Evidence of meeting #171 for Finance in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was airports.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:05 p.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Those companies that have signed letters of intent, where are they located? Are they North American companies, or are they from other parts of the world?
12:05 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Maritime Launch Services Ltd.
One is in Canada; one is in the U.S.; one is in Israel; one is in Italy. I have one pending in the Netherlands, one in South Africa and another one in Canada. We're working with some firms that are building satellites as well. And there are a number in the U.S. So it is truly a global market as far as the satellite community goes. Even our original letters of intent are quite global already.
12:05 p.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
The letters of intent are over how many years? We're talking about an intention to launch satellites. Are we talking about five years ahead or 10 years ahead?
12:05 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Maritime Launch Services Ltd.
The only thing holding them up from signing a launch contract is me telling them when I'm going to launch. They are multi-launch. One in particular has an annual requirement; they want to do science missions. Another one bundles; they aggregate CubeSats. They are quite good in the market already. They have quite a history already. They even sell their launch capacity online, and they're ready to basically put us on their website and start selling space. As many as we can fly, they'll fill.
Our financial model is based on eight launches a year. We know we can achieve 12 launches a year without any major manufacturing changes with the Ukrainian company, so at this point basically one a month is what we would see to fully realize the project.
12:10 p.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
I have one more question.
Who are your competitors? Worldwide, how many of these private launch sites, spaceports, would be either in the final stages or operational?
12:10 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Maritime Launch Services Ltd.
There are none in our class. There is one commercial launch site, Rocket Lab. They have a 150-kilogram payload. They've launched twice—one launch was successful—and they're hoping to get going. But theirs is a baby rocket by comparison. They can't even get one of Telesat's satellites on board their rocket. It's a 500-kilogram satellite for the global broadband. Those small rockets can't even get one of those on board, whereas we can get five or six on board.
The others around the globe, whether it's India, the European Space Agency, China or Russia, are all government-founded. All the U.S. launch sites are government-founded. While there are 11 spaceports that are licensed in the U.S., the launch operators are much fewer. Virgin Orbit is close to going operational with tourism, but they're still a year or two away from doing small satellites of 200 kilograms.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Thank you, both.
I really liked your words, Mr. Matier. Transport Canada is “allowing” versus embracing. I think we have to get to that embracing, in terms of seizing the opportunity.
Mr. Fragiskatos, you have the last questions.
12:10 p.m.
London North Centre, Lib.
Thank you very much.
I want to go back to Mr. Hierlihy. When I asked if there are other things we could do as a government in terms of helping airports in the Atlantic region, you alluded to fees and excise taxes. Could you go into that a little more, the concerns you have around those two, or anything else you wanted to put on the table?
12:10 p.m.
Director, Finance and Administration, Saint John Airport, Atlantic Canada Airports Association
Just in terms of the—
12:10 p.m.
London North Centre, Lib.
Can you give specific examples of how they impact competitiveness?
12:10 p.m.
Director, Finance and Administration, Saint John Airport, Atlantic Canada Airports Association
It's just another cost that's passed on to the passenger. It's those high costs—compared to going to the U.S. to get a flight, for example. What I'm referring to when I say that is just everything that goes into a passenger ticket.
In terms of the other things we'd possibly look at.... You asked me a question about pilot shortage. I think that support for training in some aspect could also be beneficial.
12:10 p.m.
London North Centre, Lib.
Thanks very much.
I have one last quick question to Mr. Beerman.
You highlight that newcomer communities and indigenous communities face a particular risk when it comes to drowning. Could you go into why? Although it is in your brief, it struck me that we should put it on the record.
12:10 p.m.
Co-Chair, Canadian Drowning Prevention Coalition
I don't think we fully understand why. In the case of indigenous Canadians, many of them live in rural and northern communities. They have isolation and marginalization. They do not sign up for events and educational opportunities like many non-indigenous Canadians might.
I think one of the transformations of the work we're doing is to move drowning prevention to a public health model, where it's provided to everybody without barrier. As soon as you put a barrier of any kind—a bathing suit, money, or a requirement—then the people at greatest risk will actually be the people who will be excluded by those barriers. I think one of the pieces of work that we're trying to do is understand this better, find solutions from the communities that are most impacted and make those solutions barrierless.
12:10 p.m.
London North Centre, Lib.
With respect to newcomer communities, you said that many are coming over and not being.... It's an entirely new environment, obviously, where they are now near water, whereas in their country of origin they were not. This new experience, this new exposure, adds to that increased risk. Swimming is now perhaps a pastime, whereas in the past it wasn't even considered. It was a luxury that was unattainable.
12:10 p.m.
Co-Chair, Canadian Drowning Prevention Coalition
Yes, or there were beliefs or mythology around the catastrophic opportunity that is created by being close to and involved with water. Many newcomers to this country have not had an exposure to water, even though they may have lived in a location where water may be more abundant than it is here. They're in a custom where water is to be avoided because of the catastrophe that might occur.
12:15 p.m.
London North Centre, Lib.
Thank you very much. It's good to have that on the record.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Thanks, all of you. Are there any last points that any of you want to make—for instance, points that you might not have been asked about?
Mr. Bishop, go ahead.
12:15 p.m.
Vice-Chair, Atlantic Salmon Conservation Foundation
This is more about Mr. Fragiskatos's first question to Greg about the shortage of pilots and so on.
You mentioned that the presenters from Newfoundland could not get here. I came from Newfoundland, but I had to fly last night from St. John's to Montreal, and then from Montreal to Saint John, because my flight from Halifax to Saint John was cancelled by Air Canada at the last minute. I understand that this is a very common event here, and I have to believe that it has an impact on the economic development of this province in particular, and of P.E.I. as well, I'm sure.
12:15 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Thank you, everyone, for your presentations.
We have two weeks of hearings in Ottawa and two weeks on the road. When you look across the spectrum, it's absolutely wonderful to hear some of the ideas and the constructive criticism that comes up at many of these sessions. Thanks to each and every one of you for answering our questions.
I think there was some further information that was requested. Anybody who has that can send it to the clerk.
With that, lunch is at 12:30, and we'll do the tour after that.
Peter, go ahead.
12:15 p.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
We don't seem to have any public coming in for the second round of the public presentations.
12:15 p.m.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
What I would like the clerk to do, perhaps, is distribute the notices for the next three days to our offices so that we can get them out. I'm sure there are people who would want to come if they knew there was an availability. We have a half-hour window, and I'd hate it if in subsequent days we don't have people going to the mikes when they have the opportunity to do so.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
For the information of the witnesses here, we usually have an open mike session at the beginning of the meeting for those who didn't get a chance to be on as witnesses. They can make a one-minute statement at the mike, without questions. The same is supplied for audience remarks afterwards. That's what Peter is referring to.
With that, the meeting is adjourned.