverse this agenda.

To Mr. Elliott, on social housing, you know that we've had this problem for a long time. I found it interesting that John McCallum raised the issue of social housing, when in fact we lost all social housing and any kind of a national housing program with the cuts back in the 1995 Liberal budget. I think it's important for us to get back on track with some new social housing program and cooperative housing program. How do we do that now, after ten years of inaction and a Conservative government that might be reluctant to invest in the public sector or in the cooperative sector?

[Ken Elliott]

Housing is going to be delivered through the provinces. We know that. I think the federal government has an obligation to ensure that money is available for building the infrastructure that housing is part of. We all know that housing plays a very large part in the health and education of Canadians. Without a safe and affordable place to live, it affects their whole lives. We need to invest in housing, so that we have the infrastructure there to help all of us.

As to how the federal government can participate, again there are two major issues sitting on the table right now. There are 60 co-ops in British Columbia experiencing envelope failure, and this affects 4,000 people. It's probably going to cost about $50 million to resolve. That's $50 million now, and in a month's time it will be $51 million, because the cost of construction in B.C. goes up about 2% a month.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

We have to continue now with Mr. McKay. I shouldn't say we have to; we have the honour of continuing now with Mr. McKay, and that will be for four minutes.

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

Thank you.

We're not going to continue with Mr. McKay for very long then.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

It's a matter of perspective, I suppose.

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

Yes, but longer is better than shorter.

Your tax prepaid savings plan is an interesting idea that we've been kicking around here for a while. I understand the basic concepts. Would something such as a mutual fund qualify as a tax prepaid savings plan?