Science and Research Committee on Nov. 26th, 2024

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Dr. Vats. That's enough for me.

You received 118 responses in 30 days. What strikes me is that you spent more time on four other consultations, including the one planned for establishing the umbrella organization, than you did on the one to gather comments from people in the science ecosystem.

I'd like you to explain to me how the Government of Canada spent three months on consultations to expand wireless satellite services, and even extended it for one month, and yet a consultation on one of the department's biggest structural changes lasted 30 days. Do you think that time frame is really sufficient?

Why do some public consultations last 30 days, while others take 60 or 90 days?

Consultation with people in the science ecosystem began in the middle of summer. As you must know, universities, CEGEPs and colleges are closed during the summer. Therefore, some people were unable to express their opinion.

Do you think it's responsible behaviour on the part of a government that's about to make such a massive change to not care if the people who are supposed to take part in consultations are able to do so?

Do you believe that a 30‑day consultation process is really enough to provide an accurate picture of the science ecosystem?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

The period of consultation, as I said, could have been longer, but you have to distinguish the nature of the feedback you're going to get for different types of consultation. When you talk about wireless, you're talking about something where there's a direct, immediate impact on citizens. You want to make sure you're getting the voices of individual citizens on what that's going to mean for them and their pocketbooks.

When you're talking about a structural change to these organizations, what you're really looking for.... Of course, individual researchers may have views, but those views are usually input through organizations and through institutions that have a greater capacity to provide feedback on a shorter time frame, so I think you're getting feedback from a community that's much better organized to be able to provide that input in a shorter period of time.

I don't think that we lost.... I'm sure we lost some voices—it'll always happen—but I don't think it's comparable. Given the importance of the issue, the fact that we launched it in June didn't seem to cause an issue in terms of getting feedback. I mean, if it's important enough, academics will respond.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

That's your opinion, Dr. Vats, and I respect it. However, I can confirm to you that I received hundreds of emails from people who were unhappy that they were unable to participate in the consultations. They were not happy with the process.

Again, 30 days is not a lot of time to hold consultations on such a significant change. Why did the other consultations take longer?

Nevertheless, I'm grateful to you for being open and for recognizing that you may have missed the opportunity to hear from some people during these consultations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Valerie Bradford]

Thank you.

We will now turn to MP Cannings for six minutes, please.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

Thank you both for being with us today.

I also want to welcome the Liber Ero fellows. They're in the middle of the back over there. These are Canada's finest conservation scientists, post-doctoral fellows who are here in Ottawa to see how policy is made and things like that, so I wanted to welcome them. I also see other student groups here as well. This is what we're here for: to talk about the future of science in Canada, so we are hopefully doing a good job for them.

I have so many questions. I'm going to start off with Mr. Vats.

Some of the concerns I've read about in the “what we heard” documents and other briefs are concerns about, in this period of change, what that will look like. They don't want things to go sideways. There's always the consideration of existing budgets.

First of all, let's talk about that. Will the existing budgets for the tri-councils remain intact, and will anything new that capstone might want to fund be on top of that? How is that going to work?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I think a starting principle is that we're not looking to take from the councils in any significant way to support the implementation of the capstone. It's still to be determined, because we're still in the process of working it through. I can't say that it will be dollar for dollar preserved, but it's not as though the intention is to take large amounts of money out of the councils or to reallocate money across the councils as part of this exercise.

It's acknowledged that if you want to do this well, you have to do it carefully. There may be some investments needed, but we want to do that in a way that doesn't compromise either the operations of the programs of the councils or their funding envelopes.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

I guess this is another major high-elevation question. This capstone idea came about because we wanted more collaboration across disciplines. How will that actually work? We have three now. For instance, from the viewpoint of an individual researcher, how will that change their opportunities?

Just walk me through how this will make things better. What do we see elsewhere in the world in terms of other things that we're trying to emulate? How will this improve all that?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

There's been a range of these kinds of initiatives going on internationally. In some cases, they've actually collapsed structures down. In other cases, they've created a structure similar to ours. Fonds de recherche du Québec has something similar, as does UK Research and Innovation. They have moved in this way.

There will be a number of changes over time. I would just want to start by saying that. I don't expect programs to shift overnight. I think what we need to do is actually talk to the researchers and talk to the consumers of that research and our international partners to help define how programs need to evolve to meet these needs.

I can give you some examples of things that even from the recent past you could have addressed more effectively with this approach. Take the example of research during the pandemic and how it could have.... It did support, obviously. It was all science- and research-based in terms of the kinds of interventions that were made. But if you're thinking about the kinds of problems we're trying to deal with in developing new vaccines and therapeutics in terms of public health actions, you're trying to bring together expertise primarily from the health science community. If you want to talk about how you can actually get community engagement to protect the public, you need social sciences and humanities. If you want to actually develop the capacities that you need to generate vaccines and therapeutics, you need engineers. You need people who are actually more in the natural sciences to bring that together.

There was no natural vehicle for doing that. In fact, we created a layer of new programs with new governance to be able to bring the councils together and CFI to have an integrated approach to that. That program is called the Canadian biomanufacturing research fund and the associated infrastructure fund. That's under way, but it took quite a while to actually spin it up. It's a very heavy kind of structure for responding to these kinds of issues.

Now, that's an extreme example, but you could see other ways where there are issues that you want to deal with as a country, where there's a societal question or there's a science question—

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Can I just jump in here and ask who picks those issues? We talk about mission-driven. Who chooses the missions? Who sets those priorities? Is it the government? Is it the researchers? If we're in the pandemic, would a bunch of researchers get together and create a mission?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I think there will different types of missions. Some will be more akin to moon shots, for example. You can see a technological objective that you're trying to achieve. These are the kinds of initiatives that DARPA does in the U.S., for example, where you achieve a certain milestone. Those may be defined through government strategies and through this new council of science and innovation, which we're also standing up to provide expert advice on this.

There may be others where you're bringing communities together to identify how to move forward. In broad issues like poverty or housing, there could actually be some technological solutions that you'd want to engage the community on and the experts on to be able to define how we're going to incentivize the right kinds of research directions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Valerie Bradford]

That's our time. Thank you.

We'll now start our second round of questions. This will be our five-minute round.

We'll start with MP Lobb.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Thank you very much for coming here today, Mr. Vats.

With regard to the people who are doing the research, is it all the same ones who get the same amount of money, or roughly this money, every year? I've looked at some of the results, and it looks like several researchers get money every year. Is that the case, roughly speaking?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I think the agency presidents may be able to speak to this better, but I think it does vary by agency. If you take a natural science or engineering researcher, you'll see that their core funding is through a program called the discovery grants program. The discovery grants program is typically on a five-year cycle. The amounts don't change; they're set for the five-year period. Someone reapplies. Typically, their money might go up somewhat or go down, depending on their research performance, and that provides core funding that they can rely on to enable their students to pursue their research.

The other things are layered on top. There are more targeted programs, of varying scales and different objectives, that can change how much a researcher gets from year to year.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

The other thing we heard a lot in the opening up of this study and throughout this study is that we need everybody to work together. Is that the position of the department, that nobody's working together? I go through all the results of the studies, and everybody's working together from all over the world. However, every time we have somebody coming in here, they're saying that we have to get these guys working together. What is the case? Are we in the Stone Age here, or do we actually have researchers...? Are we to believe that the researchers are working together or not working together?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I think researchers are very.... They have a lot of ingenuity, and they do collaborate if they can. That is core to advancing knowledge. It's a question of whether it's knowledge in the purpose of a larger goal or not. There may be some initiatives that you want to move forward on that require a greater collective action than individual researchers can achieve on their own.

If I may, one other thing that you can also have is this: There are some researchers who don't fit nicely into a discipline. They're actually people who will ask, “Am I a health researcher, a natural science researcher or a social science researcher?” Those distinctions don't necessarily matter as much as the quality of the research.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

We are setting up the capstone for the one researcher who doesn't know what slot he fits in.

I look at it, and I see that, okay, a lot of these people have been getting money for 20 years. It's different, but basically they've been getting it. Then, they're also working around the world with different researchers, and they're going to the same conferences, so they're already doing it. Is this a failure of bureaucracy, or is this some make-believe thing? I think the problems are right in front of your face, and you don't need to create another layer of bureaucracy by chance. We just have to do this in a better system, possibly.

I have one last question before my time's over. I want to get your thoughts because you see on the American news and on the Canadian news some of these studies that are getting approved. They're studies in other parts of the world. There's one here called “Population Diversity and Economic Development in...Mexico”. It's in some little place in Mexico. Why is a Canadian taxpayer paying for that? Of what value...? I'm sure there's value to the person in Mexico, but of what value is that? There's a list, a long list. I think people in parts of our communities are asking why we are funding these.

The health ones are a different story. I think there are great arguments to be made for the chances on those, but with regard to one like that, what is it? Where's the value you're asking people to make on those?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

The starting point is that the system is geared towards funding the best research projects. From my perspective, I think it's a bit dangerous to try to narrow the scope of these things, because you don't necessarily know what the outcomes and the benefits to society would be.

In the case of a study on communities in other countries—

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Here's another one, just while we're talking. It's studying Ukraine's Maidan Museum. I'm sure there's value somewhere, but why does a Canadian taxpayer have to pay for that? Why can't the Ukrainian government pay for it, or why can't some wealthy Ukrainian person living in France pay for it? Why does some hard-working guy who is working overtime and can't see his kids have to pay for that?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I can't speak to specific projects, but the examples you've given are about a better understanding of the situation in other countries.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Can I ask a question though, in all sincerity? Who do we have to get here who can answer that question? We've asked this question, and they say, “Well, we have to trust this; we have to trust that. I wouldn't question this councillor or that one.”

Who has to come here to say that this is great value? A Ukrainian museum and Mexican migration patterns and porcupines.... Who do we have to get in here to tell us that it's good value?

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

I mean—

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Just give me a name. I'd take one.

[Dr. Nipun Vats]

This is just a suggestion, but maybe you talk to the researchers. They would be the ones who are best positioned to explain the impacts of their research.

[The Chair, Liberal, Valerie Bradford]

Thank you, I appreciate that.

We'll now turn to MP Chen for five minutes, please.

[Shaun Chen, Liberal, Scarborough North, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses.

I also want to acknowledge the folks in the room, the post-docs and the researchers who are here in the committee room. I'm thankful for their commitment to research and knowledge production, especially in this age of information and the increasing amount of misinformation and disinformation in the world. To have peer-reviewed studies and research in the spirit of knowledge production is truly important.

I want to start off with a question for Mr. Vats.

Last month we had Chad Gaffield here. He's the CEO of the U15 group of Canadian research universities. He testified to this committee that, “The new capstone organization must continue to maintain the political independence of funding decisions. This core commitment to academic freedom and the free pursuit of knowledge are foundational principles of Canada's research system and are central components of its success.”

In your opinion, how can the structure of a capstone organization balance the support for investigator-driven research and mission-driven research?