Finance Committee on April 17th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Mr. Matte, do you want to give a quick answer?

[Jean-Maurice Matte]

Municipalities must feel that the federal government supports their work. This is not even a matter of setting aside additional funding, but, perhaps only of adapting already existing programs.

Earlier, I mentioned the gas tax. The gas tax must be expanded to make it possible to carry out community-based projects. We've also talked about programs for students. Perhaps we will have less need of students working in the tourist industry this summer, but we may need them to carry out municipal or agricultural work.

So the existing programs must be modified and adapted to the crisis to help cities contribute to the stimulus.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you for that.

I'll go to a single question from Mr. Poilievre and then the last question will be from Peter.

Go ahead, Pierre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Thanks very much, Chairman.

The question is for the representative from the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. Can you expound more on the cost and harm the carbon tax will cause for farm families? Furthermore, the government keeps talking about all these green jobs the carbon tax is creating. Have your members experienced increased job creation or wealth creation on the farm as a result of the carbon tax?

[Mary Robinson]

Thank you for the question, Mr. Poilievre.

Carbon tax implications on farm are just simply whittling away our bottom line. We are a price-taking part of the economy. We don't have any opportunity to get paid more or pass the costs on that we face. APAS has done some wonderful number crunching. We can get that report to you to help you understand, on a grain farm, what the implications are.

As far as increased job creation is concerned, I certainly haven't had any of our members tell me that they have seen increased job creation on their farms due to the carbon tax.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Mr. Fragiskatos, you'll wrap it up.

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

I'm happy to wrap it up, Mr. Chair.

The question is for Mr. Nighbor. Mr Nighbor, how many workers are registered in forestry under the supplemental unemployment benefit in Canada? Would you have even a rough estimate? On that, are you working with other sectors? I know the SUB is particularly important in the auto sector. That's the first thing.

I have a quick last question. You mentioned in your presentation the fact that there are, and I'm quoting you here, “hundreds of...shovel-ready projects, ready to go”. Could you go into the spinoff effects that come from forestry and how important of a multiplier that sector is?

[Derek Nighbor]

On the SUB, I'll get back to you next week. The auto piece I hadn't thought about, so I'll check first with our members in Unifor and the steelworkers, and then I can maybe check in with Flavio or somebody in auto and get a better read. I'll be back to you next week and I'll be happy to share that with the clerk as well.

We have a lot of projects. Our focus in working with our members is on things that are going to drive environmental performance and economic growth, so we're looking at air, water, effluent and then a lot of other innovations. If we can convert some of our paper mills, as that category declines, into other products, that might be more in the bioeconomy space.

There is a lot of transformation that continues to happen. In the last significant downturn, there was a massive billion-dollar black liquor program—some of you might remember—that provided a lot of stimulus to a lot of our pulp mills. We'd like to see a broader stimulus package that's going to support our sector and allow more people to participate.

In the case of that stimulus, it was very narrow. I think if we broadened it to innovation, environmental benefit and economic opportunity, that's going to allow us to not only modernize and build for the future of our sector, but also to create those spinoff jobs through construction and to support local communities.

Based on where we operate, we're mainly in northern and rural communities, so we're already thinking about what our role and responsibility is, as a sector, to be part of Canada's recovery coming out of COVID. We hope to be a big player in the north and in rural communities.

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

Great. I asked the question because of the spinoff effects and they seem to be very significant indeed. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

On behalf of the committee, I thank all of the witnesses for their presentations. Send us the extra material that a few folks were asked for. Thank you for your suggestions and also your constructive criticism. We appreciate that. This is a moving target. Certainly the government has shown a lot of willingness to modify programs after they come out to ensure that we're doing the best we can for Canadians who face difficulties as a result of COVID-19. Your suggestions are very welcome.

For the committee, I suggested this earlier. We are going to have to find some way to hold a steering committee next week if we can, but I'd suggest, from the list of panels and themes that we talked about previously, that we need a general session where each party sends in their priorities for witnesses. I can think of three already for that general session. The Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities really wanted to be here today. As well, I'd suggest the Canadian Cattlemen's Association and the Food Processors of Canada, and then three or four more.

I would suggest that be the first panel next Thursday. The second one would be workers, students and the unemployed. The first panel on Friday would be municipalities, provinces and territories, and the final panel would be the manufacturing sector. People may have differences of opinion there. I don't know.

Are we in agreement on that or do you have something else to suggest?

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

I would suggest that we need to hear from the hospitality industry. It's very harshly affected. Many of these businesses—hotels across the country, convention centres, restaurants—won't be able to apply for the wage subsidy simply because governments have shut them down because of the proximity issues and the crowding.

This is a sector we haven't heard from yet. I think we need to get them on as soon as possible. I would suggest, even before a general session, we at least get representatives from the hotel industry and other aspects of the hospitality industry to talk about what's going on with them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I don't have a problem with that. We had some of them on last week: the tourism association, the hotel association. I am hearing a fair bit from the tourism sector, the smaller hotels.

Does anybody have a problem with, say, switching out municipalities, provinces and territories for next week and going with the hospitality industry?

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

I like that idea. I think it's a good one. I hear a lot about it as well—airlines, travel.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

We absolutely need to have the municipalities next week—of that I have absolutely no doubt. I'm not opposed to having the hospitality industry back a second time, but the municipalities are at a critical stage. Some of them are talking about bankruptcy. Having them is extremely important.

If we're having that general theme, the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami and the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, both wanted to be on the indigenous panel and weren't able to attend. I think those two organizations need to be part of the general panel. Municipalities absolutely need to be a part. Labour and students, of course, we've had a lot of requests for people to come on.

If we want to meld manufacturing with hospitality or even add an additional panel, I have no objections. I wouldn't want to displace any of what you've laid out already.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay.

If I could just come in for a second, I think the manufacturing sector is probably more long term. It won't matter if it's the next week, because it's on how we kick-start that sector as we start to come out of this. We can put them on the next week and go with....

Go ahead, Pierre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

I think we need to hear from owner-operator businesses that don't have a payroll.

Mr. Généreux said a great deal about it. There are a number of companies that are not paying wages because they are small companies that are starting up and need to keep all their money. They are not eligible for the wage subsidy or to the emergency fund because those two programs require businesses to have provided wages over the past few months. That is a major shortcoming of the programs announced by the government. We really want to hear from those business owners because they are the ones going through a crisis right now.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you very much for bringing that up, Mr. Poilievre. That also concerns agricultural businesses. I remind you that cooperatives are not paying wages and that they are not eligible for the $40,000 loan. That is a very important issue.

Also, when committees invite association representatives—and I do have some experience here—it is always pleasant, but the issue is that they talk in very general terms. This week, I submitted names of Quebec's regional tourist associations. I also submitted names of owners of small hotels of 200 or 300 rooms and other even smaller hotels. Instead of inviting association representatives, it would be a good idea to invite witnesses who are personally experiencing the crisis. Associations are not experiencing the crisis, but rather their members. So it would be important for us to talk directly with members to find out how things are going in their own business.

By the way, I am a business owner myself, and I will have to invest $250,000 in my company, not to develop it, but to save it. Yet tourist industry people are going through exactly the same thing, and it is probably even worse, as that industry will not restart or will nearly not restart this summer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I guess the difficulty we have—and I'm willing to hear from others—is that we can't do everything next week. There will be hearings the week after that.

Who is it most urgent to hear from now so that suggestions can be made to the system to try to improve on the programs that are out there? I know there's a willingness to do that—

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Sorry to interrupt, Mr. Chair, but entrepreneurs and businessmen who do not have the ability to have the $40,000 have to be on the committee right away, next week. That's the priority.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay, I hear you. We're talking about owner-operators in that case.

Does anybody else want to add anything?

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

Mr. Chair, I was just going to agree with Mr. Morantz that hospitality is important. Although we've heard from hotels, we have not heard from restaurants. I've been in touch with many in the constituency, owner-operators who are getting access to the Canada emergency business account. That is working for them, and the Canada emergency response benefit is helping their employees.

Although I know we can always hear from them—and some gaps surely remain—we have not heard from restaurants, so I think that would be of benefit to the committee.

To your point, Wayne—the one you just made—we had an existing schedule. I don't want to see municipalities bumped. Hearing from hospitality next week and putting municipalities off to the following week is fine, but I'm a bit concerned that the more the discussion continues, the more we deviate from the existing set of meetings that we had agreed to—that the full members of the committee had agreed to.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Can we go with the hospitality industry and include the restaurants in that?

Whatever we do here, we need the witness lists prioritized by each party and delivered to the clerk by Sunday night at six o'clock at the latest, so that he can start making calls on Monday. If we were to agree on the hospitality industry; municipalities, provinces and territories; and owner-operators, the entrepreneurs out there, that would cover a lot of industries. Then, maybe we could draw from the general list for those who have fallen through the cracks.

The general list will open up—

I see Peter putting his hand in the air. Go ahead, Peter.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I mean, we could have a steering committee on Monday morning to work through this, but I think the municipalities, the issues you raised about the unionized workers and students—those are sections that, as Peter mentioned, we had already agreed to. I think we need to catch up on some of these organizations that, as you say, have fallen through the cracks, and manufacturing as well. For these two new elements, we either add them in and do six panels, which I'm open to, or we put off to next week the ones that are new.

The ones that are new are good suggestions. I think the block of four that you suggested makes a lot of sense. That allows us to also be thinking ahead to next week, to the next group of witnesses and the next panel.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay. Are we all on side on the...?

We did hear from the hotel industry, but we certainly haven't heard from the restaurant industry, which also ties in with tourism. I know that. That would be the hospitality industry. Are we going to go with that as number one? Are we okay on that one?

[An hon. member]

Yes.