Finance Committee on Oct. 29th, 2012

[Mark Adler, Conservative, York Centre, ON]

How much time do I have left?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

You have 18 seconds.

[Mark Adler, Conservative, York Centre, ON]

I'll pass.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

Thank you, Mr. Adler.

Mr. Brahmi.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I would like to say to Mr. Myers that a number of us feel uncomfortable because we tried to use you in a partisan war when, on the other side, you were asked to comment on partisan activities. Hearing them ask you to take part in a squabble when you are appearing to share your expertise is fairly embarrassing.

My question is for Mr. Murphy.

You mentioned in your intervention that co-operatives were sometimes required to request that their files be processed, but that they were not understood by the person they were dealing with.

The fact that you asked for a transfer of skills from one department to another, so from Agriculture to Industry, does that have something to do with your comment?

[Shawn Murphy]

Yes, that's somewhat the case. Going from Agriculture Canada to Industry Canada stems from the fact that, for several years, the government wanted to include co-operatives in a department. There were a lot of agricultural co-operatives. So it made sense that they come under Agriculture Canada.

But now, given the diversity within the co-operative sector in Canada, Agriculture Canada is no longer able to meet our needs. Also, in the last budget, the only federal program that had been around for 10 years was abolished. Agriculture Canada could not inject funds into co-operatives that were not tied to agriculture.

We considered it an opportunity to change our partnership with the federal government.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you.

My next question is for Mr. Davidson.

You said that we should make more of an effort to attract international students to Canadian universities. I am all in favour of that.

There is another aspect that has perhaps been discussed less. It's the case in Quebec, but I don't know if this is the case in other provinces in Canada. I think we should try to attract more boys to Canadian universities.

Do you think this problem is typical for Quebec, or is it the same thing across Canada? Do you think the federal government, in its budget and through the Standing Committee on Finance, could help the provinces ensure that boys are more interested in going to university and that they drop out less, as is currently the case?

[Paul Davidson]

If I may, I'd say that one of the great advances in post-secondary education in the last 30 years has been the full participation of women in the post-secondary sector. In many cases, in many programs, women are outnumbering and in many cases outperforming men.

So that's interesting to observe. I don't know if there is an underlying sociological reason for that.

If I may, though, I would add that one of our biggest concerns is that there is a lot of discussion about whether we have too many people in PSE, too many people in university. The short answer is no. We need every student who is in the system now to stay in the system, and we need a whole lot more.

Yes, we have a skills crisis for skilled trades. We need to do more on the skilled trades side. But there are job shortages in Alberta right now because of their not being able to find the university grads who are needed for the economic conditions in that province.

With respect to the situation in Quebec, everyone should be concerned that the post-secondary participation rate in Quebec is amongst the lowest in the country. That's a challenge for Quebec. It's a challenge for all of Canada.

[Tarik Brahmi, NDP, Saint-Jean, QC]

How do you think the federal government, through financial incentives or other measures, could help re-establish that deficit that Quebec has, compared with other provinces, with respect to post-secondary education?

[James L. Turk]

I think the variation in the percentage of women and men in different programs is considerable. While there is, in education and nursing and certain other programs, a significant plurality of women, in other programs—chemistry, physics, engineering—fewer than 20% of the students studying in those fields are women. There is enormous variation.

I think the challenge is in how universities and how the government can assist universities and colleges in opening up programs to everyone and overcome some of these historical gender differences. Generally the message that's been coming out around employment equity hasn't been helpful. Effectively de-fanging the federal contractors program is not any encouragement to—

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

Mr. Turk, we have to move on. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Brahmi.

Now we'll hear from Mr. Van Kesteren.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to all for being here. It's good to see some of you again. You've been here a number of times.

Mr. Davidson, I want to touch on what you were just saying to Mr. Brahmi. You mentioned that we don't have enough students. I'm looking for a clarification, because we've heard other testimony—and I think it's statistically proven—that we are having a large number of graduates out of universities who can't find jobs. Is the problem maybe that we're not putting them in the right programs?

I say that very carefully, because now we're almost starting to talk about social engineering, to some degree.

I see that Mr. Turk is agreeing with that as well.

How do we find that balance? I'll shift over to Mr. Turk later, but perhaps you could answer this question.

[Paul Davidson]

I welcome the question.

Let me just say, first off, in terms of jobs, that from July 2008 to July 2012 there have been 700,000 net new jobs for university graduates. There have been 320,000 jobs for college graduates. There have been 640,000 jobs lost for those with only high school. So we do have some issues to face.

The idea that university graduates are not getting jobs is not borne out by evidence: 94% of graduates in Ontario report having a job within six months of graduation.

For anyone who doesn't have a job, it is a terrible issue to face. There is more we can do to make sure that young people connect to the labour force. There is more that universities are doing to prepare students for careers. But to suggest that too many people are going to university is really a strategy not for success but for failure.

I might add, because we look at international rankings and standards, that university enrolment in Canada ranks 15th in the OECD. Although we've increased enrolment by about 60% in the last 15 years—the equivalent of creating the largest university in each province again, and then building another University of Toronto—other countries are increasing enrolment further and faster.

We're looking at our competitive countries. I spoke of a million graduates in Canada. China increased enrolment by a million graduates in the last 12 months.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

Those are interesting statistics, and I'm glad you shared those with us. Maybe you could provide the committee with those numbers.

Mr. Turk, I think we probably spoke back in Industry days. Part of the problem with a lot of the grant money.... When we did a large, cross-country tour of some universities...there's obviously some great research. You hear the charge, and you've heard it probably more than me, “This is wonderful, but what's it good for?” There was always the issue of the government determining where the money should go, as opposed to the freedom that traditionally universities have in their research. How do we solve that? We've asked this question before. Could you give an answer for this committee?

[James L. Turk]

None of these questions that persist year after year is easy to solve. It starts with an analysis of where you think the most important outcomes arise from. It's a self-evident, but wrong, conclusion to say that the way you get those kinds of outcomes, whether they are commercial advances, innovation, or whatever, is by directing research to that target.

If one looks historically at most of the things that have come to be recognized as having commercial, economic, or even social value, they've come out of basic research, where the researchers at the time they undertook the research had no idea. One of the most respected scientists I know in the country says that every time they fill out a grant application, they have to lie because it asks where the research is going to lead. They don't know where it's going to lead.

We addressed this briefly in our report. The discoveries of X-rays, nylon, Teflon, GPS technology, and so forth, all came out of basic research. It's not just giving the money to let scientists do whatever they want; rather, it's giving the money to granting councils so there's a rigorous peer review process. It should be a scientific and research community that makes the determination as to what looks valuable, not political officials, not bureaucratic officials, and not bureaucratic university officials. It should be the scientific community that makes those difficult judgments.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

How much time do I have, Chair?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

That's it.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

Thank you, Mr. Van Kesteren.

Ms. Michaud, you have the floor.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank my Conservative colleague for raising the issue of basic research because that is also what I wanted to ask about. So Mr. Turk, could you continue?

In your presentation, you denounced the various cuts to university research and in the area of government scientific research. I usually sit on the Standing Committee on Official Languages. We can already see the effect of the cuts on Statistics Canada with respect to the reliability of data on mother tongue and on the language of use at home.

Mr. Turk, could you please elaborate a little on what your real needs are in terms of basic research in the university setting?

If anyone else has anything to add, they may do so.

[James L. Turk]

The federal government has an important role to play in facilitating creative, innovative research. It does that by giving money to the granting councils, it does that by giving money through other programs, and it does that by enabling the knowledge base in society. That's why we've been particularly concerned with what we see to be the dismemberment of Library and Archives Canada. The ability to study, and learn from, our history is being seriously damaged. We have a website—savelac.ca—that goes into considerable detail, more than I have time to even begin to address here. That's why we're so concerned about the elimination of the mandatory long-form census: there's all sorts of research and information that businesses, communities, and researchers need that just simply is not available. That's one side.

In terms of funding for the granting councils, I certainly understand from politicians' point of view how it makes sense to say that we have this need in this area, so let's concentrate our research dollars there. If one looks historically, there's just a mountain of evidence—I'm glad to share it with the committee—that says that ideas that are being investigated by some obscure researcher looking at molecular variations that seem irrelevant to anything turn out to result in a Nobel Prize and, for researcher Paul Burg at Stanford, to be the basis of the entire biotech industry today.

The difficulty here is pressure. You have limited resources. You want to make sure they're spent best. I guess what we're suggesting is that the best way you can achieve that objective is by giving the money through the granting council so that it is scientific and research expertise that makes those difficult decisions. It's virtually impossible for the rest of us to do that. That means also ensuring that the people you appoint to the governing councils of each of the funding agencies are active researchers and scientists. The percentage of them who are has been diminishing over the last decade, and that's a concern.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you. I'm sorry I have to interrupt. I did have another question for Mr. Murphy.

In your presentation, you mentioned the importance of setting up a national investment fund for new and existing co-operatives to help them in their operations, their development and their establishment. This is a topic that interests me a great deal. I am from the Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier riding where there are an enormous number of co-operatives.

Could you please talk a little more about this fund? What do you expect from the government to help you in your undertakings?

[Shawn Murphy]

As I explained, within the co-operative sector, we have known for several years now that obtaining funds for the development of new co-operatives or smaller co-operatives was our responsibility. In other words, it was up to us to begin the process.

Today, we would like to begin this process, to create a fund and start establishing it. In an ideal world, we would like to develop a partnership with the federal government, which could come to our table and, in a perfect world, bring money and increase the fund. The idea would not be to provide money every year, but to start to put money in the fund.

For example, in northern Canada, there is a fund. They started 15 years ago with $2 million. Today, the fund is up to $10 million or $13 million. This was—

one shot and that was it.

After the start, things went well. The fund made headway and grew.

That is what we would like to do, but at a national level.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Okay, thank you very much.

How much time do I have left?

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Scott Brison]

You're out of time.