Thank you very much.
Good afternoon.
I'm very pleased to be here from the Canadian Co-operative Association. We're an umbrella organization representing 31 co-operative members, who in turn represent 3,000 co-operatives and over 7 million individual members.
Co-operatives are present in many sectors of our economy, from agriculture and banking, through to energy, health, and housing. Some 11 million Canadians are co-operative members. In fact, Canada has among the worlds highest proportion of co-operative membership.
You have in front of you our complete brief with our seven recommendations. I am only going to touch on three of our recommendations today. These are the three that are supported by six other national co-operative organizations, and which are found in appendix C of your brief.
The three recommendations I will speak to illustrate how the co-operative sector can partner with government to develop and sustain communities. Co-operatives as a form of collective entrepreneurship stimulate economic growth. They keep businesses in the community, and they allow ordinary Canadians in rural, remote, and urban communities to achieve what they could not achieve alone.
The first recommendation I will speak to is the need to establish a co-operative investment plan, or CIP. Agricultural and employee-owned co-operatives need access to capital that does not cede control to outside investors. Producers need access to capital instruments that benefit them, that allow them to maintain control of their enterprise, and that allow them to move up the value chain.
A co-op investment plan that provides investment tax credits would give producers and employees a chance to be part of growing and sustaining their businesses. Quebec, since 1985, has had a CIP that gives tax credits to those who invest in agricultural employee-owned co-operatives. Over $200 million in new investment has been generated in Quebec through this measure, and we could expect similar results across Canada if the federal measure were to be created.
Our second recommendation is to reinstate the social economy initiative. The SEI continues in Quebec, where some $28.5 million in federal moneys in a patient capital fund has leveraged an additional $30 million from the Quebec government and other sources.
The program would provide technical assistance and repayable seed capital to get community-based enterprises, including new co-operatives, off the ground. It would assist businesses, which create jobs and services where they are most needed.
Our third recommendation is to build a new partnership with the co-operative sector to develop and strengthen co-operative enterprises. The existing co-operative development initiative, a five-year, $15-million program, ends in March 2008.
We are recommending that the advisory services component of CDI be expanded from $1 million per year to $5 million per year for 2007-08 to respond to the ongoing yet unmet needs for technical assistance to help groups start, manage, and govern co-operatives. Beyond 2008, when the CDI ends, the co-operative movement would like to work in partnership with the government for a renewed co-operative development initiative.
In closing, I invite all committee members to help us celebrate national co-op week, which is this week. Our theme this year is “Own Your Future/Ensemble, bâtir l'avenir”. Please join us any time after 5:30 this evening in the Commonwealth Room in the Centre Block for a parliamentary reception hosted by the co-operative movement.
Thank you.