Finance Committee on Oct. 5th, 2022

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Do you think that the end of 2023 just to deal with level one and level two standards is way too long?

[Daniel Breton]

It's too long.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Absolutely. I appreciate that. It's great to see you here today. I appreciate your views.

I'm going to Mr. Darby.

You mentioned supports for training, upskilling, etc., that perhaps government could flow back monies to small and medium-sized companies that are in your industry. Right now the government is planning on pulling out more money, as you heard earlier, by tripling the carbon tax.

First of all, do any of your companies receive a rebate when they are under the federal backstop?

[Dennis Darby]

I can't answer that question directly. I'm not sure to be fair, but I don't think so. If it's a question related to carbon tax, clearly it's a disincentive, but that's why we actually need those supports for training and for investment, because the cost of doing business in Canada is—

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

The challenge is that when you run a program, lots of small and medium-sized businesses don't know about it. Wouldn't it be smarter if we just let them keep their money rather than drawing out...? At $50 a tonne many small and medium-sized businesses have said they're at a disadvantage to the United States. Do you believe that?

[Dennis Darby]

I certainly believe it. We hear it from our members as well. That's why if we go ahead with our net-zero goals in the country, then we are going to have to help those companies transition. We can't say to them, “Pay the carbon tax, and by the way you have to go find new technology and pay for it.” You can't push and pull at the same time.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Yes. Right now I'm hearing that they can't pay the $50 a tonne, yet we're talking about going to $170 a tonne. I just think that's too much.

You also mentioned the American Inflation Reduction Act. Does that include a carbon tax in it?

[Dennis Darby]

No, the Inflation Reduction Act in the U.S. is a pull incentive. The U.S. government has chosen to provide strong incentives to get people to invest in those industries, strong incentives to get them to make parts components in the U.S., or in North America, and then under those circumstances they qualify for a rebate. It really is a pull strategy to get companies to invest.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Someone described the Canadian approach as being all stick and no carrot. Would you say that's roughly true when it comes to your industry?

[Dennis Darby]

I would say there are both carrots and sticks, but in this particular case, the U.S. has put a huge carrot, and I think early returns are showing that they are attracting businesses. We need to do the same.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

All right.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP Albas and Mr. Darby.

We are moving to the Liberals with MP Baker for five minutes, please.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thanks very much, Chair, and thank you to all of the witnesses who are with us today.

I would just like to come back to this issue of EI contributions, which a number of the members opposite have suggested be frozen, and the impact that would have. I just want to be clear that the increases in EI contributions when they come up are there because they're needed to cover the demands for EI by people when they are out of work. That is especially important in a high inflation environment like we find ourselves in today, where the cost of living is even greater.

If people were to lose their employment and need EI, not only would doing what the members opposite suggested mean they would not have enough under normal circumstances, but in this particular case, under this inflationary environment, it would mean that you have even less than people in the past have had to cover the cost of living. I just want us to have our eyes wide open on what freezing EI contributions would actually mean for Canadian workers.

We've seen how important EI and other programs are to support workers when people are hit hard, when businesses struggle, especially during COVID. I think it's irresponsible to suggest that we not contribute enough money into the EI program to make sure it is there for workers when they fall on hard times.

With that said, I would like to change direction and go back to health care.

Mr. Staples, I represent the riding of Etobicoke Centre. In the early stages of the pandemic, there was a long-term care facility in my riding where the Canadian Armed Forces served. It was on the basis of their service in that long-term care home and four other long-term care homes in Ontario that the armed forces issued a report documenting horrific conditions in long-term care.

Back in 2020 when this report came out, the five MPs who represented the ridings in which these long-term care homes were situated, where the armed forces served, wrote a letter to the Prime Minister and a letter to Premier Ford. I was one of those five. One of the things we asked for was national standards for long-term care.

Our government has committed to working with the provinces to establish national standards for long-term care, but I'm wondering if you could explain. In prior interactions, in your presentation, you spoke about national standards and the importance of that in long-term care. Could you explain why national standards are so important?

[Steven Staples]

Thank you for your efforts in getting national standards and dealing with the terrible situation in the long-term care homes.

I've read those reports as I'm sure you have. It's hard to read what members of the armed forces were confronted with when they went into those facilities to see the level of care. Basically, of the thousands of people who died in long-term care, some of them didn't die of COVID. They died of starvation, dehydration, whatever else—just a simple lack of care.

My heart goes out to many of the workers in those places who were confronted with a lack of PPE and had to make a choice between the safety of their own families and the people they were caring for every day in the workplace. Many of those people were in the lowest part of our economy. It was a terrible situation and underscores the need.

As you know, there are three forms of long-term care. There are the ones that are run by the government, mostly municipal governments. Then there are non-profit private care facilities. I lived across from one that served the Korean community. It was a charitable organization that was run privately. Finally, there are the for-profits, the ones that are run by big investment firms that have a profit motive in the care of these people.

There was a terrible situation in all of those forms, but we know that the for-profits were much worse. I don't know the specifics of your situation in Etobicoke Centre, but my guess is that it may have been one of these for-profit firms. We need national standards.

We have participated in an exercise funded by the federal government, by the health standards organization led by Dr. Samir Sinha, who came out with a report. We should see something in the fall.

Were his recommendations good? Yes. Were they an improvement on what was there before? Yes. Are they good enough? We're not convinced. There were some gaps there.

We do think there needs to be a minimum number of hours of direct care, and the standard discussion number is four hours at least—sometimes you see higher ones—of direct care for patients by nurses and other caregivers. We think that's very important to put in there, and that would be something the federal government could do through the safe long-term care act, which it committed to.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP Baker and Mr. Staples.

We'll now go to the Bloc.

MP Ste-Marie, you have two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, I would like to make a comment. When I look at the state of the health care system in the provinces and in Canada, I see that Ottawa has not been funding the provinces according to its means since the 1990s. There is no doubt that it has damaged the health care system. It is not by imposing federal standards that everything will magically be fixed. There is a lack of money because Ottawa is not contributing what it should. I think all the provinces, including Quebec, have been asking for this since 2015. Yet no meeting has taken place between the premiers and the Prime Minister in Ottawa to discuss the refinancing of the health system. When you underfund health care for decades, tragedies like the ones we have seen happen. I do not think standards are worse in New Brunswick, Saskatchewan or Quebec. I think that Ottawa is not doing its job and that it is not funding health according to its means. That was my comment.

I now want to turn to the witnesses to whom I have not yet asked questions, like Mr. Freedman, Mr. Darby and Mr. Harvey. My hat is off to you. I agree with your demands. We will make sure that they are reflected in our pre-budget requests. You raise some very important points.

Because my time is limited, I will ask one last question to Mr. Breton.

Mr. Breton, you talked about many elements related to electric vehicles. We have not touched on off-road electric vehicles, like the snowmobiles made by Taïga. Jobs often depend on these off-road vehicles.

Are electric off-road vehicles preferable to gas-powered off-road vehicles? Should Ottawa invest in this type of vehicle?

[Daniel Breton]

Definitely. To give you an idea, air pollution caused by a single modern snowmobile is equivalent to about 40 cars. We are not only talking about GHG, but air pollution as a whole.

The Yukon now offers rebates for purchasing electric snowmobiles. I think the federal government could do the same, especially since more and more companies based in Quebec and Canada make snowmobiles, personal watercraft and side-by-sides. BRP is working on something, and there are other actors in the country. It is obviously a sector that needs to be supported. Some US states support this industry, but our federal government is not there yet. I think it is important.

There are other factors to keep in mind. The ZEV standard, as I alluded to earlier, is absolutely essential to ensure a sufficient supply of electric vehicles. Right now, all we have are leftovers. As I said, some US states, Europe and China have put regulations in place. Having to wait six months to two years for an electric car is unacceptable. Regulations will make the difference.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, Mr. Breton and Mr. Ste-Marie.

We will now go to the NDP.

MP Boulerice, you have two and a half minutes.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

We could talk forever about the quality of care in our health care system. I think that we can call for more generous transfers to provinces and for Ottawa to contribute its share. We need minimum safeguards for our seniors who suffered in long-term care facilities. We also have to get the private sector out of our health care system. I believe we can do all three of these things at the same time and come out ahead instead of thinking of them as mutually exclusive. That is my comment.

Mr. Freedman, thank you very much for being here. The quality of our democracy is tremendously important to us. Divisiveness and populism in politics, as we have seen in the United States with President Trump, is a cause for concern. I thought that we would be safe from that in Quebec and Canada. I am not so sure anymore, specifically because of the “freedom convoy” that rolled into Ottawa.

You spoke of disinformation. I would like you to give your thoughts on that.

How can your members, local radio stations that are part of their community, can act as a vaccine when it comes to disinformation?

[Alex Freedman]

I will answer in English, if I may.

It's a very simple answer.

Our stations are in the communities. Our stations are known by the communities, and therefore, when our stations speak, they're informed by said communities.

When the hosts speak, they speak because they've received their information in the grocery store line, because they've connected with those members of the community. I'm not talking international here. I'm talking about where we live.

When you hear that person on the radio or you see them tweeting, or you see them on TikTok or Twitter, you know who they are. You know how you can come back to them and say, “I don't think that's true,” and, “Where did you get that information?” That is the key to local news.

It's not just in the news reports. It's contained in the conversations between hosts. It's contained at the festivals with the artists. This conversation happens all over the place.

If you'll permit me, I'll take a moment because when it comes to tourism, the importance of having good small and medium enterprises is vital. That is the underpinning of tourism. Those enterprises rely on community radio to get their message to their listeners, to the audiences where they will survive, not just in peak tourism season but also off season.

I want to speak to health for a moment. Our journalists were the ones on the ground in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. They were the ones at the clinic who were hearing from the doctors, and they were the ones who were giving the people on the ground the information they needed in their community.

That's where we play the role of a vaccine when it comes to disinformation, because we're on the ground; we're in the faces of people who need to hear us, and we're responsible to those people when we walk out the door of our station.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Monsieur Freedman and MP Boulerice, that is the time. Merci.

Now we'll hear from the Conservatives. MP Ferreri is with us for five minutes.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for having me. It's a privilege to sit in on the finance committee, and it's nice to see some familiar faces today.

As shadow minister of tourism, I'd like to focus on Beth. I'm going to ask her lots of questions.

Beth, what was allocated in the 2021 budget for tourism? Do you have that number, roughly? You don't have to be exact. You're not going to get tested on it or anything.

[Beth Potter]

There was in excess of $500 million. The $500 million was for the tourism relief fund, and then there was a little bit more on top of that.

[Michelle Ferreri, Conservative, Peterborough—Kawartha, ON]

Was it all disbursed?