Finance Committee on Oct. 21st, 2009

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

One quick question is, why 108%; why not 120%, why not 110% on the solvency target?

[Robert Howard]

The target solvency margin would depend on the nature of the assets and the liability. It wouldn't be a flat amount; it depends on the profile of the assets. If you had all fixed-income securities, for instance, then it would likely be much smaller than if you had a substantial amount of equities, because there's less risk.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

All right. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you, Mr. Menzies.

We'll go to Mr. Pacetti.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you to the witnesses for appearing. It's a very interesting panel.

It's always tough for us to ask questions to everyone. My first question, I guess, would be to Mr. Chamberlain. Your presentation was very interesting, and I think the fact that you come from the business world makes it even more interesting, with the perspective that you have.

In your brief, in recommendation number two, you don't show a cost in wanting to provide for more benefits to the people who need them the most. I'm wondering whether you have a cost. I agree with building on the Canada child tax benefit, the benefit supplement, the working income tax, and all those things, but as for converting “other potentially refundable credits that deliver the greatest benefit”—non-utilized credits—to dollars, would that ever materialize? If people are not making money, would they ever substantially be able to benefit from any tax credit?

I don't know whether we're talking about the same thing.

[Mark Chamberlain]

One of the hard things about coming up with these numbers, and we can—we can calculate and give you these numbers—is that we have created a very complex social system; we've made it very complex. It's really quite simple.

In Hamilton, to give you an example, we have 100,000 people living in poverty: 25,000 are kids; 25,000 are people who are actually working but who aren't paid enough; another 15,000 just happen to have a disability. We could reduce poverty in Hamilton by 70% to 80% tomorrow, if we paid a living wage and actually increased our benefits from an OW and ODSP perspective. It's very simple.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Those are the solutions we're looking for: the ones that are easy to apply, without having all these different programs. Even in child tax benefits, we have the supplement, then the so-called child care supplement that the present government introduced—and it has become taxable—and there's just so much more.

[Mark Chamberlain]

We agree. If we look at the tools in the toolkit today and try to apply and use things there for simplicity of application immediately, it's still a very complex system. We know that with all of the costs of poverty.... Poverty is not “sexy” in terms of its cost, but it's a pandemic. The cost of poverty in Ontario is more per year than SARS, C. difficile, H1N1, and west Nile virus combined.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Would giving more money solve anything? Is that a solution, from a business perspective?

[Mark Chamberlain]

From a pure business perspective—and I start sounding less the capitalist, which I am, and more the socialist—the difficulty is explaining it. The most important determinant of health is not genetic, not lifestyle, but income. If you want to reduce health care costs significantly in the country, give people income, and they'll solve the problem themselves.

From a business perspective...? I would like to hope and think that our social justice would actually solve the human tragedy of poverty, but it hasn't; it just hasn't. From a business perspective, invest in the people and you'll solve a major deficit problem.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. Hall, in your second recommendation you talk about “current response demands” for emergency preparedness and even pandemic preparedness. As a country, are we prepared for any type of threat or serious pandemic? What do we need? Isn't the target always moving? Today it might be H1N1, and then next year maybe SARS. What do we have to prepare for?

[Jim Hall]

I think that's an important point. If you look at how we've responded to the current pandemic, you could argue that we are prepared. Canada has done a great job of ensuring that Canadians are protected. I understand the vaccine may be rolling out shortly, which is great news. But we must remember that when we began preparing for the pandemic, it was the avian flu that was really the greater concern, and that concern hasn't gone away; the avian flu is still lurking out there. H1N1 is with us now, and we're dealing with it—thankfully it's a milder pandemic—and are prepared for it.

The point we're making is that the need is still there to continue to prepare and plan and fund future activities, to ensure that if other pandemics come along, we're ready for them.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you, Mr. Pacetti.

We'll go to Mr. Wallace.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for your participation today. I can't ask everybody a question; I don't have time. I only have five minutes.

I'll turn to Mark first. I know Mark. Mark is not just a business person; he's an award-winning entrepreneur in Burlington and in Ontario, and Ernst and Young has recognized him. He has a new company that has a social responsibility aspect to it.

In your second recommendation—I'm following up on Massimo's comment—you say “build on” and name the four or five programs, including the working income tax benefit. But in your comments, you're recommending, in a sense, that this is too complicated.

Does your organization have a solution in terms of a single approach to income support for those who find themselves below the poverty line? Or is this the easy way to go now, because these programs exist: just to ask for more money? Is that what you're telling me today?

[Mark Chamberlain]

Yes. The existing programs, whether it be for housing, which we completely agree with, or for income support, whether through credit or whatever, are all great, because they're better than the current.... It's costing us significantly as a province and as a country to not do it.

The simplest way? Again, I look at it from a business perspective. If I were doing Six Sigma or lean manufacturing for the country, we'd simplify it significantly, because the cost of distribution and the cost of managing these tools is incredibly expensive and complex, and very hard for those living in poverty to actually do something with.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Okay. I appreciate that. Thank you, Mark.

Here is a question for Mr. Ryan. I understand you were checking out what was happening in Australia and so on. My understanding is that prior to our Conservative government taking power, there was what I want to call the “Maple Leaf project” or the “Maple Leaf reactors”. There was an attempt by a previous government to at least try to replace that item.

Could you explain to me what that Maple Leaf project is and whether it has been scrapped, so that we have to start all over again?

[Prof. Dominic Ryan]

Maple Leaf was the meat manufacturer that had the whole contamination problem; the reactors were the MAPLE program, just to keep the names right.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I mean the MAPLE program; I'm sorry.

[Prof. Dominic Ryan]

I think Maple Leaf has emerged in a better light.

The MAPLE program was an attempt to isolate one aspect of NRU's business, which was the molybdenum-99 production, and put it into one place and just do that. It would not have addressed the nuclear engineering side, the research of neutron beams, or any other isotope production issues; it was a single-purpose solution.

There are many problems with that project. It was undertaken very poorly from the beginning, and it has never been demonstrated to be cost-effective. This government has said they want to get out of the isotope business. Building the MAPLE reactors was fundamentally a massive subsidy to a single company to manufacture isotopes.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

This didn't happen recently. It happened...?

[Prof. Dominic Ryan]

It was 10 or 12 years ago. They ran out of money before they finished digging the holes. It was badly underfunded; it was a terrible project.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I appreciate that clarification.

Mr. Adams, we've had many discussions about automotive issues. I appreciate your being here today.

Concerning the green levy, I know you talked about the incentive being gone, but the penalty is still there for those cars that the program considers gas guzzlers. Can you tell me, in actual numbers, what it has done to sales in those categories?

[David Adams]

I can get those numbers for you, but my anecdotal thought would be that it probably hasn't done a whole lot to affect sales of those vehicles.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I probably agree with you, because I think I know the numbers.

So what we're saying to the consumer who buys a gas-guzzling vehicle is that if you want one, fine, but you are going to pay a green levy for that. And you don't think that's fair?