Evidence of meeting #173 for Finance in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was research.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:25 a.m.
Whitby, Lib.
Mr. Prowten, I have a gentleman in my riding who is 81 years old. He has juvenile diabetes. It obviously does not end at the age of 18. Can you expand on the impact of the clawback on families?
11:30 a.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Canada
Yes. Thanks for clarifying. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation is almost misnamed, because it's a 40-year-old organization and it's a disease that affects people of all ages.
The clawback is incredibly detrimental to people. It would be like taking your RSP. That's the best analogy I could give. It's sort of taking back money that you had put in to save for your future, but in this case you've put money away to save for your extraordinary health care costs. A clawback is going to basically rip out savings that you've had in place, in many cases just to survive. These are expensive diseases.
11:30 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Thank you, all.
Just to follow up with Mr. Miller, is the agricultural land that Transport Canada has now sitting idle? Is it growing weeds, or is it leased out to farmers?
11:30 a.m.
Head of Research, Land Over Landings Inc.
Once Ontario decided not to support the project, in September 1975, Transport Canada started leasing the properties, residential and farmlands, on annual one-year leases. Basically, with that short of a planning horizon, the lands went into cash crop.
11:30 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
I'm a farmer myself. You certainly couldn't plan in one-year cycles.
Okay. That's good information.
Ms. Alleslev, you have five minutes.
11:30 a.m.
Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, CPC
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much for your presentations.
Mr. Greenley, there are those who would argue against a space strategy because they say it's a luxury for rich countries that we don't necessarily have. Yet we need it for our competitiveness. It's a national strategic asset that was identified as a key industrial capability generating $5.5 billion in revenue, 10,000 direct jobs, 22,000 indirect jobs and $2.3 billion in contribution to GDP.
While the exploration of outer space with AI and the next generation of Canadarm is a very romantic notion, could you give us an idea of the other elements of the space strategy that are maybe a little more down-to-earth, such as mid-earth orbit, low-earth orbit, RADARSAT, both military and civilian, so we can fully appreciate that this is not an outer space notion? It's actual command and control communications. Canada has been a world leader and is now at risk of not being a world leader.
11:30 a.m.
President, MDA Space Missions Group
The first thing to talk about is space exploration and the number of jobs and stuff that come from that, which is all factually correct. Those jobs are very high-quality positions in the country in terms of the economic base. The expansion of artificial intelligence and robotics in space generates, in the companies that are involved in it, approximately 70%, in our examples, of STEM jobs: science, technology, engineering and math-based jobs. It's a very high-quality sector in terms of participation in the economy, even though the application is in space. The spinoffs of that work have affected medicine and advanced manufacturing, so far in our 30 years of experience.
When Canada chose to be the third country in space, it established this sector and has benefited greatly, both in the jobs that participated in space and the spinoff benefits, even from things like AI and robotics.
Beyond AI and robotics, the sector that we call space exploration includes rovers—advanced vehicle design and manufacturing for rovers on the moon and Mars. Canada has been on Mars for 14 years now. In addition, there is medicine. We're now getting into remote monitoring of astronauts on the moon and Mars. Telemedicine means being able to put sensors on astronauts to monitor and diagnose their health, and have new forms of medical treatment and coaching from 400,000 kilometres away. Obviously, the spinoffs in telemedicine for rural communities on earth will be extraordinary as a result.
11:35 a.m.
President, MDA Space Missions Group
The next two areas will be satellite communications and earth observation.
Canada established itself as a leader in satellite communications in the 1960s. It was the first country to have a domestic communications satellite, the first country to have direct-to-home TV broadband from space, and the first country to have two-way Internet access across the country, in 2004. Canada was also one of the first countries to have earth observation, where we use radar-based satellites to monitor the climate, ice, agriculture, natural disasters, transportation, maritime traffic and the like.
We have studied all these benefits, and we have calculated that each individual Canadian interacts with space-based data or space-based benefits about 20 to 30 times a day.
11:35 a.m.
Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, CPC
What happens without a space strategy? We had one 25 years ago and now we're at the end of that ramp. If we don't have one now, are we at the leading edge or are we at risk of losing it?
11:35 a.m.
President, MDA Space Missions Group
Yes. Your own consultant said that Canada is currently bleeding off the edge of a strategy that is over 20 years old. There is no doubt now.... When we started this in Canada, we were the third country in space and one of the six countries in the current space station, having our space agency a few decades ago. Now, we have 50 countries with domestic satellite programs, and 72 countries with space agencies. They all want in. The countries with ambition and budget are going to get the industrial base and the jobs that go with that, in addition to the economic benefits of space. Canada's industrial base, which has been established for over 50 years as world-leading, would have to find its way to countries that do have space programs and budgets if we don't continue our leadership position.
11:35 a.m.
Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, CPC
Right now, there's a chance that other countries would buy from us. If we miss the window, they will develop their own capability.
11:35 a.m.
President, MDA Space Missions Group
That's already occurring. As a representative of Canada's largest space company, in terms of the corporation that I run, I'm already seeing us set up in other countries where there are greater space ambitions and budgets. We're very committed in Canada. We want to see it hold its leading position. But it needs to do so, and the next 12 months are a critical time. This next budget is critical.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks, everyone, for your presentations.
I'll start with the Eastern Ontario Wardens' Caucus. I'd like you to bring me up to speed on something. Our government put in place what was called the connect to innovate program. Has the EOWC participated in that program and made applications?
11:35 a.m.
Chief Administrative Officer, Eastern Ontario Wardens' Caucus
We did not. It was directed more at the telecom companies, generally speaking.
We had one announcement in our region. Xplornet partnered with the federal government under CTI to extend a portion of the fibre in their networks, which was very positive for us. We weren't part of it.
We supported every company that made an application to the CTI project in eastern Ontario, but EORN itself did not make an application. We're very supportive of the companies that did.
We had one announcement in our region recently, by MP Bossio. It was not too long ago.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
I can fully understand on two levels how, when you're in an urban or semi-urban setting and you drive 15 minutes, the change in coverage is drastic. The riding I represent, in Vaughan, has great coverage, but if you go up to East Gwillimbury and up near Lake Simcoe—which is still considered York region—the coverage and Internet speed change. To add to that, I grew up in northern British Columbia, in Prince Rupert, and up until now it did not have the fastest Internet speed. I can support that.
Has there been a joint request made to both the provincial and federal governments for funding?
11:35 a.m.
Chief Administrative Officer, Eastern Ontario Wardens' Caucus
Yes. A year ago in May, we submitted our business case to both levels of government, both Canada and Ontario. I'm pleased to say that the Province of Ontario is supporting us with a $71-million commitment.
Like our last project, this is a perfect opportunity for all three levels of government and the private sector to get together and do something very special in terms of mobile broadband connectivity.
I should say that under the CTI program, EORN itself wasn't eligible to apply. We supported other companies that were.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
Did you say the application to the federal government was made last year?
11:35 a.m.
Chief Administrative Officer, Eastern Ontario Wardens' Caucus
Yes. A year ago in May, we made it to the Minister of Infrastructure federally and to the Minister of Infrastructure in Ontario.
11:35 a.m.
Liberal
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
Thank you very much.
In today's world, anywhere in the world, having access to the Internet is crucial for anyone's business success, and even just for information. It's like what the telephone became.
Moving on to MDA, I have a quick question. I don't think most Canadians think of space every day in their common language. They probably think of their house, their job, getting their kids to school and so forth.
MDA is a leader in Canada. You have operations in Richmond, Brampton—next to my riding—and obviously Montreal. What would be the biggest bang for our dollar—and when I say that, I mean the tax dollar—that we could put in place to help MDA and the related companies?
We have a great education system, and we're doing a lot of good things for fundamental research and the funding of our universities. This is obviously leading research, and we want to be involved. Could you list one or two things we could do that could produce long-term results, but also results in the near term?
11:40 a.m.
President, MDA Space Missions Group
The way we're working at the moment, Canada's contribution of artificial intelligence-based robotics on lunar gateway is the biggest bang for the buck. This is because of the positions it creates and the number of companies that are engaged. The last project, Canadarm, was around 500, and we would expect the same again. The jobs are expansive across the country.
In terms of the advancement of both artificial intelligence and robotics, on which a current study is being done by ISED, these are certainly areas that Canada wants to focus its expansion on. This is the leading edge of that stuff. It certainly drives that aspect of the economy.
In addition, this type of program and Canada's contribution are what gets Canada's astronaut missions in trades. Our previous investments have earned us 18 astronaut missions, the latest of which will go up this year. Our current astronauts, the latest two, don't have missions. Without these commitments, they won't get missions.
Those missions, and the programs around them, also massively engage our youth in their ambitions to enter into STEM education and the like. That's the “bang for the buck” side of it.
11:40 a.m.
Liberal
Francesco Sorbara Liberal Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON
I'm going to stop you, because I just want to follow up with one more question. I apologize for not getting to everyone this morning.
Regarding autism, as we were discussing earlier, in my city we have Shining Through, which has done amazing work for many years. Recently, Waves for Change raised about $300,000 for families that are impacted, and our government funded the Pacific Autism Family Network.
I read the brief on RWA and the connection to autism. It really behooves us to get a clear understanding of how things changed from funding to not funding because of a model change. Could you elaborate on that?
11:40 a.m.
Chair, Canadian Autism Spectrum Disorders Alliance
Phase 1 of RWA was actually funded in a previous budget ask, in 2014. We were encouraged to apply through the opportunities fund, and I think you're talking about the shift in the funding formula. There's been no shift in the model of Ready Willing and Able. It was a shift in the financial support moving toward phase 2.
The opportunities fund is an amazing project-based funding initiative, but it's also the only one right now that the federal government has available to support projects related to persons with disabilities in our country. Like most federal granting opportunities, it's often oversubscribed. Because it operates in every province and territory, and its accomplishments have been significant, we were well aware there was always the risk that the project wasn't the best fit for the opportunities fund. That became a reality.
What that means right now, as we move to the budget and request a phase 2 support for the long-term sustainability of this fund, is that it's not operating in five provinces in the country, and it has been significantly reduced in the remaining provinces. The work of RWA is continuing, but we're now at significant risk of silos that we broke down, and the accomplishments we made around accessible and inclusive labour markets are at risk right now. That's a concern to us as a project.