Finance Committee on April 16th, 2008

[Jean-Yves Laforest, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Thank you very much.

I have no more questions, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Merrifield]

Thank you very much.

We will now move to Mr. Menzies.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all of the officials. I don't think we actually realized how many officials are here today. Mr. Dykstra and I were just talking about the amount of effort that has probably gone into preparing for this. So thank you for your efforts.

I have a very quick question, two questions, and then I'll hand it over to Mr. Dykstra.

This is to Finance officials, referring to parts 8 and 9, where we're dealing with payments to provinces and territories, and payments to certain entities. Whoever this question may go to, first of all, where does the funding come from?

Secondly, we're in a minority Parliament. We keep hearing threats of elections. We'd like to get this through as fast as possible. What happens if we don't get Bill C-50 passed before this House rises?

[Yves Giroux, Director, Social Policy, Federal-Provincial Relations and Social Policy Branch, Department of Finance]

The money for the Police Officers' Recruitment Fund comes, among other things, from the 2007-2008 end-of-year funds. The same thing goes for payments in trust to the provinces and territories. If Bill C-50 doesn't pass, the provinces and territories won't have access to those funds.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Merrifield]

Mr. Dykstra.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

One of the things I want to ask a little about was the expansion of the mental health work that the government has done over the last couple of years. In 2007 we announced the creation of the mental health commission. Its responsibility is to lead and develop a national mental health strategy. In this budget, we've certainly extended that in terms of providing funds to establish the commission.

I just want to get the ministry's thoughts--I shouldn't say thoughts, I should say your process--in terms of how this is working and how it's going to work its way through. As many of us know, the study that came from the two senators certainly gave us direction as to what we should do, and in fact we are now, as we can see over the last couple of budgets, working through the implementation.

I wonder if you could comment on that implementation.

[Yves Giroux]

As you probably know, Senator Kirby has been a strong advocate for mental health issues and the importance of allocating more money to mental health research and treatments. That's why $110 million was allocated to the Mental Health Commission of Canada for the completion of five applied research projects on how best to deal with mental health issues, particularly in relation to homelessness on the east coast of Vancouver Island.

Other projects will be conducted in Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal and Moncton. They will all focus on specific client groups. In Montreal, it will be immigrant communities whose mother tongue is not French. In Toronto, it will be immigrant communities whose mother tongue is not English, in order to see how these different client groups are affected, how to do outreach and how best to treat them when they have mental health problems.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Merrifield]

Thank you very much.

Mr. McCallum—and these five minutes will end the session.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you.

I'd like to ask you a question about clause 153, which gives the minister the power to appoint advisory and other committees. Then the cabinet or Governor in Council decides what these people should be paid.

My first question is, why does the minister need this power?

[Jeremy Rudin]

This is a power that a number of ministers have, and one can imagine it being used in the following situation. As you know, a number of expert panels have been appointed. In selecting people for these panels, it's often necessary to look for particular expertise, and there may be a need for various points of view to be represented. This hasn't been a difficult process administratively for expert panels that have recently been appointed, because they were pro bono; so it was not a question of a contractual relationship. But it is certainly possible—and this is foreseen in the acts or powers of some of the other ministers—the minister will need to appoint an advisory group, where remuneration will have to be paid. Having the flexibility to do this under the supervision of the Governor in Council rather than the conventional contracting rules would be extremely useful.

As I said, you're looking at places where very specialized expertise is necessary and where a certain balance of representation or views may be necessary. So the minister would wish to select the people individually.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

That means he could choose whoever he wanted; he wouldn't have to go through any competitive process.

[Jeremy Rudin]

Again, the terms and conditions, or those sorts of things, would be supervised by the Governor in Council, but it would not be necessary to submit a request for proposals, for example.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

And would there be any limitation on the nature of the committees? Could he appoint a speech-writing committee, or something of that nature?

[Jeremy Rudin]

It needs to be an advisory committee, and the minister has to—

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

So he could appoint a committee to advise him on his speeches?

[Jeremy Rudin]

The bill reads, “may establish advisory and other committees”.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Chair, the question is a little irrelevant.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

It will in the act; it's relevant.

[Jeremy Rudin]

Well, it says, “The Minister may establish...other committees”, so indeed there's not a restriction that they be advisory in nature.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Okay, thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Merrifield]

Thank you very much.

Mr. McCallum was going to be the last questioner, but Mr. McKay has talked me into allowing another really good question.

Go ahead, Mr. McKay.

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

As you know, I only ask good ones.

Does the $2 billion that's being set aside for this EI fund actually move from the general fund into a special bank account for EI? What I can't quite figure out is whether this is real money.

[Bill James]

Yes, under the provisions of the proposed law, there would be an amount transferred from the consolidated revenue fund to the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board. That amount would be maintained and invested by the board outside the government's consolidated revenue fund.