Finance Committee on Oct. 21st, 2009

[Steven Christianson]

We do, increasingly.

The March of Dimes started out as a service organization for people with physical disabilities. That was fairly clear-cut. Some of those disabilities would have been temporary, and some acquired—brain injuries, automobile accidents, etc.—but increasingly invisible disabilities are being considered. We increasingly do get those, as well as neurological disabilities.

The view of disability is really an expansive concept. It's an evolving concept, frankly, because we don't have all of the information on disability today that we will have in 15 years. As well, we have various jurisdictions that include itemization in some cases, and in other cases it's more of a conceptual definition.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I appreciate that, because it's something I'm working on for some of my constituents.

To the Police Association, just very quickly, the program that we announced in 2006 when we first formed government was clearly a five-year program, and the other.... I'm from Halton, one of the safest places, with a good police force. I think we've actually taken advantage of the program and have more police officers. Based on my conversation with the chief, the money has worked its way through.

Regarding the money that's been allocated to this—and some of it has flowed—is it the province that's pushing back or is it just the municipalities?

[Larry Molyneaux]

The Province of Ontario is the only province in Canada that has actually utilized the funds for what they were intended. All the other provinces utilized those funds for enhancement of different crime prevention initiatives, and some joint forces operations; but the Province of Ontario actually used it for brand new front-line police officers. I'm a Miltonian, so I know Halton quite well, and they did utilize the amount properly.

The push-back is from the federal government. The provincial government was given this amount of money—$156 million out of the $400 million—and the Province of Ontario utilized it properly.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Okay, thank you.

I have a final question, Mr. Chair, but I don't know how much time I have.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

You have about a minute and a half.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Okay, perfect.

Mr. Samuelson, you didn't get a chance to talk about the jobs part of your piece here, and I'm just trying to get information from you on this.

Part of what I see, rightly or wrongly, is that the mobility of labour is also an issue, that people may have to go to where the jobs may be. We were in Winnipeg, where there's a 4% unemployment rate. We were also in Regina recently. Some areas of the country have less unemployment, and you're absolutely right that northern Ontario is suffering tremendously with unemployment issues.

Does the OFL have a position or a comment on how the federal government could do more for the mobility of labour, or are you not interested in that at all?

[Wayne Samuelson]

I think workers, unfortunately, have to be interested in it. I think we should be trying to figure out how we can develop strategies to rebuild those communities in the north. If you go to our website and click through it, you will find dozens of videos of children talking about what it's like when their mother or father leaves on Friday and comes home three weeks later.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Right.

[Wayne Samuelson]

I don't think it's anything we want to see. So I think we should be trying to be far more aggressive in maintaining these small communities across northwestern Ontario.

I'm going to tell you something. In my opinion, I think many people—and I'm not making this personal, just recalling my experience—have just written them off, saying there's nothing we can do for them. These people are way up there and nobody worries about them, but I'll tell you, if you want to get an eye-opener, jump in your car and just drive along from Sault Ste. Marie and just stop in any town and talk to people.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you for that.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you, Mr. Wallace.

We're going to Mr. McKay.

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

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Creighton, in another life I used to practise law, and every month I'd get this enormous bill, primarily from Thomson, for all of my periodicals. After a while, I started to resent the amount of money I was paying out to Canada's richest family. Here you're proposing this publication assistance program. Would Thomson Reuters be entitled to that program?

[Bruce Creighton]

Thomson made a fundamental decision, maybe 15 years ago, to get out of what I'll call the “news business.” They're into the data business, and so they sold off a lot of their community newspapers. They've retained a share of The Globe and Mail, but they actively got out of all of their other magazine/newspaper businesses years ago.

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

I thought they did law publications. They sold off that business as well?

[Bruce Creighton]

Well, they're into what we generally refer to as the data business.

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

In this case it was reports on precedents and reports on pricing.

[Bruce Creighton]

Right, whereas the magazines that I'm referring to are general information, general news for that specific vertical industry, not necessarily--in terms of the legal area--giving you judgments that have taken place. That tends to be covered more by the data businesses. There are some trade magazines that do provide that information.

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

So would that kind of publication qualify?

[Bruce Creighton]

There are some legal publications that do qualify, but Thomson Reuters specifically got out of that business. They really wanted to cater to accountants and lawyers, but more on the legal data business, not on the general news information.

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

I must admit I would have a choke reaction to subsidizing the Thomson family, as would probably everyone else at this table.

My second question is to Ms. Menard. It has to do with choices with respect to child care. The government essentially sends you $100 and says make your own choice, and if your own choice is, in this particular situation, loaded to looking after your own kid, then essentially, child care spaces shrink.

What would you say to the government with respect to their $100 day care money?

[Janet Menard]

It falls far short of the actual costs of child care. Home child care is an option, but we encourage families and the government to invest in regulated child care, where children are stimulated, where they're provided with a healthy lunch, where they learn to interact with each other to solve problems and in essence form the foundations that are important for later life. There's great research that demonstrates that the cost of investing in the early years results in...I think it's $4 saved for every $1, in terms of the social cost that you avoid in the future.

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

Essentially, though, the choice is no choice at all.

[Janet Menard]

Exactly.

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

Thank you.

Mr. Samuelson, on improvements to EI, the 360 hours has pretty well been dismissed by the government at this point. They've said it's $4 billion when in fact it's probably $1 billion. You've added a number of other things on here. My reaction to your suggestions--and I thought there were some pretty decent ideas in here--was first of all, who's paying for this? Is it the taxpayer, is it coming out of general revenues, or is it being paid for by employers and employees?

[Wayne Samuelson]

I'm sure you're aware that changes made a number of years ago put the plan out on its own. I can't help but note the $50 billion-plus surplus that this fund had. Interestingly enough, one would have thought it would be wise, during the good times, to hang on to that for the more difficult times. I'm sure it costs somebody money. I don't think there's any doubt about that. But I'll tell you, it can't cost as much as the impact it's having on these families. I'll repeat, these are people who worked, did everything they were supposed to do. They got up every morning, they went to work. They paid benefits. And through no fault of their own, they find themselves caught.