Thank you.
Evidence of meeting #6 for Finance in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was research.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #6 for Finance in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was research.
A video is available from Parliament.
1:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
I'll have to cut you off, Mr. Blaikie.
We'll go to Mr. Cooper, and then over to Mr. Fraser.
1:40 p.m.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Great. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ms. Daenzer and Mr. Farrant, I'll direct my questions to you. You gave powerful testimony today. We certainly heard you. All the committee members of the justice committee heard you when you appeared in the last Parliament to tell your story about how jury service had forever changed your lives. It was very impactful. It resulted in I think a very important report, with 11 recommendations and unanimous all-party support around them.
I'm wondering if you could perhaps elaborate on the void that presently exists and how the Canadian Juries Commission would fill that void. When we talk about $20 million over 10 years, we're talking about a pittance. That's really a rounding error. Perhaps you could elaborate on how that funding would result in connecting former jurors with mental health supports.
Finally, I know you've done a lot of great work. Maybe you could also elaborate on all of those who have been involved in developing the commission.
1:40 p.m.
Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Juries Commission
Jury duty is the most important civic duty left in Canadian society, and it is the last mandatory civic duty left in Canadian society. When you receive a summons, you are bound by law to respond to it. We want Canadians to welcome the opportunity to serve their communities in court to deliver justice and not to want to shirk the responsibility or find ways to avoid it.
We believe that a national organization that represents the interests of those on jury duty and that can support jurors and promote jury duty to Canadians is missing from our country as it is now. Police associations and first responders and our veterans associations, which we have connected to through our work to raise the profile of mental health and PTSD, are wonderful organizations that work on behalf of their members to support them and to give them access to evidence-based treatment and the like, which jurors do not have access to.
That's a shame, because jury duty is not a vocation. It's not something for which there is training. It's not something that has personal and professional development or peer support, yet jurors are the most vulnerable to trauma, due to the evidence they see in court and the burden of jury duty and the decisions they are bound to reach as part of a verdict.
We're already working with fantastic organizations like the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Peer Support Canada and the Canadian Mental Health Association, and we met yesterday with the National Judicial Institute and we'll be partnering with them on programs for justices. They're approaching these from the judge and the justice side. We're bringing the voice of the juror to the table to provide those solutions and the like to train judges on their roles and responsibilities in the courtrooms.
Many judges actually have power to execute very cogent security programs for jurors in the courthouse. They just don't do it because they don't realize that it's necessary. When jurors are sitting in a case involving gang-related activity and are being stalked outside of the courtroom, or are going through the security in and out of the courthouse and passing witnesses who follow them to their cars, that isn't fiction. It's actually happening.
1:45 p.m.
Chief Financial Officer, Canadian Juries Commission
It's not just mental health support that jurors require. There is a lot of evidence. We've spoken to many jurors in regard to support in the workplace. Employees are not supported. Their bosses say, “Oh my God. Who is going to do your job?”
As many of you may know or may not know, the law requires an employer to hold someone's job but it doesn't necessarily require the employer to pay the employee, so you have employees who aren't getting paid or they're being asked to take a short-term leave, which gives them only a portion of their salary.
Jurors don't get paid in many jurisdictions. That varies right across the country. In Ontario, I believe it's 30 days before you get a nickel.
My husband was just summoned to court. The sheet says please show up on this date at this time, and don't forget that you're responsible for paying for your parking. That will be $24 a day. For senior citizens who are on fixed incomes, we shouldn't be requiring that from them. If you are asking them to appear, that is your responsibility.
You're laughing. This is not funny. Everyone in that courtroom, from the judge to the Crown to the prosecutor to the court clerk, to the prisoner who gets three square meals a day and a cot, gets paid. The jurors are asked to pay to get themselves there to perform jury duty every day.
1:45 p.m.
Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Juries Commission
And then you fulfill your civic duty and you don't have access to support.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Okay. We will have to end it there.
I just want to clarify, following what Mr. Cooper said, that the $20 million is over 10 years.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Okay. I didn't pick that up the first time. Thanks for that clarification. It's $2 million a year.
Next is Mr. Fraser, and then we will go back over to the official opposition.
1:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Thank you.
Although I don't necessarily have questions for the Canadian Juries Commission, I want to say that any laughter you heard was disbelief, not humour. That's remarkable. The notion that we're going to put people in harm's way in the name of the public interest without giving them the tools to be well on the back end is unconscionable to me. I want to thank you for your advocacy.
I'll begin with Egale. You mentioned that one recommendation you'd be hoping to see would be a $12-million contribution to community organizations. I tried to do a bit of quick math here, and if it were a population-based share, my home province of Nova Scotia would probably see about $350,000. I have two concerns. The first is figuring out why $12 million is the correct amount. The second is that I realize that in a lot of smaller communities, like some of those I represent, the organizations are made up of good-natured volunteers who see a need that's going unmet but have virtually no capacity to fill out sometimes complicated calls for proposals. They're lucky if they can sometimes find the volunteer hours to submit an application for the Canada summer jobs program.
Are there safeguards we can put in place to make sure there is enough funding and a simplified application process for these community organizations so that, regardless of their volunteer capacity or lack of paid positions, they're actually able to access funding that might be attributed to such an important cause?
1:45 p.m.
Executive Director, Egale Canada
Egale is a national organization and we do work in communities right across the country. We have partnerships with organizations in different jurisdictions. We deliver our programming in these jurisdictions around the country. The $12 million is a rough estimate. I'd be happy to ask for more, if you don't think it's enough. Certainly the $12 million is a start for Minister Chagger to fulfill her mandate as directed by the PMO. A lot of the funds can indeed be allocated to organizations like Egale and some of the smaller organizations in the rural communities who are doing basically the government's work.
We believe this money should be going to things like further research to identify what the gaps are so that we can look at policy review and policy change and service delivery to the LGBTQI2S populations in everybody's riding, in every jurisdiction across the country. This is a—
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Thank you so much. I have very limited time, and I want to ask a couple of other questions, if you don't mind.
To Mr. Lamy from Intact, you mentioned some of the challenges tied to climate change for the insurance sector, particularly flooding, flood mapping and the need to assist with the cost of relocation and devaluation of property. One comment you made jumped out at me, and that was the importance of better using grasslands and wetlands to mitigate the impact of climate change for your industry and more broadly for society. I'm curious to know whether you meant protection or restoration.
How can we best use grasslands and wetlands to reduce the cost of climate change for plan members and taxpayers?
1:50 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, Intact Financial Corporation
At the Intact climate change centre, we've proven that we could probably reduce flood damage by upwards of 40%. When there's a big event, the water needs to go somewhere. If there are enough wetlands and grasslands around the area where people live, that could mitigate the damage. It's a very good way to protect the population against flood damage.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Thank you.
To JDRF, thank you for your work. It's absolutely remarkable. I have two very quick questions.
I understand that there's a real problem sometimes when someone loses access to the disability tax credit. If they age out, for example, they lose access not just to the disability tax credit but also to the contributions that have been made to a registered disability savings plan. There was a fix that you suggested for the disability tax credit, around life-sustaining therapy automatically qualifying. Would that take care of both issues?
Part two of the question is about Diabetes 360°, which we heard about previously. You mentioned that it would save billions of dollars in downstream costs to the health care system. Do you have a breakdown of how those cost savings could accrue, which perhaps you could submit to the committee? I don't think we have time in this question to get to it now.
1:50 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
1:50 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, JDRF Canada
I'll work with our colleagues at Diabetes Canada on the Diabetes 360°. They've been the leads on that and we've been working collaboratively with them.
Yes, to my mind the fix on the DTC would solve the RDSP problem. In fact, in the previous budget the RDSP clawback was removed. That now needs to be enacted, though.
1:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
We have more folks on stream. If committee members have to leave, I think we can operate in the assurance that there will be no motions put in the next 10 minutes.
We have Mr. Morantz now, and then Mr. Fragiskatos to wrap it up.
February 6th, 2020 / 1:50 p.m.
Conservative
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Prowten, we had evidence the other day from the Disability Tax Fairness Alliance that the disability tax credit is used by less than 40% of Canadians who are eligible for it. It's well known that in the last Parliament, because of rules that were changed within CRA—I wasn't here then—there was a major battle, and the organization was right there fighting for clarification on the fact that successful applications for people with type 1 diabetes were substantially reduced because of the change in policy.
I understand that your organization has expressed concerns. It almost seems that the government is tripping over itself to make it more difficult for people to qualify for the tax credit. That one got clarified, but on the next one, I understand that your organization expressed concern in regard to the publication in the Canada Gazette last June in respect of the restriction of compensation for professionals who are providing services for people with disabilities who are trying to attain the credit. It would make it even more difficult for the 40% of the people who are already qualifying.
I see that as the next tsunami that your organization will probably be up to bat on, but I'm wondering if you could comment on that.
1:50 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, JDRF Canada
Actually, if they enacted that people who require insulin, which is a life-sustaining therapy, qualified for the disability tax credit, there should be no question. The nurse practitioners or the doctors.... For type 1 diabetics, it should actually be a very simple process. That's how I would view it. If they don't go to that point, what happens is that it is a back-and-forth with your doctor. You get rejected and you have to go back to your doctor, and there's no compensation for the completion of the forms.
You're right. That creates a problem. The simple solution is to just to let people with type 1 diabetes qualify for the disability tax credit—problem solved, in my mind.
1:50 p.m.
Conservative
Marty Morantz Conservative Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Yes. You did put in a correspondence to CRA last June and expressed specific concern about the compensation to professionals in this area. You said:
The effect of limiting compensation for disability...professionals as proposed in the June 1st edition...would be to make it impossible for many of these businesses to operate, leaving thousands of Canadians with disabilities to navigate a process on their own which many find confusing and difficult.
I wonder if you could elaborate on that thought.