Transport Committee on Nov. 7th, 2006

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Good afternoon, Mr. Minister.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

On that specific question, we haven't yet determined the architecture and the design of all the programs, but certainly what Minister Flaherty was referring to yesterday in his speech in front of the Canadian Urban Transit Association echoes, I think, a strong commitment on our behalf to work with the private sector to be able to develop P-3s as a means to accelerate investment in private-public partnership.

There are, I believe, three partnerships that are well under way: the ring road in Edmonton, the Kicking Horse Pass project that I had the pleasure of announcing very early in my mandate, and the Canada RAV line project, which is a major line that is going to be in utilization in the greater Vancouver area and that will link, of course, Richmond and the airport and downtown Vancouver, which is also a P3. More recently, on Sunday, when Premier Charest and Prime Minister Harper were together, they announced a request for a proposal for the completion of Highway 30, to see whether or not there is interest from the public and from the private sector to be able to go forward.

Down the road, yes, there is an intention for our government to be able to use private funds to accelerate infrastructure in Canada.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

I know that. That wasn't my question.

My specific question is would you tie your infrastructure funding, which is in front of us, to the condition that the project has to be three-P?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

I responded, I believe, by telling you in my preamble that we haven't yet made a determination on all of the design of the program, how we are going to go about it or the architecture. But certainly there will be a component in there that will take care of public-private partnerships.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Let me switch to the topic of safety. What part of the money that's earmarked for the transport ministry is going to be fixing the problems that Canadian airplanes are having?

Recently a series of articles in the Toronto Star and Hamilton Spectator uncovered the fact that approximately 80,000 passengers have been put at risk over the last five years when planes came dangerously close to one another. There haven't been thorough inspections by the ministry to ensure the safety and working order of the planes in Canadian skies.

Judge Moshansky, who led the public inquiry into the 1989 Air Ontario crash in Dryden, has stated that he has serious doubts that Transport Canada can properly fulfill its function of providing a safe aviation environment for the travelling public with fewer aviation inspectors.

What part of your funding would go into making sure that Canadians on planes are going to be safe?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Let me say at the outset that I completely reject all of the allegations made in that article. They're unfounded and they're not true.

Before passing it over to Mr. Grégoire, who will go into the specifics, let me make one point perfectly clear to all of the members here: no plane, not one aircraft, will leave the tarmac if--if--it is deemed unworthy to fly safely. That's put as simply as I can. If there is an indication--a slight indication--that an aircraft is not in any way, shape, or form suitable to fly, it will be grounded until such time as that aircraft is fixed.

Marc.

[Marc Grégoire]

It's difficult to add anything, because that's exactly the line.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Marc Grégoire]

I should tell you that we cannot count specifically in these instances how many people are affected, but civil aviation in Transport Canada has the largest chunk of the budget. Close to one-third of all resources of the department are in support of civil aviation--the safety programs, not the security but just the safety programs. We have over 1,400 people devoted to safety. This is where we have the largest group of inspectors spread out around the country.

We have one of the best records worldwide in aviation safety, and we're quite proud of it, but we're not sitting on our laurels. We're trying to improve it further. That's why we have introduced the concept of safety management systems. We want to go further. We want to have yet a better safety record in this country.

So airplanes are safe, and passengers are flying safely in this country. We never hesitate to ground an airline or to ground an aircraft.

These numbers that you have reported prove that the system works. These numbers, these deficiencies, are reported to us and to the system in order for us to be able to improve safety and to fix the problems.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

There are actually seven articles, Mr. Minister, not just one. Some pilots said that Transport Canada inspectors were overburdened and underfunded, that the government regulatory body was inefficient, etc.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Chow, in the interest of time, could you put your question, please?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Sure.

It wasn't clear precisely how much money in the budget is to deal with the effectiveness of making sure.... Are you saying it's one-third of the budget?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

I was just going to say that we've read all seven of the articles. Mr. Grégoire made a very extensive read of all this. He looked at every allegation that was put forward. I asked him to comment on them. He came back to me and said these allegations are not founded. He's just indicated that a third of the budget in aid to civil aviation from our department goes to that.

[Marc Grégoire]

It's a third of the number of people. For the budget, I would have to calculate. I don't have in front of me the exact budget of civil aviation, but as part of the safety and security budget, it's the biggest chunk. It's about--

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

It's the $381 million line?

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

Mr. Fast.

[Marc Grégoire]

It's about one-third of the people.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

In terms of personnel.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Fast.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Mr. Minister and your staff for appearing before us today.

As you know, public safety, especially in the areas of rail and marine, is a matter of great concern to those of us on the west coast. We've seen some significant derailments. We've seen one significant marine tragedy.

I want to commend you for some of the steps you've already taken to address corrective measures for those who are not complying with our safety requirements, specifically with respect to CN and a number of the derailments that have involved that company. I'm confident in the future going out that the public's perception of rail safety, marine safety, and air safety is going to improve under your leadership.

I'd like to turn the whole discussion back to infrastructure, which is actually part of the main estimates we're discussing. Of course, the main estimates we have before us are actually the ones that are derived from the previous government's decisions and actions, but I'm also curious to discover from you what your future direction is going to be.

In Budget 2006 our government announced a number of significant increases in infrastructure spending. So my first question would simply be, could you highlight a number of those increases in spending in the area of infrastructure? Secondly, what direction do you see infrastructure taking in the next few years? Where do you see us having a requirement to build infrastructure in Canada?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you, colleague, for your question.

I think I'd respond with two answers to this. First, Budget 2006 developed a $16.5 billion component for infrastructure of all sorts. As we speak now, and as I mentioned to Ms. Chow before, we are in the midst of gathering our thoughts following, of course, the consultations that we led last summer with the provinces and territories, that we led with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and with different stakeholders from across the country to be able to give us advice and guidance in terms of where we should be going and how we should be doing it. That is an ongoing process.

There was, of course, another element to that. Coming from the municipal sector, I was extremely preoccupied by long-term funding from the gas tax. You'll recall that during Minister Flaherty's speech on the budget he indicated that he wanted to look at that issue. He wanted to look at that issue very closely. That is another objective we're pursuing. We want to be able to make sure that municipalities that are in need for either retrofitting some of their infrastructure or making sure they go forward with infrastructure projects will have a sufficient amount of money to be able to complete the project, one, but also be able to fund it.

So those are two general directions that we are taking in terms of where we want to go with infrastructure funding and with infrastructure projects in the country.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Can you give us an idea of where, within municipal infrastructure, we see deficiencies? Is it in the area of sewers, roads? Is it in the area of water supply? And can we expect that there will be a long-term plan put in place to address those deficiencies within Canada?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

I think some municipalities have to be cited as great examples. I think provinces have done a lot of the same thing.

The gas tax money is essentially a green project amount of money that covers transit, that covers clean water, that covers waste management projects, and also water waste management projects. I'd say, essentially, that is the general direction that municipalities want to take with that amount of money, with that funding.

We strongly support that. We strongly support, of course, funding to transit authorities because it involves, in many circumstances, taking a lot of the cars off the roads and substituting a good transit system. We strongly believe that congestion is not only harmful because of the air we breathe, but also is economically unsustainable for our large communities. So we do have to find alternatives. We can't always be building roads; we have to be able to maximize and utilize our road infrastructure as it stands now.

We're very supportive of that, and I do want to commend the City of Toronto for their clairvoyance in saying that every dollar it gets from the gas tax is to be invested in public transit. I've seen it in Toronto. I've seen it out west. I've seen it throughout the country. There is a strong commitment to be able to do that. I think a lot of our municipalities are very much on side and very positive about that message.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Scott.