Transport Committee on May 9th, 2019

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

It's positive from your perspective?

[Murray Hupman]

It's extremely positive, yes.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

Thank you very much.

During our ongoing study on trade and transportation logistics, Minister, we've heard from witnesses such as the Atlantic Provinces Economic Council on the need to harmonize transportation regulations, and in budget 2019 the Government of Canada announced that through the road safety transfer payment program, it would support the provinces and territories in their efforts to harmonize road safety and transportation requirements.

How does the government plan to support the provinces and territories, specifically in harmonizing these regulations regarding the weight and size of freight trucks?

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC]

I'll pass it over to my deputy minister, but you're right about the issue of trying to harmonize, because provinces have set their own weight limits with respect to how they design their roads or the kinds of roads they have to live with and the ground conditions.

We are trying to improve the situation so that if a truck is leaving St. John's, Newfoundland, on its way to Victoria, British Columbia, it doesn't have to stop along the way and unload. In some cases there have been tire problems as well. To improve internal trade in our country, we're trying to harmonize those rules under provincial jurisdiction.

I'll pass it to Deputy Minister Keenan.

[Michael Keenan, Deputy Minister, Department of Transport]

As Minister Garneau said, there's a lot of work going on to work through this very technical issue. Minister Garneau and his provincial colleagues on the council of ministers of transport commissioned a task force report on trucking harmonization. It came in early in 2019. An interprovincial group on weights and measures has been tasked with working through that and establishing priorities to harmonize these regulations.

One area where significant progress is being made is in single wide tires. We now have an agreement in principle with the provinces to standardize the regulations with respect to single wide tires, and the trucking industry is very keen to get rules that work across the country.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Keenan.

We'll go on to Mr. Eglinski.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank the minister and his staff for being out.

Madam Chair, I'd like to share my time with my colleague, Mr. Liepert.

At this time, Madam Chair, I'd like to move a motion on behalf of Matt Jeneroux, who's not here today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Yes, go ahead.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

The motion reads:

That the Committee invite the parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Indigenous Services to appear on the Minister's behalf to update the Committee on the status of delivering infrastructure directly to indigenous communities, including the doubling of the Gas Tax Fund, announced in Budget 2019, and that the meeting on this study currently scheduled for Tuesday, May 28, 2019, be televised.

Madam Chair, I would like the vote recorded, please.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Is there any discussion?

Go ahead, Ms. Block.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'll be quick because I know we want to get back to questioning the minister.

As was discussed at our last meeting, we know that the Prime Minister provided a guideline for parliamentary secretaries that outlines their role and duties, one of which is to appear at committees if the ministers can't make themselves available. I know the original motion inviting the minister was passed unanimously, so it is our hope that asking the parliamentary secretary to appear in place of the minister will be supported by the members of the governing party.

That said, I do support this motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

For the interest of committee members, the clerk has informed me that parliamentary secretaries do answer questions and can replace a minister in many instances, but it's not automatic. The clerk goes with the answer that's provided by the department, and from the department it was the officials.

Is there any further discussion on this motion?

(Motion negatived: nays 5; yeas 4)

Thank you very much.

We'll go on to Mr. Liepert.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for being here.

I just wanted to follow up a little more on the CATSA transfer.

I'm not here to ask questions on behalf of the airlines, but we had some quite compelling testimony over the last couple of meetings.

I won't repeat everything my colleague mentioned in her initial question, but I think you have to admit, Minister, that while your comments—and I'm going to paraphrase them—were that this consultation has been going on for a long time, really all of the details of the passenger bill of rights were only passed through in this session. These details around the CATSA transfer only really came to light in the BIA. Of course, the airlines have had to deal with something that was not anyone's fault, which was the grounding of the MAX 8s.

I'd like to get a little more of an explanation of why it is so important to get this through as part of the budget implementation act, rather than ensure that it's negotiated fairly and that at the end of the day the consumer is not going to be impacted negatively by this measure.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC]

One of the main reasons we're putting this forward is to make things better and more efficient for the consumer, and we feel that taking the measures we are taking will accomplish that objective. As I said, we had a lot of people who were very skeptical about when NavCan was separated from Transport Canada. Today, people continue to use that as an example of a very wise decision that was taken 20 years ago.

Now, it hasn't been officially on the radar screen, but this doesn't come as a surprise to either the airline industry or the airports. Again, the airport people are the ones who are very close to this as well. They've been asking for this measure for a very long time.

We believe that the schedule we have put forward is one that can be implemented. I can understand the airlines' situation, because lots of things are happening, and I do sympathize on the issue of the Max 8. This was totally unexpected.

However, when we make decisions about the implementation schedule, we look at it very carefully. We don't just throw out dates.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

I don't know how much time I have, but I want to get clarification on another issue.

The airlines seemed to indicate that it was a done deal, that there was a sale price actually attached to the assets. I believe it was one of your deputies at committee the other day who said that was not the case, that it would still be negotiated.

Can you elaborate a little further on where that situation stands today? It seems to us that if you sell those assets for more than a dollar, let's say, the passenger is paying for those assets twice, because they've already paid for them once.

Could you elaborate a bit more on that?

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC]

The deputy minister will answer.

[Michael Keenan]

There are two points I could elaborate on here. One is that the purpose of the BI, the budget implementation legislation, is to authorize a negotiated transfer. Beyond that, it sets some basic terms, but everything is subject to negotiations with the airlines and the airports.

The airlines have expressed concerns here in committee and elsewhere. We've been talking with them and we've addressed their concerns, to the point where they're ready to sit down with us next week and start those negotiations on a reform that's been in discussion, in some manner or other, since 2017.

On the issue of the transfer price, the director general of air policy was testifying that it's subject to negotiations, and it is. The government's position going into those negotiations is that the appropriate price to transfer the assets is their book value in the government's accounts. If you transfer them at book value, then there's no impact on the deficit. The transfer is neutral in terms of the impact on current taxpayers versus current travellers. That's our position going into the negotiations.

However, this is all subject to a negotiation with the airports and the airlines. The airports are ready, and the airlines told us yesterday that they would be ready to start those negotiations as early as next week.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

It seems that the passenger has already paid for those assets. I still don't understand how the government can make the claim that this is a straight across transfer. That asset base was built up through fees that the paying public has paid. The government is now saying that we're going to take that asset base, which the public has paid for, and put it into general revenue, and then we're going to charge you a second time. That doesn't make any sense.

[Michael Keenan]

I would say that the assets that have been built up at CATSA are quite significant, and they've been built up over a long period of time, over many years. If you go back in the history of CATSA, sometimes it ran a big deficit and the government topped it up, and sometimes it ran a surplus.

There is a big overlap between taxpayers and passengers. There are 13 million Canadians who travel every year, and they're all taxpayers. The government's position at the beginning of the negotiations is to transfer it in a manner that is neutral between taxpayers and passengers. If you don't do that, then you're either having a windfall for the Government of Canada or you're taking a hit on the deficit, which makes it not neutral between taxpayers and passengers.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you, Mr. Keenan.

Mr. Hardie and Mr. Fuhr, you are sharing your time. Mr. Fuhr, you have two minutes, and then we'll go on to Mr. Hardie.

[Stephen Fuhr, Liberal, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Minister, thank you for coming this morning. As you're aware, this committee recently tabled a report called “Supporting Canada's Flight Schools”. That came about as a result of my Motion No.177, which was supported unanimously in the House, 280 to zero, which is something that doesn't happen very often these days, as you are well aware. I think that indicates that the House is very supportive—and by extension, so are Canadians—of what this country is going to do about generating pilots.

I also understand and appreciate that the department has 120 days to respond, which is going to get tight, given the number of days we have left in this sitting period. Therefore, in the event that it doesn't happen—although I really hope it does—I was wondering if you could give us a little bit of feedback on what you thought of the report.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC]

I thought it was excellent. I want to thank the transportation committee, and I want to thank you aswell for your motion to set this process going. Also, as you know, Transport Canada is seized with this issue of the need for more pilots and more training in Canada because of the looming shortage, some of which is being felt at this time.

As you point out, we are currently looking at all of the recommendations from the transportation committee on this issue. It's my hope that we will be able to come forward, even though we have only 120 days. We're working very hard to do it before Parliament rises.

This is an extremely valuable report. It helps us. I think it's a perfect example of how important it is to have committees. It's because of the valuable input that they bring in helping different ministries do their job.

[Stephen Fuhr, Liberal, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Thank you. That's my two minutes. I'll pass.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Minister Garneau, the trade corridors are obviously very important. I think you, your ministry and the whole government have recognized that. This committee has recognized it.

Mr Badawey and I initiated a study of the Niagara trade corridor and the west coast trade corridor. You will be pleased to know that the level of talk about collaboration among the component parts of the west coast trade corridor has gone significantly up. I had the pleasure of attending a WESTAC conference a week ago, and they understand that they've got to do a better job of coordinating their activities and not just leave it to government to sort everything out.

Having said that, I have a request rather than a question. It has to do with that third class 1 railway serving metro Vancouver's ports, the Burlington Northern Santa Fe. That line continues to demonstrate difficulties with safe operation, with reliability. There was a washout just the other week that shut it down for two days, and of course there's the difficulty of capacity, because the rail line currently follows the shoreline through a residential area in White Rock, where there are obviously speed limitations.

The request is one that I'll repeat, because we've made this request before. It's for around $300,000, give or take, to co-fund, with the regional municipalities and the Province of British Columbia, a study to relocate that BNSF line off of the waterfront, opening up obviously better trade movement as well as the possibility of high-speed rail service down the Cascadia corridor.

I'll leave that with you, sir, but if you have a comment to make, please do so.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount, QC]

Thank you very much. I would also add that I would encourage the City of Surrey to continue to apply for funding for this study through the national trade corridors fund. This is an eligible project. It hasn't happened yet, but I would encourage them to persist. It's open any time for them to put their submission in.