Finance Committee on Feb. 16th, 2016

[Dr. Monika Dutt]

I am, yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Turning to the Canadian Community Economic Development Network, we have Mr. Toye.

[Michael Toye, Executive Director, Canadian Community Economic Development Network]

Thank you very much.

Thank you for the opportunity to present to you today.

The Canadian Community Economic Development Network, or CCEDNet, is a Canada-wide association of community groups, cooperatives, credit unions, municipalities, foundations and citizens committed to enhancing the social, economic and environmental conditions in communities throughout the country. We have several hundred members spread across every region of the country, including urban, rural, northern and aboriginal communities.

Community economic development is citizen-led action to enhance the social and economic conditions of communities on an integrated and inclusive basis. It reduces poverty, unemployment, and social disadvantage by building assets and creating opportunities. What distinguishes CED is its understanding of the interconnectedness of social, economic, and environmental issues, and a philosophy that the solutions that tend to be most effective to the complex problems that communities face are those that involve and are driven by the people most directly affected.

Community leaders understand that the complex challenges they face require multi-faceted responses. Recent trends in social economy, social finance, and community resiliency, all reflect that, expanding the scope of innovative community-based practices tremendously, with examples ranging from new community crowdfunding strategies to impact investing, Quebec's recent law on the social economy to the UN task force on the social and solidarity economy.

Our recommendations focus on how the government can implement the measures it has already committed to undertaking in the election and in the ministerial mandate letters, and ways that will maximize their success and value for communities.

First of all, the government will be making significant infrastructure investments, including much-needed social infrastructure. Building on the report exploring the potential of social finance in Canada under the leadership of Mr. McColeman this spring, the HUMA committee's report recommended that infrastructure investments include a social finance fund and a social infrastructure grant program that could leverage private investment and provide matching capital for durable social infrastructure projects, such as the proposed Canadian co-operative investment fund. Those investments also include a social impact scoring component on all infrastructure contracts and recipients, and that they include community benefit agreements similar to the provision enacted in Ontario's Bill 6 last year.

As part of Canada's climate change strategy, community renewable energy offers excellent local investment opportunities and tangible socio-economic impacts. While contributing to the transition to a low-carbon economy, community-based projects inspire a new kind of social entrepreneurship, building strong social licence for clean technologies and empowering local citizens, especially indigenous peoples, with the opportunity to reinvest clean energy project returns into local infrastructure, health, and education.

We recommend that new infrastructure investment include criteria that prioritize funding for clean energy projects for communities vulnerable to climate change and that financing is made available and affordable to communities and project developers through the Canadian infrastructure bank, including federal loan guarantees to support private investment.

Community enterprises operated by non-profits, co-ops, and microenterprises, established by or dedicated to supporting marginalized individuals in communities, create wealth and respond to the needs of rural and urban communities. Contrary to popular misconceptions, community enterprises have a higher survival rate than traditional SMEs, while offering a positive financial and social return on investment.

We recommend that social enterprises, non-profits, and co-operatives be given access to existing regulatory and tax measures and business development programs that are currently available to small and medium enterprises through awareness-raising efforts for government officials to ensure a level playing field for alternative forms of incorporation.

Finally, all of these recommendations will be most successful if they're implemented with a partnership approach. A round table bringing together representatives from the CED community and government would facilitate the ongoing co-construction and refinement of public policy in support of communities. This would provide access for meaningfully involving the CED sector in the development, and regular review of government initiatives to ensure they meet our shared public policy objectives.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you very much, Mr. Toye.

We now have the Canadian Construction Association, with Mr. Bill Ferreira.

[Bill Ferreira, Vice-President, Government Relations and Public Affairs, Canadian Construction Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, committee members, for providing the Canadian Construction Association this opportunity to present before you.

Our association represents the non-residential side of the construction industry. I believe you heard this morning or sometime this afternoon from the Canadian Home Builders. They are basically our sister organization. We build the infrastructure, the industrial facilities, and the commercial government buildings across the country. We essentially build everything that they don't.

The focus of my presentation today will be on areas of government policy that we believe will make Canada more globally competitive and an attractive destination for investment for years to come. If indeed we are at the dawn of the fourth industrial revolution, as many economists now believe, the process of adaptation by both private industry and governments alike must begin immediately.

In essence, the new industrial revolution, built on digital connectivity, robotics, and big data, will significantly change the traditional definitions of work forever. Most of us are aware of the impact this revolution has already had on manufacturing. The next phase of it will target primarily services, the service economy, which is where the bulk of Canadians are now employed.

The shift is already under way in many parts of the world, but it's still in its infancy in Canada. The ramifications for government could be significant. Skilled workers, as well as capital, will become more mobile, making tax policy and quality-of-life conditions critical to their retention. A modern and efficient system of infrastructure—I bet you're wondering how I'd get that in—is one of the greatest contributors to quality of life, which is why we're so pleased with the government's commitment to essentially double the annual investment in infrastructure.

Furthermore, it's also an effective way of stimulating the economy, which is critically important right now. A recent study by the Centre for Spatial Economics concluded that, in the short term, GDP rises $1.43 for every dollar invested, 9.4 jobs are generated per every million dollars invested, and the return for government is about 44¢ for every dollar invested. From our perspective, that's a win-win, not only for Canadians and taxpayers but for governments alike.

Our recommendation to the committee would be to ensure that the government follows through with its platform commitment on infrastructure; ensure that the additional funding is available for the 2016 construction season, which is critical; ensure that the application process is simple, straightforward, and not loaded with a lot of additional red tape that will delay project approvals; and finally, work with the provinces and municipalities to ensure there's no confusion around the application process.

CCA members are also very concerned about the growth of “dead money”, as Mark Carney described it. I think this was raised earlier. Many businesses are holding off on making important investment decisions over concerns regarding the health of the global economy. That should come as no surprise, given the number of times businesses have heard economists talk about “green shoots” only to be later disappointed when they saw very little economic growth.

To help pull this money back into the economy, we believe that government should consider a more aggressive use of depreciation rates to help businesses essentially invest in their assets. Such a policy has been beneficial for the manufacturing sector. We saw this with the previous policy that increased depreciation rates to 50% straight-line. We think that has certainly helped manufacturing turn around. Even though the change has been made and now is on a declining balance, we certainly believe that this is something government should consider for other sectors of the economy.

In the United States, depreciation rates are far more generous than they are here in Canada. We believe that this explains some of the productivity gap between our two economies. Simply put, U.S. depreciation policy encourages companies to put more money quickly into turning over their equipment, whereas Canadian policy does not. For example, in the United States, construction equipment can be fully depreciated within six years, while in Canada it would take you about 13 years to get down to about 1%.

Closing the productivity gap is important for Canada's economic future, and the adoption of more aggressive depreciation rates is one way to help us achieve that goal. With this in mind, our second recommendation would be to adjust depreciation rates for mobile equipment purchases to a 50% declining balance, which would bring us in line with the current state, essentially, for fixed machinery and equipment.

But investments in infrastructure and better depreciation rates will only get us so far. We also need to improve our educational and training infrastructure. In this regard, this is where we believe the federal government has some real influence.

We believe the EI system should be looked at to help lead that process. The LMDA and LMA programs need to be steered away from training just for the sake of training, and geared instead to support employer labour force needs. For example our partner association in British Columbia, the B.C. Construction Association, developed a very successful program, funded by EI, to help unemployed workers who were EI ineligible to get into the workforce. Despite the strong record of success—they managed to transition about 15,000 trainees into long-term jobs in the construction industry—funding for the program has been decreased over the past two years by 50%. Clearly this is not the right direction. Government-funded training and retraining must be demand focused and should include private sector delivery partners in not just the educational community.

We applaud the previous government for its efforts in this regard, which brings me to my next recommendation. Build on the efforts of the previous government to reform EI and non-EI supported training programs by ensuring that employers are given a more meaningful and substantive voice, not only in the design but also in the delivery of training programs across Canada.

We believe government should take a look at the EI system to find a better way to support labour mobility. For many unemployed, expanding a job search outside their home labour market is very difficult because finances are tight. CCA supports a proposal that I believe has already been put forward by Canada's Building Trades Unions. I think they are appearing on Thursday and they'll probably expand on this. We would like to see a grant provided to the unemployed to help them offset some of the costs they will incur as a result of looking for work outside their home region. That's not to say they can go off and buy a $10,000 first-class ticket from Halifax to Vancouver. What we're talking about is a minimal amount of money that will help them offset costs that are not going to be reimbursed by any potential employer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I'll have to get you to sum up.

[Bill Ferreira]

I'm summing up.

That would be our recommendation, which would be to take a look at the EI system and consider the adoption of an EI mobility grant to offset job-related expenses that the unemployed might incur.

With that, I look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you very much.

I'll turn to a former colleague of mine, Mr. Marchi, with the Canadian Electricity Association. It's not often I see two former ministers at the witness table: Mr. Wilson and Mr. Marchi.

Go ahead.

[Sergio Marchi, President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Electricity Association]

It's reunion evening.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. It's also good to see Mike.

Thank you for the invitation to appear before the committee.

First, a few words on our association, the CEA remains the national voice and forum for the electricity sector across Canada. This year we celebrate our 125th anniversary. Our membership comprises generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity, as well as corporate partner members representing the full electricity supply chain. We also, as you know, have a very close relationship with the United States, owing to the integration of our north-south grid, where we enjoy an annual $3-billion electricity trade surplus. Electricity, in a word, is indispensable both to the quality of life of our fellow citizens and to the competitiveness of a healthy economy. As such, it should be seen as a strategic asset for our country.

Second, the electricity world is in a transformational period where two critical challenges, among others, are the need to renew core infrastructure to the tune of some $350 billion over 20 years and to address the exponential growth of cyber-attacks.

Third, electricity is Canada's clean energy solution. Over 80% of our emissions are already GHG-free, making us one of the cleanest communities in the world.

Fourth, besides helping to power Canada, we are also a leading economic driver, employing over 100,000 Canadians and contributing over $35.7 billion in GDP in 2014. In terms of our infrastructure rebuild, the Conference Board of Canada estimates that the resulting creation of indirect jobs will lead to another 100,000 jobs. In ReNew's annual top 100 infrastructure builds, electricity projects represent over one-third of the $161 billion in total investments.

Turning to our budget recommendations, Mr. Chairman, one recommendation calls for sustained federal leadership and support for clean energy infrastructure. Clearly, clean energy is the future, leading to economic, environmental, and social benefits, and the government's commitment to the Canada infrastructure bank, green bonds, and the low carbon economy trust are central. We expect that these new entities will also be open and accessible to members from our sector. In fact, we are working with responsible ministers to develop a focused framework for long-term transformational projects, which currently fall between the remit of regulators and government aspirations at both senior levels.

Another proposal addresses the serious threat of cyber-attacks, where the electricity grid is unfortunately a popular target. We are calling for the budget to clarify the funding envelope for both Public Safety Canada, and specifically the Canadian Cyber Incident Response Centre. The previous government, as you will know, made considerable financial commitments to both, and we believe that it is crucial, given the threat, that the current government honour these intentions.

Two of our recommendations call for renewed funding for NRCan's Office of Energy Efficiency and for its adaptation platform. Again, the core funding for both of these platforms expires after this year, and we would respectfully recommend that they be renewed, as they create sizable savings for Canadian families and industry and reduce overall emissions.

A fifth recommendation encourages the government to implement its campaign pledge to establish electric vehicle targets for its vehicle fleet in the federal government and to place charging stations in federal parking lots. The substance as well as the symbolism of such action, we believe, is key to changing consumer and societal behaviour when it comes to transport emissions, which are almost one-quarter of our carbon footprint.

Another proposes celebrating Canada's 150th birthday in energetic style—pardon the pun—through the announcement of 150 energy innovation projects throughout 2017. Innovation is central to everything that we do and to the economy at large, and I think that the impact of pooling the work of the federal government and its agencies to support these projects would be invaluable.

Our final proposal deals with an emerging grid security risk—namely, geomagnetic disturbances that can lead, and have led, to outages on our grid. The science is still evolving in this area, so we recommend that the budget seriously consider funding in this area to enhance our understanding of these potentially devastating impacts.

In closing, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, we believe our recommendations try to strike a balance between national concerns relating to the economy and the environment in an integrated fashion, support for infrastructure renewal, and enhancing the protection and reliability of our grid.

I thank you for your attention and look forward to any comments and advice after our witnesses have made their presentations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you very much, Mr. Marchi.

We'll turn now to Ms. St-Onge from the Fédération nationale des communications.

[Pascale St-Onge, Member, Tous Amis de Radio-Canada, Fédération nationale des communications]

On behalf of the Tous amis de Radio-Canada organization, I'd like to thank the committee for the opportunity to contribute to the discussion on funding for Canada's public broadcaster.

Established by the Syndicat des communications de Radio-Canada and supported by the CSN and the FNC, Tous amis de Radio-Canada is appearing before the committee as a member of Canadian civil society and as a spokesperson for its members.

During the recent election campaign, three issues of particular concern to us received a lot of attention. The first had to do with improving democratic practices to encourage citizen engagement beyond the simple act of voting. The second involved clear commitments with respect to Canada's economic recovery, with major investments in not just infrastructure but also culture being promised. And the third and final issue was about restoring the funding CBC/Radio-Canada had been deprived of in recent years, a pledge made by most of the candidates.

Our only national broadcaster and producer is at the heart of all three of those issues, and the budget should reflect that.

The media provide a conduit for effective democratic life, social cohesion and the reflection of Canadian diversity. We cannot turn a blind eye to the challenges facing the media industry in today's world: the growing number of broadcasting platforms, the overhaul of media companies, the dangerous drop in revenues and the increasingly precarious survival of a number of major industry players.

Against that backdrop, CBC/Radio-Canada ought to be a beacon safeguarding the presence and vitality of the fourth estate in every single region of the country, east to west, north to south, in English, in French and in the eight aboriginal languages.

In 2013-14, CBC/Radio-Canada received some $976 million from Parliament. Public funding represents 63% of CBC/Radio-Canada's operating revenue. But, between 1990-91 and 2013-14, the public broadcaster's parliamentary appropriations increased by just 0.5% in today's dollars, while government spending jumped by 74% and the consumer price index rose by 51%. Had those parliamentary appropriations simply been indexed annually, CBC/Radio-Canada would have received around $1.6 billion in 2013-14, a massive $547-million difference.

In addition, the local program improvement fund was eliminated, depriving CBC/Radio-Canada of another $33.1 million annually.

CBC/Radio-Canada's inadequate public funding forced the crown corporation to look to advertising revenue to make up for the shortfall. That approach has had what many would call negative consequences, as far as competing with the private sector is concerned, particularly on the type of programming the public broadcaster has to provide in order to bring in those advertising dollars. Ultimately, advertisers are increasingly turning to new platforms to pitch their products, gradually moving away from the traditional medium of television. And that is threatening not just CBC/Radio-Canada, but also private broadcasters.

In 2011, Canada ranked 16th out of 18 major western countries when it came to per capita funding for its public broadcaster. At $33 per capita, Canada's public broadcasting funding was 60% lower than the average, which stood at $82 per inhabitant. And now, after the most recent cutbacks, Canada contributes just $29 per capita to its public broadcaster.

It is our duty to build a wealth of high-quality cultural assets and intellectual property for both Canadians and people around the world. Despite the fact that the public broadcaster is supposed to be a model of technological innovation and quality content creation, the participation and endeavours of Canadian artists and craftspeople are unfortunately at risk. In 2008-09, CBC/Radio-Canada employed 8,368 people, and in 2014-15, the crown corporation had slashed its workforce to just 6,739 staff, representing a loss of more than 1,600 jobs, or 20%.

In 2013, Deloitte estimated CBC/Radio-Canada's gross value added contribution to the Canadian economy at $3.56 billion, arising from an expenditure of $1.69 billion with a spend-weighted multiplier of 2.11. Clearly, then, investments in public television generate huge economic spinoff.

Something else the government needs to think about is companies' use of our technological infrastructure to reach Canadian users without paying a cent in taxes or contributing to the system's funding. The numbers are impressive and could generate so much in levies that the government could finally provide adequate funding to its public broadcaster, not to mention the country's private broadcasters.

Until a real strategy is put in place to compel content broadcasters like Netflix to contribute their fair share, it is crucial that the public broadcaster be given the financial resources it needs to fulfill its mandate without being forced into direct competition with private television broadcasters when it comes to content and advertising dollars.

In our view, a $150-million reinvestment is the bare minimum that CBC/Radio-Canada needs to help make up for the financial decisions that have been imposed on the crown corporation for the past 20 years. Its capacity to enrich Canadian society depends on it.

Thank you.

I would be pleased to answer any questions you have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you very much, Ms. St-Onge.

The next presentation is a joint one between Phil Upshall, with the Mood Disorders Society of Canada, and the Mental Health Commission of Canada, with Michael Wilson.

I'm certain that as a former finance minister, if he were here all day, Mr. Wilson would be saying, “Where are you going to find all this money?”

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Go ahead, gentlemen.

[Phil Upshall, National Executive Director, Mood Disorders Society of Canada]

I'm Phil Upshall and I'm very happy to be here with you today.

Thank you, Chair, particularly for your intervention in allowing Mike to join me at the table.

Thank you very much to the clerk and all the members here who have been so generous in their time for us. I certainly appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today, and with Mike. Both of us have a deeply personal relationship with today's topic, which is, of course, mental health.

Louise Bradley, the CEO of the Mental Health Commission of Canada has joined us as well, should there be any technical questions to address to her. She's here to help.

I'll be addressing the issue of the APEC digital mental health hub at UBC, and the PTSD issues that confront Canadian health care providers. Mike will be discussing suicide prevention.

As far as our topic in general is concerned, it meets the terms of several of the mandate letters that have gone from the Prime Minister's office. We'll also be dealing with issues regarding innovation, the knowledge economy, and Canada's position internationally, particularly with regard to TPP and APEC.

I'm going to skip some of my stuff, because I'm told I'm long-winded, and our brief has a pretty good analysis of what Mood Disorders Society of Canada does, and how we show leadership with regard to patient-centred care and patient-engaged care.

The APEC digital hub for mental health innovation is an opportunity presented to Canada by virtue of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation having determined that without mental health, there was no health for 2.8 billion people, and furthermore, that the economies within the APEC region were significantly suffering from the fact that a lack of mental health was preventing people's full engagement with the workforce along with a number of other obvious issues.

The APEC competition was rather significant. The three of us—Mood Disorders of Canada, UBC and U of A—put together a letter of intent that was approved by APEC, and we now have a memorandum of understanding with them. Our competition was Peking University, University of Melbourne, Manila, Tokyo, Peru, and Mexico City. This opportunity to develop a digital hub at UBC is incredible. Our hub is poised to become a global centre for collaboration, research, and best practices in early intervention, care, and recovery. We are in the process of securing a number of additional partners, but as I mentioned, we already have twelve.

The hub is going to be formally recognized by APEC leaders in November. It was recognized when Prime Minister Trudeau was in Manila this past fall, and it was recognized as a major achievement by no less an authority than President Obama. Everyone recognizes that it's an opportunity to show ongoing Canadian leadership globally and here at home.

I'll leave that issue for now. I'm happy to answer any questions with regard to it.

I'm going to move to PTSD. Mood Disorders Society of Canada has been a leader in PTSD issues for the last several years. As you probably all know, 85% of first responders and veterans dealing with mental illnesses seek help from their primary health care providers, but more than half of them leave their doctor's office without effective solutions. Many of them don't even bother to seek help because they don't think there's any help available.

PTSD affects people involved in serious accidents, those who suffer serious sports injuries, and those who are victims of abuse. We need to ensure that front-line health care providers are equipped to make an accurate and early diagnosis with the best and latest treatments. Together, Mood Disorders Society of Canada and the Mental Health Commission are seeking $5.5 million over five years for a far-reaching training program for Canada's health care providers to help in the early diagnosis and treatment of PTSD. There are well over 600,000 primary health care providers.

As you will see in our brief, we will engage people with lived experience in our planning, and case studies and interventions will be customized for particular patient groups, including those living in Canada's rural, remote, and indigenous communities. We will collaborate to maximize uptake of our efforts, and we'll measure how we are doing. This is a low-cost highly effective solution to addressing the critical gap that currently impacts the uptake of existing complementary programs.

Over to you, Mike.

[Michael Wilson, Chair, Mental Health Commission of Canada]

Mr. Chairman and committee members, it's great to be back with you after many years.

Let me talk a bit about suicide prevention. Today, more than 10 people will die by suicide, and many more will attempt to do so. Suicide is a top ten cause of death in Canada and is devastating for the families and communities who are left behind.

But thankfully, suicide can be prevented and we all have a responsibility to make the investments that will save these lives. We're ready to deploy in 13 communities across Canada based on proven programs, both in Quebec and in Europe, that have demonstrated significant reductions in the suicide rate—as much as 20% over a two-year period.

Communities would be selected based on population size, region, urban-rural, and the presence of acutely at-risk populations, including military members and veterans, first nations, Inuit and Métis, youth, LBGTQ people, and middle-aged men. This is community led and developed to ensure sustainability. Community leaders, including first nations, Inuit and Métis, will be empowered to develop appropriate local interventions.

Individuals who are experiencing suicidal thoughts or behaviours may not seek help, but they may exhibit risk factors that show they are vulnerable. Our proposal targets the gatekeepers in the community who may be able to identify these risks earlier and connect the individual to appropriate treatment. Gatekeepers are people like us around this table and include teachers, religious leaders, home care workers, first responders, and anyone who works with members of the public, even yourselves. If we know the signs, we can help.

Health care providers will receive better training. Access to means of suicide will be identified and mitigated if possible. Public awareness campaigns will be undertaken that will reduce the stigma of mental health so that people feel able to come forward. Finally, a concentrated outreach will be targeted to the most at-risk groups.

To achieve this, we're recommending an investment of $40 million over a five-year period, and we could begin work as early as this April. We're poised to act quickly, thanks to existing stakeholder partnerships and international learnings, and this program meets a priority of the Prime Minister and demonstrates action to deliver a federal framework on suicide prevention.

As a former Minister of Finance, I certainly appreciate the challenges you're facing around this table in making the tough decisions for recommendations in advance of the budget, but we owe it to ourselves as a society to stand with the Prime Minister in his desire for combatting PTSD and suicide.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you very much, Mr. Wilson, Mr. Upshall, and all the witnesses.

We will turn to questioning. I would ask people to keep their questions as tight as possible.

Ms. O'Connell.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

My first question is for Dr. Dutt in regard to pharmacare.

With regard to pharmacare, it's something that I personally think we need to move towards, but the implementation of it is critical. I'm wondering if you or your organization have given much thought to the implementation of it. For example, one of the criticisms in the U.S. with regard to the current systems there is that the insurance companies negotiate the prices for the medications themselves, so doctors end up spending a lot of time fighting with insurance companies to cover other brands, or let's say, the non-generic brands.

Has your organization given much thought to creating that protection so that if a physician prescribes a certain medication, the patient can actually get it, versus just whatever is negotiated at the onset?

[Dr. Monika Dutt]

It's one of the main reasons we talk about it being a comprehensive drug coverage plan. Bulk buying is one piece of it, but the other piece is the evidence and forum decision-making, which is to say, putting together the national formulary or the national list of selected medications that would be part of the national pharmacare. There are various models that have been put together to do something like that.

For example, in B.C. there is the therapeutics initiative where they use evidence to decide which medications are the ones that make the most sense to be included in some kind of program, or for physicians to be prescribing. You need that aspect to decide which medications should be a part of the plan. It's not the insurance companies that should be making that decision. One option could be to have a body that would both administer pharmacare and make those types of decisions, taking into account the evidence that does exist.

There are various models out there. There was a recent proposal called Pharmacare 2020 and there's something in there that talks about the type of body that would make that type of decision. I agree, it shouldn't be the insurance companies making those decisions. It should be an evidence-informed body that would make those decisions and also take things like cost into account.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Great. Thank you.

I'm glad that's been thought about.

I hear criticism for moving towards pharmacare from some of the pharmaceutical companies themselves. I don't know if I believe this, or how widely spread this is believed, but the position has been brought forward to me that pharmaceutical companies need certain countries to pay more because it funds their research and development.

I'm not so sure that this is the case. I believe that if everybody had access to medication it would actually create a larger market.

Has your organization thought about this at all? Is this something that has been raised, or is it just a minor issue that has not really been brought forward in this country?

[Dr. Monika Dutt]

It's definitely something that needs to be considered.

First of all, it's natural that pharmaceutical companies may argue against pharmacare because they do make a lot of money from Canada. We pay far more for our medication than any other country that has a universal health care system. It's definitely to their advantage for us to continue like this because we pay more for medication than most other countries that have universal health care.

The argument around research has definitely also been looked at. We don't have any higher levels of research than other places that have a pharmacare program. There's not a clear link to show that if we switch to a pharmacare program we would have less research, because there's a great deal of research that happens in countries that have national pharmacare, or something similar, as compared with Canada. That argument that there's less research in places that have a national program hasn't really been shown to be true.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you very much. That was helpful.

Mr. Ferreira, I have a municipal background and one of the issues we had with the building Canada fund was that the application process created a fury of business and tenders for municipalities, which resulted in increased costs, and—I would assume for the construction industry as well—then created an unpredictable season of construction.

Would you favour a more stable system? Maybe your individual contractors might have.... The fees would be level, but they'd have a more consistent construction season, for example, and not just funding when the applications come forward in these one-off situations.

[Bill Ferreira]

I think our preference would be for a long-term infrastructure plan to try and eliminate the peaks and valleys in the construction industry. This is what we've been arguing for.

The reason we are hoping that the money will find its way out in 2016 is that there are some areas of the country that could really use the additional stimulus. I think the minister is looking at those areas and that the approach is going to be a reasonable one, from all the signs that we've received so far.

We believe that the country needs investments in infrastructure. One of the things that we recently did with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities was to take a look at the assets of municipalities across the country. What we found is that there's a significant amount of underinvestment going on, in part because municipalities just don't have the funding.

Our hope would be that, certainly in the short term, we could see some of that money going to help municipalities address deferred maintenance, because we think that's also a priority. That would be my response.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Mr. Albas.