Evidence of meeting #44 for Finance in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was program.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Acting Senior Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
I don't have that information for you. It is something that the courts themselves and the courts administration support for the individual jurisdictions have. That is the kind of information that they would submit if they choose to make a request. That information is not the federal government's, so we would generally keep that entirely confidential simply to respect the information that they provide.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
Hold it. Are you saying that they're keeping information about caseload levels in Newfoundland confidential because for some reason this isn't deemed to be in the public interest?
Surely somebody has the caseload numbers, because I would assume that, for the most part, requests for additional judicial resources are premised upon the fact that there's additional need based on additional caseloads.
Acting Senior Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
That's absolutely correct and additional caseloads are certainly one of the important factors that we would look at and we would ask the courts themselves to provide. What individual courts and jurisdictions post publicly, and it could very well be that the Supreme Court in Newfoundland and Labrador does have that information posted publicly, it is not something that the federal government is able to collect directly.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
Do you believe it's reasonable for us as parliamentarians who have to approve this spending to ask for that information?
Acting Senior Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
The information that has been gathered as part of the business cases is held in confidence. It goes to the judicial function, which we would strive to protect for reasons of judicial independence. There's no standardized or formulaic way of going about adding resources to any courts. For example, it could be due to how the courts are administered by the provinces or by the territorial governments.
Demographic, geographic and social conditions also vary across each one, so one of the things I can say our group has generally looked at is that if the case inventory has been steadily rising, for example, this could indicate that the judicial complement might not be sufficient. That, generally speaking, is a factor we would look at, but again, that information is held by the courts themselves, not by us.
Conservative
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
I'm not standing in the way of giving these judicial resources, but I think I'm asking a reasonable question. If, in fact, taxpayers are being asked to support additional judicial resources, we as their representatives who actually approve this spending through appropriation bills, and so on, have some right to the information upon which these requests are premised.
Could I ask you just to ask for that information and make it available to our committee if at all possible? I say that through the chair.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Sure. You can respond to that, Ms. Dekker, once you check with your sources to see what information is made available to us, and drop a note to the clerk as to what's possible and what's not.
Mrs. Jansen, please go ahead.
Conservative
Tamara Jansen Conservative Cloverdale—Langley City, BC
I'm just wondering if there are any efficiencies, or any parameters, that are set that the different provinces would need to achieve to be able to have these new resources? Do they just ask for them, and do they not have to show any improvement in efficiencies?
Acting Senior Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
It's a bit of an art in some ways, simply because the Constitution gives responsibility for the administration of justice to the provinces, so how the provinces have sorted out their procedures and how they use their judicial resources varies a little across the country. Relevant information would be trends in filing cases in various areas, such as family or civil or criminal, or we would look at patterns of case flows.
Again, because each province and territory has such different demographics and different geographic and social conditions, it's not possible to give a response of, “This is what you must achieve in order to be allocated a new judicial resource.” That's simply not the way the Constitution has set up the administration of justice in Canada.
Conservative
Tamara Jansen Conservative Cloverdale—Langley City, BC
Basically, if a province wanted to improve, it could ask you for numerous new resources, and you would just have to provide them? Is that how that works? If it wanted to improve its wait list, it could just ask you for extras, and it wouldn't have to justify it, necessarily.
Acting Senior Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
There still is a very rigorous process that goes on. For example, if there had been no efficiencies and they were simply not sitting, that would obviously be something that our information would show and we would seriously question it. The justification is something that we would develop in collaboration with the provincial or court officials we work with.
We do try to respect, for example, if a province has said that it wants these sorts of matters to be heard within these sorts of timelines. That is something we try to work with. At the end of the day, there is, as you say, a certain reasonableness that we would try to look for.
Liberal
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
I'm sorry to maybe belabour it, but I just want to speak in support of the issue that Mr. Fast raised. I understand that judicial budgets and appointments are not the same as other budgetary requests or items that we vote on, but no parliamentarian—no citizen—wants their elected representatives to be told that the information a funding request was based on is something we can't see or can't receive. We do have an obligation to ask these questions and receive information, not to merely approve everything that is put in front of us.
I certainly support Mr. Fast in his question to receive the information.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Wayne Easter
Okay. That is noted. Are there any further questions?
Thank you, Ms. Dekker and Mr. Hoffmann, for your presentation.
We will go on. We're soon going to start to run out of time on this panel. Next is division 28, the National Research Council Act, and changes to that act.
Mr. Scott, please go ahead.
Stephen Scott Director General, Strategy and Performance, National Research Council of Canada
Yes, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon.
My name is Stephen Scott, and I work as the director general of policy, strategy and performance here at the National Research Council. I am joined by my colleague, Christine Jodoin, director general of the biologics manufacturing centre project.
The NRC legislative amendments are about positioning the NRC to deliver domestic vaccine manufacturing capacity in Canada going forward. There are two proposed amendments to the National Research Council Act. First, there is a proposed amendment to enable the National Research Council to manufacture and produce medical products, such as vaccines, on a larger scale to respond to pandemics and other public health needs.
Currently, the NRC is authorized to produce medical products, on a smaller scale, for things like clinical trials and experiments. This new authority would provide the NRC with the ability to manufacture vaccines on a larger scale, once the new biologics manufacturing centre at the Royalmount campus in Montreal receives regulatory approval by Health Canada.
Second, there is a proposed amendment to provide the NRC with the ability to incorporate and stand up arm's-length entities, such as not-for-profit organizations. Under this amendment, the NRC would be able to establish special purpose collaboration models that would increase and deepen linkages among NRC researchers, academics and the private sector.
The new biomanufacturing facility, which will be operated through a public-private partnership over the longer term, is an example of where a new collaboration model could be used.
Thank you, and we would be happy to take any questions.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Thank you very much for your presentation.
What is the limitation of scale right now that the National Research Council is limited to?
Director General, Strategy and Performance, National Research Council of Canada
The current legislative authority in the NRC Act provides the NRC the authority to manufacture on a smaller scale for clinical trials and experiments. It's not specifically defined in terms of quantity. It's a general authority related to scientific and industrial research. Therefore, there's not a specific quantity established with that current authority.
The biologics manufacturing centre—
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Sorry, if there is no limitation, what would stop the NRC from manufacturing vaccines right now ?
Director General, Strategy and Performance, National Research Council of Canada
There is a small legal interpretation that suggests that the authority that currently exists should be expanded to cover the biologics manufacturing centre production capacity, which, once operational, will be up to two million vaccine doses per month. The interpretation is that even though there's not a specific quantity threshold tied to the current authority, the two million doses per month is sufficiently large that it would be above a typical threshold for clinical trials, for example.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Is that subject to a legal...? We're 15 months into a pandemic, so I think this is an appropriate question about whether the NRC now has the ability to produce vaccines legally.
Was there a legal interpretation that suggested that the NRC could not manufacture vaccines beyond a certain level? If so, what level was set?
Director General, Strategy and Performance, National Research Council of Canada
The legal advice from our Department of Justice colleagues has been that the National Research Council Act wording is interpreted to provide the NRC with the authority today to produce medical products on a smaller scale—things like clinical trials, as noted. The advice was on that authority through the budget implementation act, which would align with the project timelines for the biologics manufacturing centre that is currently being constructed.
NDP
Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC
Thank you, but I'm still a little confused.
The NRC has had the ability all along to produce vaccines. Obviously, it was all hands on deck, so the NRC would have been consulted and you sought a legal opinion. What was the threshold? Is it half a million vaccines a month? Is it a million vaccines a month? Is it 100,000?
I mean, at some point, given the NRC's capability, there must have been a definition or a response that meant that the NRC wasn't actively involved in vaccine production.
Of course, as we know, we're trailing badly behind the United States. They're close to 40% fully vaccinated. In Canada, it's just over 3% fully vaccinated. We've moved to a model that is putting one shot in—despite the fact that manufacturers have expressed concerns about that—because of the supply shortage.
I'm interested in knowing whether there was ever a precise decision coming back from justice saying that the NRC can't produce beyond half a million a month or it can't produce beyond 100,000 a month and as a result, the NRC wasn't part of the solution.
Director General, Strategy and Performance, National Research Council of Canada
I'll just offer one or two points and then turn to my colleague Christine to expand.
To answer the question, there was not a specific quantity identified as part of the legal opinion. It's more of a qualitative interpretation of the current legislative text in the National Research Council Act.
The second point is that it's coming forward now through the budget implementation act and not sooner because it's tied to the timelines with the broader BMC project that's currently being constructed at the NRC's Royalmount campus in Montreal.
At this point, I'll defer to Christine, if that's okay, Mr. Chair, to see if she has anything to add.