Finance Committee on Feb. 6th, 2020

[Scott Ross]

If there is some relief being granted by virtue of the fact they're small businesses, the number that we reported earlier speak to what was actually accrued on those farms as carbon tax or carbon pricing implications. One way or the other, the costs are still significant and are causing significant financial challenges for farmers across the country.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you.

Ms. Ballantyne, you have recommended $1 billion a year from the federal government for national child care. What does that assume the provinces will contribute? Or is only the federal government going to be paying for the whole thing and it will be run by the provinces?

[Morna Ballantyne]

We assume that the provinces and territories would continue to contribute to the cost. We're asking for the federal government contribution to be $1 billion in this fiscal year and an additional $1 billion thereafter. If the provinces and territories continue to increase their contributions at their current rate, that would still bring us short in 10 years' time of 1% of GDP, the international benchmark.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

So the provinces—

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Sorry. I'll have to stop you there.

Mr. Poilievre for four minutes and then Mr. Fragiskatos.

We will have to wrap it up after that.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

My comments relate to those of Mr. Kiss.

I understand that he is currently in Palm Springs, California, but his business is in Alberta, a significantly colder place.

I'm originally from Alberta. I grew up in Calgary, and I just want to add to your observations about how desperate a situation it is out there. I think that some of the members of the committee might be surprised by some of the language they're hearing from business leaders in Alberta. It might sound dramatic, it might sound over the top, but it's actually real.

Alberta has been a generous, calm, kind contributor to Confederation. For as long as I have been alive, for the last 40 years, the province has contributed net about $650 billion to Confederation through taxes that are paid to the federal system and never returned to the province. On a per capita basis, that makes it the largest contributor.

In the last five years, the province has experienced a massive downturn, not because it's not getting enough money from the federal government but because the federal government is making it impossible for the province to sell its products at world prices. The irony is that Alberta is actually not looking for a handout. They're actually just looking for a bypass so they can build pipelines at the expense of private investors, at no cost to their fellow Canadians, in order to sell their products at world prices. Failure to allow that to happen has led 200,000 people to lose their jobs.

Over 20% of young men in rural Alberta are unemployed. Rural property crime has skyrocketed, because people are desperate enough to go onto farm properties and literally siphon fuel out of vehicles that are parked there. Delinquencies have skyrocketed. The commercial real estate vacancy rate in downtown Calgary is 25% to 30%. Those are Great Depression-level vacancy rates. It is astonishing. If you go to Kensington, which used to be a happening, hipster neighbourhood near the river in downtown Calgary, the Starbucks closed there. Starbucks doesn't close anywhere. Do you know what I mean? That is a place where people love to drink coffee. I don't think people in Ottawa on Parliament Hill realize how desperate the situation is getting. This is at a time when world oil prices are relatively high, where there's growing Asian demand for natural gas that we could supply from western Canada, but government policies are preventing it from going ahead.

I know we're supposed to just ask questions here, Mr. Chair, but having grown up in the province and having many friends and family who are suffering there right now, I just think people around Parliament Hill need to come to the realization of how desperate it is out there and how many people are suffering. You wonder why you're hearing this heated rhetoric. People are desperate, and they want someone in the government to get out of the way and allow people to rebuild their livelihoods. I hope and pray that this government will use the budget as an opportunity to do that, because the situation is going to get more and more desperate.

If the government thinks it's going to kill the Teck Frontier mine by simply imposing a bunch of unrealistic conditions, then approving it and letting the company pull away, just the like the government did with the TransCanada pipeline when they riddled it with impossible conditions, the company backed away, and then the government said, “Well, it's not our fault”—

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

It's the energy east pipeline.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Sorry, the energy east pipeline.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

We bought the Trans Mountain.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You bought it but you haven't yet built it. You put on a bunch of conditions that made it impossible for the thing to get built, and then TransCanada disappeared from the project. If you do that in the case of Teck, I think that the justifiable anger will shock people in the Government of Canada. I encourage them to change course on this.

Let Alberta be the comeback kid of Confederation. It can happen, it should happen and I want Mr. Kiss to comment on how we can make it happen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

You are out of time. Mr. Kiss, go ahead, but I do want you to understand that I know Alberta too. I spent a fair bit of time there. My first job was in Calgary. I understand what has been said, and a lot of people in the government understand as well. We know there are serious problems. It's one of the reasons we bought a pipeline, and it's being constructed now. So let's not let the rhetoric get too high here, but lay out your points, because we certainly want to hear them.

[Peter Kiss]

Mr. Chair, you may not remember this but you and I shared a lobster roll in September when my YPO Alberta forum group was out in your great province.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

That's true.

[Peter Kiss]

I had this in my presentation and I crossed it out because I felt it was, quite frankly, too shocking. I was with Petroleum Services Association. We were presenting to the Alberta government and I was in the environment minister's office. He told us that on the night of the federal election, three business owners in his riding committed suicide because they had lost hope. That's what we're up against and that's what's going on in Alberta.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you, and that's understandable when things get tough.

Mr. Fragiskatos, you have four minutes.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Like all members, I wish that we had more time here.

I want to ask Ms. Masotti and Ms. Sonea a question. In the Minister of Health's mandate letter, as I'm sure you know because you brought up pediatric cancer research today, it says, “make new investments in pediatric cancer research and develop a long-term plan to ensure sustainable funding”. There is no dollar figure assigned at this time.

Is there a dollar figure that you would suggest to the committee? I know if you put that question to organizations, sometimes they might ask for the maximum, but what works in your mind? It does talk about the need for sustainable funding. We have a real issue across the country. This has not been earmarked before by a federal government as a spending priority. There is a family in London in particular that has advocated very strongly on this. It is one of the reasons, among many others, that it did find its way into a mandate letter.

Do you have any thoughts on a dollar figure and what could work?

[Kelly Masotti]

Maybe I'll start and then Helena can add.

We were pleased to see the Liberal government commit $30 million for pediatric cancer research, not only in your party's platform but in the ministerial mandate letter as well. That is certainly the figure our organization is quite keen to work with you on. We were happy to see that, but we can certainly always see an increase in investments for pediatric cancer research in this country. We need to see an increase for clinical trials, as a start, but the $30 million was nice to see.

[Helena Sonea]

As well, the Cancer Research Alliance produced a report demonstrating the trends of pediatric cancer research funding over the past number of years. We've seen that plateau. We'd be pleased to provide that report.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

The figure of $30 million is not in the mandate letter itself. I believe it was in the platform, but it is perhaps a figure that can be put forward as a recommendation of this committee.

With the last question, Mr. Buy, kudos to you because you really know how to lobby politicians. Any time you mention their riding at the outset, they're much more.... We always pay attention, but it pushes me to ask you a question.

With the limited time that I have, agri-food stands as one of the great potential areas of economic growth for this country. Dominic Barton has really advised on this, as have many others, talking about the breadbasket that is Canada. I come from London, Ontario. We are an urban oasis surrounded by some of the richest farmland in the entire country. What is the single biggest impediment standing in the way of our agri-food sector scaling up even more, so that we can have it as a fundamental pillar of our economy, if it isn't already?

[Serge Buy]

We need to ramp up innovation. We're at a stage where we're competing against a number of players throughout the world and they're investing significant amounts of money in innovation.

We've made some progress in the last few years. The investment the government has made in the protein industries supercluster is certainly helping that sector. It's part of the supercluster strategy the government has put forward. Some other investments have been very good, but we need to continue to focus on innovation because that's the only way we're going to remain competitive. It's not going to be on labour wages; that's not feasible. It's not going to be on price of pure commodities. It's going to be on innovation, and innovation in food processing and processing in Canada. Too often, we ship our grains to be transformed overseas. We need to look at innovation and transformation here.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

We have Maple Leaf Foods coming in to London. When it's finished it will be the world's largest chicken processing plant—maybe not the world's largest, but certainly in North America, with groundbreaking innovation made possible in part by a federal investment about a year and a half ago. We can build off that and do more, I hope.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Thank you, Peter. Your last word would have to be about London.

Mr. Lanthier, there were no questions directed towards you. Do you have any comments you want to raise to sum up?

[Allan Lanthier]

No. The discussion has been very interesting, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay.

For committee members, the deadline for recommendations is February 18 at 6:00 p.m. to the clerk. Those recommendations will have to be translated. If they could be in earlier, that would be better. We have to do that to meet the turnaround time so that the recommendations can be distributed to all members and we can consider them as a committee as early as possible. We are going to run down the time frame.

Mr. Kiss, I'll put it this way. I'm worried about Teck Frontier becoming a real flash-point. Decision-makers within government have a very tough decision here. On the one side, I think Teck Frontier isn't an investment that is immediately going to go ahead; it may never go ahead, but it will depend on the price of oil. I understand there are something like 20 projects already approved, but not operational.

On the other side of the coin—and we've heard this loudly and clearly as well—if Teck Frontier is approved, the society is really concerned about the environment and it will be a flash-point on the other side for those who would believe that this government is just not going to do anything about the environment.

I think that's the kind of box we're in, as a country. I think we're going to have to be....

And I hear and understand what you said, because I'm one of the ones who talks consistently about the fact that the Alberta discount is costing the oil industry about $587 billion a year. That's our loss because we don't have an outlet for our product.

So I don't mind admitting that I'm really concerned about this issue and I hope that the rhetoric, the anger and frustration on both sides doesn't lead us down a path that none of us wants to go down. I think we have to find a solution at the end of the day.

Those are my comments on the issue.

Do you have anything to add?

[Peter Kiss]

No, sir.

I appreciate your comments.

As an Albertan with boots on the ground, if you will, the environment is at the forefront of everything we do and my clients treat it.... I don't think people understand the care that goes into constructing these facilities and the reclamation that goes on behind them.

I appreciate your comments. Thank you.