Evidence of meeting #87 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was communities.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Maxime Bernier Conservative Beauce, QC
The motion reads as follows:
That the Committee review the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act (BIA), the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act and the Investment Canada Act (ICA); and that the Committee invite relevant stakeholders to appear before the end of 2017 in order to provide the members with information about the impact on pensioners of companies involved in bankruptcy proceedings such as Sears Canada and U.S. Steel.
Liberal
Liberal
Lloyd Longfield Liberal Guelph, ON
I think we should have a discussion on the motion. I'd like to continue with the discussion we have going on today with the witnesses we have. We have ministers coming in.
I think it's a motion worth discussing as opposed to voting on. I think we need more time to discuss it.
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Dan Ruimy
Absolutely.
(Motion agreed to: yeas 5; nays 3)
We're going to go back to our questions.
Conservative
Maxime Bernier Conservative Beauce, QC
All right.
My question is in line with what I said before. When we're talking about Internet access, wireless, and all that, the CRTC has a new proposal for being sure that everybody will have a lot of data, more than they have, and the minimum Internet access. What do you think about their new proposal on that?
Chair, Rural Forum, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
You're referring to the download speed, the megabits per second?
Conservative
Chair, Rural Forum, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
We're in favour of that. We believe that all Canadians should have a minimum amount of download capacity as well as a minimum of upload capacity. We believe it's a step in the right direction. We believe they need to spread out that coverage throughout the rural and remote areas of the country first before it's enhanced any further. We need to have that basic coverage. The reason is that many people need this to operate their businesses. Whether they are farmers or other kinds of business people in the rural area, they need to have the basic capacity, so we're in favour of it.
We're pleased with the funding. Funding is never enough, obviously, but as time goes on, there's more funding being made available. We're happy with that direction.
Liberal
NDP
Kennedy Stewart NDP Burnaby South, BC
Great.
Thank you very much for your presentations today. This issue is important to me because I grew up in a remote area of Nova Scotia that still has very little access to broadband. It's often intermittent, so I understand the challenges faced by folks in rural and remote communities when it comes to Internet access.
To both of you, in terms of coverage, can you give us some examples of the extent of the problem we're facing here? Perhaps you can give us some examples of communities and the levels of access, which range probably from 0% coverage to 50%. Can you give us some sense of the range of the problem we're facing?
Chair, Rural Forum, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
Yes, we can. I would say that the problems with coverage are even more exaggerated in northern Canada, so I'll let Sara answer first, if you don't mind, and then I'll answer as well.
Member, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
Thanks very much.
It's not so much a percentage as it is.... We do have coverage in most communities. We don't have the same rural base in most communities, but the speeds are so slow that it makes it almost impossible to participate using Internet for health, education, and those sorts of things, but our remoteness makes it even more important to have it. You can't drive up the road to access the service that you don't have in your own community. It's absolutely critical to participating in and enjoying a lifestyle that most Canadians have.
NDP
Kennedy Stewart NDP Burnaby South, BC
Do you have any specific numbers you could give us on how slow things are, such as the worst and mid-range scenarios?
Member, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
No. There are some on dial-up, but even when you're not on dial-up, you're still looking at significantly slow speeds. You can't stream. Often video conferencing is a real challenge. The delays with the satellite links just complicate that.
