Evidence of meeting #9 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was money.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
Right now I am still confused. You can help me in my ignorance here, but I would like to know the answer. Of the money in last year's budget allocated and approved under the Building Canada fund, how much has not been committed and will be allowed to lapse?
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
That number will be available some time in September, but I can give you more detail.
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
That's correct. That's how it's done through supplementary estimates. You know that.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
When the infrastructure minister said yesterday that no money will be left behind, what exactly did he mean?
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
There are a number of ways that money can continue on through the next year when commitments have been made. It can be through re-profiling, with the consent of the Minister of Finance and Treasury Board.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
So I'm asking how much of this money will be re-profiled. The next budget year starts in April.
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
We don't know how much money will be not committed or unallocated. I can't give you that answer. That's what the supplementary estimates in September will deal with.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
You have to bear with my appearing to be somewhat rude and interrupting. My challenge with this--and this speaks to my colleague's earlier question--is that we are being asked to approve a significant amount of money that is only going to be reported on after the fact.
There are two different issues. I will point to one and then refer back to the fact that under infrastructure spending, the investment that was approved and allocated under our accountability parliamentary processes, virtually none of that has been spent.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
It is correct. The majority of the money in the Building Canada fund has not been spent, when it should have been flowing into the economy over the last number of months. There is a bit of hypocrisy, quite frankly, in saying that we need to spend all this money quickly, but by the way, we have actually had approval to spend money over the last number of months and we haven't done it.
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
Your premises are almost entirely wrong. Your statements are entirely wrong.
I haven't had a chance to reply, since you've interrupted every time.
Mr. Wouters.
Secretary, Treasury Board Secretariat
Of the Building Canada fund, roughly $3.3 billion was allocated to Infrastructure Canada through the main and supplementary estimates for 2008-09. The money that's been allocated is still being spent.
I think the minister alluded to the fact that many provinces have reached agreements where they are still putting in their forecasts about how much can be spent this fiscal year. At this point we don't have an estimate of the exact amount we've spent this fiscal year. If there were any lapses, if there were commitments made through framework agreements with the provinces, normally the Minister of Finance would look at that and make a determination as to whether that lapse should be re-profiled.
That process does take us into the summer, because the finalization of the 2008-09 estimate takes a period of time. Then as the books close, the government will determine whether that should be re-profiled in the next year. But the commitments are there, and it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of that were re-profiled.
Liberal
Martha Hall Findlay Liberal Willowdale, ON
But given that we're about to come to the end of this fiscal year, we don't know in the next three weeks how many of those commitments will be carried out.
Secretary, Treasury Board Secretariat
We have a precise forecast, just like many of the departments. They may be in a better position to know; we don't have that exact. The money was voted on by Parliament to spend on infrastructure, not to spend on training or whatever, which the $3 billion fund is going to be used for.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Derek Lee
Ms. Hall Findlay, we are way over time.
Thanks to all of you who were trying to generate good and useful information there.
Madame Bourgeois is next, for five minutes.
Bloc
Diane Bourgeois Bloc Terrebonne—Blainville, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Minister, in your introductory remarks, you said you wanted to protect the most vulnerable Canadians. We know that single women, single mothers and senior women belong to this category of Canadians and Quebeckers who are extremely vulnerable. Among your priorities, you say that you also want to ensure a dynamic public service. However, you have just given it a cold shower by making pay equity negotiable.
Historically, in the public sector, pay equity has never been part of the collective bargaining process, when it comes to negotiating on this, because it's always the part that gets dropped. I see that your officials are giving you suggestions, but I would ask you to listen to me carefully. The fact that pay equity is set aside during bargaining is important. First, overall wages are negotiated, then benefits; finally, we leave it up to individuals and their unions to take pay equity further.
Minister, you seem like a logical man. What got into you to go over and above the Human Rights Commission and the group that wrote a report on pay equity? I fail to understand your stance.
Conservative
Vic Toews Conservative Provencher, MB
Let me first deal with the issue of why we've moved to the Public Service Labour Relations Board. It was a specific recommendation of the Bilson report in 2004 that it move to an independent tribunal, away from the Canadian Human Rights Commission, because the Canadian Human Rights Commission simply did not have the expertise to deal with the issue of wages in that context. So that's a direct recommendation that we've taken from the Bilson report.
The other point you make, that pay equity is never taken into account in the context of collective bargaining, is not correct. In fact, in your own province a plan is developed between the employer and the union on pay equity. Then that plan is brought to the collective bargaining table and worked into the collective agreement. So there is a clear utilization of the pay equity plan in the context of that.
What we are doing here is very similar. We are saying that there are certain principles in pay equity. We don't have the same strictures of the Quebec plan, but they still have to follow those principles of pay equity. So when the collective bargaining takes place, neither the union nor the employer can ignore the principles of pay equity, in the same way that in Quebec they can't ignore the plan that has been developed in accordance with the principles of pay equity.
We have essentially ensured that it is done in a flexible way so that pay equity principles are respected and not bargained away. What is presently happening in the federal sector is that a union can go in, bargain without regard to pay equity, and simply enter into an agreement that puts women at a disadvantage. Obviously that has happened in the past, because subsequently they've had to go to the Canadian Human Rights Commission to say that pay equity wasn't taken into account in the collective agreement, and therefore they now need to have a hearing by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. The Human Rights Tribunal and the court take 15 to 20 years to resolve those issues. That's not right, from a legal point of view. That's not right, from a human rights point of view. That's not good from a collective bargaining point of view, and it's not good for--
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Derek Lee
That's five minutes. If you wanted to just wrap up, a very short wrap-up, you could.
Bloc
Diane Bourgeois Bloc Terrebonne—Blainville, QC
I simply want to tell the minister that the principle of pay equity is non-negotiable. It falls under equal rights, and the principle itself is non negotiable. That is why I'm asking you what you were thinking, when you introduced bargaining. It's not logical to negotiate pay equity when it's a right for both men and women. You are completely out in left field.