Natural Resources Committee on Feb. 19th, 2021

Evidence of meeting #12 for Natural Resources in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was amendment.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

Critical Minerals and Associated Value Chains in Canada

Committee Business

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Ian London Executive Director, Canadian Critical Minerals and Materials Alliance

Samantha Espley President, Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum

Pierre Gratton President and Chief Executive Officer, Mining Association of Canada

Lisa McDonald Executive Director, Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada

Jeff Labonté Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Minerals Sector, Department of Natural Resources

Clerk of the Committee Ms. Hilary Jane Powell

Jeff Killeen Director, Policy and Programs, Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada

Brendan Marshall Vice-President, Economic and Northern Affairs, Mining Association of Canada

4:20 p.m.

Liberal

Maninder Sidhu Liberal Brampton East, ON

Thank you for that, Mr. London. Definitely, I know there's much more to mining than just electric vehicle batteries, but I'm getting a lot of calls into my constituency office, especially after the Ford announcement and the GM announcement and Canada's investments into that sector. That's something that relates a lot to the bedroom community here in Brampton.

Can you elaborate more on the risks associated with not securing our supply chains for these commodities? I know you spoke about many of the benefits. Can you elaborate more on the risks associated with not securing supply chains?

4:20 p.m.

Executive Director, Canadian Critical Minerals and Materials Alliance

Ian London

I won't talk about vaccines. I'm not even going to go there, but it's associated with all these minerals and capabilities that we have. So goes the technology. If we're not producing the product, we don't have control of it. How did the Chinese build an entire infrastructure? They created 100 million jobs just around rare earth. It started with their rare earth supplies, commodities, powders and so on. They eventually took the magnet business. We now buy their refrigerators, motors and washing machines.

If we look at it that way, in terms of demand pull, that's the kind of strategy this country can implement. We have access to European markets, the American markets and our own. That's what we have to take advantage of. The risk of not doing it is that there also goes the technology—the high-tech jobs and high-tech schools and programs. As well, there's the environment. They're trucking all this stuff. We're trucking the heavy stuff and bringing back the light stuff. I'd prefer not to truck the heavy stuff.

4:20 p.m.

Liberal

Maninder Sidhu Liberal Brampton East, ON

Thank you. I appreciate that.

Mr. Chair, I will take my last few seconds to thank everyone for being here and for sharing their insights with us. I definitely learned a lot today.

4:20 p.m.

Liberal

The Chair Liberal James Maloney

Thanks, Mr. Sidhu. I appreciate your sticking to the time.

To all our witnesses, thank you for your input. This was the first day of the study. You got us off to a great start. Thank you again for your patience and for indulging us. It has been, for some more than others, a very strange day in our business. Sometimes things get in the way. You guys were great.

I want to thank all the staff and the people who hung around and helped us get this meeting concluded. It has been a long day and a long week.

All the best, everyone, and thanks very much.

The meeting is adjourned.