Finance Committee on May 30th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

You are out of time. You've just reached it.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Okay, that's perfect.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

You're out of time, but we want to thank you, MP Sorbara, for advocating for so many important programs here.

Now we have MP Ste-Marie, please, for the next six minutes.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to welcome the two witnesses, who bring some very interesting points to our deliberations.

My first questions are for Ms. Stevenson.

Could you remind us again about what the support provided for in this bill would enable your organization to do and what it would enable all comparable organizations to do?

[Sherry Stevenson]

Thank you for your question.

Yes, this support will help organizations like Fresh Roots Urban Farm Society continue our programming and potentially improve our quality and expand our reach. It will also support other programs to start from scratch and provide that infrastructure that is needed to ensure we have kitchens available and resources available in the schools to provide the school food programs.

Because it goes through the provincial governments, which already have relationships and partnerships with the school boards in their provinces and territories, we really support this method on behalf of the Coalition for Healthy School Food. We think this is an efficient way to start implementing this right away. This is needed as soon as possible to make sure our programs can continue to run and expand to support even more children having access to healthy food, as well as learning.

I talked a bit about the need for food security and to feed children, but here at Fresh Roots, a big part of our mandate is around education. The more the children learn to connect with food and the land their food comes from, the more they appreciate that, are really engaged and develop those life skills around cooking and sharing food.

All of these things are really important. We definitely appreciate your support for this movement.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you.

So this is something that children really need. Many children from less well-off backgrounds do not have enough to eat. As well, as you said, the whole educational component also benefits all children. Is that correct?

[Sherry Stevenson]

Yes, absolutely. We're providing healthy food in the schools, which benefits children by meeting their nutritional needs and helping them be better able to learn and engage in school. There's also the educational component about food systems themselves and how to cook, grow and engage with our food systems.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, and I wish you every success in all your projects, because this is extremely important. Let us hope that this funding will enable you to expand.

My next question is for Mr. Murphy.

Mr. Murphy, I thought your presentation was very interesting. I would like you to remind us of where the changes you are proposing would be made in the present bill.

Second, since I am not a specialist in the subject that has been brought up, can you tell me whether it is in fact federal law that has to be amended in order to respond to your request?

[Kevin Murphy]

Yes, it would need to be amended federally. I'm told that it's a ministerial regulation and could be dealt with in that fashion. It's a piece of legislation. The acronym is PRMHIA, and it governs mortgage insurance. There is an eligible mortgage loan definition that requires a registered first or second charge. The legislative change we're looking for would add title insurance, guaranteeing priority as an alternative to a registered first or second charge.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you.

So people have to make sure they start to pay the mortgage during the interim occupancy period; there would be an additional insurance policy to cover the risk of the builder failing to complete the project.

Do you have any figures about the number of projects that may encounter problems during this interim occupancy period, and give us an idea, a percentage or an amount, of the cost of this insurance premium for the buyer?

[Kevin Murphy]

The active projects today in the province of Ontario alone are approximately 400, representing 90,000 units and, coincidentally, approximately $90 billion in capital.

The insurance is actually borne by the developer. It's not borne by the purchaser. The purchaser has no additional cost for this program. It's a choice. If the purchaser chooses to wait under the traditional scenario to registration, they're more than welcome to do so. It's just that the economics supporting their opting in are so compelling that we believe the vast majority would opt in.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Okay, thank you.

This is new to me, so I apologize for my mistake about the person who takes out the insurance policy.

To your knowledge, is there a program like the one you are proposing already in operation somewhere else, whether in American states, in European countries, or in other provinces?

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

May we have a short answer, please, Mr. Murphy?

[Kevin Murphy]

No, there is no similar program that exists. The closest comparative would be when a purchaser buys a condo and puts down their deposit. If it is insured over, it can be used by the developer to fund construction costs.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP Ste-Marie.

Now we will go to MP Davies for six minutes in our first round.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for being here, especially on short notice, and for making the time to comment on this important budget.

Ms. Stevenson, I'd like to direct my comments to you.

I've long been familiar with the Fresh Roots Urban Farm Society and the wonderful work you've done all over the Lower Mainland in food cultivation, education and provision. Thank you for being here.

As my first question, what are the main challenges that Fresh Roots identifies in providing consistent healthy food to students in Vancouver?

[Sherry Stevenson]

For some of the challenges we encounter.... Oh my goodness, there are many challenges to urban farming. It's an interesting ecosystem, I suppose. When you're literally growing a farm in a very dense city, there are challenges around access and infrastructure. We're not in a rural place. We sometimes encounter crop theft. We encounter theft pests. There are some of those challenges, but also just the regular challenges of running a farm and of crop failure. Some of these things we do encounter, which is normal for running a farm. There are some added challenges to being in the city, but we feel that it's really important and beneficial.

We have some challenges around getting the food that we produce into the school programs. I would love to see this happen more with the national school food program. Because of some of the regulations or barriers to maybe having the proper infrastructure ready in the schools yet to be able to prepare the food directly from the farm, with this investment I'm hoping that we can see more of this kind of model, where the food that we grow on the farm gets directly into the school food programs.

Those are a couple of the challenges.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

I've seen your operations. Previously, I've talked to people who've worked at Fresh Roots. I know there's even been a concept of incorporating this into school curricula and growing on schoolyard grounds—Fresh Roots as a means of teaching students about botany and plant genetics. It's far more fun, probably, to learn about those things by tending to your own vegetables in the schoolyard rather than from a book.

I'm wondering how a national school food program can contribute to ecological stewardship and food literacy, in your view.

[Sherry Stevenson]

Yes, you're right. There are so many things we can build upon.

By having the schoolyard farm, we're making use of land that is otherwise unoccupied. It's using the schoolyard as a productive space for growing food, as well as a learning space. We've seen and witnessed that all the children are so much more engaged in their lunches and cheering for kale in their lunch because they grew it themselves. There really are these benefits when the children engage directly with planting, growing and watching the food being produced, and then they put that into their meals directly.

I think a national school food program can really help organizations like Fresh Roots continue to expand, build upon our curriculum, share these best practices with other schools and bring this opportunity for learning and engagement with good, healthy food in the schoolyards to more and more children.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

I want to move to program universality, Ms. Stevenson.

The advocates I've worked with over the years have told me that it's critically important to them that a school nutrition program be available to everyone for a number of reasons. First of all, it's not a “poor person's program” and we don't stigmatize children, particularly in elementary school, when they're very sensitive to differentials like that. We don't want some kids going into one room for the free lunch and others not. More importantly, there are kids who come from wealthy families who don't necessarily have good nutrition either.

I would like to hear your views on the importance, or not, of program universality when rolling out a school nutrition program.

[Sherry Stevenson]

Yes, absolutely. Having a school nutrition program is a really great equalizer in the school. No matter your background, everyone is engaged, learning and having healthy meals. Whether you come from a lower economic background or a wealthy family, you can still learn so many new things about nutrition and be exposed to different foods from around the world. We try to work with the diversity of our communities and make sure the foods we're providing are coming from the various cultural backgrounds represented in our schools.

I really think this is an equalizer and an opportunity for children of all different backgrounds to be engaged, learn about food and, of course, have that nutritional addition to their day.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP Davies.

We are going to our second round. We will not have time for a full second round. We are, as we do normally, dividing the time up among all the parties. Each will have three-ish minutes to ask questions.

We are starting with MP Morantz.

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

Thank you.

Mr. Murphy, I want to go over a bit of ground again with you.

Basically, somebody makes a deal to buy a condo. The title isn't ready to be transferred, but the condo is ready to be moved into. They move in on the basis that they're going to pay a rent equivalent to an interest rate, which is set in the manner you described earlier. This may be higher than they could get on an actual mortgage at a bank. They're paying this higher rent and not getting the advantage of principal reduction in the interim period.

Do I have that right?