Finance Committee on Nov. 5th, 2009

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

For example, they want needs-based grants. So should there be targeted needs-based grants for graduate students specifically?

[Graham Cox]

One of our recommendations was for graduate students to be allowed to apply for the national system of needs-based grants that the current government implemented this year. Currently graduate students are not allowed to.

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McCallum]

Thank you, Mr. Atamanenko.

We'll go to Mr. McKay, please.

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

There's something supremely ironic about locating palliative care in between Own the Podium and the Physical Activity Policy Collective.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

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

I must admit, after hockey on Sunday nights, I do need palliative care.

In the concept of choosing life, maybe I'll direct the first question to Mr. Baumann and Dr. Jackson.

As the excessively proud father of an elite athlete, I spend way more time in swimming pools than I want to. My observation is that the physical plant regarding swimming pools and athletic facilities generally is substantially deteriorating. Your request is basically to keep the money available for our elite athletes. It's pretty hard to keep our elite athletes going, whether elite or not, if in fact the physical plant is deteriorating. I'd be interested in your observations, because you spend way more time in pools than I do.

[Alex Baumann, Chief Technical Officer, Own the Podium 2010]

Thank you for that question.

You're exactly right. I think from an Own the Podium perspective, the two key priorities to have success at the high performance level are, one, having the proper coaching and technical leadership, and two, making sure our athletes have access to quality facilities. So within that $22 million, within our budget as well, we have put aside some funding to make sure that our top athletes actually have access to facilities.

In addition to this, we all realize, particularly in Ontario and in the greater Toronto area, that there is a dearth of facilities. If we're successful tomorrow in hosting the Pan American Games in 2015, the legacy aspect of those games will go a long way in putting infrastructure in place for some of our top athletes.

It is an issue that we have to address. We have to work with the federal government, obviously, and the provincial governments as well, to ensure that we have adequate facilities for our top athletes, because you're right, without those facilities, they cannot succeed and would otherwise have to train in other countries.

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

I'm rather hoping we are successful because the pool for that venue will be located at Morningside and Military Trail. I have a rather keen interest.

I appreciate the presentation by Sharon Baxter and Dr. Pereira, and Ms. Block's and Mr. McCallum's questions sort of anticipated mine. I was rather interested in the spectrum, if you will, that you present, the spectrum being that you simply don't have to go directly to assisted suicide, that there's a long way in that spectrum of life. I appreciate, in particular, your presentation.

I speak to the issue of the accelerated demographic in this country. I think Canada is depressingly unique in that respect.

[Sharon Baxter]

Let me tackle that one.

On the first part of your statement, we don't like to consider euthanasia and assisted suicide as any part of palliative care, and they really aren't. Hospice palliative care is a set of services delivered to help ease people at the end of their lives. It constitutes a lot of things besides that.

The demographic issue is a huge one for Canada. We are an aging population. We're not expecting to be hit by any huge epidemic. It's just that we're going to be hitting the magic 65 and older.

One of the things we need to consider is that many years ago we died of our chronic diseases in a year or two years. People over 65 in this country will be living with, on average, two chronic diseases and will be living in declining health for up to 12 years as opposed to two. So what does that mean?

There's some irony in that I'm sitting between two sports people.

How are we going to handle the number of Canadians who are living longer--which is obviously a really good thing--but in declining health for a longer period of time? What are the stresses? I think we have to tackle this not just as a health issue but as a socio-economic issue also, because it's the only way we're going to be able to handle it.

We start talking about things like caring communities and how we engage others in caring for people. Maybe older seniors will be using younger seniors. There are some innovative programs we need to start thinking about, but we need to think about this now, because we're all hitting it. And having been caring for a family member, I know it just causes great burdens.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McCallum]

Okay.

Dr. Pereira, you wanted to comment. Be very brief, sir, if you can.

[Dr. José Pereira]

I think it's great that we're sitting next to the sports people, because palliative care is not just about the last few days or weeks of life. Palliative care begins much earlier in the illness trajectory. We have to start changing our concept of what palliative care is.

One of the programs we're starting up in Ottawa is a palliative care rehabilitation program. People are exercising to help them live as best as they can for as long as possible at home.

I was wondering if we could append our briefing to the minutes, because I understand that it wasn't done.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McCallum]

Everybody has your brief.

Thank you, Mr. McKay.

We'll have Monsieur Roy, s'il vous plaît.

[Jean-Yves Roy, Bloc, Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Baxter, palliative care is an issue I am especially interested in. You say that we need to do more to educate people and make them aware of the fact that palliative care will become increasingly important in our society.

Quebec has a sort of hospice system, in my area, in particular. And these hospices are entirely run by non-profit organizations and are often administered by a board of directors made up of volunteers. There is a lot of involvement required from people. And 99% of the funding for these hospices comes from grassroots fundraising.

Another such hospice is currently being built in Quebec. I know of three or four in my area alone, and a few others in the rest of the province. And I know that they really do not get much support. I believe that they should. Essentially, what Quebec's program does is give the public control over its own services. Obviously, we cannot run on volunteers alone. We need nurses, doctors and other healthcare staff. But a large share of the work is being done by volunteers.

Is there a similar program elsewhere?

[Sharon Baxter]

You're totally right. The residential hospices in this country are predominantly in Ontario and Quebec, with some in B.C. They aren't universal in the country. We know that they're a good program to offer. They are well supported in some areas, but they are struggling with the model of being a charity. I know that in Ontario the provincial government put up some money for increasing the number of residential hospices in Ontario.

The problem is that they gave them money to create the building and the space but not the operating funds. In Quebec, there are different models, but they are asking the Quebec government for more operational funds so that they can strike a balance between what they need to raise as a charity and what they get from the government. They are contributing to the health care system. It's an ongoing issue. I think we need to look at all the services we need at the end of life—acute care hospitals, residential hospices, home care programs, and others. They are all funded in a different way.

The integration between long-term care and acute care is not there in many places. People sit in hospitals when they could be in a residential hospice or at home with supports. It costs our system a huge amount of money to keep people in acute care, because we haven't thought downstream. With respect to residential hospices and long-term care facilities, we have to start thinking in more than a two- or three-year gap. We have to look at what the needs of our population are going to be over the next ten years.

Residential hospices are great. There are less than 200 hospice programs in the country. There are less than 50 residential hospices in this country. Quebec and Ontario have the bulk of them. If the population can support a residential hospice, it is a great way to go. But we're not there yet.

[Jean-Yves Roy, Bloc, Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I am fortunate then because there are at least three in my area. I am fortunate because there are fewer than 50 altogether, but at least three of them in my area.

My next question is for Ms. Grantham. A littler earlier, we heard from representatives of the Brain Injury Association of Canada. I would like to give you an example. In the early 1970s, we had programs to encourage people to take up biking, but we did not have any bike paths. Within one year, there were 18,000 people injured throughout Canada as a result of biking accidents. Some were more serious than others, but the people were not wearing helmets.

I am in favour of encouraging people to play sports, but I think we also need to do some education. I think that situation had a devastating effect on services in Canada. Some 18,000 people were injured in biking accidents. We sent people out bike riding, but there were not even any bike paths, no helmets. Here we were using an advertising campaign to push people to go bike riding. I thing we had a problem there.

I hope that governments will realize that when you send people out to play sports, you have to educate them a bit beforehand. I have no objection to encouraging people to play sports, but I want us to encourage them to play safely.

[Andrea Grantham]

Absolutely. That's an excellent point, and it's part of the strategy to educate children and youth on skills, providing programs within communities that support knowledge, awareness, and practice.

There is a lot of information on active transportation and on developing communities that are safe and supportive of physical activity, so that children can ride their bikes in a safe environment, and it's part of a larger infrastructure. This is the comprehensive approach that we believe we need to take in this country.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McCallum]

Thank you, Mr. Roy.

Mr. Wallace.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, and my thanks to you all for coming today.

I'm going to focus on sports and physical activity. I'm hoping that we win tomorrow's bid. I'm from the GTA, from Burlington. My daughter is a competitive heptathlete. She'd be of age to compete for Canada if she could make it that far.

Mr. Baumann, I have a question for you. The Own the Podium program, is it just for the Winter Olympics, or is it for all Olympics? It's for all high-performance athletics. Is that correct?

[Alex Baumann]

It's for summer and winter Olympics and for the Paralympics.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I believe you came back from Australia. Was it not Australia? Was it because of this program? What is the difference between what they are doing in Australia for their high-performance athletes and what we're doing here?

[Alex Baumann]

There's a number of differences. The main reason I came back was that I saw a definite shift. Part of it was because of the Own the Podium program, but part of it was also that Canada was starting to focus on excellence, and our athletes no longer seemed afraid to try to be the best in the world. I saw that change in attitude, and it was a critical piece for me.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

How long ago did that attitude change happen?

[Alex Baumann]

It really started some time in 2003-04. The evidence was really in 2006 in Torino, where Canada won 24 medals, so that shift was there. I'm seeing that attitude is starting to shift more and more; we're getting out there and we have the confidence to compete against the best in the world.

The question in terms of Australia...certainly Australians value sport. They see the benefit not only in high-performance sport, but sport in general, that it creates role models, it unites the country, and it creates patriotism as well. And ultimately there's a trickle-down effect to increasing participation as well.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Here's my general question, then, and I'm going to gear it to Ms. Grantham. We've had ParticipACTION and other Olympians in front of us asking for money for different programs.

In your presentation you talked about 1% of public health money going to this. I don't know what that number is off the top of my head. Can you all work together? It's very difficult for us when we have different groups asking for money, including yourselves, to be frank with you. But can the physical activity and health groups all work together so there would be one budget: some of it would go to high performance, some would go to recreation, and some would go to getting me off my couch on Sunday afternoons instead of watching football on TV? Is there a movement for that to happen, or are we going to continue to see individual organizations.... And I'm not sure what the output is on many of them, to be honest with you. That's what I'm asking from you. You're representing a number of groups. What's the future? What are the outcomes in relation to physical activity, in general, for Canada, that you see could happen?