Evidence of meeting #53 for Finance in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was colleges.
2:40 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
The reason I'm asking is that the idea is to try to simplify a credit or a new idea, but I think you're making it more complex.
2:45 p.m.
Manager, Government Relations and Advocacy, March of Dimes Canada
These are examples of existing regimes and fiscal tools that are in use. By explaining these, we're merely pointing out that it can be done. We put this within the context of the legislation being developed here in Ontario. There is proposed legislation on a built environment standard, but the challenge is that retrofits have not been included.
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
I'm in Quebec. They have building codes and city codes. Before you get a permit, the building has to be accessible to the handicapped.
2:45 p.m.
Manager, Government Relations and Advocacy, March of Dimes Canada
Yes.
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
Obviously you might have old businesses that don't necessarily have to transform, but any type of renovation or improvement has to take these things into consideration. Wouldn't you have the same thing in Ontario?
2:45 p.m.
Manager, Government Relations and Advocacy, March of Dimes Canada
We do have the same thing in Ontario. What we're talking about, though, are the retrofits. With the new built environment standard in Ontario, this will apply to all work on a go-forward basis as well as to major renovations. This is also the case in some other jurisdictions where this is under consideration, like Manitoba and British Columbia. Anything that is inaccessible today will remain inaccessible tomorrow, and that's pretty huge. In Ontario alone, we have upwards of 360,000 private sector entities. That's a lot of activity, but we're finding that the consumer base in our communities is simply not participating. They're not able to contribute.
If we go along our main streets, just here in Toronto, to some of our favourite destinations—the Roncesvalles, the Danforths, the Queen Street Easts—I defy anyone in this room to find more than two or three accessible establishments. It's no one's fault. In a place like the Danforth, which is my home community, we have gone from establishment to establishment to test this. It's no one's fault. When we bring it up to people—
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
And if they were to get tax credits and tax deductions, it would help them.
2:45 p.m.
Manager, Government Relations and Advocacy, March of Dimes Canada
They're small businesses, family-owned businesses. They want to do the right thing, a good social thing, a public good as well as an economic good. But how? Do they cut expenses elsewhere? Do they lay people off?
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
I want to talk to the Police Association.
Mr. Molyneaux, how is the money transferred? How do you know Ontario used the money specifically? Was it supposed to be used specifically to hire a new police officer?
2:45 p.m.
President, Police Association of Ontario
Yes, the original agreement was for brand new front-line police officers, not to supplement anybody who's retired but to actually increase the number. The Minister of Community Safety in the Province of Ontario, along with the different associations, came up with a formula, and that formula spoke to--
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
So what would have happened in other provinces?
2:45 p.m.
President, Police Association of Ontario
In other provinces they used it for crime prevention initiatives.
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
That's what you were saying, but why wouldn't it have been used for hiring front-line officers?
2:45 p.m.
President, Police Association of Ontario
Well, what happened was that the money from the federal government went to the provinces and there were really no stipulated rules to each province to say, this is a done deal, you must do it. The Province of Ontario took the lead and did follow the guidelines.
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
Okay.
I have a quick question to the Writers' Union. The third part in your brief talked about the public lending right. What is that?
2:45 p.m.
Executive Director, Writers' Union of Canada
The Public Lending Right Commission is a commission that was set up with Massey funds many years ago to provide funding--
2:45 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
When you talk about many years ago, when was many years ago?
2:45 p.m.
Executive Director, Writers' Union of Canada
I'd say at least 30. What happens is that a writer's income is based on royalties, and when they sell a book, they get 10%, if they're lucky, of that sale. When a book is sold to a public library, they get ten cents or one dollar. But then it's read by many people. So our Public Lending Right Commission has funds that were originally established through the Massey fund, and they do tests of all the public libraries and the university libraries in Canada to see which books are found. When they find a book it's called a hit, and a hit rate is applied. If a writer has 10 hits, they get 10 times the hit rate. If they get 20 hits, they get 20 times the hit rate. So they're generating revenue for their books that are in public libraries and being used. But that hit rate has gone down to about a quarter of what it used to be, and we have more books available, more writers producing works, and fewer dollars having to cover this larger group of authors.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
Massimo Pacetti Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
But what are we talking about in terms of dollars?
2:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Writers' Union of Canada
I can't give you an answer to the dollars. I'd have to go back and prepare that for you.
2:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Rajotte
Thank you, Mr. Pacetti.
We'll go back to Mr. Dechert and Mr. Menzies.
2:50 p.m.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Thank you, Chair. I'm going to split time with Mr. Menzies.
Mr. Molyneaux, in your brief you mentioned the Toronto 18 investigation and trial and the cost that created for Peel Regional Police. I've heard from Peel Regional Police about this. Can you give the committee a flavour of what the cost of that was? I want to point out that the crimes those people were planning to commit would have impacted all the members of Parliament in this room and a lot of other people across Canada.
2:50 p.m.
President, Police Association of Ontario
I don't have that number. It's very difficult. But what I can tell you is that this was a joint forces operation. If you were following the newspaper yesterday, the RCMP detonated a bomb to show you the impact that this would have had. That was a joint forces operation with Peel, Toronto, OPP, RCMP, and a lot of other municipal services. Then when you have that joint forces operation, you travel all over Ontario and through Canada to arrest these people, to bring them to trial. There's wiretap information, there are search warrants.
So to put a dollar figure on that, we don't have that.
2:50 p.m.
Conservative
Bob Dechert Conservative Mississauga—Erindale, ON
But they were national costs essentially borne by the local police force.