Finance Committee on May 26th, 2026

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

Building on the notion of the defence industrial strategy, I'll note that as a health care person in my former life, I'm interested in the dual-use application of many of the innovations that sit under the umbrella of the defence industrial strategy, particularly as they relate to the sustainability of Canada's health systems and access to essential medicines, vaccines and other critical supply chains and infrastructure to support the health of Canadians.

What are the big areas of dual-use that you see in the aerospace field, not necessarily for health, but for domestic well-being, if you will?

[Mike Mueller]

I have an example specific to health, which I think very much illustrates this concept of dual-use and the ability, in the case of health care, non-health care and traditional health care companies.... During COVID, we had aerospace companies pivot to designing, manufacturing, building and supplying ventilators within a span of a number of months. Government was very clear in defining the capability required, the timelines and the funding and identifying it as a bit of a sovereign capability. It's a perfect use case, in my mind, for the defence industrial strategy. You can have non-traditional companies pivoting into dual-use where required.

Some of the huge opportunities we see are in firefighting, with a great announcement from the government about procuring 10 different aerial firefighting capacities over the next while, again falling under the defence industrial strategy. If you take a look at the new drone technology, there are quite obvious military purposes for that. In a country so large and with such a large Arctic, there is a huge ability, and the technology can be used. I think of the tie-in to helium, where we have folks taking a look at some of the different airlift capacity that would be beneficial particularly in the north.

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

I certainly would agree with that. The more we can emphasize the dual-use principle, particularly when publicly funded research and innovation are taking place, the better for Canadians.

I have a quick question for Mr. Dunn, because I'm short on time.

You named several provinces that have supported, broadly speaking, the notion of inclusion of helium as a critical mineral for the purposes of tax incentives. Does that mean there are provinces that are against it, or simply that those other provinces have been silent on it? For my edification, I'm just trying to understand what the case is against the proposal that you've put forward.

[Richard Dunn]

Well, I don't believe there would be any case against what we've proposed. As I said, it makes so much sense for the security of supply in Canada. The provinces that I mentioned—Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta—are the provinces in which helium will be actively explored for if we get the tax measures right.

Interestingly, Premier Eby, from British Columbia, about a month ago called for the government to have a first ministers' discussion on the Strait of Hormuz. He actively referenced the concerns with the restrictions on the global supply of helium.

It definitely goes beyond just the producing provinces, and I'm not aware of any province with any concerns about what we've proposed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Great. Thank you.

We'll now continue with Mr. Garon for six minutes.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Greetings and welcome to all the witnesses who joined us today.

I'll start with you, Mr. Mueller.

You know I'm the member for Mirabel and the Bloc Québécois aerospace critic. You also know how important this industry is to Quebec, Montreal and my riding in particular. For several years now, the Bloc Québécois, together with the industry, has been pressing the government to adopt an aerospace industrial strategy.

Yesterday, the Minister of Industry appeared before the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology. Here is the question my colleague from Joliette asked her, word for word: “Canada is the only country with such a large aerospace industry that still doesn't have an industrial strategy. Are you planning to adopt one?”

Basically, the minister responded she could table the document, if need be, that no one in the industry was asking for such a policy, and that they were instead asking for a defence procurement strategy.

Has the industry been asking for an aerospace industrial policy for a number of years, or did I dream that?

[Mike Mueller]

Thank you for the question.

I want to thank you for your strong support for the aerospace sector, coming from Mirabel, a great hub of aerospace not only in Quebec, but also right across the country.

We've been very clear on the need for an aerospace strategy. We're very encouraged by and support the government fully on the defence industrial strategy, which covers aerospace. It was identified as one of the key sovereign capabilities, which is absolutely critical, but we have been very clear on the need for the corresponding civil aerospace strategy piece. Quebec has an aerospace strategy, which is great. We have other provinces taking a look at how to drive this sector forward. It's been a long-standing ask of ours to have an aerospace strategy, defence being a large portion of that.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

You're saying that for many years, the industry's been asking for an aerospace industrial strategy. What do you think the parameters of such a strategy should be?

For the benefit of my colleagues across, and even for the Minister of Industry who might read the meeting transcript, can you explain the difference between a defence procurement strategy and a real aerospace industrial strategy? How do they differ?

[Mike Mueller]

It's going back to the other question on the dual-use nature. That's a great example of it. Defence obviously drives so much of this, and that's such a lever for the government to pull. Again, it's very complementary.

It's also about the government including the workforce into the defence industrial strategy, but you have to link that together with the civil side. Aerospace in particular, as I said in my opening remarks, is two sides of the same coin. You have defence capabilities that bleed into civil applications, and vice versa. It's also a huge opportunity to put an extra emphasis, if you will, on the civil side.

It's about certification, environmental regulations and workforce development working in tandem with a very good defence industrial strategy. That's what we're looking for.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

If I understand correctly, the fact that the aerospace industry is a very long-cycle industry, meaning it takes a long time to do research and development and to design new aircraft, would be recognized. In a military context like the one we're in, when it's time for procurement, we realize that not having had a strategy for a couple of decades is hurting our procurement capacity.

Did I understand that correctly?

[Mike Mueller]

You're absolutely right. They're corresponding. There are long lead times across the board. There are very good pieces with respect to the defence industrial strategy and how that knits together the innovation cycles, but the civil side also cannot be ignored. It's about certification, the environmental workforce and the innovation on the civil side.

The defence industrial strategy is a very good start. It's encouraging on the defence side, but drawing together some of the linkages on the civil side is still required.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

We agree. Let's be clear: We're happy there's defence procurement. We're pleased that orders have been placed and things are moving forward. However, we recognize this is the first in a long series of steps that need to be taken and have been asked for for a long time.

Some Liberal members have been caught saying a national aerospace industrial strategy would be unfair to other Canadian regions that want to develop this sector, such as Manitoba. They think it would be unfair to other provinces if such a strategy led to a stronger aerospace cluster in Montreal. Obviously, as a courtesy, I won't give any names.

Would it be wise to have such a strategy strengthen this cluster in the greater Montreal area?

[Mike Mueller]

Aerospace is right across the country. I was out in Calgary two weeks ago, and De Havilland, a great Canadian OEM, was starting up the De Havilland field.

While there is a very significant cluster in the Montreal area, it's right across the country. We'll actually be holding our board meetings with industry out in St. John's, Newfoundland, so we're absolutely coast to coast, and we feel a strategy would be of benefit right across the country.

I would also—

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

What you're saying is that's an unjustified fear, correct?

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you. Your time is up.

We will continue now with Mr. Viersen for five minutes.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'm going to continue along a similar vein of questioning, Mr. Mueller.

It's been a frustration for me over the last 10 years that the government speaks a good game about supporting the aerospace industry but then limits some of the key inputs to the aerospace industry, one of them being pilots. I increasingly have to work with pilots to get their medical, which in many cases they need every six months. They are getting a medical exam, first of all, and then getting an approval of that medical exam from Transport Canada.

Do you have any recommendations for how that process could be improved?

[Mike Mueller]

Thank you for the question. It's a bit outside of our bailiwick, if you will. We're focused on the manufacturing side of things—

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

If there are no pilots, nobody needs planes.

[Mike Mueller]

I was just getting to that. The broader ecosystem is incredibly important, obviously. If you don't have pilots to fly the planes, they're not flying. If airlines aren't doing well, we're not maintaining planes.

That broader ecosystem is incredibly important, but I couldn't speak to the specifics of the question you have.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Could you confirm for me that a pilot shortage is an ongoing problem in the aerospace industry?

[Mike Mueller]

The pipeline of highly skilled workers across the board is absolutely a challenge.

I can speak more eloquently to aircraft maintenance engineers. We're doing quite a bit of work with the federal government and the provinces to build out the pipelines that are then responsive to the industry's needs. Quite a bit of work is going into that, because you're absolutely right. Over the next 10 years or so, we're going to need 50,000 new folks within the aviation industry. Some of the government's recent announcements around skills training that focus on that are a step in the right direction.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Thank you.

Mr. Dunn, I was wondering what helium is used for. I've recently come across helium-3, which some folks are getting all excited about. Can you tell us a bit about what helium is used for and what this helium-3 that we're hearing about is?

[Richard Dunn]

The properties of helium are unique in that it is the lowest-condensing molecule. This is what we use to cool the magnets in MRIs and NMRs, or nuclear magnetic resonance machines. Of course, we've seen in the press in the last month or two that for the researchers who use NMRs for their research on cancer, etc., it's starting to be apportioned, and they can't complete that work.

It's an inert, pure gas. Because it condenses at the lowest temperature, it's the most pure molecule, at 99.999% purity. This purity is absolutely critical to the environment for making semiconductors. This is one of the large growth areas in the world with semiconductor manufacturing. With the United States reshoring its semiconductor manufacturing, one of the concerns is that it's starting to look inward more for its own supplies, and Canada's supply chain is at risk.

The majority of helium is the helium I was referring to. There is an isotope of a helium called helium-3—

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I think you've answered that question appropriately.

[Richard Dunn]

The short answer is that it's used for quantum computing.