Science and Research Committee on March 7th, 2023

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Yes, examples would be good as well.

This committee just finished a research project on colleges and applied research across Canada, and colleges stuck out. It is the same for my colleague, Mr. Blanchette. We were very pleased with the results from colleges and universities across Canada in all provinces including Quebec.

The statistic we heard before was that 95% of Canadians live within 50 kilometres of a college across Canada. What's really important about that when we look at Canada is that Canada is very rural. Only 95 municipalities in Canada have over 100,000 individuals, and 3,500 municipalities are rural in Canada with under 100,000. Colleges are more prevalent across those rural communities.

When I was involved with economic development in my region, which is very rural, we really looked at clusters and working with accelerators across Canada. Those clusters, if they scale and grow, will then develop IP and will be successful in Canada.

Universities do a great job with applied research on a lot of disparate emerging technologies, such as quantum, biotech, etc., but we found that there are a lot of emerging small and medium-sized enterprises in Canada that work in the college system. If we have those statistics, we can further relate how, to your three recommendations, we can help grow those IP rates, giving the rights to Canadians, and fund R and D for those different models as well as, obviously, IP property rights, etc.

Do you agree with that? Is there anything you'd like to add to that?

[Jeffrey Taylor]

No, and 100% this is great. You should be where I am. This is a wonderful answer.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Well, I am here now.

The next stage I would like to ask about, as we talk about IP, is growth-stage companies or scaling companies. Is that something on your radar?

You know, we've talked about this for years, how Canada has a really big problem with not seeing its companies scale. Sometimes when we do see that—and we've talked about a lack of venture capital, etc.—those companies end up in foreign hands and the IP ends up in foreign hands. Do colleges see scaling Canadian companies, scaling SMEs, as a priority?

[Jeffrey Taylor]

Yes, it's certainly part of the strategy overall to help businesses innovate. We're hopeful that this new Canada innovation corporation is really going to be focused on that challenge you just brought up, the kind of ceiling that happens when businesses try to scale in Canada. In part of their blueprint documentation, that seems to be one of their priority areas of focus.

We would offer a spectrum of services and try to tailor opportunities for everyone from a start-up to a large corporate partner. I go back to my Nova Scotian examples. Irving Shipbuilding has the big contract to build warships for the next 30 years. We work with them all the time on everything from workforce needs to R and D projects, so we can certainly address the spectrum of business challenges.

I think capacity is there within the sector. It's really the funding limitation that we get jammed up with.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

This the last question, Mr. Chair. I have 10 seconds.

In terms of funding, because you have a large alumni network and you work directly with Canadians who own businesses and SMEs, do you think you could come up with a strategy that would help see venture capital grow, with maybe 50-cent dollars to government dollars, through the college system and their networks to local companies?

[Jeffrey Taylor]

I love that question.

VC is often brought up as a bit of a challenge for the Canadian ecosystem, and I think establishing better VC and better access to it through our college network, for example, across Canada could be a tremendous opportunity for us.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Good. Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thank you so much for that.

We now move to the final five-minute round of questions.

MP Sousa, go ahead, please.

[Charles Sousa, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Just to follow up on that last question, venture capital is the biggest problem we have, I suspect, and the ability for the government to then have that risk tolerance to initiate some of that is not in our wheelhouse. You don't want us adjudicating these deals and participating, but you do want the funding. I like the notion of having a partnership with the private sector, and some of the colleges that I've visited, be it Niagara or elsewhere, have done a great job of dealing with local businesses, as you've just explained with Irving out on the east coast.

There were three recommendations you made. One was about funding. The second one was about funding, and I'm not sure what the third was. Perhaps you could just reaffirm. One was to enhance college funding and the second one was to explore funding for educational purposes. What was the third?

[Jeffrey Taylor]

The third one was specifically looking at new programs that are being developed by the government, like the Lab2Market program, for example, and ensuring that colleges have an important role to play in those programs.

I mentioned earlier that the Lab2Market program is largely focused on graduate students and post-doctoral fellows in university labs. While I think we can be helpful and do stuff in that space, it's perhaps a little university-centric, so it's about finding a way to have colleges break into these programs.

[Charles Sousa, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Yes, you've commented on how 98% of the funding now goes to universities and only one or 2% is going to the colleges, and you want a bigger piece of that pie to facilitate some of the practical solutions. Our previous witnesses talked about how you can't commercialize and you can't monetize what you don't own. You want to own these IPs and initiate some of this within Canada and scale them, but you also want them to win.

In order for that to happen, in providing the funding alone—and we've heard some criticisms that funding is actually not as strong as it can be or should be—what's really at risk is who that funding is coming from. We want a bit more of that risk tolerance, because we're risk averse. The traditional banks of Canada are risk averse too. That's not what they do. They're not taking equity risk.

The equity, by its nature and by its very term, is equity owned by the investor. We heard criticism already that we don't want the government to just throw money out at a deal. We want the government to actually have an equity stake so it benefits, but that's not what government is there for. We're there to promote, enhance and encourage investment from the private sector. We're there to encourage and provide a stimulus by which some of the private sector can grow, create jobs and succeed. That's the role of government.

Do you want government owning businesses? Do you want government being in the sector that actually operates these and takes equity risks and then suddenly changes its scope? Do you want us to provide regional sources, regional investment? We want to inspire some of that growth, and you want government to provide some of that funding to those colleges to initiate that very issue. The measurement of our government's engagement isn't by way of success in the choices we make. That is up to the private sector and that's up to the colleges to provide some of that adjudication. It's up to the government to provide resources and stimulus. I suspect that's what I'm hearing you say.

That measurement has to be done in that capacity, so how do we then facilitate government engagement but not then be critical of government for making the engagement? The opposition will say, “You're investing in crap.” I'm sorry. It will say, “You're investing in deals that don't work.”

The fact is, deals do work on occasion. That's the payoff. How do you equate that?

[Jeffrey Taylor]

Maybe I'll give you a story, a success story, and we can use it as an example. It's another local Nova Scotia story.

This is about a rural machine shop, I'd call it, and an entrepreneur. A husband-and-wife team were running their own business and hiring local people. He had a neat idea to develop what I think is called a “slouch correction” device. It's like a seat belt that people in a wheelchair would use. If you have a spinal cord injury and you're in a wheelchair and your posture becomes an issue, this is a sort of seat belt device to correct that.

We helped him innovate. It was a $15,000 project. We helped him to have a prototype and build the thing. He said, “I think I've got something good here, but I can't buy the IP. I don't have money. I don't know how to file this. Could you guys do me a favour? Could you file to register this patent, and I'll buy it from you two years later, some period of time later?” We did that, and we used government money to do that. We sold it back to him and recovered that investment, and he is now employing 40 people in rural Nova Scotia, not just to do this particular device but to build other things. He now has experience with IP and patents, and he knows how to go down this road.

That's a very anecdotal story. It's a one-off. I wish we could scale it up and do that at every college in Canada all the time.

[Charles Sousa, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Yes, it is a great story, and we want to see more of that.

Again, it's the stimulus by which the government engaged to facilitate this, but you also have to be tolerant that, in many of those instances, you won't succeed—

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

We have to wrap up, Mr. Sousa. We're 36 seconds over. I won't cut off witnesses, but I will cut off MPs when they are over their time.

I appreciate the witnesses for being here today.

We won't suspend, but we'll take a small break and then come back for committee business. We will still be in public when we return. We will recess for a quick two minutes.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

We'll get back into the committee business. We have two matters that we have to discuss. First of all, the clerk has distributed a draft supplementary budget for our study on the international moon-shot programs. As explained by email, we slightly underestimated our expenses when adopting the original budget for the study. The supplementary budget of $2,550 will cover what is left. Is there a motion to adopt the supplementary budget?

It is so moved. Is everyone in favour?

(Motion agreed to)

Moving on, the chair would like to share an update regarding the committee's proposed travel in relation to the study of big science in Canada. I will turn to the clerk for this information.

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Keelan Buck]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll go quickly.

As we heard at the last meeting, the travel period from January to March 2023 is coming to a close very soon. We have not received the House's approval to travel during this period, so the chair has instructed me to begin planning for the next travel period, which is April to June 2023.

I remind you that this process has four major steps. First, a preliminary proposal is submitted to the liaison subcommittee. If this is accepted, then a detailed budget is submitted to the liaison subcommittee. If this detailed budget is accepted, it's up to the House to adopt a motion to actually authorize our travel. Only once we receive this authorization from the House can the committee actually begin spending from the budget it adopts. That means booking flights, accommodations, etc.

As I mentioned by email recently, the committee is now at step two of this process for the April to June period. The subcommittee has accepted our preliminary proposal, and at the chair's instructions my logistics team and I have researched and put together a draft detailed budget for the proposed travel. This was distributed last week.

As indicated in the draft budget, we would be visiting the same sites as originally planned. The travelling group would still include seven MPs, two analysts, a clerk and the necessary interpretation staff. After considering several factors, Madam Chair instructed me to plan the travel for the break week in May, so that's Sunday, May 21 to Saturday, May 27. It's for those dates that this budget is made.

To proceed to the next step and continue the travel planning, the committee needs to adopt a budget before Friday this week, which is March 10. If members have any questions, I'll do my best to answer them, but I do know we have limited time.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Seeing that there are no questions, as the clerk mentioned, the draft travel budget has been distributed. If we want the travel planning to continue, the committee needs to adopt a budget and submit it to the SBLI committee no later than this Friday. Is there a motion to adopt this travel budget?

Seeing that there's a motion to adopt the budget, are we in agreement to pass the motion?

(Motion agreed to)

Finally, I remind you that the committee agreed to send a list of proposed witnesses to the clerk for the IP commercialization study by tomorrow, March 8. Once the deadline has passed, the combined list will be reshared. As always, the analyst can offer witness suggestions upon request, and the wish-to-appear list is also regularly updated and shared. That is the end of what I have for committee business.

Now we have Mr. Blanchette.

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

Thank you, Chair.

I have two items to raise.

First, I would like our analysts to give us the status of the draft report on our study of research and science publication in French.

I would like to know when the draft report will be ready for our initial analysis.

[Grégoire Gayard, Committee Researcher]

With respect to the report, it is currently being translated. The first draft is still underway, and we are waiting for the translators to make a few final edits before submitting it to the Committee.

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

Could you give us a sense of when the Committee can expect to receive the draft?

[Grégoire Gayard]

I can't give you a specific date—

[The Clerk]

If my colleague doesn't mind, I would like to interject.

We realize the meeting is public, but the Committee Chair's office will make a decision on this sometime in March. We can assume that will be within a few weeks. The translation is proceeding.

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

Very well.

If I understand correctly, we don't know when the translation will be completed.

I have another point to raise, Chair.

During the February 2nd meeting, I had questions that some witnesses were unable to answer because of time constraints or because they did not have the answer. I therefore asked them to provide the Committee with a written response. Four weeks later, I still have not received the answers to my questions.

I would like the Clerk to tell us how to proceed. Some of the witnesses sent us written answers, but others have not.

My questions were directed to government officials. I don't know if they have to follow a particular process, or if they have a specific deadline to meet.

Perhaps the Clerk could enlighten us?

[The Clerk]

Generally speaking, after witnesses have appeared, they are reminded to provide the information requested by the Committee or one of its members. Committee members may also ask me to follow up with certain witnesses.

As for the deadline, if the Committee decides it's important to set one, it can do so through a motion.

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

Very well.

I will be more specific, Chair.

The question I asked on February 2nd was directed to the MInister of Innovation, Science and Industry, who was accompanied by representatives of the three funding agencies and by Canada Research Chairs.

Also on February 2nd, I asked the Chief Science Advisor a question.

I saw that we received a written response from her office—I wish she had written the response herself. However, I have not yet received a written response to my question.

I think it would be a good idea to set a reasonable time frame for a written response. That would allow committee members to do their work. In my opinion, four weeks is a reasonable period to respond to a simple question.

Thank you.