Science and Research Committee on March 22nd, 2022

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

Thank you. According to my clock, I believe I'm running out of time, so I'll leave it there.

Thank you, Dr. Kerr.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

You've all brought new perspectives, some that we haven't heard, and I'd just say it's really lovely to hear our colleague being recognized tonight. Thank you for that.

We're now going to go for a five-minute round, and we're going to begin with Mr. Soroka.

The floor is yours.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for coming this evening.

Dr. Winter, I really like how you spoke about the need to have government, industry and academia working together. You also spoke about how we're not funding enough to get proper research done, and yet you also spoke on emerging science that's developing.

How are we able to get better information from emerging sciences if we're not even funding properly currently? What areas do you think we need to improve upon?

[Dr. Alan Winter]

I do think my comments around the total amount of money we as a country are investing in research and development applies to not just government but also business. So part of what we, as government, need to do—and this was part of my work with the B.C. government—is to determine how to create the environment into which we can attract companies wanting to invest in IP, in new products, etc., here in Canada.

If we look, for example, at the forest industry, a lot of the companies involved in the forest industry here have done very well over the years, but they're really lumber companies; they're exporting lumber. If you look at forestry companies in other countries, generally they've moved up the supply chain and up the value-added chain into chemicals, into fibres, into materials of different types, etc. That's all because the government, academia and industry have come together and decided, for Finland or New Zealand or other places, that doing this is really important to the country. If we are able to bring these groups together, then we can focus on the application for the country but also for export. Again, if we look at our natural resources areas, we've generally not developed the ability to export a lot of the expertise around, for example, mining. In Australia, if we look at the amount of GDP per capita that is contributed by the services the mining industry provides the rest of the world, it's actually greater than the amount from natural resources that are exported from Australia.

We have to be able to use whatever we have in the way of resources in the highest product way possible. The only way I know of to do that is to make that a priority within a province or within a government and to be able to bring industry, academia and government together to make sure that all the tools we have support that area we're going to invest in. That's really economic development. The piece we're missing, really, is the context for the investments we want to make.

I may not have answered all of your questions, but that's at least part of it.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

No, that's actually very good. You're right that in order to create a more stable economy, we need to build upon what we have. We can't just keep producing our primary products and sending them away, so definitely development is a great opportunity.

Ms. Amyot, you spoke about applied research and the fact that currently we do not have enough equipment in a lot of our institutions. What areas do you think we need to improve upon, especially within the same kind of scenario of trying to get new science or new technologies built? How can we improve upon this? Is it directly through funding or is it by specializing in certain areas only?

[Denise Amyot]

In fact, in your own riding you have the Bee Diagnostic Centre that is associated with Grande Prairie College. They are doing research for greenhouses. In fact, when I said there's no equipment, I meant the SMEs often do not have the equipment to do applied research. That's where colleges can help. We know there is funding from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation to buy equipment. The issue is always to cover the percentage that is not covered by CFI, and often our colleges do not have the funds to cover that 40% or 50%, depending on what we are talking about. That's a huge issue, especially for small institutions.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

That's definitely one area in which we need to look at improving efficiencies or maximizing our abilities.

Thank you very much for coming this evening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

We will now go to Monsieur Lauzon for five minutes.

The floor is yours.

[Stéphane Lauzon, Liberal, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My sincere thanks to the witnesses for being here today. We certainly appreciate having you.

Mr. Kerr, I think you're just about the only one who mentioned inclusion. You even gave us an example at your university. You told us about the progress the university had made to foster diversity and inclusion in the research sector.

What barriers remain in order to achieve greater inclusion in universities?

[Dr. Jeremy Kerr]

Thank you. That's a superb question, and I'm grateful that this has been brought before the committee.

There has been an awful lot of progress on this issue in the last number of years. I think we have seen the stirring of a revolution in terms of moving towards a more inclusive research environment for everybody in Canada. The reasons we want to do this are terribly straightforward.

First of all, there are basic justice issues. We don't want to be party to any sort of injustice, and exclusion creates that. That's unacceptable. Also, from a strategic point of view, inclusion means that we have brought all of our excellence to bear on the problems of our time, and that's important.

There are things that we really need to do and that have started to take place in very important ways in the Canadian landscape, especially in making sure that our entire community is really well informed about what it means to train and to operate a research lab in an inclusive way. There have been some really significant changes that Dr. Duncan, as Minister of Science, oversaw, and that meant the way grants are administered means we explicitly recognize that we should train in a thoughtful way that accounts for individual differences as well as potentially systemic obstacles.

That's just one example of progress, and I think that's important, but if we were to point to chief obstacles, I would say that one of the worst things we have to overcome is bad habits. This is another way of saying that this is really the hardest part of any problem to solve.

It has to do with entrenched cultures of practice that mean we have developed ways of approaching situations that are simply informed by a bygone era, and we need to revise the way we think. Microaggressions, for example, can be significant and essentially traumatizing for some people. The fact that in some cultures it's actually very difficult to address a question to a senior authority figure means that we need to account for that when we try to understand and reach out and engage with those people.

We need to make sure that we keep the pressure on and ensure that in trying to overcome the barriers to a really inclusive research environment, we're thinking about all of the individuals and all of the excellence they represent, which can help solve problems that we all face.

[Stéphane Lauzon, Liberal, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, QC]

Thank you very much for that comprehensive answer.

That said, we may be able to draw a link.

Is there a link between inclusion and the difficult road to the top, in other words, the path to becoming a researcher?

[Dr. Jeremy Kerr]

Inclusion and achieving success: well, one of the things we know for very high-ranking people in the academic world, for example, is that those people are disproportionately looking like me and are disproportionately not people of colour. There are very few indigenous leaders in our academic institutions.

Some people have argued that this is changing, but I have analyzed that rate of change, as have others. What appears to me to be happening is that the rate of change is too slow to actually achieve real progress in senior leadership levels within the academic environment. Indeed, in some fields, there's not much evidence of change at all. If we were to point to achieving senior leadership in some fields like computer science or electrical engineering, for example, the rate of change of representation is really quite low in those environments, and we want to try to accelerate that rate of change.

I'd be happy to chat more about this outside of this committee should you like to engage in further conversation. I'm sorry to take so long.

[Stéphane Lauzon, Liberal, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, QC]

Thanks a lot for a complete answer, but we only have 10 seconds left.

I just wanted to say that it's very difficult to achieve the maximum and become a researcher.

Quickly, can you tell us whether immigrants have a role to play?

[Dr. Jeremy Kerr]

Absolutely they do, and we welcome their presence in our communities.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you so much, Monsieur Lauzon.

Dear colleagues, I'm looking at the time, and I would like to be fair to everyone. I propose that I give a question to Mr. Blanchette-Joncas and a question to Mr. Cannings.

Would everyone be okay with that?

Okay. That's terrific.

I have Mr. Blanchette-Joncas.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'll dive right in then. My questions are for Ms. Amyot, from Colleges and Institutes Canada.

Ms. Amyot, I'd like to help the committee understand what college centres for technology transfer and innovative social practices, known as CCTTs, are. It's an innovative concept that started in Quebec, my neck of the woods, actually, the lower St. Lawrence region. The idea was to address specific applied research needs, mainly for Bombardier.

Quebec's regions are home to 59 CCTTs currently. Drawing inspiration from Quebec, Canada established technology access centres, or CATs, in 2010. However, CCTTs and CATs do not have equal status when it comes to funding. In the rest of Canada, CATs receive $350,000 in funding; whereas Quebec's CCTTs receive just $100,000.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas, could we have the question, please?

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

Ms. Amyot, what can you tell us about this funding inequity?

[Denise Amyot]

You're absolutely right to call it an equity.

The reason behind the inequity is this. Previously, the provinces made virtually no investment in applied research.

In Quebec, CCTTs were already receiving funding from the province. Even if they became CATs, they still received only $100,000—not $350,000—because the province was giving them funding already.

We have expressed to the government that this approach may have been fine a few years ago, but that today, a number of provinces are investing in applied research. It is unacceptable that one province's CCTTs can become CATs—which not all do—and still be entitled to only $100,000. They should receive $350,000.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you, Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas, and thank you Ms. Amyot.

For the last question, we will go to Mr. Cannings.

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

Thank you. I will continue with Ms. Amyot and a question about applied research.

You mentioned how important applied research is in colleges. In my hometown of Penticton, we have Okanagan College, which has a renowned sustainable building program both for research and training.

The federal government is looking for ways to quickly expand the construction of new green buildings and the retrofits to buildings across Canada. Is this something where perhaps this program could be expanded? If the government needed knowledge research results quickly...you mentioned the fast turnaround.

Is this the kind of work that the federal government could directly engage with colleges if they want quick answers on specific bits of applied research, or are they doing that now?

[Denise Amyot]

They are not, but the quick answer is yes, they could, and it would be quick.

We are waiting for their request.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you Mr. Cannings and Ms. Amyot.

I want to thank all of you. You have given up your time. This committee is grateful for what you had to say. You've given people a lot to think about. We're grateful for your expertise. Thank you.

To the committee members, I thank all of you, and to everyone who supports this committee.

Could I have 30 seconds of your time as soon as this ends for committee business?

The meeting is adjourned.