Industry Committee on Nov. 19th, 2020

[James Cumming, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Madam Chair, wouldn't it be possible to have those two ministers next week go back to back? I appreciate that the department officials are making themselves available, but it's really the ministers we want to talk to.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

I understand. The ministers are available next week. I will double-check with the clerk as to the exact timing that the ministers will be here, and I will get back to you on that.

With that, though, I do want to start the third round, because time is ticking.

If that is okay with the committee, we will start with MP Sloan for five minutes.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I have a point of order, Madam Chair.

I just want to say that I agree with the honourable member's request about the scheduling of ministers the committee meets with. I am looking forward, though, to asking the deputy ministers questions because their answers may be more informative. If we stick with the plan, I would be just as happy to question the deputy ministers.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much.

With that, I will turn the mike over to MP Sloan for the first round of questions.

You have six minutes, MP Sloan.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Madam Chair, could I clarify if the deputy ministers would be available right now to receive questions?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Yes. That's who we have here.

Mr. Kennedy, Mr. Thompson and Mr. McConnachie are here for the next hour to answer technical questions.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Okay. That's perfect.

This question is for whoever wants to answer it. In relation to the EORN project and similar projects, there seems to be some confusion about the various funding streams. Local officials in my area are concerned about getting the funding for the EORN project.

I know there is a rapid funding stream for a maximum of $150 million, I think. The buy-in that EORN needs for the EORN project is $200 million. Can I get some feedback on how we can make the project happen? I know that various people have been aware of this. The minister has been aware of this for many years. How can we make this project work?

[Simon Kennedy, Deputy Minister, Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada, Department of Industry]

Madam Chair, I'm happy to start with that.

It is true that there are a number of streams of funding available for broadband. The CRTC, obviously, has funding that it is allocating. We have the universal broadband fund, and we have a set-aside that's available to work with the Infrastructure Bank, which has set aside $2 billion, so there are a number of streams of funding.

ISED is leading a coordinating process to try to make sure that on the federal side we're able to bring those tools to the table and work with our colleagues in a way that makes sense to make projects work. We certainly have talked to EORN and other project proponents.

I could maybe turn to my colleague, Éric Dagenais. Éric is actually the one who has been dealing directly with project proponents. He might be able to speak a bit about the EORN project specifically, Mr. Sloan.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

That would be fine, if he's available.

[Éric Dagenais, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Spectrum and Telecommunications Sector, Department of Industry]

Yes. We have been talking to EORN pretty regularly about how we can work together, so they're aware that we have launched a request for proposals. Actually, we've looped in the Infrastructure Bank and Ontario as well, because it gives us an opportunity to work closely with EORN on the project they're putting forward.

The rapid response, as you mentioned, is $150 million, but it's a maximum of $5 million per project, so as far as the big project that EORN wants to put forward goes, it's probably the universal broadband fund that is most fitted to the kind of project they're looking at.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

I'll follow up on that. This question would probably have been better answered by the minister, but back in the prior report that the Standing Committee on Industry did on broadband connectivity in rural Canada, the suggestion was to create a coordinated national strategy. It seems that we have a variety of different funding initiatives through various streams in the Department of Industry and the regional development agencies. Why hasn't a coordinated national strategy been undertaken, as was recommended before by the report of this committee?

[Simon Kennedy]

Madam Chair, I could answer that.

As the minister said, the government does have a coordinated national strategy, just to assure members. There is a coordinating table. ISED plays a chairing role in that regard.

Without getting deep into the details, there are different kinds of broadband projects, and different projects have different demands. For example, it's very difficult to connect some of the very remote communities with fibre optic. We might need satellite. Deployment of satellites is going to involve different organizations than working with a small community in a suburban area. So we have the LEO project that deals with satellites.

There are projects that are close to being commercial, and with a bit of a shove they could go ahead on reasonably commercial terms, and that's the role the Infrastructure Bank plays. The Infrastructure Bank has a role. Those are generally large-scale projects involving many thousands of households, and then there are going to be these opportunistic projects where we can move quickly to maybe connect a small number of households or a small community, and that could be done through the rapid response stream, as an example.

This infrastructure is not a whole lot different from bricks and mortar. This is like building the national highway system, except that it's kind of the pipes of the future. We have a number of different instruments suited to that purpose, and we're working in a coordinated way with all our colleagues.

I would also say, Madam Chair, that we have close relations and contacts with every provincial government and with the territories as well. We work very closely with them to move these projects ahead.

I'll stop there.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you. I appreciate it.

Could you provide some clarity for me on the EORN project? I speak regularly with, for example, Jim Pine, who's a regional bureaucrat deeply involved with this, and again, there seems to be some confusion on the way forward.

Could you give me a direct explanation of which funding streams can be applied for to make the EORN project a reality?

[Simon Kennedy]

Madam Chair, maybe I'll turn back to Éric Dagenais, but what I would say is that, obviously, we've just launched the program. There are clear application criteria. We want to sit down with potential applicants and work through their circumstances to understand how we can work together.

Éric has been at the forefront of that with EORN, so I'll just turn to him briefly on that.

[Éric Dagenais]

Thanks, Simon.

MP Sloan, I've been talking to Jim Pine on a number of occasions. There is availability of the $1.75 billion. If EORN has leftover projects that can be eligible for rapid response, they can submit some applications—either under a partnership with the bank or from the broader fund. We're sorting that out right now. As Mr. Kennedy said, we launched last week, and we're in discussions with EORN as of two days ago. That was the last time we spoke to them.

[Derek Sloan, Conservative, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you. I appreciate it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sherry Romanado]

Thank you very much.

Our next round of questions goes to MP Ehsassi.

You have the floor for six minutes.

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

My first question will be for Mr. Kennedy.

It was great that the minister appeared before committee today. Obviously, the great news is the recent announcement regarding the broadband fund. However, I was disillusioned to hear howls of outrage from some of the members on this committee, talking about how we have to move on and that everything we've done has been aspirational.

One of the things I think we're responsible for here is putting things in context for Canadians. Minister Monsef referenced some statistics about how much our government has been spending on connectivity since 2015. I believe I heard her say that we have spent 10 times more in the last five years than we had in the previous period, prior to 2015.

Could you share some of that data with us?

[Simon Kennedy]

Again, as I noted, there have been a number of strings of activity that the government has launched, generally aimed at different purposes—for example, there is the low-earth orbit satellite investment the government has made; there is funding that has been provided to connect first nations communities; there is, obviously, the universal broadband fund.

If you do the math and add up those resources, they're around $6.2 billion all in. The total spend by governments historically, up until 2015, was around $678 million. So I think the minister is.... It's roughly $600 million to $6 billion in investments. We could certainly share those numbers with the committee, but I think the point the minister was making was that there have been some very large deployments of resources in the last five years or so towards broadband through the various pots that I just talked about.

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Would you agree with me that what the government has done since 2015 hasn't been aspirational, as we've seen some real investments in connectivity?

[Simon Kennedy]

Madam Chair, from the department's point of view—and I won't pass judgment on whether the quantum is sufficient—it's been a very large amount of money relative to the historical spend, in the zone of nine to 10 times more than the historical spend.

The other point I'd like to make to the honourable members is to point out that in many cases these are infrastructure projects that even in the best of circumstances take time. When you're laying fibre-optic cable over hundreds of kilometres of rough terrain and that sort of thing, particularly when you get into a rural and remote region, the challenge can increase significantly in terms of the actual deployment.

Obviously, we're as impatient as members are to get going, and we want to move the project as quickly as possible. There's no upside to going slow. We have to appear before committees like this and have people push us, but these are big projects and they can take a number of years in some cases. From the day you announce it to the day you get service, it can take some time, and that's just physics. It's just the amount of time it takes to build them.

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you for that.

I have a follow-up question. The minister made reference to two different segments to what our government has done since 2015. Could you share with us some of the things that were done by the government, even prior to the recent announcement on the universal broadband fund?

[Simon Kennedy]

One example would be the connect to innovate program, which was announced by the current administration in its first mandate. Then there was a top-up to the connect to innovate program. The total value of funding for the top-up and the original programming is $585 million, with the anticipation of about 390,000 households being connected.

Investments in first nations broadband, specifically.... Obviously, there have been investments through the connect to innovate program that have done to first nations communities, but for specific funding through Indigenous Services to first nations communities there's been $65 million put in since 2015 for about 90,000 households in first nations communities. There has also been funding through the infrastructure program worth about $405 million.

At any rate, Madam Chair, I could go through the list, but those are some of the illustrative examples of the funds that have been allocated prior to the universal broadband fund.

[Ali Ehsassi, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you.

Turning to the universal broadband fund, could you explain to us what the department has been doing to make sure that it accords with realities on the ground in regions of the country, to make sure that it's an effective approach?

[Simon Kennedy]

Madam Chair, there has been an enormous amount of work, I can assure members, to get more sophisticated mapping and to build a pathfinder service so that when communities come to us we are actually able to work with them more closely, particularly communities that have a little less capacity to engage on these complicated projects.

Maybe what I should do is turn to my colleague, Éric Dagenais. He's actually been leading the work and is very conversant on this. He might want to give a little bit of information on this.

We've really tried to up our game to have a much more sophisticated understanding of the gaps and how to fill them.