Evidence of meeting #35 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was products.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:50 p.m.
President, Marché central du Nord
I did not really understand your question.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Clarke Conservative Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK
What I want to know is, with the opening up of the distribution points and with more flexible schedules, how would this affect your business as a whole? Will you see more benefits, more profit? Or will the savings be passed on to the customers?
4:50 p.m.
President, Marché central du Nord
We cannot answer that question right now. The nutrition north Canada program is not ready. We are really in the dark. How much will it cost? What subsidies will customers get? As we speak, we know what subsidies Canada Post's customers will get in their orders. We do not know what subsidies will be like under the nutrition north Canada program.
Mr. Clarke, we do not know what the subsidy will be. So I cannot say whether the nutrition north Canada program will create more benefits. The program is still not ready to go.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Clarke Conservative Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK
Okay.
I'm going to ask some questions of the airlines. What challenges are you encountering under the food mail program? I want some more clarification, if you could provide it.
4:50 p.m.
President, Canadian North
We don't have any challenges, because currently we don't carry any product under the food mail program. In our current operations, there are no complications in our world.
However, what we will face going forward is having to make sure that we have the appropriate ground-based infrastructure and the right amount of aircraft lift to be able to carry whatever additional volumes we're able to negotiate. But we do that all the time. This is not really a...I don't want to say it's not a big deal. It's an important program. But we're an airline, and that's what we do. We compete for business all the time.
The airlines, left to free competition, have reduced basic airfares by almost 30% since deregulation. I'm going to suggest to you that, left to their own devices, the airlines would see similar reductions in cargo rates and food rates. We're good at that stuff. We deal with these kinds of issues all the time.
For example, in order to meet the requirements to carry medical patients in Nunavut, we had to start service to seven communities in the Qikiqtani region on Baffin Island, and we had six weeks to do it. But we were there with two brand-new airplanes, and seven communities had a new air service in seven weeks. I think we can deal with whatever incremental food mail is out there.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Clarke Conservative Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK
Maybe the other airline can answer the question as well.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Clarke Conservative Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK
Okay. The question I have probably takes too long to get a response.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Rob Clarke Conservative Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK
Yes, unless Mr. Fogarty has something.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
Do you want to take 30 seconds and pick up on that last question we didn't have time for?
4:55 p.m.
President, Marché central du Nord
I would like to add something in closing. You talk about building warehouses in various locations, so that products can be delivered by boat. That would be less expensive, according to the lady who left earlier. It's true that some products that can be sent by boat, such as Tide soap or similar products, cost less. But what about all the canned goods that are sent a year in advance?
Our community's turnover in canned goods is high. The sales figures are about $20 million per year. High product turnover ensures an amazing quality. Cans have expiration dates on them. When canned goods are sent to the north, what will be their quality be in six months or a year?
Products are shipped to the north. Even though we're talking about canned goods, these are still high-quality products packaged two or three weeks prior to being shipped off. When Heinz delivers its ketchup, it doesn't stop producing it on a weekly basis. Metro does not sell six-month-old Heinz ketchup. Heinz ketchup is delivered daily or weekly to Metro's warehouses. You want to buy Heinz ketchup. Nutrition North Canada wants people to buy Heinz ketchup and warehouse it for a year. Where is the quality of service in that approach? We might want to save money to cover costs, but we must consider the people living in the north, we must worry about the quality they are getting.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Bruce Stanton
We are out of time, unfortunately, Ms. Novalinga, but I think I'm going to have time to come back to this very point.
Let's go to Ms. Crowder for five minutes, and then I'll take the next question.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
Jean Crowder NDP Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC
I have a quick comment before I ask my question.
It is fine to talk about going to the website for information, and I did go to the website and printed it off, but I had more questions than I had answers as a result of going to the website. There are so many things in here that say “per kilogram basis“ or “yet to be determined”. It goes on and on. The shipping minimum weight per year is to be determined by INAC--this is for eligible southern suppliers. The website is full of questions, not answers.
I can understand the discomfort people in these communities are having about not knowing how businesses are going to operate, about not knowing how people are going to eat, about not knowing whether they can afford things that most of us in the south would consider essential items, such as rice and noodles. Those kinds of things are just part of our daily diets.
Ms. Novalinga, I want to touch on an item here. When the department was here the other day, they told us that all the retailers got sufficient notice to put their orders in for the sealift this year. What we've heard from other witnesses is that there are challenges with storage. Mr. Fogarty pointed out that in terms of controlling for best-before dates and those kinds of things, there are challenges with ordering things that could sit on your shelves for eight or nine months.
Could you say a little bit more about that? It sounds as though time limits on orders are a big storage issue for you.
4:55 p.m.
General Manager, Fédération des coopératives du Nouveau-Québec
In the north, because we found out in July that some items were not going to be on the list anymore for October 3, we decided to have a shot at this. We decided that we would put items on the last sealift that can be on the shelf for two months; in other words, we packed the ship with as many items as we possibly could so that at least it would be cheaper for about six months.
Our problem here in the north is that we have best-before dates, and nobody will want to buy after the expiry dates. We don't buy after the expiry dates; we throw them out.
As for the Internet, very often the Internet is down or slow. During business hours you have to download for an hour or two, weather permitting, and then it's down sometimes, so it's unreliable at best here as well.
5 p.m.
NDP
Jean Crowder NDP Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC
Mr. Kusugak, I wanted to ask you a question about consultation. That's always a big issue for first nations and Inuit. We hear consistently from people that what the government determines is reasonable consultation is not consultation. What we've heard today is that you were consulted at a couple of meetings, I think. In your view, is that consultation?
5 p.m.
Acting President, Nunavut Tunngavik Inc.
No. This is the kind of consultation they're talking about when they ask us to look at the websites or comment on the decisions they've made.
Laurie was pointing out to me that since 2009 there has been no involvement of NTI or any other Inuit organization.
5 p.m.
Acting President, Nunavut Tunngavik Inc.
Yes. Article 32 actually says that on all social issues--like this one, for example--Inuit have to be consulted, and that they will help to develop programs and suggest programs that the government would be working with us on. Most of the time there's absolutely no consultation, in our opinion.
I understand that everybody has an idea of what real consultation is, but for us it means to be involved in actual development of some of these policies, and that doesn't really happen.