Evidence of meeting #4 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was toyota.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
Lois Brown Conservative Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Minister, can you talk about whether or not there have been complaints and how we've been dealing with those?
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
Rob Merrifield Conservative Yellowhead, AB
Yes. We take those complaints and we give them to Canada Post. We don't get into the day-to-day operation of Canada Post; they're a crown corporation. They have been working very, very closely with these individuals, trying to accommodate them wherever possible. As I said, they don't want to move any of these boxes. They have to, to comply with the Labour Code, and it's really about safety. They have been doing an exceptional job. They're about halfway through. There are about 800,000 boxes that they're assessing, and about 355,000 to 400,000, I believe, in that neighbourhood, have been assessed already, so they're about halfway through.
There are some areas of the country where more of these have to be moved and assessed than in other areas. So some of the ones that have a significant number of them that need to be moved have been working exceptionally well. That doesn't mean they're going to solve all the problems, but even the specific member of Parliament from that area has suggested that Canada Post has done an exceptional job in the communication work in trying to accommodate the mail delivery wherever possible.
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, and welcome, ministers and officials.
Minister, the way I see it, a large portion of the estimates is related to your economic plan. I would ask the minister if he would agree that the infrastructure stimulus spending he had is temporary. Is that yes or no?
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
Yes.
I'm pleased to answer infrastructure questions, but you're not Gerard Kennedy. Where is Gerard?
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Minister, when you say temporary, are you confident in your stimulus job creation figures in your budget?
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
The Department of Finances makes those figures. I have no reason to doubt them. The Federation of Canadian Municipalities came out with this: every $1 billion in infrastructure spending would create or maintain about 11,000 jobs. That's a good number as well.
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
We notice, Minister, that you made a critical error when you used those numbers, because you used a wrong multiplier. You used a multiplier by using permanent spending, while you just admitted that the stimulus money you are spending is temporary. By making this critical mistake by using a wrong multiplier for permanent spending, how much have you overestimated your job creation numbers?
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
We should be very clear. This is a jump-start for the economy. This is not a permanent measure. We've always been very clear on that. Our hope is that as the fragile recovery takes hold, we will see the private sector take over in terms of job creation.
The other thing is that we've sped up Building Canada, which is seeing significant long-term investments happen, which is a bit slow.
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
When you say that they are temporary measures, you agree that you used that multiplier for temporary spending, not for the permanent....
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
It's not going to be after 2011, that's right. And that's not just the Government of Canada.
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
All ten provinces are doing the same thing. So we agree.
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
On the other issue, when it comes to your budget and the action plan, you say that this money should be timely, targeted, and temporary, right?
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
When it comes to targeted and temporary, it's very consistent, the way I see it. But “timely” you have changed. In the 2009 budget, you said that timely means that we should spend that money in the first 120 days.
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
We wanted to get projects under way as quickly as possible.
9:45 a.m.
Liberal
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
That was in 120 days. But in the 2010 budget you say, “Timely: to support the economy when private demand is weakest”. Why did you change the definition from 2009 to 2010?
9:50 a.m.
Conservative
John Baird Conservative Ottawa West—Nepean, ON
I don't think we changed it. The object of the game is that it had taken governments, frankly--our government under Building Canada and the previous government under all their infrastructure spending--too long to get things going. Our department moved probably ten times faster than we normally did. So did the provinces. Would we have liked every single project to have gotten under way within 120 days? You bet. If you look back over the past year, by no means was it perfect, but it was literally ten times faster than ever before.
I'll give you an example in your province. British Columbia was able to move very quickly. We worked with them very quickly. Then they dissolved the legislature and weren't able to continue when they went into a provincial election campaign that was scheduled. So we got a lot done very quickly. Then after their election, they took two or three weeks for a cabinet shuffle. They got a new minister. It took her, naturally, two or three months to get up to speed. So there was a little bit of a gap there. That happened in British Columbia. It happened in Nova Scotia. But at the end of the day, we were able to get the job done. It was a two-year plan.
9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Bonnie Crombie Liberal Mississauga—Streetsville, ON
Ministers, it is a pleasure to see you both.
I'm going to challenge you that it was anything but quick, because when you look at the supplementary estimates (C), and you look across the suite of infrastructure programs, it was anything but swift or timely.
On the infrastructure stimulus fund, 44% wasn't delivered. That is $850 million unspent of $2 billion. When you look at the communities component of Building Canada, 48% wasn't delivered. That is $135 million of $250 million. On provincial-territorial-based funding, 48% wasn't delivered. That's $240 million unspent of $495 million. Of the green infrastructure fund, 93% wasn't delivered in the fiscal.... That's $186 million unspent of $200 million. So it wasn't timely. In fact, there was a lapse of $1.4 billion, and that was a lost opportunity to create approximately 30,000 jobs.
In fact, the economic action plan promised to create 190,000 jobs. What we see is, “It's coming”. There was a net loss of 300,000 jobs in this recession. Yet you are taking credit for it. Can you explain it to us? Can you admit that you failed to deliver on your commitment in budget 2009? When you are suggesting, especially, that 300,000 Canadians have lost their jobs since the recession hit, you should simply--
