Finance Committee on Sept. 15th, 2009

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon to all of the witnesses.

Mr. Dinsdale, you are the Director General of the National Association of Friendship Centres. In my riding which includes a northern area of Quebec, there is an aboriginal friendship centre in La Tuque. I know that the aboriginal friendship centres offer services to Aboriginals living off reserve, often in cities located quite close to reserves.

The question I have heard frequently recently is the following one. There is a higher suicide rate among aboriginal populations than in the white population. Suicide prevention centres are subsidized by the Quebec Ministry of Health as this is an area of provincial jurisdiction. The province administers and subsidizes suicide prevention centres. These centres, in particular the La Tuque centre, want to begin to offer many services to the aboriginal population, both off reserve and on reserves. There is a lack of funding for these additional services that they want to provide to help prevent suicide.

Is there a similar situation elsewhere?

[Peter Dinsdale]

The issue of aboriginal youth and aboriginal people generally committing suicide is rampant across the country. Numerous studies have been done on the lack of self-government in many of these communities and its impact on people committing suicide. When varying degrees and notions of self-government increase, suicides decrease. This exists across the country in every jurisdiction.

I think the suicide epidemic speaks to hopelessness. Half of all aboriginal people don't graduate from high school, half of our people are under the age of 25, and half of our people live in urban areas. Whether we choose to acknowledge it or not, Canada has a growing underclass of people who are racialized, being aboriginal, who live in the most impoverished areas of our communities, and who see little hope. They see little hope because budget measures don't directly target them. They see little hope because jurisdictional battles between the province and the federal government over who has responsibility prevent meaningful action from taking place in many cases.

Our program and others like it provide hope and a place for these people to come. We provide programs that turn things around, and we partner with the very types of programs you're talking about that in the most drastic circumstances prevent suicides directly. Our appeal is based on one program, but the larger principle at play is the need for all jurisdictions to support meaningful interventions to really break the gridlock of poverty that exists. Ultimately, things like suicide, gangs, violence against women in our communities, our teens prostituting themselves on the streets, and murdered and missing aboriginal women are all related to the same types of issues. Interventions like this in one of those programs can have an impact.

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

In fact, you are saying that if the federal government met the demand as you have formulated it, which is to increase the budgets of the aboriginal friendship centres, this would also be an adequate way of fighting suicide.

I would now like to put a question to Ms. Russell.

I listened to your presentation. We are always surprised to hear data such as the data you submitted, even if we have heard it several times before, for instance the fact that there is still a considerable gap between the salaries of men and women everywhere, in Canada and in Quebec. Whenever I hear this type of thing I have trouble understanding how it can be that in a country as developed as our own, we cannot see to it that both women and men contribute equally to the development of society. I agree with you entirely that we do not use women's talents sufficiently. There is even inequality where persons holding degrees are concerned. It is completely unacceptable. I can unequivocally state that my party, the Bloc Québécois, supports your pay equity demands.

You also talked about setting up a universal day care system. In Quebec, this is a model that works very well and allows women to participate in the labour force while continuing to fully play their roles as women and mothers. I encourage you to continue your struggle in this area because this is extremely important.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

You have one minute left, Mr. Laforest.

[Susan Russell]

I'm very aware of how excellent the system is in Quebec. I wish the rest of the country had the same system. It's one of the linchpins to women's economic independence. I thank you for your comments.

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

My last question is addressed to Mr. Lee.

Concerning the universal benefit, you were talking about compensation of $300,000. Everyone is aware that firemen provide a very noble service. When there are deaths, unfortunately, this is comparable to the situation of soldiers who lose their lives in Afghanistan.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Could you put your question, please.

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

On what is this amount of $300,000 based? Is it comparable to what the families of soldiers receive when they are killed?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Very briefly, Mr. Lee.

[Jim Lee]

We have actually looked at what the U.S. is currently doing. The U.S. is currently at $400,000 for firefighters who die in the line of duty, in the performance of their duty. That's what it was based on. We compare ourselves to the soldiers because we are the domestic defenders here in Canada. In a natural disaster or a terrorist attack, or any of that, it'll be the firefighters who are first on the scene. We're there within four minutes. That was proven in 9/11 when we lost 343 firefighters in the twin towers.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Kramp, please.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

Ms. Russell, could you tell us what a full-blown national child care program would cost?

[Susan Russell]

I'm not entirely sure, but I remember just before the Martin government fell, there was $750 million allocated to a child care program that would be shared with the provinces. I would suggest that it would be cheap at the price. It would be an investment in the future. If we shortchange our children and our families, we shortchange Canada itself.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

Thank you.

The reason I ask is that as a government, in a perfect world, we can be everybody's problem-solver from cradle to grave, but we had witnesses testify this morning to this committee that such a program would cost roughly $40 billion. I have no idea whether that figure or yours is accurate, but I suggest we would need some very hard figures brought to this committee so that we can make an intelligent decision based on those figures. Could I make that recommendation to you?

[Susan Russell]

You might want to cut back on defence spending in order to do it. You might want to think about that.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

I'm not asking you to set priorities for the government. I'm asking you to provide information that would tell us what your assessment would cost. If you could do that, we would certainly appreciate it.

[Susan Russell]

Okay. I can get back to you with figures.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

That's all I'm asking. Thank you very kindly.

I'd like to go to the issue of food safety.

Mr. Culbert, as parliamentarians, I think one of the number one priorities that we are responsible for is the health and safety and protection of our citizens, whether it's listeriosis, BSE, or E. coli. I had a very good friend and neighbour in my riding who was one of the people who passed away from listeriosis. When we take this across the country and we see the effect, people have to have faith in their food supply.

I'm very interested in the proposal by Bioniche to move forward with a demonstration program. We're looking at a $10 million demonstration program. What does that entail? I see in some of your earlier figures $35 million for a national vaccination program, but where does this demonstration program take us? What would this do for us?

[Rick Culbert]

Thank you for your question.

The demonstration projects that we're trying to facilitate right now have basically two elements.

One element is that they would measure in the environment, where the vaccine is being used, the reduction of E. coli. Again, it's naturally coming out of the cattle; it can naturally get into aquifers, it's on their hide, and it can be carried into packing plants. We would be measuring the actual reduction of the E. coli that could potentially be at risk of being exposed to humans.

The other element we're looking at is really more of a trade issue, in that we believe there are customers, both internationally and domestically, who, if they knew there were supply chains of cattle available that had a further risk reduction procedure done to them, might get a premium, or it might get them preferential supplier status. That again would be a favourable signal to the farming community that something like this could help them in their marketing.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

We have not adopted this technology--your science. Are there other nations or countries in the world that you've exposed this to or that are considering this type of protection?

[Rick Culbert]

We're working on some international submissions right now in the U.S. and Australia. Again, Canada deserves some credit here, but the challenge for regulators is to think outside the box. Every other cattle vaccine that's registered in Canada and elsewhere in the world up until now is to prevent disease in cattle. This one doesn't prevent disease in cattle; it prevents the colonization of a bacteria that causes disease in humans.

Some nations are better adapted to deal with an innovative technology like this, and Canada has been the first to do it. Whether it'll be next licensed in Australia, which is very focused on ensuring the safety of their beef export, or the U.S., I don't know. We're working on regulatory dossiers elsewhere around the world.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

How long has your company been working to bring this to this stage?

[Rick Culbert]

We started on this in 2001, as I recall. So it's been about eight or nine years now.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

So this has been a long process. Would it be similar to a normal pharmaceutical drug process, or is it...?

[Rick Culbert]

No, I think it would be similar. Biologics or vaccines, as a rule, may not have quite as exhaustive mechanistic studies because, again, you're not putting anything in their system, such as a chemical; you're just stimulating the immune system to put up its natural defences against a germ, so the cost of developing a vaccine is slightly less than that of a drug. But you're absolutely correct on the timeframe.