CHER Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON CANADIAN HERITAGE

COMITÉ PERMANENT DU PATRIMOINE CANADIEN

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, May 5, 1998

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[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Clifford Lincoln (Lac-Saint-Louis, Lib.)): Order, please. We are here, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), for consideration of a cultural policy by the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage.

[Translation]

Pursuant to Standing Order 108 (2), the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage is continuing its consideration of Canadian culture.

We have the pleasure of welcoming the following witnesses: from the National Gallery of Canada, Director Pierre Théberge and Assistant Director Yves Dagenais; from the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation,

[English]

Dr. George MacDonald, president and chief executive officer,

[Translation]

and the Corporation Chair, Ms. Adrienne Clarkson; from the Canadian Museum of Nature,

[English]

Ms. Joanne DiCosimo, president and CEO, and Mr. Frank Ling, chairman of the board of trustees;

[Translation]

and from the National Museum of Science and Technology,

[English]

Mr. Christopher Terry, director general of the National Museum of Aviation.

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As you know, we are carrying on with this study of Canadian culture. There are four institutions represented. At the same time, our members would like to question you regarding the estimates of the ministry regarding your institutions.

To allow time for questioning and interchange with the members, I would suggest that each institution take about ten minutes in a very informal setting rather than make very formal presentations and tell us about how you see the future of your particular institution viewing the three main thrusts of our study: globalization of commerce and trade and new intertrade agreements; changing demographics in Canada; and the impact of new technologies, the Internet and so forth, on our cultural institutions.

You can choose the order, but maybe you can start in the order in which you were named. We'll start with Mr. Théberge and go on from there.

[Translation]

Mr. Théberge.

Mr. Pierre Théberge (Director, National Gallery of Canada): Mr. Chairman, the Gallery's President, Mr. Jean-Claude Delorme, has asked me to make his apologies to you. He regrets that he cannot be here today.

I've distributed the notes for my presentation. The first few pages are simply an overview of the past year. As you know, the National Gallery of Canada has been very successful over the past year, with shows like the Renoir exhibition, of which we are very proud. To save time, I would like to go straight to the questions that the Committee sent us in advance.

I will start with the questions about federal government cultural support measures and their beneficial effects in our sector, and then I will identify the measures that have not worked quite so well.

It is obvious that as a National Gallery, we depend on the generosity of the federal government. The government has a wide range of means at its disposal to support its cultural objectives. Its main instruments are direct ownership, i.e., the proprietorship of organizations such as museums, galleries, archives, libraries, broadcasting and film services like the CBC and the National Film Board, and heritage and performing arts institutions and facilities. Then there are also, of course, grants and contributions to the operating and capital budgets of organizations with arts or heritage missions.

Regulation is another means available to the federal government. One example is the Copyright Act, which protects the interests of creators and thus helps galleries; another example is the Cultural Property Export and Import Act, designed to protect valuable art objects from export. Another category would be the measures giving tax deductions to taxpayers who make donations to charity, including donations of works of art. These federal government measures are extremely beneficial to Canada's galleries, among others the National Gallery of Canada, which I represent today.

A number of these measures have been very successful. Some of them, in particular parliamentary appropriations and the Cultural Property Export and Import Act, have enabled Canadian museums and galleries in general and our Gallery in particular to build and maintain very beautiful collections of works of art from this country. In return, the National Gallery of Canada is committed to offering exhibitions, loans, education tools and expertise to sister institutions, in Canada and abroad.

As you know, we have programs of travelling exhibitions designed to make Canadians aware of the value of the Gallery's permanent collection. We intend, over the next few years, to expand this program of travelling exhibitions to include exhibitions organized by other galleries in Canada and to send them on tour as well.

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As you know, fewer and fewer Canadian galleries have the means to send their exhibitions on tour, and we want to help share the artistic wealth throughout this country, by including in our programs not only works from our own collection, but also works from other Canadian institutions. This is a measure that we're going to discuss with our colleagues on the Canadian Art Museum Directors Organization, which will be meeting in Ottawa at the end of May.

The second question dealt with the impact of technology, but first I would like go back to certain measures that we want to take to share our collections with other galleries in Canada. I mentioned travelling exhibitions, but we also want to take the national collection of Canadian art. As you know, this collection is huge. It has been building up since 1880, largely with the help of federal funding. We believe that we now have enough substance in these collections to be able to share and place on more or less long-term loan certain parts of the Canadian collection in other Canadian galleries.

[English]

This is something we are also going to discuss with our partners at the meeting of Canadian art museum directors, the idea that we would share not only travelling exhibitions but also the permanent collection of Canadian art with other institutions. This is something that has been in our strategic plan for a certain number of years, but we want to implement this plan starting this year, with discussions on how to implement it with our colleagues across the country.

We would also like to introduce a program of sharing ownership of acquisitions of works of art.

[Translation]

We want to make co-acquisitions with other Canadian galleries, so that we can share the resources. What this would entail would be that we would buy, in collaboration with other galleries, works of art that we could then share and exhibit in different places on the basis of agreements that might be something like so many years in Montreal, so many years in Winnipeg, so many years somewhere else. This would be a new program. It has already been made part of our strategic plan, but we would like to activate it more formally.

[English]

We would also like to be more involved in the co-production of exhibitions from across the country. We are producing a lot of exhibitions in-house, from our own resources. We are also taking exhibitions coming from other institutions, travelling exhibitions. We will be taking, for example, in 2000, the Krieghoff exhibition being prepared by the Art Gallery of Ontario for circulation across the country. It will be coming to Ottawa.

[Translation]

Another thing we would like to get into is co-producing exhibitions, in other words sharing the organizational work, on research, financing and preparing the catalogue, with other institutions. We already have two such projects under way: a co- production project with the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, for an exhibition on modern art in Mexico between 1900 and 1950, and two other co-production projects involving the Musée du Québec, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and of course the National Gallery. We would like to extend this system of co-production to other museums and other projects.

There are some of the measures that we intend to pursue thanks to the funding we receive from the federal government. Recently we produced an audio guide on our Canadian collections, which is available free of charge to visitors to the Gallery. We would like to extend production of audio guides to our European collections as well.

In January, we intend to launch an extension to our WebSite, which in English is called the Learning Centre and in French L'Art/thèque. We are doing this in collaboration with IBM. It's one way of using electronic means to make the Gallery's collections and programs more accessible.

We also intend to continue increasing our self-generated revenues. Thanks to exhibitions like the Renoir and the Picasso, we have had some very sizable sponsorships from the private sector.

[English]

We would like to have more support from the private sector. We have just hired a deputy director for development, and the museum's foundation will be much more active than in the past in seeking more sponsorships and seeking more support from the private sector. Together, we think, we can continue to better serve the Canadian public.

[Translation]

Now I'd like to go back to your questions about new technologies. I mentioned our web site, which has been in action since 1996 but which, as I said, is going to be expanded thanks to what we call the Learning Centre. The Gallery data and records are being converted to the Collection Management System, which will make the collection still more accessible to other museums and to the public.

We are very involved in the use of new electronic media. Obviously, we will never be able to make sure that all Canadians can come to Ottawa to see the national collection. We will never be able to send every work in the collection on tour. The electronic media are thus a way for the public all across Canada to have access to the national collection and to obtain information, sometimes very scholarly information, about the collections.

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With regard to the question on freer trade in the cultural sector, I would like to say that it does not directly impact on the activities of the National Gallery.

[English]

The liberalization or opening up of markets to other countries is not affecting us very directly, because we are not in the business of selling services directly, but as you know, the museum has collaborated in the past very well with international institutions. These include the Musée d'Orsay, Louvre, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Chicago Art Institute, Kimbell Foundation in Fort Worth, and Museum of Modern Art in New York.

We want to continue developing international contacts. Our professional staff is communicating constantly with other institutions in order to bring to Canada the great works of art but also in order to have Canadian art seen abroad.

[Translation]

We have two projects in the works: a Group of Seven exhibition in Mexico, and in Sweden and some of the other Scandinavian countries. We have also been approached by the Embassy of China about putting together a Group of Seven exhibition that could travel to Beijing and Shanghai.

Of course, we need funding to keep on with these projects but we'll also have funding from the private sector.

With respect to demographic change, all studies indicate that galleries and museums attract adults, children ,and above all families. As you know, we have educational programs that are very well-designed to welcome all segments of the public.

Our premises are generally user-friendly because we have adequate services. We want the Gallery to be perceived as a place where families are welcome and where everyone, adults and children, has access to the collections as well as to the temporary exhibitions.

You are familiar with the statistics that we cite: by the year 2016, one Canadian in five will belong to a visible minority, which will double the proportion of persons in this group of the population from 10% in 1991 to 20% in 2016.

Another factor affecting social cohesion is the growing urban aboriginal population. Its growth rate is double that of the population as a whole and it is expected that this group will grow by almost 50% to reach 1.6 million individuals by the year 2016. The Gallery will have to continue adapting to these phenomena, of which we are very much aware.

The federal government's role in the future will be to support the cultural industries sector. We still think a strong and energetic federal presence in the arts sector is essential to the transmission of Canada's cultural treasures to all Canadians.

I mentioned the major federal agencies and the federal government's role in continuing to support those agencies. Most corporations and agencies that receive grants from the federal government have for some years now been looking to the private sector as well. This is a growing source of revenue, but its growth must not make us forget the importance of the federal government's role in supporting the arts.

We recommend that the private and public sectors invest in new funds to help museums with travelling exhibitions and other forms of outreach (such as co-productions, co-acquisitions, a national program of exhibition exchanges, etc.). We want to continue sharing collections with other Canadian institutions. Long-term loans are one method of doing this.

With respect to concrete formulas which have been or will be put forward by the federal government, there is one measure that is currently under discussion. I know there were meetings recently with officials of the Department of Canadian Heritage on the subject of developing a National Indemnification Program for travelling exhibitions.

[English]

This is a very important program, the indemnity program. I know there are discussions with the heritage department on this. It would help not only the art museum but also other sectors. I know my colleagues are very interested in this program. I think it would allow more Canadians to have more access to many important artifacts and works of art and to develop the cultural sector in Canada. As well, in terms of financial responsibility it would be a great help to not just federal institutions but also those all across the country.

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[Translation]

We would also like the federal government to be able to stabilize the MAP and to inject new money for travelling exhibitions and for outreach. There is a practical aspect to our desire to do more outreach. Naturally, the institutions that host our exhibitions, or that would like to host portions of our permanent collection, have to be able to pay for these programs.

Currently, financing fluctuates quite a bit, and it would be desirable for new money—we wouldn't ask for extraordinary amounts—to be injected into these sectors.

We would also like the government to continue encouraging private charitable donations and gifts of works of art by private individuals. This is of concern to our colleagues at other museums and galleries as well, because one way of enriching the collections is to have enough funding to acquire new works. Acquisition funds should be increased, but we must also protect and strengthen the program of donations to cultural institutions. I'm speaking on behalf of my colleagues everywhere in this country. This formula has been extremely enriching and we must make sure that it remains as effective as ever.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Théberge.

Ms. Clarkson.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson (Chairwoman, Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

Thank you very much for having us appear before you today. I think we really want to focus on some large questions you have put. You have all the details from our briefing notes and our annual reports. You know what we do. Basically, you can see that museum of ours across the river, as you see the Musée des beaux-arts—the beauty of them. You know they're very popular. Our museum is very popular.

We are technologically linked up. We have a website. We are digitizing all our products. We are doing all these things, and we are doing them under a great deal of constraint financially, because we really have been losing money over the years. We have 36% less money now than we had four or five years ago, and it will continue to be this way.

However, we are trying, because of this, to create partnerships with the private sector, with fund-raising. We have a very active development area, and of course we are doing everything we can to boost our attendance, which is excellent, but we always want more. We have seasonal fluctuations, of course, and we are very much dependent upon the kind of tourism we get in the national capital area.

That said, the dollars are important. I think the ability to appear before a committee like yours is to say that our heritage is in our museums as artifacts but also as concrete examples of the history of our country.

A recent study, less than a year old, of the Dominion Institute pointed out—and I think many of you know this, but I think it's worth underlining all the time—that 64% of youth interviewed between the ages of 18 and 24 did not even know when the Confederation of Canada had occurred. Over half of them didn't know the century in which Canada was founded. When they were asked who Canada had fought against in the First World War, 39% thought we had fought against France, Britain or Russia, and one in ten had no answer at all. Only 24% of university-educated people between the ages of 18 and 24 knew we had repatriated our Constitution from Britain. And on and on and on.

So with that background of the falling of the knowledge of history comes our paradox, which is that we are the repositories of the living elements of our history, our civilization objects, our artistic and our natural ones. That is the dilemma for the future. We have a problem, which is to put those things together. While our museums are more and more popular, while people are coming more and more to our shows, we have this falling ability to understand what our nation is really about, and we have a role to play in that nation, because we are

[Translation]

heritage and because we are responsible for everything that has to do with heritage. Another essential thing is to have a vision of the future. That's what counts, not just dollars. The dollar is a concrete, unique and necessary symbol for something that in our eyes is more important, the vision we need to continue as a country, with our heritage as it exists now.

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There are challenges in the global marketplace. Globalization is a very important concern for us as museums. As Mr. Théberge said, we have always had partnerships with other major museums in the world so that we could organize exhibitions and obtain shared subsidies to finance major exhibitions.

The big problem is not simply globalization, but also the monopolizing of our heritage by outsiders.

[English]

When we are talking about globalization, let's be very certain that we don't just think it's every country trying to get into every other country's market. We are up against a juggernaut of informational monopoly, which is buying up the heritage of other countries.

Let me be more specific. There is a scenario under which you could see Microsoft, an American company, or Ted Turner, an American company, buying up all the archives of say the National Film Board of Canada, or all our objects, or the rights to use them on the web, or the rights to use the visual ones of the National Gallery. They would have that and say, “Look, we'll give you this amount of money”—a huge amount of money—“and you'll be able to run your little museums and have your people come into them and have your national `ideas'. We'll even give you money to acquire.”

Incidentally, we have not been able to acquire. We don't have an acquisitions budget any more. We do acquire, through donations and through people giving us opportunities to acquire things, but we do not have an acquisitions budget any more.

But you could see that if these large American organizations are willing to put out money to buy up images and objects, they would therefore control them. We could be asked to license them back at not very much money initially, and it might look like a very attractive prospect. This is something that I think we have to address as a nation, and this is something that I think your particular committee has to look at, because I think it is a very real threat.

Right now there's a new museum getting a lot of attention. It is the Bilbao Museum created by Frank Gehry in the Basque area of Spain, in an underdeveloped, depressed, sub-industrial area. This museum was created with money from the Spanish government, at all levels—a budget of over $100 million, I believe—using one of the most wonderful and unique architects in the world, Frank Gehry, who happens to be a Canadian by birth. It is an example of a new kind of museum imperialism, or colonization may be a nicer word, or partnership, which is that it belongs to the Guggenheim really. It will show American art, but it has been built by the Spanish with Spanish money.

If you read the words of Thomas Krens, who is the curator of this museum, the Guggenheim, he is saying this is the kind of thing they want to do all over the world. They have done it in smaller ways in places like Salzberg already. This is not going to stop with Europe. We're their closest neighbour. Could be we given a museum? Could we be asked to provide something in which they would then provide the content?

There are all kinds of things like this that I think your committee should be addressing itself to.

The other things you are asking us about we can discuss absolutely. They're here, and we can give you facts and figures about all of that, and you know that. But this is the real problem for the future, and I think we have to address ourselves to it. If we don't, we're going to suddenly have one of our institutions faced with this terrific deal, where somebody like a Bill Gates or a Ted Turner is going to say, “We'll give you a billion dollars. You'll never have to worry about money from the government again. You'll never have to follow the Auditor General's rules. You'll never have to really talk to the standing committees again. You'll never have to do anything like that again. Everything is set.”

That's what I think we should be addressing ourselves to, which is not at all short term, and it's not even long term; it's our medium term, because it's right here now.

[Translation]

I don't want talk too long. We can discuss other things later on. I just wanted to mention that this is very important.

I'll let my colleagues have the floor. Thank you.

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[English]

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mrs. Clarkson. I think you've left a real challenge before us, and I'm glad you addressed it. It certainly merits a lot of thinking on our part.

Mr. Ling.

Mr. Frank Ling (Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Canadian Museum of Nature): Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee.

[Translation]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

[English]

Thank you for inviting us to outline the accomplishments and plans of the Canadian Museum of Nature and to take part in the round-table discussion about cultural policy.

To respect the time limits, we will briefly summarize our recent accomplishments, current activities and plans for the immediate future.

I'm happy to be able to say that what I consider one of the museum's major accomplishments is here with me today. Ms. Joanne DiCosimo took over the role of president July 1, 1997, having been chosen from among eight competitive candidates from across Canada. She was previously the director of the Manitoba Museum of Man and Nature. Ms. DiCosimo had an impressive fundraising record in Winnipeg and she has already assembled a strong development team and program at the CMN.

Of even greater importance, in a relatively short period of less than a year our new president has instilled an enormous amount of staff trust and confidence and been a catalyst for a new dynamism within the institution. With your support we are now able to once again move forward and look outward as a team.

It is my pleasure to introduce Ms. DiCosimo to speak about the CMN's accomplishments and plans.

Thank you very much.

Ms. Joanne DiCosimo (President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Museum of Nature): Thank you, Frank.

Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, it's a privilege to be invited to speak to you today. As Mr. Ling said, I will give a bit of the accomplishments, although those are largely contained in the brief. I want mostly to tell you about our current activities and our future plans. Some of those touch directly on the questions you've put to us today, and will lead naturally to the discussion that will follow.

I will start with an event that was a watershed in the history of the Canadian Museum of Nature's service to Canada. Just about a year ago, on May 9, 1997, the new collections and research facility, the Natural Heritage Building, opened in Aylmer, Quebec. Just prior to this, on March 31, the museum had completed the mammoth task of packing, moving, and rehousing the 10 million specimens that comprise the national natural science collection.

[Translation]

In addition to congratulating the staff and Board on this remarkable achievement—which pre-dates my arrival—, there are three things about this project that I would like to bring to the attention of the Committee.

First, the development of this new facility and the re-housing of the national collection have addressed the grave concerns that existed across Canada about the collection's safety. The National Heritage Building thus made it possible for the Museum to fulfill its essential public trust in this regard. This major step forward will be acknowledged publicly in June when the staff of the Canadian Museum of Nature receive the Canadian Museums Association's Award for Outstanding Achievement in collections management.

[English]

Secondly, the new facility was built using existing financial resources. The federal government awarded no new or additional funding for that project. It's very important that be understood. Rather, the Museum of Nature reallocated resources formerly spent on 11 different rental site leases and collaborated with a private developer in order to build the Natural Heritage Building.

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Thirdly, on this point, you will recall the concerns expressed by the environmental community when the Aylmer site was allocated for the new facility. To address these concerns directly we've developed, in partnership with a number of experts and public interest groups, a strategic plan for the responsible management of the wetlands and the museum's facilities. This environmental stewardship plan and program will be presented to the public in late June of this year.

In addition to that, we've begun an environmental education fund, and to date have raised approximately $30,000 from private industry to support this aspect of the environmental stewardship program.

[Translation]

By the time of my arrival in July, the Canadian Museum of Nature had experienced approximately five years of the kind of activity that engenders inward organizational focus. The construction projects and the re-housing of the collection are examples of this essentially internal focus. The staff and the Board were eager to look outward once again and to focus on the community in whose interest the institution is established—on the Canadian people and on fulfilling the special responsibilities of a national Museum. National museums of course exist for national purposes.

[English]

Because all museums, universities, scientific agencies and others are experiencing identical challenges of funding and concern for the gaps in the knowledge base and in the scientific record, it was appropriate that the Museum of Nature begin a dialogue with that national community. To this end, during the period of October 1997 to December 1997 we conducted a national consultation process. The goals of our process were to gather the views and perspectives of the broader scientific and museum community and explore the potential for collaborative work. Specifically, we wanted to know what the appropriate role of a national museum of the natural sciences in 1998 and beyond is, and how we can work together to achieve our common purposes.

We travelled to six cities in that time period. We held discussions with forty to fifty people in each centre, and we've received input from an additional approximately 100 people in writing. We've also had face-to-face meetings, other than the formal sessions, with many partners, including the Canadian Society of Zoologists, the Canadian Nature Federation, and many others. These meetings to revitalize longstanding relationships as well as engage new partners and friends will be ongoing work for the institution.

[Translation]

Using the information gathered to date and the views and perspectives of our very talented and dedicated staff, we have developed a plan for the Museum in the immediate future. The Museum will be renewed and will increase its public value by focusing institutional energy, knowledge, skills and resources on the achievement of four objectives, as follows:

First, its national service and impact will be increased, by creating and maintaining national networks in each of the scientific disciplines in which the Museum operates and initiating a consortium of natural history museums and related organizations; by posting descriptions of major collection holdings and scientific expertise on our WebSite and thereby facilitating access to them; and revitalizing its program of travelling exhibits, specifically responding to the expressed desire of Canadians to see their national collection.

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These are examples of strategies that will be adopted to achieve each of these objectives. The full plan is of course more comprehensive.

[English]

The second objective is to demonstrate the value of the work done by the institution, to make it visible and obvious. The further strategies in fulfillment of that include the further development of a public function at Aylmer, possibly through tours of the collections areas, and certainly through wetlands interpretation; the continuation of our strong program of popular and scientific publications—as I think you know, these range from the best-selling dinosaur eggs booklet and model in the Tiny Perfect Dinosaur series with Somerville Press, to very essential reference tools like the Insects of the Yukon, or Lichens of North America, a current co-production with Yale University Press, as well, of course, as the ongoing publication by research staff in a range of scientific journals; the further development of the web site—clearly another strategy; and a new opportunity to work with the Quebec community with the launch of the Canadian tour of Monarcha: Butterflies Beyond Boundaries in Sherbrooke in June of this year.

Our third objective is to put in place the basic operating systems, and by that we mean human and technical, to support all institutional work.

There are two main basic technical objectives. One is of course year 2000 readiness. The second is the creation of an electronic record of all collections data, thus supporting Canada's contribution to the essential task of monitoring biodiversity on a global basis.

We also have a number of strategies aimed at further strengthening and addressing the essential human resources of the Museum of Nature, and our continuing work to achieve an open and participatory planning process with the rest of the nation has been a part of that.

Finally, our fourth objective is to increase self-generated revenue. Our focus here is to build the fund-raising and revenue-generating capacities of the museum. It's necessary both to support the mission-critical programs, as has been discussed, and in our case to conduct a much-needed capital campaign to address the chronic needs of the heritage facility, the Victoria Memorial Museum Building at McLeod Avenue and Metcalfe Street, which is the main public face of the Museum of Nature.

[Translation]

In emphasizing these aspects of the past, current and future plans of the Canadian Museum of Nature, I do not wish to de- emphasize the considerable achievements of the institution in the two years since our last appearance here. These accomplishments are considerable and, as Mr. Link mentioned, are highlighted in the brief contained in your information package.

[English]

I'm going to mention just a few of them.

[Translation]

Attendance has increased, as has our market share in the region. Last year, our collections staff respond to over 1,400 specimen loan requests, despite the constraints of the move. Thirty-seven new species were named and described. The Arctic Odyssey exhibition was developed in cooperation with the community of Igloolik, effectively twinning science and traditional knowledge. A travelling version of this exhibition will celebrate the creation of Canada's newest territory of Nunavut next year.

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[English]

In closing, I want to note that the concerns, issues, and work in the natural sciences transcend political and geographical boundaries. We know that Canadians share an intense pride and a deeply held value for the incredible physical beauty and variety of this country. We also share a concern for the natural world and for its future because it has, of course, a very direct bearing on the future of the human race.

When polled, we said that projects to sustain the natural environment were the legacy projects we preferred when choosing projects for the millennium. We at the Museum of Nature have assumed nature's view on this event. We call our project “Just Another Millennium” because we want to insert that longer view into the discussions.

As the members of this committee consider the development of a cultural policy to guide the country for the next millennium, I respectfully request that the term be understood to include our science culture just as our shared Canadian heritage must include our natural heritage.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you, Ms. DiCosimo.

Mr. Terry.

Mr. Christopher J. Terry (Director General, National Museum of Aviation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First, I would like to proffer the apologies of our chair, Dr. David Strangway, and our director, Dr. Geneviève Sainte-Marie, who were unable to be with you today.

One of the things, of course, about following distinguished colleagues who have commented on these areas is that many of the things one wishes to say have already been dealt with, and with great eloquence, by those colleagues. So I will not go through all of the notes that I have prepared here because I think you've heard most of the issues raised already.

I would like to focus more on the scientific and technological aspects of Canadian culture and our heritage in the context of the points you have raised.

First, though, let me say that, as our brief points out, the government has given our corporation a mandate for the preservation of a national collection and the dissemination of knowledge about the scientific and technological heritage of Canada. The Minister of Canadian Heritage stated when she appeared before the committee in November that we need, “as a government, as a country and as a committee...to ensure that we safeguard our capacity to tell our own stories”. In essence, this is what we are committed to doing. By fostering an understanding of our scientific and technological heritage and how that heritage has contributed to the development of Canada as a country, we can build pride in our achievements and stimulate interest in our future.

Science and technology have played an integral part in almost every aspect our our society, and have done so for countless decades. Whether in transportation by air or rail, the development of our natural resources, helping us to learn how to cope with the realities of living in our climate, or growing food for domestic consumption and export, science and technology have had pervasive impacts.

As the committee is well acquainted with our corporation and its sites, let me just say that we carry out our mandate through the activities of our three museums. There's the National Museum of Science and Technology on St. Laurent Boulevard, Agriculture Museum at the Central Experimental Farm, and National Aviation Museum at Rockcliffe Airport. These museums hold magnificent collections that richly illustrate our many accomplishments in the field of science and technology. We also hold artifacts that demonstrate that Canadians have suffered a few reverses too, but we don't gloss over the fact that we have had reverses. It's part of an evolutionary process.

We manage these three facilities and their associated collections and activities on the smallest budget of any of the national museum corporations, $22 million in this fiscal year, and we record almost 700,000 visits to our sites each year, almost half of which come from people who live beyond the national capital.

The effect of program review and other financial restraints throughout this decade has been profound. As with our colleagues, we received a full third less in our allocation than we did several years ago. Painful though this process was, it has hastened our evolution into an organization with solid entrepreneurial instincts and a strong track record of success in forging beneficial partnerships with the private sector and our not-for-profit colleagues.

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The need to re-engineer our organization in the face of reduced resources occurred simultaneously with the advent of the information highway as a new means of communication with large numbers of people. We seized the opportunities that this presented some five years ago with the creation of our first electronic encyclopedia. This was done in conjunction with a variety of private sector partners who wished to use real content as a trial for the transmission of multimedia information over standard telephone lines.

The success of this, which was recognized by several awards has given rise to several derivatives of this project, the most recent of which was a further groundbreaking multimedia application on the ill-starred Avro Arrow. This application has been used by Bell Canada to test the feasibility of broad-band transmissions into individual residences. The application, which was paid for in full by Bell Canada, is in the process of being installed in the National Aviation Museum.

Our work in the electronic world has sensitized us to a vast range of issues, ranging from copyright to the optimum resolution of images intended only for display on monitor screens. It has also led us into other partnership arrangements with Industry Canada and local social agencies across the country whereby we have digitized vast parts of our image collections to permit them to be used on SchoolNet and mounted on our own web sites.

This experience has proven conclusively that disadvantaged young people can, when appropriately encouraged, use modern technologies to accomplish these tasks, thereby gaining valuable experiences and contributing to the public good.

Current and emerging information technologies therefore present rich opportunities to expand our reach, publish in virtual form material of very specialized nature, to reach directly into every school in Canada, provide access to information about our collections and our substantial image banks, browse our library catalogues and archival records, and gain rapid access to our knowledge workers.

This latter issue has become significant for us. We are answering hundreds of questions every month that are received by our web sites. This fosters a dialogue between our museums and their vast network of clients of all ages, pursuits, and specialized interests.

We have learned that change is vital to continued success, elegance of design does count, and content does attract users. Far from using this technology only as an electronic billboard and an event reminder, we see it as a cost-effective way for us to share information of proven interest and knowledge that stems from an analysis of this base information. It's a value-added approach that's quite consistent with contemporary marketing practice.

I should also mention that these electronic technologies have also permitted us to provide new experiences to the visitors of our museums with the introduction of virtual reality devices and simulators, which add considerably to their experience.

We envisage that we will continue to use these platforms to broaden our audiences and provide them with useful content, because the content is our most significant market advantage, and as you heard my colleagues reflect, other people fully recognize this fact.

I should say, though, that in doing this, we do not believe that the real visit is a thing of the past. Only a face-to-face visit with the last generation of steam locomotives at the science and technology museum properly conveys the majesty of these legendary machines, and no photograph will ever convey the impact of the severed front fuselage of the Avro Arrow on display at the National Aviation Museum.

Our research shows quite clearly that visitors come to see real things. Their appetite for this may have been stimulated by images, virtual or otherwise, but in the final analysis, visitors do tell us that there's no substitute for personal exposure.

• 1200

In this respect, it is appropriate for government to maintain its role as the gatherer and keeper of a representative collection reflecting the history of the country and its people. The continued existence of such collections and their supporting documentation provides tangible evidence of the transformation of this country, its economy, and its people. It also helps to demystify the past and reduce to reality many of the stylized views about the past and its influence on the present that permeate much of our thinking.

With a commitment to preserve our material culture, however, goes an obligation to look after it properly, and here our system does not always accord appropriate importance to meeting that obligation. We in particular have been working for over 30 years to secure proper housing for some of our aviation and rail artifacts.

We also run a danger of being unable to provide space for even modest growth in such collections. By their nature, museum collections must evolve if they are to continue to be representative and relevant. This is not an advocacy position for unbridled growth. Given the opportunity, I could cover the 50-odd hectares of Rockcliffe Airport in about six months if I were to take that irresponsible approach, but we never would. But it does point out that modest net growth will be required to accommodate new artifacts added to collections, and it must be accommodated.

Apart from the issue of housing artifacts, I would also like to comment briefly on something my colleagues have mentioned: travelling exhibitions. As they have found, travelling exhibitions serve many useful functions. They enable parts of national collections to be seen in the far reaches of the country; they expose artifacts that might not otherwise be seen, because they're not required for exhibition purposes in their home museums; and probably most important, they assist many of the smaller institutions across the country to expand their offerings and therefore develop their own audiences, and this ultimately rebounds to the benefit of all of them.

Our experience is that many of the museums in our community of technology-oriented institutions simply cannot afford the costs of bringing travelling exhibitions in. Although steps have also been taken recently to reduce one of the costs, many of our colleagues still can't afford the costs that remain. Consequently, we have had to make the decision that if we feel it's important for travelling exhibitions to be seen in various parts of the country, we've had to bear some of the costs ourselves.

Given the powerful ability of artifacts to tell stories of national significance, this might be an area for further discussion about useful initiatives that might be implemented at the federal level.

The final thing I'd like to touch on is demographic change and its impact on cultural policy. The nature and extent of demographic change in Canada over the next generation has been the subject of extensive public discussion in recent years. We must be one of the few countries in the world where such a treatment has become a best-seller. We are aware of the aging of the post-war generation, the decline in fertility rates, increase in life expectancies of both men and women, the increase in single-parent families and in families formed from second marriages, and the change in the profile of new arrivals to Canada as to both ethnicity and value. All of these things have been mentioned.

We are also only too aware of findings about the knowledge of our history, also mentioned earlier, and of concern to us in particular, of the seeming aversion to education and careers in the sciences and associated fields. I do say “seeming” because we do see on a regular basis wonderful examples of highly motivated people who need no encouragement to pursue such careers, but they do not constitute a majority.

The need to increase the level of general scientific literacy in Canada is critical. Given the dependency ratios forecast for the next 30 years, during the retirement age of the dominant post-war generation, which I presume means all of us in this room, it will become imperative that we produce as many skilled knowledge workers as possible to take account of the increased responsibility they will be called upon to shoulder in looking after us. We see museums in general playing an important role in an overall strategy to develop a well-educated workforce, and we see our three museums in particular as having the potential to play a significant role in the fields of science and technology.

• 1205

I would quickly add that although we continue to focus much of our energy on young people, we have also come to the conclusion that we should not restrict our focus to young people. In fact we've started to have some very real and positive success with older people, who are in their own right just as interested in learning about science and technology as their children are.

Demographic change therefore brings with it the growth of non-traditional markets, fragmentation in traditional ones, a critical need to encourage development of high skill levels and competencies, and a better comprehension of science and technology issues in the population.

The Chairman: Mr. Terry, are you ready to conclude very soon?

Mr. Christopher Terry: Yes.

Museums are not the only solution. They are part of it, and we have been thinking about how they can play pivotal roles in the overall strategy to increase literacy in the fields of science and technology.

That overview gives you some sense of the issues we have been addressing in recent years, our views on where they stand, and some of the things we foresee ourselves doing to deal with them in the future.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Terry.

I'm opening the meeting to questions from the members. I would suggest members choose who to address their questions to, and I would suggest a free-flowing dialogue so we can have an interchange, rather than a very formalized format.

Mr. Obhrai.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai (Calgary East, Ref.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'd like to thank all the members of the museum for coming here, especially Adrienne Clarkson, who I met for three weeks, and as a credit to her, she didn't lobby me. I escaped your lobby in the three weeks, which I do appreciate.

From the perspective of the official opposition, museums are an important part of retaining our culture. That's been mentioned a couple of times by many of the speakers.

As I listened to your presentation, there seemed to me to be three things coming out of all of this. The first one is of course the funding, which is curtailing some of the activities you want to do. But I was very curiously struck when Mr. Christopher Terry said that, and perhaps that is a point to ponder.

With the smaller cuts you have taken, the museums have to become more entrepreneurial, and as they become more entrepreneurial, they are responding more and more to the needs of Canadians, which is a very good situation. It is excellent. I would like to commend the museums for doing that. That is the road to go in the future.

So while government has a role to play, a fine balance needs to be created so the museums do not become dependent on the government and lose their entrepreneurial skills. In the final analysis, entrepreneurial skills will take the museums where they want to go: responding to the market.

All these great museums are housed in the national capital, which is not in the centre of Canada. Canada is a vast country. In my 20 years out in the west, we haven't seen much happening in the way of your bringing the national treasures out. In your briefs here you have been talking about the travelling exhibitions, which are to take the national treasures out.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.):

[Inaudible—Editor].

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Forget it. Just because you're from Ottawa doesn't mean anything.

Canadians right across the nation want to see their treasures. After all, it's taxpayers' money going in there. It's their thing. And not all can afford to come here.

• 1210

You have mentioned the difficulties and the costs associated with travelling. The art is going outside, and when you move it from its housing, what will happen here as well? I say that is a challenge you have, and we have as well, to see how we can do that.

We would like to have some dialogue with you as to the constraints you have and how we can help get the treasures to Canadians. That is key; it's very important. All of you emphasize it, and I'm emphasizing it very strongly, because museums no longer have to be looking inward. You have the web site, the new technology, and that does help you to a degree, but as I think one of the speakers said, you have to see it to really appreciate it.

The third one—and that's what Adrienne said, which I guess will come back to the committee—is this museum in Spain you're talking about. You're talking about the great dollars that can pour in. Did I understand you right? You said these museums were just going to show American artifacts and that's all?

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: This Bilbao museum is a branch of the Guggenheim Museum of New York.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: The question I am asking you is this. If there is one that shows up in this part of the world, in Canada, why would I, as a Canadian, want to go and see that and not go to my own museums?

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: That's a good question. When you think that in Spain there is the Prado, which is one of the greatest repositories of European art.... We're just talking about European art here; we'll say we're in Europe. The Prado, the Louvre, and the National Gallery in London probably are the three greatest repositories of European art. Why would anyone go to a museum that has been built as an American museum, putting in American modern art? Well, that's called marketing, Mr. Obhrai.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: It's true that's called marketing, but—

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: That's called entrepreneurial marketing.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: But you have the best marketing tool: the history of Canada for Canadians.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: Absolutely. I'm saying we do. But we have to be aware of the fact that there are other people out there thinking in different ways.

We are trying to market our things. We are trying to market what we have. But we must never be blind to the fact that other people have different priorities. When I say they got the Spanish government to put up the money for this building and then they filled it with American art, it does seem odd, doesn't it? But that is what happened. And that will happen more and more, because there is a kind of feeling that....

If you see the pictures of where this building is located in this industrial area, which is very run down, in Bilbao, you'll see that it was partly a kind of downtown regeneration project, because it's in the middle of a rail yard and a bridge and a rundown series of warehouses. So it was presented in a number of very attractive ways to the people there, who were told, “Look, if you just build this museum, we'll make sure you get hundreds of thousands of tourists”. And they are getting hundreds of thousands of tourists.

George MacDonald has just been there and I'm going next week, actually, to do a program on it. Gehry is a Canadian and had been planning to do this, and we did a program on him three years ago when he was planning it. So I've been tracking this for some time in my other life, but I'm not going to be able to see it until next week. George MacDonald has just been, though.

Dr. George MacDonald (President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation): I could just mention the fact that it was a shock to me to see the Bellas Artes Museum, which is just a block away from the new museum, and it has really one of the very best medieval collections in Spain and western Europe. There was no one in that building; they were all over in the Guggenheim museum. It was a bit of an annoyance to think that the attraction was really the building itself, because it is so radical, and that it was, in a way, a Canadian product. The architect, Frank Gehry, grew up in Toronto and a lot of his training was there.

There's no doubt about it. The place of pride inside the museum is for the American nouveau artists and modernists that have not been exposed much in Europe.

But I had exactly the same reactions, and this morning when I heard Adrienne's reactions to it, I was quite surprised. I saw it as the same kind of imperialism, in a sense, as she did. This was the thing that came across most clearly—that in creating venues for American content, it is really just adding one more level to the kind of saturation and domination we see in the movie industry.

• 1215

Now, I think there are things we can do in this country to address the fact that American marketing and production of all sorts of entertainment and informational products is so successful. I think one of the ones we did do was to develop a technology of the large-screen theatres, the so-called IMAX theatres, and that took Canadian architectural design for theatres, production companies, producers and directors.

I remarked just recently an article in the Montreal Gazette that talked about the fact that James Cameron had come to our world premiere of Titanica—

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: I'm just trying to understand. Is this actually a very significant threat, or is this a challenge to you people?

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: I think it's both.

Dr. George MacDonald: Yes.

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Yes, and maybe the threat is not...I mean, like my question, who's going to go and see American when Canadian history is available to us?

The Chairman: Mr. Obhrai, there are still—

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Let me finish—

The Chairman: Can I come back to you, just to give a chance to the others?

Mr. Deepak Obhrai: Sure.

[Translation]

Ms. St-Hilaire.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire (Longueuil, BQ): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and my thanks to you all. I have a number of questions, some of which are very technical. I don't know whether it would be possible to have the figures for the past few years on attendance and clientele? Has there been an increase or a decrease? How are you adapting to your clientele?

Mr. Pierre Théberge: With reference to the National Gallery?

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Yes, and any of the others as well. I would like to know how things are going.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: You want the attendance statistics?

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Yes.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: I'm going to ask my colleague, Mr. Dagenais, who is the Gallery's Assistant Director, to talk about attendance at the Gallery.

Mr. Yves Dagenais (Assistant Director, National Gallery of Canada): Over the year ending March 31, 1998, we welcomed 772,000 visitors to the Gallery. Obviously the Renoir exhibit had a lot to do with that, among other things. For the sake of comparison, the preceding year's figure was 493,000. That's a considerable jump.

There are also the visitors to our touring exhibits, the ones we send across the country. That adds almost another 500,000 visitors to the 772,000 I mentioned just now.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Was it mainly the Renoir exhibit that attracted so many visitors?

Mr. Yves Dagenais: No, the 500,000 I referred to were visitors to our touring exhibits—the Renoir exhibit didn't really have anything to do with that.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: About 350,000 people came just to see the Renoir exhibit.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Nonetheless, attendance was up.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: Enormously.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: How do you think the federal government could help you continue to raise attendance? How can it help you increase access to your collections?

Mr. Pierre Théberge: I don't want to be too specific when I talk about touring shows. Certainly the federal government should play a larger role in the programs of the Department of Canadian Heritage. There have been some very major cuts, which have meant that Canada's other museums and galleries—Mr. Terry spoke of this as well—are no longer able to host our exhibitions because they no longer have the means.

If there were an increase, even a very modest one, in the funding allocated to hosting touring shows across the country, that would help all museums and galleries, including the National. It would mean that our clients would be more likely to receive what we have to offer. We're not requesting an increase for our own programs, but the money that goes to travelling exhibitions should be increased. I'm speaking for my colleagues as well. I think the same question is being raised everywhere. Mr. Terry spoke of it.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: I have another small question. I would like to know how you determine your choice of collections. What do you base yourself on? Do you do studies?

Mr. Pierre Théberge: We start from what we have, mainly our collections of Canadian and European art. We also have an Innuit art collection and a small collection of Asian art. We look at polls done by our counterparts in other galleries. We ask what they would like to see and what shows they would like to prepare. There's constant dialogue. There's no official forum. The gallery directors get together, like the conservators. Our staff travels a lot in Canada and a consensus is built up. We try to figure out what people would like to see over the next few years.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: You mentioned federal government subsidies. Of your revenues, what proportion comes from federal subsidies and what proportion from donations?

• 1220

Mr. Pierre Théberge: Mr. Dagenais can tell you that.

Mr. Yves Dagenais: Once again, one has to pick a specific year. For the fiscal year that has just ended, the ratio is about 70:30; that is, in terms of gross revenue we raised almost 30 per cent of our total resource needs, which is quite high.

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Thank you.

[English]

The Chairman: Mr. Bonwick.

Mr. Paul Bonwick (Simcoe—Grey, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll direct my first question to Ms. Clarkson. It bothers me when I hear about members discussing our heritage like it's a product, like it's something for entrepreneurs or the private sector to capitalize on. I disagree with that. I think there are ways of involving the private sector and entrepreneurs in assisting and helping develop, but it's not necessarily something for them to simply take advantage of and exploit for money-making.

You give us some fairly scary scenarios, and I agree with them. I think it all boils down to, in my opinion, how a government prioritizes its history, or its culture, or what it is. I wonder if you could provide some suggestions on how we might protect ourselves against these inevitable scenarios. I'll maybe just give two more questions and then they can all get addressed, one after the other.

My other question is to Pierre Théberge. You talked about the importance of travelling exhibits, and I agree with you completely. I wonder if it's part of your terms, as you're discussing these travelling exhibits, and perhaps more so some of the smaller ones, that there is a rural commitment. And by that I mean when you travel to Vancouver or when you travel to Halifax, are you hitting smaller rural areas as well, whereby in fact there's accessibility for areas like my riding in central Ontario, where there's no city and the accessibility to some cultural experiences is somewhat less than that of somebody in Toronto, Ottawa, Vancouver, or Calgary?

My last question would be to Ms. DiCosimo. You touched on lack of funding and how the government might better support or encourage alternative sources of funding, whether it be through taxation, tax breaks, or partnering and that kind of thing. Do you have any specific recommendations on how the government might do this?

Maybe Ms. Clarkson would start.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: Yes, Mr. Bonwick, I do have a very specific recommendation on what I think we could do as a government for the possibility of this sudden idea that our patrimoine would be bought by somebody, the images, or the right to use the images.

I'll give you a specific example of something I know really well, which is the CBC television archive, and I'm only going to speak about the English network from 1951 on. Many people say to us, why don't you simply use all that archive and do that as repeat broadcasting, or whatever? One of the reasons we can't is that there are rights involved. When you first made that program, for instance, say in 1962, you made the National Ballet's production of Swan Lake using the National Ballet orchestra, filmed it in the O'Keefe Centre, as it then was, with Veronica Tennant and Rudolf Nureyev. You then at that point, because of the nature of the contracts with the unions, both with the house IATSE and with the AFM musicians' union, and with the grand rights owners of the production, of the direction, etc., would have negotiated a contract that would allow you for English-language television play, and possibly for export to the world, five or six plays, maximum.

In other words, your costs at this point were that. So even if you want to replay it now, even 30 years later, you have to go back and renegotiate all those costs with all those people. That has always stopped the CBC dead in its tracks at the thought of doing it. They did it recently for Sleeping Beauty, but all the time you hear that we can't do it for all these old series because of the money.

I think you could set up something called, or along the lines of, a protection of heritage fund, which would, on a case-by-case or sector-by-sector basis, say we want to protect this area. We want to protect, for example, all our National Film Board films. We want to buy all the world rights for them forever, in perpetuity, for showing everywhere, on every medium of communication.

• 1225

I don't think that is necessarily going to run into billions. Certainly if you did it on an appropriations basis or a year-by-year basis it wouldn't need to be, because you could apply for it. The fact that it was there would mean that it wouldn't be vulnerable any more to being bought up by the Ted Turners or the Microsofts.

I think if you said we would have a fund where we could apply and protect these things, it would be very worth while. That's something that very concretely could be done, because certainly the CBC in its mode—which I gather is now over, from a recent e-mail I have received—of cost-cutting would never consider putting money into old rights for old programs or their archives.

In fact, the archives of a broadcasting network like our own, which for many years was the only broadcasting network, or things like our three million objects at the Museum of Civilization or all those paintings we have at the National Gallery, all of this is something that is incalculable almost in value to us as a people. Therefore, if we do it on a staged-out basis, with a protection heritage fund to protect those images and protect them and keep them for us so that they don't go into somebody else's bank, I think we could make that work. And I don't think it would be that expensive, Mr. Bonwick.

Dr. George MacDonald: Could I perhaps respond to that, Mr. Bonwick?

The Chairman: Briefly.

Dr. George MacDonald: Getting the shows to smaller communities I know is a concern of all my colleagues and myself. What we try to do is to have large, medium, and smaller-scale exhibits that will fit into their spaces. But it is a growing problem with the fact that a number of years ago we had a fleet service of the national museums that helped to subsidy the travel of the collections across the country. That's gone now. It's full freight, so to speak, for those small museums. For the revenue generation to offset the losses of the 36%, which we have all had, we now charge user fees, and many of those small museums simply cannot afford any user fee. I think there has been a discrimination against the smaller institutions by cutting off a number of these things.

Indemnification, which we have already mentioned, was another one. That is being restored, it would appear now, but it takes at least a three- or four-prong approach so that government can assist to ensure that those exhibitions get to the smaller centres and also that we decentralize.

For example, we have had more than 500 objects from our indigenous peoples first art collection in a Thunder Bay museum for the past 20 years now, and we're just about to turn that over and replace it with new materials. So the decentralization of the collections does have some history, but it certainly could be accelerated, and we'd be a willing partner.

Just a last point on first nations. There is a great pressure now for them to have some of the collections back, aboriginal artifacts and so on, and certainly my museum is very involved right now with the determination of what collections can be redeposited in other parts of the country. Most of those are very small communities we are dealing with.

The Chairman: Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Would you like to add anything?

Mr. Pierre Théberge: I think Mr. Dagenais covered the question. If the Committee would like to have a list of the travelling exhibitions that we have put on over the last five years, in every venue, we can provide it. There is also the Canadian Museum of Photography, which puts on lots of shows in smaller centres. A portion of our collections can also be distributed.

[English]

Maybe I could provide you with the information.

[Translation]

The Chairman: If you can send all that to the Clerk, it will be distributed to the Committee members. Thank you.

[English]

Ms. DiCosimo.

Ms. Joanne DiCosimo: I'll start with a comment on exhibitions as well, because it will lead me into the funding question you asked.

I know that you met with a number of our colleagues from across the country, so you know that and have heard us speak about the importance of the museums assistance program nationally. In that context, I'd like to make the point that our museums here are receivers of exhibitions as much as we are developers of them. The treasures of the country exist in museums across the country. They are not all here. An equally important part of a healthy program for national institutions is the support available to the museum community nation-wide so that we can share that important heritage.

On that note, as you look at funding, my chairman had a very interesting perspective. When we watched Team Canada embark for South America, we wondered how much of heritage and cultural industry interests were being promoted. We wondered aloud about the opportunities that might exist for federal support and assistance as our society shrinks and as global interaction becomes more and more important for all of us, yet impossible for each of us to do individually, given our own resources. I am aware that some of my colleagues from the science centre community participated. Given my comments about science culture, I find that very appropriate.

• 1230

I have a quick list of other ways of supporting, such as through assistance in the establishment of endowments for different purposes in our institution. Those represent one-time investments that institutions then have the freedom to take and use as needed and as appropriate, but it breaks the dependency from government over the longer term.

I know tax relief items were mentioned to you by them and the broader museum community consideration with respect to museum memberships as potentially claimable. Volunteer work, donations to our institutions—the list is much longer, but I hope that addresses your question, Mr. Bonwick.

The Chairman: Ms. Clarkson, you wanted to intervene briefly.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: I just want to intervene here on the remark about the idea of science, nature, or cultural people going on Team Canada. Recently the Governor General of Canada made a state visit to India and Pakistan, and that's where I met Mr. Obhrai. We were part of his group that went. I was there as part of a three-person cultural unit within that group. It was the first time that had been done on a Governor General's visit.

I would say it was very successful, because while he was there doing the head of state kinds of things, we had our parliamentary group, of which Mr. Obhrai was a part. We had the cultural group and did our separate things, while benefiting from the general publicity Canada got from doing all of this. We got very good publicity. We were at universities and different cultural groups speaking about our culture. It was a very well chosen group and it was very worth while. Everybody who was on it thought it was a worthwhile thing and should be continued with Team Canada.

I think they should be encouraged, because Canada is not just one thing. We are a very complex country, and it's very interesting to have these kind of layered messages given to the world.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Ms. Clarkson.

Mr. Godfrey, Mr. Saada, and Mr. Bélanger.

Mr. John Godfrey (Don Valley West, Lib.): I guess one of the challenges for the committee is to imagine where it will be in the months of November and December as it attempts to pull out from all of the various panels and sectors we've heard something that is coherent. The challenge every time we meet with another cultural ecosystem, if you like, is to try to pull back and ask, all right, what are we hearing? How radical are the changes this sector seems to be asking for relative to other sectors, such as film distribution, where the changes are quite radical?

Let me make a couple of observations and ask one question. There's a general theme in the first place of steady as she goes, particularly with regard to funding. Obviously they'd like more, but keep those dollars coming. There's a certain element of tweaking, which is suggested about changing tax regimes, as we've already begun to do. But I don't hear a call for anything radical other than “more”, which by the way is not a unique theme to this group.

The second theme that has emerged from this group, but also from the performing arts groups, is restoration of the policy of touring, whether that applies to the performing arts groups across the country, arts, authors, or travelling exhibitions. I think I take up Mr. Obhrai's point about getting Ottawa out in a physical sense, not simply in a virtual sense.

There is an emerging theme our group will want to consider about the restoration of money for travelling exhibitions, with a sub-theme of indemnification being a very concrete way of helping both national exhibitions and international shows. That may be the single biggest thing we can say as a committee, because it's a cross-cutting issue, but it's not a new one because we used to do it. Remember the various offices of the Canada Council that promoted that.

• 1235

The third theme, which I think we've really heard for the first time today from Ms. Clarkson, is to do with the protection of our heritage from the new forces of technology and globalization. There are really two sub-themes that were identified. One was the sort of Bilbao theme, and that seems to be a very special case. I will ask the panel members whether they foresee that kind of specific operation of the Guggenheim happening anywhere in Canada. Are any signs of that appearing anywhere on the horizon?

The other theme that was alluded to was the Microsoft theme, and it was illustrated by the recent death of Mr. Bettmann, the creator of the Bettmann Archives, who sold his entire photographic collection to a sub-unit of Microsoft.

I guess the question to the other panelists is really about the third theme, because I think we've heard the first two quite well. Do you see any threat of that kind of a Guggenheim Bilbao operation emerging anywhere in Canada? Perhaps more specifically on the preservation of our heritage, Mr. Terry referred to the image banks he has, for example. What do the others feel about that as a real threat, and do they think the solution put forward by Ms. Clarkson, a sort of protection of heritage fund, is the way to go?

I'm really throwing it over to Monsieur Théberge and Mr. Terry to respond.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: If you're talking about the Guggenheim threat, I would maybe answer with a sense of humour. What if the National Gallery opened a branch in Alberta or B.C.? The Spaniards spent $100 million U.S. I think it is fantastic to spend that on a museum. Things will evolve. But I think you can look at the Guggenheim in another way: that is, the will of a country to have a great institution and to really put itself on the map, hire the greatest architect and have a fantastic collection. Outside of the imperial aspect of it, I think in itself it's a great moment in our time. If in Canada the National Gallery or the Museum of Civilization opened a great building somewhere else, the Ottawa question might be addressed. So it's a little bit of a joke as a way to answer you.

There is, as Madam Clarkson said, a threat in terms of the technological grabbing of rights and things like that, and what she's suggesting is very sensible, this protection of patrimoine. A certain form of funding to protect is something we should really look at.

Outside of that, you mentioned the need for more circulation and sharing of the resources across the country. This is unanimous. Everybody in the arts field will tell you. There was a cultural summit in Banff about a month and a half ago, and everybody agreed, from the performing arts, the theatre, the opera and the visual arts, this is very necessary. Sharing is a very big issue.

The Chairman: Mr. Ling.

Mr. Frank Ling: If I may just add to this theme, I recall two years ago when we made the presentation to this board I mentioned the word “crisis”, which is made out of danger or threat, but the other word that is actually part of this word “crisis”, which happens to be in Chinese, is “opportunity”. So I would like to look upon this so-called threat as just one part of the whole approach, which is our approach of not colonization or imperialism, but partnership, which falls within the values of Canadians.

In other words, instead of a fund that is focusing on protectionism only, I would like to see a broader approach to promote ourselves as partners of the international marketplace. Thank you.

The Chairman: Dr. MacDonald.

Dr. George MacDonald: I'd just like to say I don't think we'll see quite the formula of Bilbao here, because that represents the colonization of Europe, as an uncolonized area, by the U.S. from the point of view of high culture. However, we're already colonized. They're not going to make quite that approach here of opening up and sharing their collection on an ongoing basis. But we see it in the packaging already. The productions and the exhibits that are offered to us are often bundled, just as on the media. In fact, I think both Adrienne and I keep going back to the media because the colonization that we have seen in the media is now spreading into museums. Museums are at one end of the spectrum of media. We send messages to our public, and the bundling we have seen with television programs, with movies, and blocking in screens is happening now in the museums.

• 1240

If you look at the big exhibits that are on, even Picasso comes from the Museum of Modern Art.

Mr. Pierre Théberge:

[Editor's Note—Inaudible].

Dr. George MacDonald: But it's the American bundling of the shows—not the content in that case—the fact that they can often bundle shows that are much cheaper than the shows to produce in Canada. Most of the exhibits now, if they are going to compete on the high end, are going to be a $5 million production, and there are not many Canadian museums or galleries that can put that kind of money together. So the process begins there.

But it's also virtual, and now that the web service providers and search engines are being developed to be very glitzy and so on by commercial groups, they are also beginning to take in these assets, the electronic assets, and put their own message and spin on those. They are very professional in packaging the services. Even on the web, they are making their sites very exciting. They are offering them for free, for tourists and others to come, and then they link to your site as an institution, like one of the national museums.

But it's not long—and there's some evidence already, and this was very nicely presented last week by the director of the Art Gallery of Ontario. Museums and galleries and others have been very vertical and isolated in their organization in the past, but in order to face this current...and it is a threat, in a sense, and maybe also, as Mr. Ling says, an opportunity. The opportunity is for the museums and galleries to horizontally network with each other so that they can interchange and share their collections more effectively. I think that's where the federal government can, through the various devices that have been laid out here, become even more effective in ensuring that the whole Canadian cultural heritage can be shared across Canada, both virtually and in terms of real exhibits and collections.

The Chairman: Mr. Saada and then Mr. Bélanger.

[Translation]

Mr. Jacques Saada (Brossard—La Prairie, Lib.): I would like to start by thinking Ms. Clarkson, who said how sorry she was that she wouldn't have any further opportunities of meeting with us. Of all the disagreeable things she mentioned—the increasing American presence, the Multilateral Agreement on Investment—she said the worst was not seeing us again. I find that very gratifying and I want to thank you.

One question that has not been discussed is what is happening in the schools. Mr. Terry spoke of the Rescol network and of partnerships with Industry Canada, but the question of using schools as springboards for the visibility of our museum products has not been raised. Let me explain to you very briefly how things happen in schools. In a classroom, if you're lucky, you have one computer. When you're very very lucky, in an especially favoured area, you have two, perhaps three, but that's all.

As a result, the fact of having access to your museums via the Internet is a good thing, but extremely limited in scope. You said how concerned you are about knowledge of history or lack of knowledge of history. This also applies to science. It seems there is a connection that is not being made. In other words, it seems to me that there is a kind of passive use of access to your products, because all the support activities are missing, games for example, workbooks, all the pedagogical material, all the programming that could be constructed that would mobilize not just two or three children at a time around one computer but also much broader activity. I think that's the pedagogical aim you are striving for.

Have approaches been made to the various provincial ministries of education, to school boards, schools or universities, to develop the support products that would give an impetus to what you have available in your facilities for the general public?

• 1245

I'm not thinking only of the public in big cities. This would help you to resolve some of the problem of accessibility in remoter regions. My question is open to anyone who would like to respond.

The Chairman: Mr. Théberge.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: The country's local museums already have educational programs. There are educational services that work with school boards, with the whole local population, with local institutions. Obviously, national institutions can help, but the initiatives have often come from local museums developing their educational services.

Mr. Jacques Saada: You're talking about ad hoc activities that happen because a local museum decides to connect with a school board, not about something systematic?

Mr. Pierre Théberge: There's no national system.

Mr. Jacques Saada: Very good.

[English]

The Chairman: Mr. Terry.

Mr. Christopher Terry: In our case, we have tried not to replicate curriculum but to build on the experience we have of developing programs for young people in the museums themselves, to provide to teachers material that would help them demonstrate fundamental principles they are in fact dealing with in the material they provide themselves to children through the curricula.

So we see ourselves as being an adjunct, in that sense, not embedded in the curriculum development process. That's not our function.

We have had some success using our Internet connections to move out, to places beyond our museums, the kinds of things people can come and enjoy in the museums themselves.

Dr. George MacDonald: I have a very quick comment that builds, I think, on what Chris has said.

Our discussion with the various educational authorities across the country has pointed out that what they're looking for is primary material, but they're looking for it in digitized, accessible methods. What they want to do is have the teacher work with the students in building a history or building an educational presentation without having it all pre-packaged by the staff of the museum or by others. What they want is the raw material and the access to it, particularly the visual material.

This is what we hear the educators coming and saying: you have the relevant material on national treasures and on the collections and we want access to the raw material. In our museum, and I think in most of the other nationals, we have gone a long way toward digitizing our collections. We're prepared.

What is more of a problem across the country is that the medium and smaller museums have not yet been able to bring their collections into the mega database that is building up and that the educators are using.

Recently from the province of Ontario the head of electronic education visited us and said that 120,000 teachers are on-line in the province of Ontario, and 30,000 of them are very regular users of the Internet. They're drawing material. If you take that across the country, you're looking at many tens of thousands of teachers that are already coming regularly to the databases of the national library archives and so on.

So I think the process of digitization—and it's being addressed perhaps slowly—eventually means the federal institutions will have all of their assets digitized. The problem more is perhaps with the rest of the country's museums and archives not yet being part of the system to build that “super-database” of Canadian heritage and art.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Mr. Saada, I'll ask you to keep it short, because we don't have much time left.

Mr. Jacques Saada: In that case I'll let other people ask their questions.

The Chairman: I'll try to give you the floor again later on if there's time.

Mr. Bélanger.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[English]

I have a few comments, if I may. First, I'm quite pleased, in listening here, to get the sense that there's a relatively good situation in our institutions. There have been some changes. For instance, at the Museum of Nature there's been the arrival of the new chairman, new president, new CEO. One gets the sense that things are functioning smoothly. One also has a sense that the stresses that might have been evident lately between the Museum of Civilization and the Canadian War Museum will be smoothed out and things will move quite well.

[Translation]

Things are going well at the National Gallery.

• 1250

[English]

There's a sense that despite having survived a few years of austerity, we're coming out of this in generally good shape. I want to thank and congratulate the people who are responsible for our institutions for making that happen.

I have a couple of comments other than that.

I understand the desire, the impetus, to move our collections about the country, and I certainly do support that, but I also believe it is very important for Canadians to visit their capital. That is why these institutions are here, and we should not forget that. It cuts both ways, because if we are to help Canadians develop a sense of self and a sense of nation, visiting one's capital certainly is an important element in that development. As a member of Parliament from this area, privileged to have three of the institutions in the riding, I can't forget the importance of that.

Madame Clarkson, I believe your concern is real, of collections being bought. It's not just in the cultural or heritage field. There are examples of international corporations, not necessarily just American, buying up biodiversity, right now, for their genome, because there's incredible wealth there. The gold rush of today is genome mining, so people are staking claims, and for small amounts—millions, but relatively small amounts—they're buying from third world countries, in many instances, the genome of entire biodiversity museums or collections that they have. It's a phenomenon that I think is real, and it can be very well applied to our culture and our heritage. I think we ought to be careful of this.

One of the principles we may wish to address in our proposed cultural policy is indeed to address that of public ownership. I'm not necessarily just concerned with Americans. I don't perhaps bind to the imperialism argument as much as others, because I don't think it's American corporations, necessarily. There are many multinational corporations other than the Americans as well. They're acquiring a citizenship of their own.

So that is a concern, and I think we have to address the matter of ownership. And if we can't necessarily free up all of the money necessary to do as you would suggest, there may be a legislative means as well to protect it and prohibit certain ownership of certain things, or at least the reproduction rights or les droits de diffusion, and so forth. So I think we have to address that in the policy.

[Translation]

I would like to revert to the question of healthier public finances. It has been difficult, that's true. Everybody has had to tighten their belts and cultural institutions as well have had to do their share. I would stress, however, that this exercise has had benefits. It has forced certain institutions to go in search of other sources of revenue. Mr. Dagenais said, for example, that self-generated revenues at the National Gallery have reached 30 per cent. I venture to think that this is progress and not a decline. A few years ago, it certainly would not been 30 per cent.

In the institutions that are represented here today, there is an element of permanence that is not necessarily found in other cultural elements. As a result, funding can also be of a permanent nature. I'm thinking in particular of the idea of capital, of endowments. With a 10-to-20 year plan, in a generation or two, could we aim at total financial independence for institutions by building up, over 25 years if necessary, sufficient capital to insure total financial independence? Is this a goal that you think we should be considering, and if so, would you be ready to put the required energy into establishing a long-term plan that would make it possible to establish this permanent financial independence?

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: But where would this funding come from?

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: It could come in part from governments. If we say that a certain amount of money is needed so that the Museum of Civilization can be genuinely financially independent, and we divide that by 25 years, and every year during that period we invest 1/25 of that amount, then at the end of the 25 years, we've reached our goal.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: Personally I think that's a very good solution, if you could get it approved.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: The money would have to come from somewhere.

The Chairman: Could we have some brief comments, please?

• 1255

We have five minutes left.

Mr. Pierre Théberge: It takes a huge amount of capital. In New York City, the Metropolitan Museum has an endowment fund of hundreds of millions of dollars and the Museum of Modern Art there has $100 million or more, and still they both put on massive fundraising campaigns every year. The Canadian reality is very different. When our colleagues at the Montreal Museum or other institutions set out to raise funds, their targets are in the nature of 20 or 30 million dollars. Ideally I think the idea is possible, but you would have to be very alert to the country's economic reality. We're not in the same economic situation as the Americans. In the United States, the major museums and galleries are entirely private institutions. In Canada, I think privatizing our museums and galleries would be a very very long process.

The Chairman: Are there any other comments? If not, I'm going to ask a question.

[English]

I was thinking exactly the same thing as was my colleague, Mr. Bélanger, when you were speaking, Mrs. Clarkson. It's so hard to set up funds, especially funds that are derived from taxation today from any government. I don't know why the legislative route is not much easier, more feasible, and faster.

In other words, we can't sell Banff to the Americans; we can't sell Jasper to the Americans. The museal heritage is there, and all we have to do is consecrate in legislation that all our national collections, which are after all federal institutions, are protected from any sale or loan or leasing to foreign interests unless the government agrees. It seems to me it's very possible to do it without too much trouble. You have raised a very important point that maybe our committee could look at.

I wanted to mention one other item before we close. May 18 is International Museum Day. This year it's too late, but maybe next year, if you would be interested, I was thinking it would be an ideal opportunity for your institutions to be represented and meet all members of Parliament, besides the committee people. Our committee could sponsor something, a reception, for next year that we would publicize in advance, and you would be aware of it, to sensitize the other members as to your realities.

I was thinking, if you would agree, we could start working on it. The clerk could make a note to prepare for it for next year.

Ms. Adrienne Clarkson: It sounds like a wonderful idea, a really wonderful idea. We would welcome that very much.

The Chairman: Because I think here you are preaching to the converted in many ways. The members who are here believe in what you do, and it would be nice to sensitize our colleagues. It would be great.

I really appreciate your presence here. Thank you very much for appearing before us.

[Translation]

If the members of the Committee can remain for five minutes, we're going to settle two important matters of Committee business.

[English]

First of all, we need an allocation of new funding to carry on the work of the committee until the end of the session.

[Translation]

We will need $23,000 to continue our work on Bills C-29 and C-38,

[English]

a Canadian cultural study and the subcommittee on sports. It's just to subsidize the work of the committee and all the costs. It amounts to $23,200 for the period April 1 to June 30, 1998. I would like to have a motion from a member to authorize us to obtain this budget.

Mr. Jacques Saada: I so move.

Mr. John Godfrey: What's the breakdown between the work of the subcommittee and the work of the main committee in that period?

Mr. Mark Muise (West Nova, PC): Good question, Mr. Godfrey.

The Chairman: It's $5,000 for the subcommittee and $17,000 for us. Okay?

(Motion agreed to)

• 1300

The Chairman: The next item is far more important for us.

[Translation]

Mr. Bélanger, give me a minute.

[English]

We have several amendments that are to be presented. I believe the NDP advised me this morning that there will be 23 amendments, and I think Mr. Muise has five or six.

Mr. Mark Muise: Five or six.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Ms. St-Hilaire, how many amendments do you have for Bill C-29? Do you know?

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: No idea, I'm afraid. I'm sorry. I'd have to check.

The Chairman: I gather it's around six?

Ms. Caroline St-Hilaire: Eight, I think.

The Chairman: We have 40 amendments in all being moved by Opposition MPs. As you know, we decided the other day that the deadline would be Monday at 5:00 p.m., but at the same time I said that because of the very limited time available,

[English]

we would just look at it when we knew how many amendments you had.

I think instead of being very formal here, we have tried to sort of accommodate everybody. I understand you have a problem with so many amendments. I understand you've already lodged with the powers that be for translation and legalized wording. So you certainly are not trying to impede the work at all, and we appreciate that. Could we come to some sort of a trade-off that we give some flexibility?

I think I asked your researcher to tell us what sort of deadline you need, first of all, because we have to know when these amendments are going to be ready, and you have the biggest number. So do you know that, first of all?

Mr. Rick Laliberte (Churchill River, NDP): Well, in the bare minimum, I would look at least this Thursday.

The Chairman: You would be ready for Thursday or after Thursday? That's important, because if we can start Thursday, that's one thing.

Mr. Rick Laliberte: A lot of it is out of our hands because of the legislative review and the interpretation.

The Chairman: I appreciate that.

Mr. Rick Laliberte: But as to the bulk of our work, we'd look at Thursday.

The Chairman: Yes.

The Clerk of the Committee: Excuse me. I think we need to clarify to distinguish between your amendments, and then the second part, getting it translated, edited by the legal editor, and drafted by the House of Commons legal drafter. That's the key point, and that's what we're trying to find out from you.

The Chairman: I'm going to address your researcher, because he's the one who saw me, and I suggested that he inquire. This is really what I want to know, not your part of it. So that we know, have you been given some sort of an idea as to when this work will be completed?

Mr. Rick Laliberte: At this point, Mr. Dupuis has not gotten back to us. He was our contact.

The Chairman: Okay. Could I make one suggestion? Tomorrow we have a meeting that is provided for. I think we'll just let it go by. It's impossible to have it tomorrow. I think members deserve a break anyway, so tomorrow is out.

What I would suggest is in the meanwhile you can let the clerk know as soon as possible when Mr. Dupuis is going to be finished with your work. If we can start on Thursday, all the better. By then....

The clerk doesn't think we will be able to start Thursday. If we cannot start Thursday and we miss two meetings this week, I would suggest a trade-off to you: that next week we find a day when we'll sit for as many hours as we need to, because we'll have lost four hours in the process.

It's really hard, and it applies to your parties as it applies to us. It takes our whip a tremendous amount of advance time to be able to have enough members in case there are votes, and so forth. Some of them belong to two committees, some of them to three. We have to have some idea as to whether we can devote so many hours. That's the trade-off I would suggest, that if we leave it for this week, if we're not finished by Thursday, we set a time for next week where we say if we need four hours or five hours, we'll just carry on, and if we have to work at night, let's work at night. Is that agreeable?

Mr. Mark Muise: Mr. Chairman, I have to agree with you, because what we've been told from the research department when we brought our documentation forth is that they could not confirm when they would have that prepared. So I wonder if we could maybe not plan for Thursday, but possibly next week. Let's do as you suggested and deal with it. It's just a suggestion, however.

• 1305

The Chairman: So would I have a commitment from members that we do this? We'll find a day next week—the clerk will negotiate with all the parties—such that we would just work until we sort of replace those hours, virtually.

Mr. Laliberté.

Mr. Rick Laliberté: Yes. That's favourable. We would also inform the clerk and you as soon as we find out when we would be prepared from research.

The Chairman: If by some miracle the work of Mr. Dupuis and his staff is completed by Wednesday night or something like this and we can have a meeting on Thursday, then let's do that, because when that's provided for, we'll let you know in good time. We'll check too, but it doesn't look too likely.

Mr. Godfrey.

Mr. John Godfrey: Just on the technicalities, can I assume that the clerk will be in direct communication with the Department of Canadian Heritage as the situation evolves, rather than doing it indirectly through me or anybody else, so that we'll know when they are going to be required to...?

[Translation]

The Chairman: Is everyone in agreement?

[English]

If everybody is agreed, then we'll proceed accordingly. If there's any change, if you get any information that we don't have, just let us know right away.

[Translation]

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: No meeting Wednesday or Thursday.

The Chairman: Definitely not on Wednesday. Thursday will depend on how things develop. If by some miracle everything is ready, we'll let you know.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Amen!

The Chairman: Wednesday is out.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: It's a miracle nonetheless.

The Chairman: A miracle.

Mr. Mark Muise: It's a miracle.

The Chairman: Very good.

The meeting is adjourned.