Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Random—Burin—St. George's.
I want to discuss budget 2015 in detail with regard to science and technology and research and experimental development. I would like to start by talking about why that is important. It is important because we must invest in the future. If we want our grandchildren to have well-paying jobs, they need the know-how, the tools, the equipment, the infrastructure and the community in order to be productive. If they are productive, they can command good salaries. We need to stay on the forefront of technology to do that.
If we want our grandchildren to have jobs where they have a competitive advantage, if they work in areas where Canada's competitors have a barrier to entry, then science, technology and innovation are a prime source of that advantage. If we want good jobs to stay in Canada for our grandchildren, then we have to develop new industries, not only new companies but new industries, which means companies around emerging technologies but also the supply chain, the partners, the pool of skilled labour, the finance, all of the infrastructure. Those are the things that would create good jobs for our grandchildren.
In light of the finance minister's comment that the Prime Minister's granddaughter could fix any problems in the budget, I say let us give our grandchildren the resources to fix problems, some wealth-generating resources to help them. They will need it because our grandchildren, it seems, will be taxed by the burdens left behind by a short-sighted, closed-minded, innumerate and ideological Conservative government.
I want to talk about the budget in detail now, and I would like to start by looking at federal spending on science, technology, research and development in constant 2007 dollars. This comes from data collected by Statistics Canada. It is government spending on science and technology corrected for inflation. In 2005-06, the spending in all of the federal government was $10.0 billion. This was just before the Conservatives took power. In 2014-15, the fiscal year just completed, the number, according to Statistics Canada, corrected for inflation, was $9.1 billion. Therefore, federal government spending has gone down by $900 million a year before we even get to anything announced in the budget.
Remember that there were cuts to the scientific research and experimental development tax credit announced in 2012 that are not counted, because StatsCan is only counting contracts, grants and contributions and research fellowships. Therefore, that tax credit, which was cut for scientific research and experimental development in the private sector, really kicked in last year and this year, so that in 2014-15, there were $315 million of cuts to tax credits. This year, there were $480 million. Next year, there will be $500 million. This is money that is not going into companies that are doing research and development here in Canada.
I want to now deconstruct what the government would say in reply to that. The government has been saying that $11 billion in new investments in science, technology and innovation have been made since 2006. I put in a written order paper question, which is Question No. 950, asking for a breakdown of that $11 billion. The answer shows that when money was moved from one place to another, it was called new spending. Aside from about $3 billion in stimulus spending right after the recession, there was not really any new spending. When the government talks about this $11 billion, it does not account for any cuts, especially inside the federal government, such as in Environment, Fisheries and Oceans, StatsCan, and the government does not account for inflation when it quotes this number.
The most egregious example is that the government told me, in the reply to the written order paper question, that included in this $11 billion was $110 million a year of new money for IRAP, the industrial research assistance program, and one-time $400 million for a venture capital fund investment. However, if anybody remembers budget 2012, that was supposed to be paid for by cuts to the scientific research and experimental development tax credit for the private sector. That $500 million a year cut in support for the private sector R and D swamps that new spending.
At this point, I want to make some special mention of the cuts to the eligibility of capital expenditure for the scientific research and experimental development tax credits. We have heard from a number of companies that it should not have been eliminated. Some companies are labour intensive, others are much more capital intensive, and there is no good reason for favouring one over the other.
I will say to the credit of the Minister of Industry, who was not the minister in 2012, when he was in my riding of Kingston and the Islands, somebody who owns a company asked him about the exclusion of capital expenditure. He sounded open to reversing that mistake and I hope that he will look at that and change the government policy in the budget implementation legislation.
I would now like to talk about particular lines in the 2015 budget. There is a line in there for CANARIE, which is Canada's Internet backbone. The government said it would spend $21 million a year for five years. The problem is, that is just continuing the current level of funding, which is $20 million a year with a little inflation adjustment. Great, it is worth a congratulatory tweet from the minister, but the minister forgot to mention that the budget is now $20 million. It used to be $30 million before the government cut the budget in 2012.
Budget 2015 also mentions funding for the CFI, $1.33 billion over six years. I talked to somebody at CFI who told me it is actually equivalent to just continuing funding at the current level, so there is nothing new there.
National Research Council will get $60 million a year for the next two years. Two years ago in budget 2013, the government said that it needed to spend an extra $60 million on top of the $900 million NRC budget to refocus NRC. It is not clear to me whether it finished refocusing, whether these next two years of funding are required to continue the refocusing because it is taking a lot longer than expected or whether NRC has found a good use for a permanent $60-million increase to its budget. We cannot tell that from the budget document.
MITACS internships, which connect graduate students in Canada by giving them industry experience, get $14 million a year for four years. Last year, when the last boost to MITACS was announced, budget 2014 moved the NSERC industrial post-doctoral fellowships to MITACS and said that NSERC, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, could use the money left over for other purposes, could reallocate it.
This year, the government moved a different program, the NSERC industrial post-graduate scholarships program, over to MITACS to create internships, but it does not say that any money would be freed for NSERC, so we may actually be losing money over at NSERC to pay for this increase to MITACS. The budget is very different this year than last year. It is not clear at all. It seems to me there will actually be a cut in NSERC.
Since we are talking about the research councils, we could go over their budget. Budget 2015 announces $46 million for the three research granting councils, starting not this year but next year. Notice the skipping year. The problem is that the three research councils have a $3-billion budget, so we lose $30 million to $60 million every year just from inflation. The government does not mention that. A one-time boost of $40 million does not even cover the inflation, since we have to wait another year until it starts. Bread and butter research grants across Canada will shrink.
That leads us finally to the new programs. There are new programs. There is money for TRIUMF out of Vancouver, the 30-metre telescope and the Canada first research excellence fund. I am sure that good science will come out of these programs because of the proven quality of Canadian scientists. The point I would make is that the funding on these new programs does not come near what all the cuts have been so far.
Let me just summarize. The Conservative government's spending on science, technology, research and development, according to Statistics Canada, is down $900 million since it took power. Add to that another $500 million every year from cuts to the scientific research and experimental development tax credit for the private sector. Add to that another $102 million cut just because of inflation and the Conservatives have not replaced the effects of inflation. That overwhelms the real new money in budget 2015.
We will hear the members on the Conservative side tout the extra spending. The conclusion is that on the Conservative record on science and technology, if we really dig down into the numbers, look back at the last ten years, look at inflation, look at what has been cut elsewhere in the federal government and in the private sector when it comes to research and development, the talking points of the Conservatives fall apart.
The Conservative government's record on science and technology and research and development is dismal and it is failing our grandchildren.