Science and Research Committee on May 18th, 2023

[Paul Davidson]

No, it's $1 billion annually, and $700 million of that is for the granting councils, with a couple of hundred million to the graduate students.

That's the order of magnitude we're speaking about—$1 billion annually.

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

Okay.

You don't have to comment on this. It's just a thought. In seven or eight years, the budget has increased pretty well 50% to 60%, to almost $400 billion. One billion dollars to set the course for the next 15 or 20 years seems like a pretty small percentage of our overall investment. However, don't answer that, because I know you need to have meetings again sometime.

That's the number, so that's good. Hopefully we can get that in the report.

There's another thing, and I think a few people have mentioned this already. Why don't you folks and some of the university presidents meet with—maybe you already have—the granting tri-councils and say, “You know what? Screw it. We are only going to fund this many projects, and we're going to fund them for the appropriate number of dollars. We're going to let the federal or provincial government deal with the backlash of the reduced granting. On principle, we are going to finance these folks with the proper amounts, so they can live their lives accordingly.”

Why don't we just do that?

[A voice]

Exactly.

[Paul Davidson]

Part of the challenge is that the demands on universities are increasing. To say no to a field of research that may actually create significant new opportunities for Canada, help us in the next pandemic or help us fight the wildfires in Alberta is not a position any university president wants to be in. The universities have done their level best to stretch all available resources to make sure they can support the undergraduate enterprise, the graduate enterprise, work-related learning experiences, the mental health support of university students, the—

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

In a way, though, you're facilitating. I'm not criticizing you, but you say, in a way—

[Paul Davidson]

No, we've had those conversations internally. We've—

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

You're facilitating the lack of investment by going along with the thing. I'm not criticizing you, of course. I'm just saying that the way I look at it, that's a bit of the reality.

Now, I—

[Paul Davidson]

Again, rhetorically, we've seen a number of emergency centres in hospitals close their doors. It's just—

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

It's almost every emergency room in my riding. I know that.

[Paul Davidson]

I will say that university presidents are looking at what their alternatives are.

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

Okay, thank you.

I have another one. It's about these large multinational tech corporations, some of them wealthy Canadian tech companies, like OpenText and Constellation Software. There's quite a long list.

The big Canadian banks all poach these very intelligent people to do their hedge funds, ETFs and everything else. Why doesn't the government put more pressure on them? Instead of saying, “We're going to put a wealth tax on you high-profit banks”, why not say, “You know what? We're getting rid of that. What we want you to do is put more into our universities and our future.”

What do you think about going back to the table and saying, “Business, you're taking a lot of these people anyway. Put more money in.”

[Paul Davidson]

We have some tremendous Canadian business leadership. I don't want to start a long list, but top of mind is Dave McKay, the CEO of RBC. RBC has put $500 million of their corporation's money into their future launch program, which has created scholarships for Black, indigenous and under-represented youth. That is a tangible commitment the Royal Bank has made.

You mentioned OpenText, a great Canadian success story driven out of University of Waterloo discovery research. You know, it's not far from Guelph. They are in active conversations with Canada's universities about investing in the research enterprise.

One thing that's also on the to-do list, frankly—and it was on the to-do list during the Harper years and continues to be on the to-do list—is looking at the SR and ED tax credit system. It's been announced twice by this government. They want to have a review on how to make sure we can optimize private sector investment in the research enterprise, because that continues to be an ongoing challenge. That's another way of looking at how we attract more resources into the research enterprise.

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

Before my time runs out, I'll note there are some extremely wealthy Canadian executives, innovators and entrepreneurs who have done extremely well. John McCall MacBain from the McCall MacBain Foundation—Marcy is actually from my area—donated $200 million to McGill.

What about more of that? What about more of these super-, ultra-, uber-wealthy people...and providing them an incentive, or more of an incentive, to help offset...? What else are they going to do? You can only buy so many yachts and so many private jets. Why not put it into universities—

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

Thank you, Mr. Lobb.

[Paul Davidson]

Every alumni development officer in the country is singing hallelujah to your comments right now. They're working very hard to raise funds.

I'll just add—

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

Actually, we're well over time now.

[Paul Davidson]

To just add, Mr. Chair, if I may—

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

No. I'll go to Charles Sousa from the Liberals, who's next. However, definitely give us a submission.

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

Not to worry. I will follow up on the question that Mr. Lobb was expressing.

I want to begin by reaffirming something so that we all have some clarity. I think all of us around this room want to see us succeed in grants, research and investment. We want our talent to be homegrown and stay here. We want the commercialization of some of the work that's been produced to stay home as well, because we're at risk there.

You've cited some of the issues that need to be corrected to ensure we are setting ourselves in the right direction. To your point, we're talking beyond election cycles here. We're not talking about any particular government per se. We're talking about what is in the best interests of Canada in the future. We're talking about enabling ourselves to put our infrastructure in place so we can continue to succeed, because there has been success.

Notwithstanding that everything seems to be broken on the other side, it's not. Things have been going well, but we can do much better. I want us to talk about what has been going well.

To follow up on Mr. Lobb's question, there is private sector engagement, not just in Canada but around the world. You cited some GDP numbers relative to what the grants could be, but what is the private sector's engagement in the United States, for example, or in the U.K. or Australia, and how is that facilitating some of the needs we have?

We'll hear from Mr. Davidson and then we'll go to Mr. Normand.

[Paul Davidson]

Again, I'm an optimist and I'm a booster for Canadian research and innovation. We can be really proud.

I grew up in the sixties and seventies. Where do you find Canadian success? We have a whole track record of success, both on research and on innovation.

This is Canadian Innovation Week, and one of the things we like to say is the innovation comes from discovery and research. Canada has had a challenging history of developing into commercializable research, and this government has taken important actions through the creation of the new innovation agency, which is a good step. It is a century-long problem of attracting private investment into the research enterprise in Canada. There will always be a role for government.

When we look at our international competitors, the U.S. levels of private sector investment research are much higher. When we look at the U.K., Japan and Korea, they're much higher. Is it a combination of tax measures? Is it grant measures? What do we do to attract them?

The innovation agency will be one partial step, but again, it's one of those things where we have to do more than one thing at one time. This is because the emphasis on immediate innovation and what's commercializable is at the expense of this generation of young researchers, who will be part of the next AI, the next quantum and the next EV.

[Martin Normand]

I would like to add that the dynamic that is being referred to at the moment—that of the private sector and wealthy potential donors—is occurring in favour of major fashionable disciplines. We talk a lot about MATES—mathematics, arts, technology, engineering and science. If this is the model we want to move toward, we are abandoning the smaller institutions that do not have the means to offer these types of programs or that do not offer them.

These institutions are unable to position themselves relative to the major players—in other words, the U15, the group of Canadian research universities. Examples include the Université de l'Ontario français, Université Sainte-Anne in Nova Scotia, the Collège communautaire du Nouveau-Brunswick and Collège Boréal in Ontario. These institutions are connected to their local industry and serve the needs of local SMEs. These SMEs will not be able to support research infrastructure in rural and isolated communities.

When Mr. Davidson says that we have to do more than one thing at a time, that's what it's about. Yes, we can count on funding for major research projects, major initiatives and major innovations. However, small local innovations will not be possible without extra government funding to support smaller institutions that have specific fields of research and expertise and that meet local needs that no one else is meeting.

At the Université Sainte-Anne, for example, an entire research team has developed on the lobster fishery. If the Université Sainte-Anne does not do so, the University of Toronto or the University of Alberta will certainly not be meeting the local needs of Acadian fishers in Nova Scotia. A diverse research infrastructure is needed.

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

Do I still have some time?

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

You have 30 seconds.

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

I think we all agree, Mr. Normand, that this is a collaborative effort between the government and the respective bid corporations and larger institutions. However, it's essential to have small communities and SMEs. Some of the colleges that are working collaboratively with some of those SMEs are also important. We need a collaborative effort, but we need to have a partnership. We need to ensure we attract and incentivize some of those efforts.

I appreciate the work. I appreciate the Bouchard report. It is being reviewed and assessed, so we will take it into stock when we do our report.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Lloyd Longfield]

Thank you so much.

We have Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas for two and a half minutes.