Industry Committee on May 28th, 2015

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Can you explain the difference between the job numbers that the government references—

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I'm sorry, I'm not sure what you're.... It sounds like you're leading a question, but do you have an actual specific citation?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

The ranking according to the World Economic Forum on private sector capacity for innovation is 26.

[John Knubley]

Sorry, what does that have to do with—

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

So they're completely different things, it sounds like.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Yes, that's fair. That's a fair comment. It is fair.

But there does seem to be some discrepancy between what the World Economic Forum's views on job creation or job numbers are, and the minister's. Where do we get this notion that we are among the best in job numbers in the world?

[John Knubley]

I think I stated the fact that since 2009—

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Chair, on a point of order. I think we've gotten to the point, Chair, where the questioning is inappropriate. The question was asked, the answer was given, and to keep aggressively going after one of the witnesses is not appropriate.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thanks, Mr. Warawa.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I don't think there's anything appropriate or inappropriate. What the honourable member thinks about how I should or should not conduct a question is irrelevant.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

I think Mr. McKay just reframed the question. Go ahead, Mr. McKay.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Yes, I'm looking for the basis for the minister's statement, which is that Canada has one of the best job numbers in the world according to the World Economic Forum. If you could provide the committee with that, that would be helpful.

[John Knubley]

We will provide that.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Any other questions?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I still have a question.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Okay, go ahead, Mr. McKay.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Now, there's another quote from the minister which said that “Bloomberg has said that Canada's the best place in the world to start a small business, which of course creates jobs.” However, if you look at the Bloomberg Innovation Index, Canada ranks 17th in manufacturing, 20th in research and development, and 21st in patents, in rankings out of 50 countries—not exactly the best. Again, I'm trying to arrive at the discrepancy between the minister's statement, which seems to say that Bloomberg says this is a really great place to create jobs, and the actual rankings of Bloomberg.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Clearly, the honourable member was reading his last question and didn't characterize it right. It would be helpful, again, if we had a citation for the point that he's making right now.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

It's the Bloomberg Innovation Index 2015.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Innovation index...thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Go ahead, Mr. Knubley.

Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Daniel. You had a point of order—

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

It goes to the relevance of the question on the data. Clearly, what he's talking about in terms of jobs versus what they're saying about innovation, there is no correlation between the number of patents and the number of jobs. So let's get close to the point.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Mr. Daniel, that's not a procedural point but I understand the information.

Mr. Knubley, you can go ahead.

[John Knubley]

What I'd say is that I do know the Statistics Canada data shows that Canada is a leader in the creation of small firms. In fact, when you compare our record in the creation of small firms to that in the United States, we're actually better at creating small firms and we create more than the U.S.