Health Committee on May 28th, 2019

[Andrea Carey]

Yes. Thanks for the question.

We are very supportive of the tax on sugar and sugary consumables in general, so we think that's one approach. We also—

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Sorry, can I interrupt you there?

When you say “sugary consumables”, are you saying everything that has added sugar you would put a tax on? Is that what you're saying?

[Andrea Carey]

I think if you were to look across our food system, everything that's inside of the outside aisles of our supermarkets is pretty much laden with sugar. Obviously, there needs to be an investigation into what the balance is within that. We're supportive of a sugar tax and looking at how we can leverage that to create healthier outcomes across Canada.

We also want to highlight a program that we've been working on in B.C. called Appetite to Play. It's an early childhood education program that works with leaders of early childhood programs around healthy eating, and physical literacy development and physical activity. That program gives parents a number of resources, as well as the leaders of those programs, around healthy choices, recipes. It's trying to instill at those really early ages what healthy foods look like, how to create them, how to be engaged in the process of healthy eating.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Does anybody else have a comment on that? Do I have time left?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

You have one minute.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Mr. Way was saying you can fix up the arenas, and so on, but also make sure of the small spaces. I think that is what we're talking about with the integration in a development model with municipalities and cities. I agree that it's great to renovate an arena or soccer field, but it's also important to have a fully functioning park that's safe for kids to go to, or a little community centre along the way.

I thank Kyle for bringing this forward. There's no one answer to this situation, that's for darn sure. It will take everybody pulling in the right direction to get it going the right way.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

Ms. Quach, you may go ahead for three minutes.

Pardon me, I made a mistake.

Kyle, it's you again, for five minutes, and then we'll go to Madam Quach.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks, everyone. We're just about wrapping up here, but because we have four witness groups here, I want to ask everybody, what would be your one recommendation if you could give one?

Please be as brief as possible. We probably have about a minute and 10 seconds each.

I'll start with Mr. Watt in Winnipeg.

[Josh Watt]

For your consideration, if there's one recommendation that doesn't appear in our brief, it would be that you continue to have a permanent dialogue on the subject by way of focusing effort and energy on it.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Perfect. Thank you.

We'll go to the Sport for Life Society.

[Richard Way]

We would recommend multi-sector partnership tables at the community level to develop physical literacy for all.

[Josh Berman]

Others will talk about the schools, and I believe it's important to talk about the whole child and youth and the way they spend their time, but from the Boys and Girls Clubs perspective, they spend so much time out of school, whether that's for months in the summer, for PA days, for school breaks or on the weekends, that we believe the out-of-school programming can play an important role in tackling lack of physical activity and also addressing mental health and other concerns.

[Melanie Davis]

Our recommendation, tying all of that together, is a parliamentary secretary for physical activity, who uses the common vision as a way to bring everybody together.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

I think that was a good approach, too, bringing every provincial minister together with the federal ministers and all the stakeholders.

I have a bit of time left, but a lot of this has to do with culture and just the way our society functions, the way we look at daily life, daily routine. Changing a culture of a whole nation, of course, is a Herculean task, to say the least. We can have the infrastructure in place, we can have the systems in place, we can have the impetus to do it, but without a cultural shift we're not going to get there.

What role do you think the federal government can play in influencing that necessary cultural shift?

I'll start with Melanie.

[Melanie Davis]

Years ago, I worked with the United Nations in regard to building child-friendly cities, and those child-friendly cities had 10 building blocks. One of those building blocks identified that there needed to be a line in every single budget that was produced asking, what is the impact of this on children and youth in those communities?

It's the same type of consideration so that every decision we make references back to how we're influencing the lives of children and youth. That will start to become entrenched in our systems and in our decision-making and lead the way in regard to culture change.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

I have two minutes, so I can get to everybody.

Adam.

[Adam Joiner]

I agree with Melanie. The biggest piece for us is having the ability to continue to serve children and youth and to provide more resources and support for them. A lot of our programs, not just Boys and Girls Clubs, but community partners across the country, are overprescribed with young people looking for activities. The federal government and all levels of government play an important and key role in helping to develop that and to continue to resource organizations to do work to help young people in Canada.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Okay.

Mr. Watt.

[Josh Watt]

In keeping with the agents-of-socialization theory, I would have to say, and this is somewhat self-serving, that education, education, education is the key to changing an entire culture for the better and for the positive. By having this focus within our schools, not to discount any of the other programming that's available, because we all have to work in collaboration with each other, we do see that this is a shared responsibility and that education can help further that change.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

The Sport for Life Society.

[Andrea Carey]

We would call on you to invest and deliver on the common vision.

[Kyle Peterson, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

Ms. Quach, you may go ahead for three or four minutes.

[Anne Minh-Thu Quach, NDP, Salaberry—Suroît, QC]

Thank you.

The witnesses all talked about the importance of healthy eating and healthy living.

My question is for all of you.

Do you think the federal government should bring forward legislation to limit junk food advertising aimed at children? A number of Quebec-based groups have made that their mission, in fact. It's too bad no groups from Quebec were invited to participate in the committee's study. We were talking about parents earlier, and Quebec has integrated health and social services centres, which provide parents with support to help them make smart choices.

[Melanie Davis]

In the past year we've been working a lot with former senator Nancy Greene Raine who particularly took this on to put something in motion. Within the school systems, absolutely, that has been put in place. I will leave it to our community colleagues to share whether or not the same is true.