Finance committee  They would say they have complementary purposes. The tri-councils have large budgets, or relatively large budgets. The three councils together fund about $3 billion a year of research, of talent development, scholarships, and transitional support, whereas CIFAR's budget—the feder

Finance committee  It's actually a complicated question. We have given CIFAR the requirement to develop an intellectual property policy in consultation with the nodes and institutions that will be recipients of this federal funding. As you may be aware, institutions across the country have their o

Finance committee  In many cases it would be individual universities that house the researchers who are doing some of this work. That is, many universities have those kinds of policies. Most of those policies are designed to ultimately facilitate some form of commercialization. Usually there are me

Finance committee  There are a number of measures the federal government has taken in the past. There are programs, for example, run by granting councils that support talent, including the Canada research chairs. What's a bit special about this type of funding is that it is specifically for the pu

Finance committee  Certainly, this has sometimes been thought to be a very disruptive technology, with potentially disruptive effects on society and implications for policy. Indeed, some of the funding being provided to CIFAR will be used to support research into the ethical, legal, and public poli

Finance committee  We anticipate that this investment—which is high, it's true—will allow us to continue our work for five years. As I mentioned earlier, there are other funding tools to support research. The future will tell us to what extent we should seek additional funding and if it is necessar

Finance committee  It's difficult to predict the future, but I think the current investment will probably prove to be adequate.

Finance committee  CIFAR receives funds from the federal government to support research networks. Generally they fund Canadian researchers to participate in international networks, so some of the funding is received by researchers outside of Canada. It's very excellence focused. That's their normal

Finance committee  Thank you very much. This next clause is fairly straightforward. It provides authority for the Minister of Industry to make a payment of up to $125 million out of the consolidated revenue fund to the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, commonly known as CIFAR, for the purp

Finance committee  Yes, you're right—

Finance committee  Thank you for that clarification. I will just mention that this is clearly a priority for the government. A government can sometimes use legislation to outline some of the measures it wants to focus on. There are also implications for the process, which can be faster if the meas

Finance committee  It could be, yes.