Finance Committee on May 6th, 2019

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Now we'll move over to Mr Poilievre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Do you have LICO statistics from the year 2005 until the year 2015?

[Karen Hall]

I'm afraid that I don't have those easily with me at the moment.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

They would show you the biggest drop in poverty in Canadian history under any government since the LICO was collected. They also show a significant drop in child poverty, which not only happened under the Conservative government, but also happened uniquely in the OECD during the great global recession. UNICEF literally singled out Canada and said, “What the hell is going on over there? Poverty is dropping among children in the middle of a great global recession.”

What I take some satisfaction in is that the Liberals, who so strongly opposed giving money to parents because they worried, in their words, that all the money would be blown on beer and popcorn—

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

I didn't say that.

[Kim Rudd]

I didn't say that.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

—the Liberal Party spokesman for the Prime Minister's Office at the time said that.

The Liberals came around to our view that giving money directly to parents would actually work in reducing poverty, so they adopted our policy and took it further.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Made it better.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You know, we always welcome that kind of plagiarism. They thought our policies were so good that they wanted to do even more of them, and we're glad they did because it's the right approach. I think the debate is over now between the previous Liberal approach, which was to pump money into bureaucratic systems in favour of one day building up a government-run day care program, and a policy of giving money to parents because we trust that they actually know what to do with their own kids. That has definitely been a success.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Is there a question here?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Now I wish that the market basket measurement went back to 2005. I think that it came into place in 2006, if I'm not mistaken. Is that right?

[Karen Hall]

I thought that it was 2002, but I can confirm that for the committee.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Okay, if you wouldn't mind, I would like to have a look at the numbers on that. I know that if you look at LICO, which is the longest-standing consistently available measurement of poverty in Canada, you can see a historic drop under the previous government to record low levels despite great global economic difficulties.

My final question, though, is this: Can we just get a confirmation that you will be sending a list of all the items that are currently in the market basket so that we can examine that list?

[Karen Hall]

What I will undertake to do is contact my colleagues at Statistics Canada to find the most complete publication they have available, which would include the methodology for the market basket measure. We will arrange to have that provided to the committee.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Okay, but just wait a second here. Are we going to get the list, though? I didn't understand that answer. You said that you were going to get the most complete list that's available. I presume there would have to have been a complete list available for the measurement to actually be conducted, so there must be a complete list.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I understood that to be the case, Pierre, that Statistics Canada would have the complete list available in its publication, and that will be provided to the clerk.

[Karen Hall]

Exactly.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Excellent. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

You can provide that to the clerk, Madam Hall.

Are there any further questions? Is there no further debate? No Canada child benefit or anything like that?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

No, that debate is over. We won.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay. We'll move on then from division 20.

Thank you, Madam Hall and Mr. Vaillancourt.

We will turn to the Veterans Well-being Act, with Ms. Elizabeth Douglas, director general with VAC.

[Elizabeth Douglas, Director General, Service Delivery and Program Management, Department of Veterans Affairs]

Good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to be here.

On April 1, 2018, the education and training benefit was introduced. The ETB is a taxable benefit that provides up to $40,960 in funding for veterans with at least six years, or 2,191 authorized paid days, of Canadian Armed Forces service, and up to $81,920 for veterans with at least 12 years, or 4,382 authorized paid days, of CAF service. This covers tuition, fees, supplies and some incidental and living expenses for participants when they are attending school.

Currently, the ETB is not available to supplementary reserve members; however, due to a lack of educational and training opportunities for veterans who are supplementary reserve members, VAC will expand access to the ETB for these persons. This approach will help to ensure that veterans who are supplementary reserve members do not have to choose between remaining as part of the supplementary reserve or receiving the education and training benefit. Expansion of the ETB to supplementary reserve members will be implemented on July 5, 2019.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

We're open for questions. Are there any questions from anyone?

How many people do you anticipate this to be? You might have said it. I didn't catch it.

[Elizabeth Douglas]

Currently, we've received 4,540 applications. We have approved 2,353 of those applications.

In terms of the number of supplementary reservists, we really don't know how many are going to come in. This is a new program area for us, but the number of supplementary reservists was calculated in our forecasts because they have given a release date.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

With reservists, though, is there any difficulty for them in coming up with the hours needed to qualify? I think you need to get a number of hours or days to qualify.