Great. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Good evening to all of the members of the standing committee.
I'm calling in today from FCM's offices in the city of Ottawa. As FCM moves forward with our commitment to reconciliation, we acknowledge that our head offices are located on the unceded unsurrendered territory of the Anishinabe Algonquin nation, whose presence here reaches back to time immemorial.
I'm very pleased to be here on behalf of FCM's more than 2,000-member municipal governments from coast to coast to coast. Intercommunity passenger bus service is a critical issue for municipalities in all regions of the country, and so I want to start by thanking the committee for choosing to study this important topic.
There is no doubt that providing reliable, affordable and effective passenger bus service in a nation as vast as ours is a challenge, and we've heard that already tonight. The loss of Greyhound routes was a terrible blow for Canadians in rural regions, particularly those in areas where transportation options were already limited. It follows similar announcements over the past decade impacting Acadian Bus Lines and, as we already heard tonight, the STC—Saskatchewan Transportation Company—on the Prairies.
This marks a concerning trend. We're not going in the right direction. These challenges aren't new, and yet we still lack a coordinated approach to passenger bus service in this country. FCM's sincere hope is that this study is a catalyst for concrete action by the federal government in partnership with provinces, territories, municipalities and indigenous governments.
As the committee has already heard in the course of its study, passenger bus service is a critical element of an equitable and sustainable national transportation system. It's not only vital for economic development—especially in a rural context—but it's also a key contributor to public safety and community well-being. There's a direct link between the lack of affordable and safe transportation options in certain regions and violence against indigenous women, girls and the two-spirit and LGBTQ+ communities. As we've already heard tonight, the National Inquiry on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls recommended improved rural and remote transportation options for exactly this reason.
Intercity bus services are also essential to achieving a zero-emission transport system.
Across the country, emissions from the transportation sector are on the rise. Municipalities and the federal government have chosen to invest in urban public transport as a priority. This partnership enables cities and communities to develop transportation networks that will enable these communities to become carbon neutral by 2050.
As we look at greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector, we must not forget intercommunity travel. Canadians need affordable public transit options, be those bus or train, between communities to reduce the number of single-passenger vehicles on our highways even as we shift to electric vehicles and low-carbon fuels.
For municipal leaders, the question of how to move Canadians safely and reliably between communities has only grown in urgency. At our 2021 annual conference, shortly after the announcement that Greyhound would be reducing service in the Canadian market, municipal delegates voted to adopt a resolution calling for urgent federal support for intercommunity passenger bus service.
The resolution calls on the federal government to take leadership on this issue by identifying a lead federal department—most likely Transport Canada—and working with the provinces and territories to develop and implement a long-term funding model for passenger bus services for all regions of the country.
The federal government's mandate set out in the Canada Transportation Act is to contribute to the development of a competitive, economical and efficient national transportation system, and it's in that spirit that FCM's members adopted the resolution last year. The federal government has a critical role to play in terms of coordinating and funding this essential public service.
One of the key messages that I want to leave with you today—and that I'm hoping we can discuss more in the Q and A—is that we aren't starting here from scratch. We have some of the elements of a comprehensive national system already in place, and we've heard about some of that already tonight. There are regions of the country that are covered by passenger rail, and the federal government is rightly looking to expand and improve rail service in the Toronto-Quebec City corridor. Over time, passenger rail service could be added elsewhere in the country as well, starting with existing underutilized short-line infrastructure.
We have a long history in this country of publicly run or publicly subsidized passenger bus companies at the provincial and regional level. We've heard some examples of those tonight. As the committee heard last week, we're seeing more private and non-profit carriers entering the market since Greyhound's departure—on certain routes and in certain regions of the country—and these can be supported to expand further.
Lastly, the federal government already has funding programs for public transit in place, notably the rural transit solutions fund that was announced in 2021. There's a very strong existing federal-municipal partnership on public transit, and we can build on that. I would be happy to speak more about that during the Q and A.
FCM is calling on the federal government to build on these existing elements and work with provincial, territorial, municipal and indigenous governments to create a national approach that includes a sustainable funding model in partnership with provinces and territories. Such a plan should be developed in consultation with municipalities to ensure it reflects local realities as much as possible. The federal government should work to ensure that any strategy to address gaps in service avoids a one-size-fits-all approach.