Transport Committee on Feb. 25th, 2021

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Campbell.

It's very reassuring to hear there was a business plan. Any business venture that starts up, whether you're selling hamburgers or shoes or whatever, has a business plan that obviously involves targets and goals.

Would you be able to tell me, Mr. Campbell, what the targets or goals of that original business plan were, for projects or for dollars complete going forward?

[Glenn Campbell]

First off, after Parliament approved authority for the $35 billion, the government's fiscal framework and policy in the budget set out that the $35 billion would have a net fiscal expense of $15 billion. Then it was spread out over time.

Given that it was not clear what the projects would be and at what profile, there was an estimated amount of a couple billion dollars per year, back-end loaded. I don't have those figures at my disposal, but it started with the smaller amount and ended up at around $2 to $3 billion a year at the end of 10 years.

That was the financial plan, if you will, that was coupled with an operational plan of setting up the entity and then really going out to consult with provinces, territories, municipalities, indigenous groups and investors as to what the projects would be. The government's plan was to adjust that fiscal financial profile based on the response that was received, which is not unusual for setting up these types of entities.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm just beginning to learn about the Canada Infrastructure Bank. Even though I was a municipal councillor for many years, I'll be honest with you and say that it was never discussed in our municipality.

Would you say, then, that having no completed projects in the first three to four years was not part of the original business plan?

[Glenn Campbell]

I would say that when we went back, and as the lead in helping the government and the new corporation set out that plan, it was prospective. It was really going to depend on market response as to a project's coming forward under either an integrated bilateral agreement or the CIB. Given the CIB's details and the fact that its offering was not available to, say, a municipality, there was no way to know what project would potentially come forward. There were some major projects that were under way, such as the REM, but those still needed to be negotiated and structured.

We'd anticipated from the experience, including PPP Canada and others, that it might take several years to identify a project or potential structures. The private sector typically would want to come in early and help design it before it moved forward, so we had planned accordingly that it might take some time for the structures to come together.

My last point is that the CIB has, from then and today, an advisory and an educational mandate. They knew in the early days that a lot of the bank was going to be helping municipalities, provinces and indigenous groups imagine what the power of that tool could be and how to partner with the private sector. We put more operational emphasis on that outreach and development rather than necessarily building out the systems to handle investments, which we knew was going to take time to do.

[The Chair, Liberal, Vance Badawey]

Thank you, Mr. Shipley, and Mr. Campbell.

We're now going to move on our last speaker of the afternoon, Mr. Sidhu.

You have the floor for five minutes.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Gillis, Mr. Campbell, Ms. McKay and Ms. Mitchell, for being with us today. I'd like to thank your department for the important work that you're doing for communities across Canada, especially here in Brampton: the $45-million recent investment by the federal government into Brampton Transit, which is the largest investment into Brampton Transit in over 10 years. To my understanding, the federal Liberal government has invested 13 times more than the previous government into transit, which will support so many communities across Canada, so thank you for the wonderful work.

Ms. Gillis, I have been reading about clean power projects across the country and how they can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help us achieve our emission reduction targets. The Canada Infrastructure Bank has committed to invest $5 billion in clean power projects across the country and $2.5 billion in the next three years.

Can you talk about what kinds of projects the Canada Infrastructure Bank will be looking at funding in the clean power area?

[Kelly Gillis]

That is a really important area that has been a focus. It's also part of the growth plan and what the bank will be concentrating on in the next 10 years. Certain areas like transmission for provinces that have high dependency on coal and need to transition off coal are important types of projects, like the Atlantic Loop that the CIB is involved in and renewable energy like the bank is involved in. They have made some commitments in discussions with District Energy in B.C., as well as wind power in Nova Scotia. Those are some of the areas of opportunity.

I will ask my colleague, Glenn Campbell, to talk a little bit more about some of the work in this area.

[Glenn Campbell]

I'd be happy to.

Under the rubric of clean power, as the deputy said, there are renewable-type projects. For example, the CIB is undertaking an advisory engagement with the Northwest Territories, both with the territory's utility and indigenous groups, about how to increase the megawatts of power, and clean power, in that region over time and bringing in private investment to help them manage some of their engineering risks, but also to more efficiently deliver power in the north.

In B.C., for example, there's talk both around renewable projects as well as transmission lines, supporting first nations, and how to bring clean power to enable the natural gas industry that's burgeoning in the central part of British Columbia. Again, it's just dialogue at this stage, but now we're starting to see real responsiveness by the utilities once they what might be the value of partnering. Similarly, between Manitoba and Saskatchewan, there are some discussions about how the two journeys partner together and do things a little more boldly—not in the traditional ways that utilities have done it—and bring in partners.

Finally, there is the Atlantic Loop that my deputy, Ms. Gillis, mentioned, which I'm involved in, given that a number of departments are supporting that effort, including our own infrastructure tools to see how a backbone of transmission lines can get clean power from Labrador and/or Quebec in to help New Brunswick and Nova Scotia move off coal-powered generation. I think it's clear that the risk and ingenuity needs to be managed on both sides. Bringing private partners and capital into some of those equations can relieve the burden on both the ratepayer and the taxpayer.

To go back to an earlier comment, there are many large pension institutional investors that are looking to recycle pensioners' capital and others' capital into these long-term assets and really partner with governments to achieve public policy purposes. Now, even for private funds, given their move towards investor demands for ESG and climate-friendly investments, having partners in clean power and distribution really meshes. It's a win-win if we can do it, and we need the CIB there largely because these complex deals need that balancing and structuring to make that work.

This area holds a lot of promise. These projects are big and complex in any event, and I think they are an area where the CIB can bring a lot of value.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Thank you for that, Mr. Campbell.

Mr. Chair, how much time do I have left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Vance Badawey]

You have about 35 seconds.

[Maninder Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton East, ON]

Okay. Because my question would be pretty long, I'll just take this opportunity to thank the department for the wonderful work it's doing. Thank you for taking the time to join us. I know communities across Canada really appreciate your hard work. Thanks once again for being here today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Vance Badawey]

Thank you, Mr. Sidhu, and to everyone else.

Before I do let everyone go, there are two things. One, I do want to thank members for their participation and their questions today. Equally, if not more important, were the answers by and dialogue with Minister McKenna, as well as her team.

Thank you for your time today and being a part of the interventions.

Lastly, to committee members, we do have to take our next steps with the report on the impacts of COVID-19 on the airline industry. We will need drafting instructions from each individual party. What I'm requesting from each party—one from the Liberals, one from the Conservatives, one from the Bloc and one from the NDP—is that we receive drafting instructions no later than next Thursday, March 4, so that we can hand those to the analysts who will, of course, come back with a draft report.

Is everybody okay with that? Are there any questions? No.

Mr. Clerk, do you want to add anything?

[The Clerk]

Could the members send those to the committee's e-mail address, [email protected], thus to me the clerk, and then I'll hand those off to the analysts.

[The Chair, Liberal, Vance Badawey]

With that, are there any further questions on today's agenda and our next meeting date? I know we've got a break week next week, unless you guys want to come back on Tuesday and Thursday next week to meet. I see Taylor smiling. I'm sure you're okay with that. No, Churence? Stephanie? No.

Following next week, we're going to be meeting on Tuesday and Thursday. Once again, hopefully we can get those drafting instructions to the clerk as quickly as possible so that we can get them to the analysts.

Other than that, good job today, folks. Have a great evening.

The meeting is adjourned.