Transport committee  Let's start with....

Transport committee  Yes, it's a big question, but let's start with the reality that municipalities are really strapped for cash. If you look at the tax dollars collected in this country by different orders of government, the municipalities collect eight cents out of that tax pie, and that is simply

Transport committee  The permanent gas tax is an enormously important financial support for municipalities in this country. It is not indexed, so as inflation carries on into the future the value of that gas tax will diminish. Secondly, the gas tax, while invaluable and predictable, which is a reall

Transport committee  Federal leadership in urban transit is critical. Any time we have a national challenge that challenges us as a country socially, environmentally, or economically, we think there's a really important role to play for the federal government. The federal government and its agencies

Transport committee  I can't give you an order of magnitude in terms of a figure. What I can say is that in the particular case of urban transit, exactly because of the scenario you're painting, dedicated transit funding is essential. Municipalities simply can't live on the gas tax and the property t

Transport committee  We believe very strongly that infrastructure generally is an essential foundation for the economic competitiveness of our country. Within that framework of infrastructure and the discussions of the commitments of the government to long-term infrastructure planning, it's really cl

Transport committee  Great. Thank you. Of course we're always interested in anything related to infrastructure, so we really appreciate being invited here today. I should say that our president, Berry Vrbanovic, a councillor from Kitchener, was not able to be here today. He has a council meeting

Transport committee  Certainly there's a need for long-term and planned funding for infrastructure. There's no question about that. As we said earlier, the idea of having a period of time to plan and develop the longer-term vision would then, we would think, set the framework for following up with th

Transport committee  Oh. Sorry.

Transport committee  It was a way of responding to a crisis.

Transport committee  Everyone understood that the urgency was important. The deadline was important. All of that was part of the context that we were responding to. If in the future we're operating in a context that is not a crisis context, then no, we wouldn't see that as the ideal. But all the othe

Transport committee  To me, the main beneficiary was our country. Municipalities were part of the work and part of the benefits of that, for sure.

Transport committee  Yes, of course we would. I'm certainly not going to comment on the selection and distribution in the country. It wasn't part of the municipal role to be involved in that in any way whatsoever. Certainly, the expectation is that programs are accessible to all municipalities across

Transport committee  We think the context we've been through in the last two years has demonstrated very clearly that to tackle national priorities the three orders of government must work together. If they do work together, it can be very efficient and effective. Let's identify the key national pri

Transport committee  There are examples of those cost savings across the country. We don't operate on a project-by-project basis at FCM, so we don't get into that level of detail, but we know of situations where there have been savings.