Evidence of meeting #57 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was projects.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
No, because they can put together a project proposal and work through the province and territory.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Okay.
When the Minister of Infrastructure came here, I asked him why the old building Canada fund, which had grown to about $1.6 billion a year, had dropped by 89% this year to $210 million for this fiscal year. The number we have is that there is $210 million available under that fund for your members.
Is that a right number?
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
It must be the right number, if you've done the research. I don't have the number with me specifically, partly because, as we have said many times, the thing with the building Canada fund is that it's for projects that are approved. Work is done, receipts are sent in, and payment is made—
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
—so, profiling the money over a five-year timeframe, it makes sense in the reality of the way things work in this program that most of the money comes later on in the project timeframe, because that's when the receipts are going to be coming in and municipalities are going to be looking for reimbursement.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Okay, so you can't tell us either. The government won't tell us and you can't tell us how much money is available for your members.
I'm going to go to another area that I asked the ADM of policy about when he came here and read the documents that he was asked to prepare by the government. I asked him repeatedly whether we had a global number for the infrastructure shortfall in Canada. One of his answers was:
We only have the answers that may have been provided to us by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities or other national think-tanks that have tried to do some work on this.
Let me ask you what the shortfall is. We hear that the government spends 3.9% of GDP on infrastructure, but they don't tell us that a lot of that money is provincial and municipal. They try to claim it as their own, but it's actually combined money.
We know it's 3.9% and you're arguing for it to be between 4% and 5% of GDP. That's an irrelevant number, if we don't know what our real needs are, you would agree. What are the real needs in Canadian society? Do you have the metrics to do that assessment? Has it been done?
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
What we did, we being FCM, with a variety of other organizations, including CPWA and the other professional organizations that are key players in the question of infrastructure, was launch the Canadian infrastructure report card in 2012.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Right. Do we have a number? Can you give us the number? What is the number?
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
The infrastructure report card said that 30% of all municipal infrastructure, particularly focusing on roads and water, is at risk. The infrastructure report card was a combination of a qualitative assessment of the state of infrastructure—
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
What we've come up with is that when you think of what's at risk, and 30% of infrastructure is at risk, if we were to have to replace all of that stuff, it would cost on the order of $170 billion.
Liberal
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
That's for municipal infrastructure related to roads and water.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
It doesn't include federal infrastructure; it doesn't include provincial?
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
No, it doesn't include federal or provincial.
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
We don't have one that I know of.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Okay. The Government of Canada doesn't have one either, because we asked for one repeatedly. You don't have one, and they don't have one, so we don't have one.
Chief Executive Officer, Federation of Canadian Municipalities
Our interest is only municipal.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Okay.
May I go to the third theme, which is sustainable development.
Ms. Dedman, you raised the important question of the federal government playing a role in this regard. I just want to remind you, and if I could, get a reaction from you, that it's rather hard to prevail upon a government to do something on sustainability when it eliminates the eco-energy program and thus eliminates a whole new economic sector in Canada, eliminates the commercial building retrofit program, eliminates the wind power production incentive, eliminates the renewable power production incentive. It won't even take its lead from the U.K. Conservative government, which brings in a whole new green deal that actually goes as far as compelling British homeowners to put a GHG rating on their home, which has a profound influence on the property markets and property values. The higher the GHG efficiency in the home, the higher the price of a home is now in the U.K., because they've actually incented a private sector approach to property ownership and to becoming more efficient.
Would you see the holus-bolus adoption of the American Envision program? They get it. They've just done it. Now you say that there are some Canadian projects looking to the U.S. Envision model. Should we be migrating it north? How do you see this?
President, Canadian Public Works Association
With significant investments that are coming in over the next decade through the new building Canada plan, there is a good opportunity to look at how we assess sustainability. That's why, through our submission, we refer to sustainability rating tools such as the Envision tool. It gives us some metrics and some standards that we may want to look to.
That tool in particular our organization looks to adopt and adapt where possible, and you are correct that it has been used in Canada in several projects. Just recently, the Grand Bend waste-water treatment facility received a platinum award through the Envision rating system.
I think the key for the federal government is that it could take a role in promoting the use of those tools and systems as we go forward with the investments in infrastructure.
Conservative
Peter Braid Conservative Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
Thank you to all of our witnesses for being here today and for contributing to our important study on infrastructure and infrastructure investments in Canada.
Ms. Dedman, I want to start with you, if I may. Could you begin by briefly describing who your organization is, the Canadian Public Works Association?
President, Canadian Public Works Association
Our organization is a non-partisan organization made up of members who are municipal workers across Canada. We are the practitioners who look after, who design, build, maintain, operate the municipal infrastructure across the country. We also have a private sector involvement. There are consultants and contractors, who also bring a balanced approach to our organization and to the work that we do.
Conservative
