Industry Committee on May 5th, 2009

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

There's no delay. We are going through a process of working with the Province of Ontario. The designated minister is Minister Smitherman. At the end of the review of those proposals—I think we have something like close to 200 proposals in Ontario.... We are going to continue to review those and hope to have an announcement out soon.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Okay. Well, thank you, Mr. Minister. With the current conditions in Windsor, I hope this will move fast.

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Yes, and in fact I took the time, you should know, Mr. Masse, to meet directly with the proponents to hear their side of the story, and that was a very productive meeting.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you for doing that.

Moving on to a letter you received from the Canadian Association of Research Libraries, what's happened is that the Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information, CISTI, Canada's national science library, is being slashed by 50%, and then another 20% is being hived off. It's a $15 million to $20 million cut. This institution is responsible for the provision of information that's led to fuel cell technology improvements, competitive techno-intelligence, improvements on everything from ships to automobiles, all kinds of different industrial developments, solid oxide fuel cell technology—it goes on and on—aerospace, NRCan.

Why the cut right now? Right now this is an institution that a lot of businesses and research and development pulls from. If you destabilize this institution at the moment, it will throw industry and others backwards. Why the cut to this fund, especially at this given time right now?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Well, I can tell you generally that when we do our strategic reviews, the intention always is.... Obviously, there are some parts of an agency that might be underfunded but do important work. There might be other parts of the agency that have the appropriate funds and are doing well. And there are certain parts of the agency under review where the results have been not up to standard and where the agency has concluded it can get by doing it in another way without having a direct impact on their reason for being. That's my general comment. I'd have to look at the specific case in order to find out whether it fits in that category or not.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I would really ask you to review this again, because at a time now when we have a lot of uncertainty in the economy, and we actually have an interest in moving on science and technology, to take this and introduce another model is very harmful. I think you'll hear more about it.

I do want to move a little bit to your department and its use of budgetary resources. The parliamentary research service looked into your spending in 2007 and 2008, and what they found was that $1.364 billion—almost 84% of your allocation—was spent, but you had a series of other moneys left untouched, including $140 million that was never spent and now has been sunsetted. You also had other funding.

I can provide these figures to you later on.

There was another $275 million unused by your overall department, as well, including your affiliated agencies. You also had rollover dollars in the future, but the total unused funds were $750 million, or nearly $1 billion.

Given the issues facing sectors such as the tool and dye mould-making sector, which has been asking for a credit facility to get them through the problems in the automotive area—and we've seen the specific cutback of $15 million to $20 million in the previous case I outlined here—wouldn't it make more sense to start to use these funds, especially the slippage funds, amounting in total about $415 million? Wouldn't it make it more sense, given your portfolio, to actually use these funds, as opposed to returning them to the general coffers?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

I would say that it depends on the particular situation. Let me give you one example I'm aware of.

The auto innovation fund is something that's been in the news and has been raised in the House, quite rightly so. We actually inked a deal with Ford of Canada, for instance, for $80 million from the auto innovation fund. But the fact of the matter is that many parts of the auto sector right now are rather occupied, and they haven't accessed the fund as quickly as we thought they would, because they've been busy dealing with the other challenging aspects of the auto sector.

That's not an excuse. It's just an explanation why certain funds may not be accessed at a particular time.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Yes, I know. That's fair, and that would apply to some of the funds that are carried over. But for example just this last year, in your overall portfolio, $274 million was actually returned. It wasn't used in your department. It's that slippage in particular that I'm really concerned about.

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

I'll let the man with the institutional memory perhaps answer the question.

[Richard Dicerni]

I really would like to see those numbers, in the sense that the overall portfolio includes the CFI, the granting councils, and the National Research Council, and so forth.

The department runs fairly tightly, in turn, and I keep a fairly close eye on how much has lapsed. I think that within the Department of Industry, you're looking at something that is under 5%, which is quite manageable, because you don't want to run it—

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

The document I have here—and I'll provide it to you—says that of 91% of allocations were used overall by the entire department, and Industry Canada only used 84% of its allocations. In this regard, I'm concerned about all of the challenges out there.

I want to quickly move to one last question, Mr. Minister, if I have time. On my right-to-repair bill, Bill C-273, you've asked for a voluntary agreement two days before the vote. But clearly, in the United States, the model is based on legislation. The EPA is what actually creates an operating agreement for the legislation that provides information to the aftermarket in the United States in a rules-based system.

Why would you want to bring forth a voluntary agreement? I've seen your letter at the eleventh hour that it would be based upon American legislation. But it would only be voluntary over here, versus that in the United States, where they actually have to provide it by legislation. Why are you asking that Canadians be treated differently by the automotive companies over here in Canada—by the foreign companies that will dictate the rules, and there'll be no recourse for the actual process—versus having a Canadian solution that would be rule-based and actually be quite similar to the one in United States, in the sense that it's backed by legislation and wouldn't be voluntary?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Well, I guess I can't count on your support for my initiative then.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

No.

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

That's fair.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

No, I want a solution that's based upon legislation in Canada, not on some other foreign government's legislation and foreign companies.

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

As you know, Congress works very differently from Parliament. From my perspective, if we can get a deal that the OEMs or manufacturers sign on to, and that gives access to the secondary market for the purpose of helping to enhance our environment, that's a good deal.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

But why do you want Canada to be treated differently?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

I'm saying this will be good for Canadian consumers and good for the aftermarket too. The manufacturers, because of my initiative, are willing to go along with this. I think it's a step more than we had a month or a year ago, and that's progress.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Masse.

Mr. Rota.

[Anthony Rota, Liberal, Nipissing—Timiskaming, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Welcome, Mr. Minister.

The question I have concerns IRAP, the industrial research assistance program. I understand you have increased their funding by $170 million over the next two years. Is that correct?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

That's the number, I think.

[Anthony Rota, Liberal, Nipissing—Timiskaming, ON]

Very good. Now, I also understand that in southwestern Ontario, part of IRAP will be administering SODA, the Southern Ontario Development Agency, for economic development. Is that correct?

Okay. Of the $170 million, how much is actually going to IRAP programs, how much of it is going to SODA, and how much is being added for the administration of SODA within that program?

The other thing is that you mentioned what seems to be two years at a time. Is this sustained funding, or is it something that will drastically end after two years?

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

It's amazing how we have two northern Ontario MPs debating the Southern Ontario Development Agency.

[Anthony Rota, Liberal, Nipissing—Timiskaming, ON]

I have FedNor coming up.

[Tony Clement, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Okay. Let me assure the honourable member and this committee that we continue to make progress on developing the terms and conditions of SODA, as it is now known. What we're looking for, I can say generally, are ways in which we could quickly, for the time being, until a full-fledged agency is created, use instruments available to us through Industry Canada to enable us to flow the money in a successful and efficacious manner.

So as the saying goes, when we have something to announce, we'll announce it, but I appreciate your input on this matter.