Evidence of meeting #37 for Science and Research in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was federal.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:40 p.m.
Conservative
12:40 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
I do not have that information at hand, but I know that they are—
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Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
—adjusting to and adapting rapidly to this changed geopolitical context.
12:40 p.m.
Conservative
Dan Mazier Conservative Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB
So there are universities still continuing to work with Huawei after CSIS has suggested not to.
12:40 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
I know that our vice-president of research—
12:45 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
—at the University of British Columbia, at this committee, said that they were, for example.
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Conservative
12:45 p.m.
Conservative
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Chad Collins Liberal Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, witnesses, for appearing today.
I was going to ask one of the questions that MP Mazier just referenced, and that is about the Fraunhofer question. Mr. Balsillie, you answered that very well. You're not the first person to raise that.
You provided some other examples internationally, such as Singapore and Taiwan, and I think the Swiss have been mentioned here. These are other countries to look at in terms of maybe trying to steal some of their legislation or investment opportunities that exist for the government. The U.S. has come up a couple of times. I think you raised it here today.
You talked about the relationship between the federal government and state-level entities in the United States. How should that play out here in Canada as it relates to the federal government working with provincial partners? Sometimes that's difficult, as we know, as partisan politics can unfortunately stand in the way of making progress on certain issues. You mentioned what Ontario is doing here.
What role should the Government of Canada play in terms of supporting its provincial partners and, by extension, sometimes municipalities and post-secondary institutions?
12:45 p.m.
Chair, Council of Canadian Innovators
I'm in active regular dialogue on this issue with Canada's four largest provinces, so I can speak with direct knowledge of it.
The nature of freedom to operate is that it's non-rivalist, which means I can give you my freedom to operate and it costs me nothing, so it's the perfect opportunity for federalism. Different provinces will compete with their agencies because it costs nothing for, say, Ontario to share its freedom to operate with Alberta and with their institutional approach if Alberta reciprocates; and the federal government can provide a blanket.
You can never have too much freedom to operate. All you do is create the institutional asset, which is the freedom to operate, and make it available to domestic companies on the technical forms of transfer. It's a perfect opportunity for federal-provincial co-operation, especially because of those shared granting responsibilities to research. It's so easy to fix.
12:45 p.m.
Chair, Council of Canadian Innovators
It would be beautiful, because it would almost overnight change the opportunity for companies to grow and to create economic outcomes and security outcomes for Canada. I know that at the premier level, they would welcome co-operation with the federal government on this. That would start to reverse Canada's being in last place. You can start to turn that in a year. It's a policy change, not a money change. It's right before us. It's right here.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
12:45 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
Yes. It's a really important question, and it seems to me that in the world of universities, federal-provincial partnerships have been key.
I must say that historically speaking, it's really the federal government that's been the leader in the world of research and in promoting the notion that as a country we need a solid scientific foundation for our society. Without federal leadership, I think we would be in a very different position.
As we said earlier, it's really only the Province of Quebec that has similarly taken that kind of role to bolster what they're doing. It's much more fragmented elsewhere across the country.
I think federal leadership is key. Often now that is done in a kind of matching and partnership way. As you know, the provinces are the ones that pay for the educational side.
I think there's been a new merging of these notions of teaching and research. They used to be seen as different things. Now we know they're very integrated. In fact, all our universities see that even undergraduate education is really underpinned by the quality of the research environment, because we're not filling pails anymore. We're not just trying to memorize information. Now education is all about learning to learn. It's about learning those skills and those competencies for this intangible economy, this new world.
It seems to me that partnership is key, but I must say that in the world of research and the world we're living in now, federal leadership is really key.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Chad Collins Liberal Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Thank you for that, sir.
Mr. Balsillie, you elaborated on the benefits of the IP collectives that you recommended in your opening statement, but much of what we hear at this committee and at all committees is about funding, the level of funding. You didn't talk about what kind of funding would be required in order to support a federal investment in IP collectives.
Do you have any thoughts on that in terms of comparisons elsewhere and what level of funds might be required to assist in that regard?
12:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Vice-Chair Conservative Corey Tochor
I'm going to have to jump in here.
I'm sorry, Chad, but you could request a written response on this one, if the witness agrees. We are 20 seconds over already.
We're going to move on to the next round of two and a half minutes. We have MP Blanchette-Joncas.
The floor is yours for two and a half minutes.
12:50 p.m.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Gaffield, I'd like to hear you comment specifically on the latest budget released on Tuesday.
I repeat: there were zero dollars in additional funds for the granting agencies.
When you were here before the committee on December 5, you said the following:
Over the next five years, the CHIPS and Science Act in the United States will essentially double the base budget of the National Science Foundation. This massive funding will put enormous additional pressure on Canadian universities as they struggle to compete for and retain top research talent and the best graduate students. This and similar initiatives in other countries demand our immediate attention.
On Tuesday, the science community had high hopes for the federal government. After seeing the budget, I can say that I have some serious comments for the government. Instead, however, I'd like to hear yours.
These are my questions.
What do you think about Tuesday's budget, particularly with respect to funding for science and research?
What message is that sending? What message is the federal government sending to scientists at universities in Quebec and across Canada?
12:50 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, U15 Group of Canadian Research Universities
Thank you for that question.
Last summer, the United States did two things. The first was adopting the CHIPS and Science Act , and two weeks later, the Inflation Reduction Act.
It was a two-tier initiative, and the United States put them together.
I think one of the really important things is the threat that this poses for Canada. The notion that in North America we're going to be all happy and wonderful....
I think the fear is that if they have the capacity and interest in building a 21st century economy based on massive investments in terms of the Inflation Reduction Act and on massive investments in terms of science research and they see them integrated, then the threat to us is that we become a kind of intellectual colony again, and our best and brightest will be vacuumed out of Canada, much as happened, I would say, before the 1960s and 1970s, when there was a massive exodus historically in Canada. If you wanted to pursue graduate work, if you were really talented, you went somewhere else, often to the U.K., France or the United States.
I think if we want to be a strong country in the 21st century, we must understand that economic and social transformation must be underpinned by strong research and science.
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Bloc
12:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Vice-Chair Conservative Corey Tochor
Thank you very much.
Now we'll go on to our final round of questions.
MP Cannings, the floor is yours for two and a half minutes.
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NDP
Richard Cannings NDP South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC
Thank you.
Again I'm going to turn to Mr. Balsillie, because this is a brand new field for me. It sounds so simple when you say it, but I really just want to make sure I get it.
You talked about the freedom to operate and how that one policy change would change the game for Canada. Maybe you could just explain to me especially—perhaps everybody else here gets it—exactly what that policy would look like and, on a more specific level—because it's where I come from—how that might relate to the tri-councils and to federal funding of research.
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Chair, Council of Canadian Innovators
Sure.
I have a document on that—on freedom to operate—which has been provided to other committees. Have you received it?
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NDP