Government Operations committee  We have over 300 primarily small to medium-sized businesses, but we've been attracting more medium-sized businesses. We are a grassroots organization. We don't have any full-time employees. We're all just business owners. We do this on a voluntary basis because we think small and medium-sized businesses are so important to this country and—

Government Operations committee  I would say that during the last four weeks—probably even the last six weeks—every week we've been on a federal committee, a provincial committee or even at the municipal level. One of our members is involved at least once a week, if not a couple of times a week, in sitting on various task force committees.

Government Operations committee  Often I will refer to small and medium-sized businesses as the forgotten middle child. It just seems that for so many programs, we don't qualify. I didn't even qualify.... We've hired four summer students who are graduating and who are going to college next year. Two are indigenous students, and there was no program.

Government Operations committee  It needs to be faster—

Government Operations committee  I'm going to also ask Catherine to comment on that, but I believe we need clear.... There's no transparency. There's no explanation for how those first five very large contracts were awarded and what the criteria for the sole-source awards were. There is a lack of small to medium-sized businesses being awarded when we, in the small to medium-sized space, can very rapidly provide parts and pieces.

Government Operations committee  Absolutely not. Manufacturers have put up their hand. A lot of them have just gone ahead and started to retool on their own nickel. We need to make sure that for those people who invested their own money to make PPE—because they recognized there was going to be a hole in the marketplace, not only for medical, but also for industrial—there's a way to distribute those products and an equitable playing field.

Government Operations committee  To answer that, first of all there was no clarity on how the contracts were let. As the federal government had mentioned, there were thousands of companies that put up their hand to say that they could support manufacturing of PPE, but there was no transparency or clarity on how those contracts were provided, who got them and what criteria was given.

Government Operations committee  Good afternoon. My name is Jocelyn Bamford. I'm the president and founder of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada. I am also vice-president of our family business, Automatic Coating Ltd., in Scarborough, Ontario, where we employ 90 people and own over four patents in the corrosion coating arena.

Finance committee  There are many ideas that you can benchmark. A lot of our members from the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers have gone to the States and relocated their businesses because of the incredible incentives there. You just need to do a quick SWOT analysis. In fact, our company had Queen's University do a study and a SWOT analysis, which I provided a couple of years ago, and the incentives are only better.

Finance committee  No, it's Jocelyn.

Finance committee  It's Jocelyn Bamford. Can I just comment to build on what Mr. Cross said? We had 3,000 initially, now 8,000, businesses put up their hands to say that they would assist with the COVID-19 response. We've only seen four or five POs. I have had, in our coalition, people who have said, yes, they'll make masks and they'll make gowns.

Finance committee  Absolutely. I'll just share with you that my November hydro bill was $55,000, and $35,500 of that was global adjustment. As you will recall, the global adjustment is what was paid to subsidize inefficient wind and solar. Some $10,000 was for delivery, and only $2,000 was the actual electricity cost.

Finance committee  My name is Jocelyn Bamford. I'm the president and founder of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada. For the past three years, since our inception, the coalition has been warning all levels of government that there would be catastrophic effects from policies that had the effect of driving both the manufacturing and the natural resource sectors out of this country.

Finance committee  Hi. I'm Jocelyn Bamford. I'm the founder and the president of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada from Scarborough, Ontario.