Industry Committee on May 1st, 2018

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

We'll get you that momentarily.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

But I'm out of time.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

That's okay. It's an hour-long committee. We'll definitely get that to you soon.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you very much.

We're going to move to you, Mr. Masse. You have seven minutes.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think I'll move onto something more exciting.

In terms of gas pricing, is there any money allocated for increases either to the Competition Bureau or for support to actually fund a petroleum monitoring agency or an office of an oil and gas ombudsman? I've asked this question in the House of Commons before. The issue—I don't want to get into debating the pricing of gasoline and a series of things—is that I'm looking for more consumer accountability and transparency. Is there anything for Canadians in these estimates to allow for that?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

Unfortunately, there's no new money allocated in these estimates.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I'm disappointed to hear that because I've been hoping there would be at least be something of the nature of even augmenting the Competition Bureau, but I'll set that aside.

I want to move to what we're hearing are concerns with regard to our hearings on copyright right now. It is a mess with regard to the Copyright Board of Canada in terms of the expression that we're hearing from interested parties on both sides. There have been some hearings and some submissions made.

Are there any allocated funds or improvements for making sure that Copyright Board of Canada decisions move quicker and we have decisions in a more timely manner?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

That's a great question. Copyright Board reform is important to us. We want to make sure there's an efficient, transparent, and predictable Copyright Board. We are going to be bringing forward changes to reflect the issues that you've raised. We feel this is something that industry wants.

More importantly, for example, if you look at the national IP strategy that we announced last week, there are some legislative changes to the “notice and notice” regime as well to make it easier for consumers. You mentioned, as well, the 85 year-old lady who received a notice to pay an up to $5,000 fine. We think that's unacceptable so we're going to be bringing you some of those changes as well. There will be some changes to the board reform as well to make it more transparent and to deal with the issues in a more timely manner. Some legislative changes will be proposed as well to deal with issues like notice and notice.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I would like to quickly follow up on that.

One of the concerns that I've expressed during our review of copyright—which we're doing right now—is, even if we present whatever report, whether there will be time for a quick turnaround and also changes. There's no doubt that the Copyright Board's time frame of decision-making seems to be perhaps impeded by resources. I just wanted to note that.

Now that we have Mr. Knubley back, you might be part of this answer because it follows up with regard to the new window that you have. I've expressed concerns in the past about the strategic innovation fund, not because of the fund itself but because we had an independent auto fund. It was different for aerospace but now it's the one-shop window.

Can you provide any numbers in terms of percentages of where the funding is going? My concern has always been a siphoning, perhaps, from the auto sector. What can you report at this point?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

The overall fund amount is $1.26 billion. This is really a reflection of the SADI fund that you referred to for the aerospace sector and the automotive innovation fund that existed. They've been consolidated and we added new resources as well.

We just started to announce some programming in projects under the SIF that go beyond aero and auto. I would say that auto is in a strong position. One of the key announcements we made was on Linamar, for example. That was the first announcement we made. There we announced a 1,500 job contribution. It's still too early to say because there's a competitive process and we're looking at a range of different proposals that are coming forward. The automotive sector has done well historically and we're confident it will do well going forward because we're looking for significant capital investments as well. It's still in early stages, as you know. This was just announced and we've just rolled out a few projects and there are many more to come.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

We can pick them apart individually but will there be a compartmentalization of the types of industries that will be accessing this fund, or is it just going to be a long list?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

We can prepare it in a manner that would be helpful to you and others if you want it broken out by sectors. Ultimately, we're going to list the different projects. For some of those projects, it's interesting, it's not necessarily auto but auto and aero working together. It is sometimes based on R and D to help multiple platforms that deal with multiple sectors. We can do our best to categorize them. If you're thinking of the car of the future, I am too. It's a huge concern of ours and a preoccupation because we want to see the long-term success of the automotive industry. We're looking at the role of AI, clean tech, autonomous vehicles, and making sure that we make those strategic investments. We're very mindful of that in the strategic innovation fund to set ourselves up for success, not only in mandates right now but also in mandates 10 or 15 years from now.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

I will move on to another issue.

We've just issued a report as a committee on rural broadband. Is there any comment you wish to provide right now? Obviously, we are receiving a lot of attention about this from not only constituents but also companies in the field. Do you want to use this opportunity of one minute to comment about the fact that we've submitted the report right now?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

First of all, thank you.

As I mentioned, on the intellectual property report, your feedback and guidance were extremely helpful as we articulated the government's first national IP strategy. In the new knowledge economy, it was long overdue.

With respect to investments in high-speed Internet connectivity in rural and remote communities, that's still a priority for our government. That's why we introduced—and it's in the estimates as well—the connect to innovate program. This is a $500-million program to provide that fibre backbone infrastructure.

The neat attribute about this program is that it actually leverages private sector funding. Overall investment will be over a billion dollars. It will help over 700 communities, including really remote and rural communities, but we're looking to build upon that. We announced for example, LEOs, low Earth orbit satellite technologies, that can help, again, those rural and remote communities to deal with the latency issue.

We're looking at technology. We're looking at traditional funding in fibre. We're looking at partnerships with the private sector. We've also been working very closely with the provinces and territories to make sure that we have better program alignment to maximize those opportunities as well. It continues to be an important issue that our caucus raises. We'll continue to make those investments.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

When will you respond to the report though?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

It will be in a timely manner. We'll look at it, review it, and get back in a timely manner.

[The Chair, Liberal, Dan Ruimy]

Thank you.

We're going to move on to Mr. Jowhari.

You have seven minutes.

I would just remind everybody that we're very tight on time, so let's keep it tight.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be sharing my time with Mr. Sheehan.

Welcome, Minister.

I want to go back to the discussion that Mr. Masse started around the strategic innovation fund. In your opening remarks you said that since its launch in 2017, Canada's innovation industry has responded positively to the strategic innovation fund. You highlighted one or two of the areas where the funding has been announced. Can you also touch on the benefits this has brought into the government's innovation agenda?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

Which particular program are you alluding to?

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

The strategic innovation fund.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

This fund is really designed with multiple objectives. First of all, we really want to bet on early-stage R and D. One of the challenges we see for us in Canada is that our businesses are 22nd out of 34 OECD countries when it comes to investments in R and D. We can and must do better. There's a sense of complacency. There are also just challenges in the environment here where risk aversion exists.

We're trying to unlock the record cash that's on balance sheets right now and see how we can invest in R and D. One of the key objectives of the strategic innovation fund is to develop that partnership not only with the private sector but with academia and small businesses as well to unlock some of that money.

The other aspect of this is to look at some key emerging technologies. For example, we just did an encore announcement. This is really about 5G and creating the 5G bed, this platform on which small businesses can come and test out their ideas, their solutions, their technologies. The larger companies have put money in too. So have the Province of Ontario, the federal government, and Quebec. This is, again, an area where emerging technologies can really flourish.

We're really focusing on unlocking new monies but also on investing in key strategic areas where there's high growth. Especially with 5G, with the Internet of things, there are enormous opportunities there. It plays a big role in autonomous vehicles as well. The connected vehicle is a key component of that. Hence the name—the strategic innovation fund. We're being very strategic, but again, we're not prescribing what these partnerships should look like. The onus is really on businesses. These are initiatives led by businesses working very closely with academia and smaller businesses in particular to come forward with ideas to invest more money in R and D and also in emerging technologies.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

I have one last question on that topic. There was a narrowing down of the amount of funds from $15 billion to $10 billion. I'm sure that's focused on benefiting a lot of businesses.

Can you highlight one or two of those benefits as a result of this narrowing down?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

That's a narrowing down of...?

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

It's the limitation of funds from $15 billion down to $10 billion.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

The benefit is that ultimately we want to see more activity. We want to see more competition. We want to see more businesses participate.

As you know, historically these funds have been allocated for two key sectors. They are important sectors. The aerospace sector is absolutely essential, and so is the auto sector. In my opinion, they'll continue to participate in an active way in this fund, but we've opened it up to different sectors as well.

We believe the criteria that we have in place really allow us to touch on key growth areas. For example, I was in Vancouver just a few weeks ago, on stem cell technologies, at a Canadian company. As you know, in the sixties we discovered stem cells. It's Canadian know-how, Canadian research, but now we're commercializing it. Our investment of $22.5 million will generate 800 new jobs. We're excited about those strategic investments. Again, that's above and beyond the traditional aero and auto, which are important, in an area where there's high growth. These are good-quality jobs, especially because these companies deploy strong IP strategies. On average they pay a 16% wage premium. Those are the kinds of middle-class jobs that we talk about, and those are the kinds of investments that we want to see more of.