Evidence of meeting #57 for International Trade in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was know.
A video is available from Parliament.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
Linda Lapointe Liberal Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Thank you.
You spoke earlier about green companies. A number of very fine companies operate in my constituency. We have exporters, including agri-food exporters. We have Volvo buses. We also have maple producers. I'm talking about people who manufacture a whole range of maple products.
How can I enable these companies to benefit from the free trade agreement with Europe?
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
I will agree with you that we need to do a better job to communicate with them.
There are programs and services at work. When we are looking at the success rate of these SMEs that are applying, a good number of SMEs are successful, but we want to see that number go up.
When it comes to the Canada Business Network, we need to ensure that every entrepreneur or anybody who wants to consider business is going to the Canada Business Network and looking at those opportunities. It's a single window, as our colleague has spoken about. You can mention where you're from and what you're looking for, and then all of a sudden it will provide you the information.
BizPaL is another opportunity for businesses that want to start up. Regardless of the community, province, or territory, you're able to say where you're from, and then you're able to see what regulations, licensing, and so forth you need to ensure that you're doing it in the right way.
By bringing regional development agencies under one umbrella, you're also able to go to the RDAs to retrieve that information, but most important, I would say, is the IRAP concierge service. Most people don't know about it, and that's unfortunate. If we can consult and engage with people earlier, then they will be able to go to this concierge service, which will be able to help them manoeuvre and get to the spot they're going to.
I will challenge all members in the House and will be working closely with them to ask them to consider sharing information, as part of their householders, on how SMEs can succeed and grow.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Linda Lapointe Liberal Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Thank you.
The concierge service you spoke about is very good. We should give this information to all our business community networks, including the chambers of commerce and small and medium-sized business associations. I imagine that you'll be able to provide the information, unless it's easy to find.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
Yes. We can definitely provide that information. We are working with them. We know where the offices exist currently, and we also know where we need to reach out. Rural and remote areas are also on our radar. We are going to make sure that this communication and that information are more available, now that I've been invited.... It's when we make linkages like these and create those opportunities that we recognize how many more people are part of the team and can provide this information.
I will be ensuring that all members of this committee have the information so that you can continue to work with your colleagues to have that information. I am going to have a list provided when it comes to contact information and also for access directly to the office, as well as the department, for providing constructive feedback so that we can continue to improve these opportunities. We want every single business to know what they need to know so that they can succeed, and we want the programs, which we are improving all the time, to work for Canadians and for the business owners.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
That ends our first round. We're probably going to have enough time for questions from about five more MPs.
Madam Ludwig, you have the floor.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Thank you.
Thanks to you, Madam Minister, and to all of you, for being here this afternoon.
I initially had two questions, but because there was such a great answer regarding women and services, I've rewritten my question.
I'm very honoured to represent the most beautiful riding in Canada, New Brunswick Southwest, where one of the areas of particular interest, certainly with one of my constituents in the back corner, is marine tourism. The island of Campobello is the gateway to Atlantic Canada.
Can you share with us any services or supports that you have to encourage and promote marine tourism, especially if there's any work being done on the pre-clearance side of getting our Americans more easily through customs to Canada?
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
That's an excellent question. You do have a beautiful riding.
I would have to say that I have a beautiful riding as well, and I'm sure every member would agree that is the case. We need to create opportunities to be able to flow through that border better. We know what that border does. We know the relationship between Canada and the United States is a critical relationship, and that's what the Prime Minister did a great job of representing.
It was really good to see Minister Freeland also south of the border, speaking to her counterpart to ensure that SMEs were being represented.
When it comes to this government and our approach, it's not that I need to go down to be the voice of SMEs. When any minister, including the Prime Minister, travels to any community in any country, he or she is also voicing what we are talking about right here.
We will continue to work closely with the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness to ensure that those opportunities exist, because we know how important pre-clearance is. That's why, for me, regardless of where people talk about it, this conversation comes down to the people we are serving and the responsibility I take very seriously.
I also want to take a moment to talk about the trade opportunity and the fact that the United States is our number one export market. It is our number one source for tourists. With Canada's 150th birthday this year, with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms celebrating its 35th anniversary this year, and—just because it's my riding—with the University of Waterloo celebrating 60 years, and Conestoga College, 50, we really want people to come and see what our country has to offer. Something we have in common in every single community that I've been to is that we all have tourism operators. They are SMEs. They have the potential to grow and succeed, but we need someone to showcase...and allow people to know to come here.
People individually will feel that they bring tourists to their communities, but the reality is that they come to our country, and that's why the government invested $50 million over two years in Destination Canada. We continued with the connecting America program to ensure that the United States considers Canada as a travel destination.
We know that with the dollar right now we have opportunities. We will continue to thrive and grow from those opportunities. We also know that Canadians need to be challenged to visit the10 provinces and three territories, and that's why the millennial travel program is so important. It's so that Canadians also travel.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
In our education and support of small and medium-sized businesses, they can take advantage of trade agreements. What particular characteristics are you or your department looking for when aiding our micro-businesses?
In Atlantic Canada, roughly 50% of businesses have fewer than five employees, but there are certainly huge opportunities for them to take advantage of the trade opportunities with CETA and others.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
That's a voice we know needs to be represented. When we talk about SMEs, as much as we think we are talking about all of them, there are so many of them. We're talking about the backbone of the Canadian economy. We're looking at numbers that are quite vast. This is something we will continue to do more for.
When it comes to the microcompanies, there's a lot of talk about financing and creating opportunities. The Canada small business financing program really is important, because it helps businesses obtain term loans of up to $350,000 to finance equipment and leasehold improvements, and up to $1 million for real property. People don't know about that program. It has existed for quite a while. We need more people to know about it. We need to start engaging with people as they become entrepreneurs, and to provide that solution so that we can support them in the early stages.
What's unfortunate is that when you're later in life—meaning in the experience of a business—you then all of a sudden see so clearly, because hindsight is 20/20.
Mentorship is so important. That's why we are using programs and services to ensure that mentorship is key. There are people who have faced those challenges and overcome those obstacles who are saying that the next generation of businesses will not have to do that, and we will mentor and create those partnerships.
Futurpreneur is a very important program for people under the age of 39. It helps to support entrepreneurs to start a business. It provides them with $15,000, and then leverages that with the Business Development Bank of Canada. Sometimes people find the BDC a little overwhelming, which is understandable, but it allows them to work more closely together.
4 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
Thank you, Minister.
We're going to move to the Conservatives, with Mr. Van Kesteren, another successful business person on our committee.
Go ahead, sir, you have the floor.
4 p.m.
Conservative
Dave Van Kesteren Conservative Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's very kind of you to say.
Minister, welcome to our committee. You must be a busy lady. I hope the government gives you enough time to devote the necessary energy and attention to your portfolio, because this is a very important portfolio.
As the chair said, I had the privilege of starting a number of businesses. I am a businessman. I can remember as a young man working for a car dealer and watching him for seven years. I would just watch everything he did. I planned and I got that opportunity. Every year the spring would roll around and I wanted to go, but I just wasn't ready.
I have a real passion for businesses, as I think most members in this place do, but especially for small businesses.
You touched on a number of areas. You talked about small and medium-sized businesses. I don't know what they call the large businesses, maybe just large businesses.
I believe small and medium-sized businesses have 0 to 99 employees. Medium size is 100 to 400. I think that's how we classify them. Maybe some input—
4 p.m.
Conservative
Dave Van Kesteren Conservative Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON
Five hundred.... We had an exercise in Chatham. We have a business development organization that analyzes how we're doing with the hiring and that. I was part of that and was very pleased to see the work they are doing. They offered those statistics to us. Now, I want you to understand; I want you to just kind of visualize what I'm saying here. They presented how many businesses we had that had over 500, and there were very few. I think there were two. Then for the 100 to 500, there weren't that many either. The vast majority had less than 100.
Now, this is kind of a trick question. I don't know if it's going to be much different in my riding, Chatham–Kent–Leamington, which is a small rural riding. Our main city has a population of 40,000. If I were to ask you the question, the number of hirees, what would be the largest group? In other words, from zero to 100, 10 employees, 20 employees. What do you think would be the highest? I know this is kind of an unfair thing to offer you, but I do suggest that your department should get a handle on this and find out. I'm going to tell you because it's really not fair. It was zero, zero employees by a landslide.
At first I was shocked. What I'm telling you is, in Chatham–Kent—Leamington, the vast majority of all those small businesses that we're so proud of had zero employees. I can tell you why. I got thinking about this. As a businessman, I remember that, if government taxed us 50%—if that's all there was—you'd probably go out there to beat the bushes and try to make a living. You know what kills you? EI, because when you hire an employee, there are EI premiums, CPP, workmen's comp—and I know that's not part of the federal—licences, and energy costs, all those things. By the end of the day, after you've worked and you've tried to make a profit, you find out that you're behind the eight ball. There are more and more young people, more and more entrepreneurs saying, “This isn't worth it.”
I'm going to suggest this. I'm going to suggest that, first of all, the government give us those statistics. I really want to know them, nationwide. Then I think I'm going to suggest, because we're talking about working together, and I'd really like to do that, that we figure out a way to tackle this and get people excited about starting businesses again, because we could do all the other fancy stuff we want. We can have all the programs, but if those things are stopping our entrepreneurs, and I believe those are precisely the things that are stopping our growth, then we're just going to be spinning our wheels.
I know I'm almost out of time, but not yet. I've got—
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
Dave Van Kesteren Conservative Chatham-Kent—Leamington, ON
Would you commit to, first of all, letting this committee know statistically throughout the country what those figures are and what kind of plan we can put in place so that entrepreneurs will have that vigour and that energy to go out and set out on their own?
4:05 p.m.
Some hon. members
Oh, oh!
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
Exactly. This is kind of like when you go to somebody's house as a dinner guest and they don't even feed you dinner. It's kind of like, why did you invite me over?
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
I actually respectfully appreciate the comments and the insight you've shared, and it's true that, when it comes to the members of this committee, you have a lot of insight to offer. That's partly why I'm here, to say that I don't need to be at the committee to have this conversation. I welcome the opportunity for these conversations and discussions to continue.
This is a challenge that all of us take seriously, and we need to advance. I can assure you....
Do I get the last half a minute, or does he go again? I can't take my time now.