Evidence of meeting #145 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was funding.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
All right.
In your statement you said, “Projects are identified for potential funding using the first nations infrastructure investment plans, which are submitted annually by first nations and are screened for eligibility and prioritized according to a national priority ranking framework."
Can you table this national priority ranking framework with the committee?
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
I will verify. I don't know if I can provide it by Thursday.
Conservative
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
I will look into it, yes.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Thank you.
Between fiscal years 2014-15 and 2018-19, Indigenous Services Canada allocated $138.7 million of the gas tax fund towards 255 on-reserve infrastructure improvement projects. Are you able to table that information as well as to where those dollars were spent?
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Yes, we can.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Thank you.
The reason I ask these questions, Ms. Ferland, is that time and again.... As a matter of fact, I was just meeting with a first nation from British Columbia which is saying that these dollars are not flowing to their communities. It's interesting to hear that it is flowing to first nations when time and again we have first nations that are coming to us asking, “Where is the funding? We don't know how to access this money.”
If we're saying that the money is flowing, yet we have first nations that are saying they're not able to access that, there seems to be a bit of a discrepancy there. I speak from a British Columbia experience.
Are there any suggestions you might have? Why do you think that might be the case?
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Thank you for that comment.
We have been working with Infrastructure Canada. There are a number of programs that first nation communities can access either through Infrastructure, through us, and through ISED or the former Industry Canada, so we're working really closely with the other government departments to find a single window to be able to better communicate and aggregate this information.
Liberal
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you to our witnesses for being here.
Like my colleague from Prince George, I fly back and forth across the country and although we cover more of the southerly portion of the country, it's still remarkable how sparsely populated it is. It could only be even more technically challenging to meet expectations with the small, very distant, very isolated communities across the north.
As impressive as your numbers sound on what you've actually delivered, is this just a drop in the bucket in terms of the needs for things specifically like housing, education or medical care? Do you actually have a grasp of the total scope of the need?
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
I'll invite my friend and colleague Chad Westmacott to take this question.
Chad Westmacott Senior Director, Strategic Water Management Team Directorate, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Madam Chair, the member is absolutely right that there are a lot of first nation communities. There are over 630 first nation communities. The numbers that we provide are impressive. We feel like we've done a lot of work to address the infrastructure needs on water, housing, education, etc., but I think it is clear that there are more needs out there. We have the national priority ranking framework that allows us to prioritize projects because the demand for projects is greater than the available funding that we have.
That being said, we do take the opportunity to direct the funding to the highest priority projects, often based on issues around health and safety.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
To what degree do you rely on co-operation or collaboration with the provinces to deliver some of your programming?
Senior Director, Strategic Water Management Team Directorate, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
It varies. We do work with provinces and territories, but our first point of contact is the first nations and the first nation communities we work with.
In some cases the first nations themselves have really good relationships with the provinces and territories in terms of the infrastructure projects that are available and going forward. For example, in Alberta there is a program through the province to provide water through regional water networks to first nations, so we will be working with the first nation. The relationship itself is with the first nation and the province and we work with the first nation in that relationship.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Quite often with infrastructure projects there's cost sharing with a certain percentage federal, a certain percentage provincial and a certain percentage local. Do you have that, or do you follow that same structure with your infrastructure programs?
Nelson Barbosa Director, Capacity, Infrastructure and Accountability Division, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Thank you for the question.
I would say that from a health perspective, certainly there are arrangements with provinces in relation to the services being delivered. As Mr. Westmacott indicated, our paramount relationship is with the indigenous community for provision of services and programs.
In the case where there might be secondary or tertiary care provided by the province, the first nations and Inuit health branch will partner with the respective province to determine the nature of care, the nature of funding and the nature of the relationship with the indigenous communities for the provision of those services.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
We're talking here about infrastructure, which is usually some sort of capital program to build something. That was the nature of the cost-sharing agreements that we had, for instance, on a rapid transit line in metro Vancouver, where I come from. It's, give or take, 40% feds, 30% provincial and the rest local. Is that the same kind of funding structure you have for the capital projects through this program?
Director, Capacity, Infrastructure and Accountability Division, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Again, with respect to health capital or health infrastructure, there isn't a set quota of provision of resources from other orders of government, whether they be provincial or local. From the health perspective, and the facility built over the provision of those services, it's really about the nature of the service being provided and who is best placed to provide those services locally.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Given the small populations in many of these communities, is the allocation of money according to population, a sort of population-based allocation, appropriate? Is there a better scheme that you would be looking at to ensure that communities that have either been neglected or left behind can be brought up to a certain standard, one that a lot of us expect in the southern part of the country? There must be some interest in accelerating this beyond simply allocating by population.
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Thank you for your question.
If I may, it's only the gas tax money, the roughly $29.4 million that we get on an annual basis, that's allocated based on indigenous people on reserve by population. What we do, given the pot of money is around $29 million yearly, is pool it with three other sources of funds. We make a larger pot of money so that we can make a difference with the first nation communities. We pool it with the building Canada fund, the other community infrastructure fund and the structural mitigation fund, which basically gave us about $87 million for the last fiscal year. That allows us to make a much greater impact. Overall, we have received about $8 billion to make infrastructure investments up to 2027.
NDP
Robert Aubin NDP Trois-Rivières, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I want to thank the witnesses for joining us and for helping us better understand this issue.
I've learned to be wary of inflated numbers. In your presentation, you spoke of $8 billion by 2026-27. By then, three governments will have been formed, if we include the current government. Will there be an equal distribution of spending by 2027, or will there be crumbs at the beginning and more substantial amounts at the end of the program?
Director General, Regional Infrastructure Branch, Regional Operations Sector, Department of Indigenous Services Canada
Thank you for the question.
We received funding in the 2016, 2017 and 2018 budgets and, more recently, in the 2019 budget.
