Transport Committee on March 7th, 2016

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Through you, Madam Chair, thank you for that question.

You are absolutely right. We will not do one at the cost of the other. Overall, we have committed to invest $60 billion over 10 years. You will see small communities, mid-size communities, and larger urban centres receive their fair share of the funding.

We also learned in other conversations with other partners that a cookie-cutter approach does not work. We need to have flexibility built into our system, to design our system to meet the varied needs of each community, whether it is smaller, mid-size, or larger. Urban centres have a need for public transit, but smaller communities may have a need for water facilities, a need for a recreational centre, or some other needs that fall under social infrastructure or green infrastructure.

We will design our plan in a way that reflects the diversity of our country and is nimble enough to meet the needs of all communities regardless of their size.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

To follow up on a comment about public transit in my home riding, I know a modest investment in public transit would be transformational. The lack of access to public transit has had a disproportionate impact on people living in poverty, on seniors, and on persons with disabilities. Although this is typically reserved for the bigger cities, is public transit for smaller communities that can't necessarily afford their traditional one-third contribution still going to be on the radar?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

We have very extensive ongoing discussions with mayors from across the country, as well as with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities. Along with other things we heard from them is the municipalities' capacity to match their share of the one-third funding that has been traditionally required by the federal government. We are listening to them very carefully. We acknowledge the challenges they face. As we develop our new plan for the new money, we will be looking at different options. I don't know what those options are going to be at this time.

I want to make it clear that for the existing funding under the building Canada fund which is midway through implementation, we cannot change that funding formula. Some communities have already received their share at one-third. If we change that midstream, it creates complications for our relationship with the provinces and municipalities. For the new money, we are looking at a different set of arrangements, for how much the federal government should contribute to our municipal infrastructure.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Thank you. I'd like to shift gears a bit.

I'm approached frequently by NGOs or community organizations in my riding that have a specific infrastructure need that would greatly benefit my own community. Do you have any advice as to how these groups could best access any infrastructure funds? Is it by going through the province? Is it by partnering with the municipality, or is it by reaching out through me to your office directly?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

The process that exists now is that each community will prioritize their own projects through their own internal processes and bring that over to the province. The province will bring that forward to us. That is the process that exists now. As for the new money, we don't know what process or mechanism we're going to develop. For the existing money that is available, if a community has a project they want us to look at, then they need to go through the local community and then the province before it comes to us.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

When you say community, can I assume you mean the municipal government?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

It depends. Sometimes if a municipality is a funding partner, then they promote and advocate that project. In most cases in my experience municipalities are partners in those community-based infrastructures.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

I will put on your radar then that in my experience there are certain communities that fall within a larger municipality, but because they don't form part of the population centre, they sometimes feel ignored. In your deliberations, I ask that you keep those communities in mind.

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Okay.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Do I still have any time, Madam Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Half a minute.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

I have a quick question then.

On green infrastructure, you mentioned flood mitigation as a priority. Will there also be room for severe weather protections?

I live in an area that has lots of fishing communities, and often fishermen won't fish out of certain harbours due to choppy waters. Would something like a breakwater that protects against severe weather be possible under the green infrastructure plan?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Thank you for sharing that. We will take that into consideration as we develop our plan.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Berthold, for six minutes.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Minister, it's a pleasure to have you here today, along with your team, whom we had the chance to meet with a couple of weeks ago.

I'm going to continue along the same lines as my colleague and discuss small communities in a few moments. But first, I'd like to pick up on something else. When we were studying the supplementary estimates, the committee had the opportunity to hear about the elimination of the Champlain Bridge toll. We learned that the department was to assume another $4 billion.

Will that money come from the new investments the government is making under its infrastructure plan or from existing funding?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Thank you for that question.

Through you, Madam Chair, I want to assure this committee that no infrastructure dollars from the existing funding or from the new funding are allocated or are thought of being allocated for the Champlain Bridge. The cost of the Champlain Bridge project is already built into the fiscal framework. The tolling revenue would not have gone to pay for the bridge. It would have gone into the general revenues of the government.

The reason we made a commitment to remove the toll from the Champlain Bridge is that it is a replacement bridge, not a new bridge, and it was done without any consultation with local communities, the local mayors, or the local business community. The communities impacted by the toll were not consulted in the design of the toll.

We are going to live up to that commitment to remove the toll from the Champlain Bridge, but there will not be any impact from that on the infrastructure dollars that are available to communities, whether they're existing dollars or whether they're the new $60 billion, because everything related to the cost of the Champlain Bridge already has been built into the fiscal framework.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

I have a bit of trouble believing that taking away $4 billion will have no impact whatsoever. Unless I'm mistaken, the government is going to lose revenue but will have to pay you the same amounts as before.

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Through you, Madam Chair, as I said earlier, the complete cost of building the Champlain Bridge has already been budgeted into the fiscal framework.

The tolling revenue was not designed to be used to pay for the cost of the bridge. The tolling revenue was designed to go to the general revenues of the government, so there is no linkage in that way, and there is no linkage to taking money away from my department's resources to compensate for the lost tolling revenue.

I can ask Helena to perhaps add a little more to that.

[Helena Borges, Associate Deputy Minister, Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, Department of Transport]

As we said two weeks ago, the total cost of the new bridge is already included in the fiscal framework. No additional funding is necessary to cover the costs of the project. It's already been approved. It's already been budgeted into the fiscal framework.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Okay, so we'll ask about the loss of revenue at a different committee. Thank you for your answer.

You talked about the existing building Canada fund. Having been the mayor of a municipality, I'm more familiar with the situation in Quebec. I know how much the building Canada fund can help small communities carry out large projects. Right now, however, obtaining the funding appears to be difficult in Quebec.

Minister, where do things stand in terms of finally giving Quebec's municipalities access to that funding?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Thank you for that. You're absolutely right. The Province of Quebec was allocated almost $176 million under the small communities component of the existing building Canada fund, but unfortunately, none of that money actually has been invested in any of the communities in the province of Quebec. That is the case in other provinces too.

That is why we are looking at what barriers in the existing program took away the ability of the provinces to actually get their money in a timely manner. We are looking at streamlining our processes. We are looking at removing some of those barriers so that provinces such as Quebec get their fair share of the money from the existing building Canada fund, both for the small communities and also for the provincial-territorial component.

When I took over this department, that's one thing I learned about: what are the reasons that communities are not getting the support they need? We're looking at streamlining and removing some of the barriers that exist so that communities can get the money they need.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Minister.

Mr. Sikand, you have six minutes.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Minister, for being here.

I know you're aware of the missing link project. We've also talked about it. In light of today's discussion, I'm trying to plot where it would be on the funding spectrum. Would a project like that fall within the other types of infrastructure in this additional $60 billion?

[Amarjeet Sohi, Liberal, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

What has happened so far is that I have met with the mayors from the region as well as both the transport minister and my counterpart in the province of Ontario to understand the need for this project. This is a very high priority for area municipalities as well as for the province. We are working to assist them.

There has to be some preliminary work done, not only in looking at where the funding is going to come from, but a lot of work has to be done to facilitate some of the partners to bring them to the table, whether it be CP, CN, or other stakeholders.

That's where we are. We're using the federal government's facilitative role to bring those partners together. Unfortunately, I missed the meeting because I had to attend my father's funeral.

Maybe the deputy minister could give you an update on the meeting between Transport and some of the other stakeholders.

[Jean-François Tremblay]

It's a very good question. It's a bit premature to know.

We're going to have to see the development of the project and suggest that it be included in public transit. Some see it more as a transportation corridor which would be beyond public transit. We will need more discussion to see the detail of the project before assuming which envelopes can actually take it. When the project is further developed, we will see how it will fit inside those different envelopes.

One thing that is sure, as the minister said, we've been engaging with Ontario over the last few months on this one and it's clearly one that we want to look at in detail. As you know, it's big and very complex.

We're also going to have to understand the first steps. There's the work with the railways and there's an environmental assessment that will also have to happen. We'll have to dig further in terms of the project before knowing exactly the envelope and the time frame.