FINA Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Finance

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Thursday, October 30, 2003

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1305

The Chair (Mrs. Sue Barnes (London West, Lib.))

Mrs. Verda Petry (President, Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism)

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1310

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1315

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1320

The Chair

Mrs. Janet Hering (Executive Director, Partners for Rural Family Support)

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1325

The Chair

Ms. Judy V. Hughes (Provincial Coordinator, Saskatchewan Homoeopathic Consumers Protection Group)

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1330

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1335

The Chair

Ms. Judy V. Hughes

The Chair

Mr. Doug Richardson (Legal Counsel, University of Saskatchewan)

The Chair

Dr. Bill Thomlinson (Executive Director, Canadian Light Source (CLS), University of Saskatchewan)

The Chair

Mr. Doug Richardson

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

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1340

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1345

The Chair

Mr. Elie Fleury (Executive Director, Northern Teacher Education Program)

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1350

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1355

The Chair

Mr. Elie Fleury

The Chair

Mr. Bruce Ruelling (Chairman, Northern Teacher Education Program)

The Chair

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

The Chair

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

The Chair

Ms. Maria Minna (Beaches—East York, Lib.)

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1400

Mrs. Verda Petry

Ms. Maria Minna

Mrs. Verda Petry

Ms. Maria Minna

Mrs. Verda Petry

Ms. Maria Minna

Mrs. Verda Petry

Ms. Maria Minna

Mrs. Verda Petry

Ms. Maria Minna

Ms. Judy V. Hughes

The Chair

Ms. Maria Minna

Ms. Judy V. Hughes

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1405

Ms. Maria Minna

Ms. Judy V. Hughes

The Chair

Ms. Sophia Leung (Vancouver Kingsway, Lib.)

Mr. Doug Richardson

Ms. Sophia Leung

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Ms. Sophia Leung

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1410

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Doug Richardson

Ms. Sophia Leung

Mr. Elie Fleury

Ms. Sophia Leung

Mr. Elie Fleury

Ms. Sophia Leung

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

Ms. Sophia Leung

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

Ms. Sophia Leung

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

Ms. Sophia Leung

The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna)

Ms. Sophia Leung

The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna)

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna)

Hon. Lorne Nystrom (Regina—Qu'Appelle, NDP)

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

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1415

Mr. Doug Richardson

Mr. Lorne Nystrom

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Lorne Nystrom

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1420

Mrs. Verda Petry

Mr. Wally Coates (Vice-President, Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism)

The Chair

Mrs. Verda Petry

Mr. Lorne Nystrom

Mrs. Verda Petry

The Chair

Mr. Lorne Nystrom

Mrs. Verda Petry

Mr. Wally Coates

The Chair

Mrs. Janet Hering

The Chair

Mrs. Janet Hering

The Chair

Mrs. Janet Hering

The Chair

Mr. Roy Cullen (Etobicoke North, Lib.)

Mrs. Janet Hering

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mrs. Janet Hering

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1425

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mrs. Verda Petry

Mr. Roy Cullen

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

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1430

Mr. Roy Cullen

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Roy Cullen

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Roy Cullen

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

Mr. Roy Cullen

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1435

Mr. Bruce Ruelling

The Chair

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

The Chair

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

Mr. Doug Richardson

The Chair

Dr. Bill Thomlinson

The Chair

Mrs. Verda Petry

The Chair

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CANADA

Standing Committee on Finance

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NUMBER 093

l

2nd SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

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EVIDENCE

Thursday, October 30, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

·  (1305)  

[English]

    The Chair (Mrs. Sue Barnes (London West, Lib.)): Pursuant to Standing Order 83(1) we are in pre-budget consultations in the afternoon session in Regina, Saskatchewan.

    For our panel this afternoon, from the Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism we have the president, Verda Petry, and Wally Coates, who is the vice-president. Welcome, both of you, to the committee.

    From the Northern Teacher Education Program, we have Bruce Ruelling, who is the chair. Unfortunately, it appears that this organization is not yet here.

    We will move on to Partners for Rural Family Support. Janet Hering, you are here—I'm glad—as the executive director. We welcome you.

    From the Saskatchewan Homeopathic Consumers Protection Group, Judy Hughes, who is the provincial coordinator, has joined us. Thank you very much.

    From the University of Saskatchewan, we have Bill Thomlinson, executive director, the Canadian Light Source. Thank you for joining us. You have with you your legal counsel, Doug Richardson. Thank you very much.

    We'll go in order of the agenda. If the Teacher Education Program join us, we'll add them at the end.

    We'll start with the Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism. Go ahead, Madame.

    Mrs. Verda Petry (President, Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism): Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for hearing our presentation.

    I think I need to say a word or two about the Seniors Mechanism. It is a provincial umbrella group for most of the seniors' organizations, especially the larger ones in the province.

    The demographics of Saskatchewan are a bit anomalous. We have the largest proportion of our population—14.6% or 14.7%—over 65, and the largest youth population under 14 in the country. So the demands on education and health are significant.

    Although we are representing seniors, we do not propose only recommendations that benefit seniors, because we believe what is good for us is good for everyone.

    The mechanism supports active living, and not just individual enterprise but also participation in community events. I suppose that's why, in part, we're here.

    We believe tax reduction, and to some degree debt reduction, are less important than fairness in tax policy and the provision and/or restoration of publicly funded social services.

    We all know that the most progressive form of taxation is the income tax form, provided it is set up in a progressive way. We also know that everyone has basic needs that must be provided, and we believe many of these should be provided through public funding. They include such things as health care—including prescription drugs—education, clean air and water, affordable housing and transportation, adequate nutrition, safety, and recreation. Because we don't have any choice about those needs, we believe they should be universal and publicly funded.

    In Canada, the income gap between citizens in the highest income bracket and those in the lowest has gradually increased and is continuing to increase. You have copies of my brief. I have numbers there that indicate the severity of this situation. Those numbers are not for Saskatchewan; they are for Canada. In fact, all of the statistics I have used are Canadian statistics but would apply to us equally, I would think.

    In the past decade, average incomes of the wealthiest 10% of the population shot up an average of $23,000 to an average annual income of just over $185,000, whereas over the same period the poorest 10% got an increase of $81, to reach just over $10,000 on average.

    This situation is particularly severe for a number of seniors. In 1997—the latest figures I could find—among people aged 75 or over, 11% of females and 9% of males lived on less than $10,000 a year, and 75% of females and 58% of males lived on less than $20,000 a year. That is almost unconscionable, I think, in a wealthy country like Canada.

    There is another important factor we need to take into consideration when we are talking about the progressivity of the tax system. There's a lot of research that shows that where the income gradient between the poor and the wealthy is flatter, the health of the population is better and the lifespan is longer, whereas if the income gradient is very steep, even for the wealthy those benefits do not accrue. In countries, then, like Sweden, Holland, and Norway, where there is more equality in disposable income, the lifespan is longer, health is better, education is better, there is less violence, employment rates are higher, and so on; whereas the U.S. shows a very steep gradient and there is a consequent effect of that.

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    Also, I think the federal government needs to make adjustments and plan for the long term because of the increasing numbers of senior citizens in our populations overall. I won't dwell on that, but it is an important factor.

    We divided our recommendations into two sets: those that apply particularly to seniors and those that we feel are important to everyone, including ourselves.

    On tax reform we ask that you try to reduce the effect of bracket creep by indexing tax brackets to inflation.

    Secondly, restore the full amounts of the tax credits seniors receive, based on age and retirement rather than retaining the current 17% credit limit.

    Eliminate the clawback on old age security and guaranteed income supplements. Old age security should be paid to all age-eligible citizens and taxed at the same rate as all other income. In other words, tax back; don't claw back. That actually reduces the cost of administration, if it is done in the way we are advocating.

    Fully index OAS and GIS to the actual inflation rate and to the cost-of-living index.

    Increase the basic exemption, or give a special tax credit for low-income earners, and increase tax credits for home care expenses to reflect the true cost of service.

    On tax reform we are suggesting those things. The last point there leads into the next one.

    Home care workers are—I'm quoting here—“silent victims in a silent system”. Our group especially asked that I talk about this. These caregivers are usually spouses or children. They are underfunded, overstressed, and undervalued as they strive to care for ill, frail, or dying family and friends. You have all heard, I suppose, that the caregiver often dies before the one being cared for, simply because of the stress of this situation.

    In 1996 there were an estimated 2.1 million informal caregivers providing home care to 800,000 seniors; this again is a Canadian figure.

    We recommend increased funding to include direct compensation for the caregivers, adjustments to CPP and EI to relieve the pressure on personnel who must discontinue or cut back regular jobs in order to care for sick family members, national training and standards for caregivers, and the seamless integration of the home care system into the regular health care system.

    We know, of course, that the implementation of health is a provincial matter, but the federal government has an important role to play in it as well.

    Item number three concerns the high rate of withdrawal from RRIFs between ages 69 and 77. Especially in the beginning years it is a hardship for many seniors, especially when interest rates are low and the returns on investments are low. We recommend that the government either lower the rates of withdrawal or index them to interest rates.

    As item number four, we ask that more support be given to seniors who live below the poverty level. This can be done by increasing guaranteed income supplement payments or increasing the basic exemption for income tax purposes.

    Number five, we urge that the spouses' allowance program be amended to remove the present discrimination based on marital status so that never-married, separated, and divorced Canadians aged 60 to 64 be entitled to the same benefits as spouses, widows, and widowers.

    Number six, many seniors—but not only seniors, I might remind you—live in substandard housing. We ask you to look at increasing federal funding to provide safe and healthy living conditions for low-income seniors, and in fact for low-income people—altogether, low-income families.

·  (1315)  

    Bill C-78, which, as far as I know, has not been passed into law, allows the federal government to confiscate the surplus in the federal civil servants' pension fund. These surpluses in pension funds belong to the retirees who have paid into them and they should be distributed in an equitable manner.

    There is an organization called ALCOA, Active Living Coalition for Older Adults, which was established, I believe, by HRDC, and that organization has done a lot of useful work, particularly in researching and developing packages that could be used for implementation in the community. Now the funding for the organization has been cut back, so these outcomes cannot be implemented. There are no funds for training and working through the implementation.

    Those are the main features of the recommendations for seniors. I will just very briefly mention the general ones that we really care about.

    First, restore the full amount of social transfer payments to the provinces to the 1995-96 levels, with an adjustment for inflation.

    Number two, stop the erosion of the tax base by disallowing the flight of capital to tax havens such as the Bahamas or Cancun. You know what they are.

    Third, transfer to the provinces the additional $2 billion--in fact, I think it's $2.3 billion--that was promised for health care, as recommended in the Romanow report.

    Fourth, establish a strong health council to monitor and report to the government on the use of those funds so that we, the public, and the government know that they have been spent wisely and for health care.

    We are very concerned about the health of the environment and ask that you provide appropriate funding to meet the objectives of the Rio and Kyoto agreements. This requires long-term funding in cooperation with other levels of government.

    Number six, regulations must be put in place to ensure that all people have clean air, water, and food. There has been a significant cutback in inspection services and regulations. We want those reinstated. We want more inspectors hired, and we want the enforcement to be strict. Industries that pollute should be required to pay the cost to clean up.

    I probably have used up my seven minutes, so I thank you for the opportunity to present the views of senior citizens in Saskatchewan, and I trust that you will give them careful consideration. Now remember, we represent a large number of people who have had very wide and long experience, and we think we have some useful ideas.

    So once again, thank you for this opportunity, and I wish you well.

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    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    I will welcome the Northern Teacher Education Program, Bruce Ruelling and Elie Fleury, the chairman and the executive director. I am going to give you gentlemen a couple of minutes to catch your breath, because you probably rushed here. I'll put you at the end of the agenda, and that will give you a chance to settle down first.

    So we'll go to the Partners for Rural Family Support. Ms. Hering, please go ahead.

    Mrs. Janet Hering (Executive Director, Partners for Rural Family Support): Good afternoon, committee members, Madam Chair. My name is Janet Hering and I'm the executive director for Partners for Rural Family Support. I want to convey regrets on behalf of Lesley Nordich, who wasn't able to attend today.

    This afternoon I will share with you some of our accomplishments, experiences, challenges, and concerns. Partners for Rural Family Support is a non-profit community-based organization located in the city of Humboldt that serves a large rural area encompassing 25 towns and villages with a population of nearly 20,000. The family support centre was opened with a grant that had provided operational funding through the Community Initiatives Fund. My presentation today will be largely based on the sustainability of grant-based funding.

    Partners for Rural Family Support is committed to promoting healthy individuals, families, and communities through education, support, and referral. Our organization strives to work with rural communities to build on their strengths and enable the development of supports that strengthen families within their own communities.

    We believe children thrive in families and communities that meet the needs of security, respect, and love. Preventing risk now is far more effective and cheaper to society than ignoring the issue or creating short-term band-aid solutions. Families will be safe and secure if they are cared about, respected, valued, connected, and supported.

    Our goals are: to provide support and information to women and their families who are experiencing family violence; to build partnerships with various agencies and community stakeholders to address the issues of family violence; to work with others to develop a coordinated community response to focusing on prevention of family violence; to support and maintain the safety and security of families in rural Saskatchewan; to educate the community to the dynamics and social costs of family violence; to offer safe and appropriate educational and informational groups to rural communities; and to ensure people are treated respectfully and equally.

    Partners for Rural Family Support is in its second year of operation after a period of change and rapid growth. The family support centre originated out of the absence of similar services in our rural region. Prior to the opening of the family support centre in Humboldt, families in need of support services were forced to access services in larger urban centres or go without those services completely.

    The sometimes confused direction, combined with the many barriers that challenge rural people while they are attempting to access services, results in frustration and often escalates the urgency of a crisis situation. The existing urban support systems do not reflect the rural nature in our area and are currently overburdened in serving the needs of the urban population.

    Due to the absence of similar services in the region, Partners has become a conduit for organizations, various levels of government, community-based service providers, and the many rural families that have been without a family support service in our region of east central Saskatchewan. The consistently increasing number of individuals and families accessing services in the region is a clear indication of the necessity of an organization such as Partners.

    This success, however, has placed a great deal of strain on board members and volunteers, due to an increased workload, community demands, and the constant effort extended toward obtaining financial support to sustain the organization. Funding concerns have overshadowed the work that is being done to support individuals, families, and the rural communities.

    Project-specific funding creates wonderful opportunities to engage targeted groups of people who learn to become less dependent on more costly social and health-related systems. These community-based self-support networks alleviate the increased demands that are being placed on our health care system.

    Often people in need are in need of someone to talk to, to be understood with compassion, and to network with others who may be experiencing similar life challenges. The services provided by Partners for Rural Family Support are attempting to fill that void in rural Saskatchewan. Grant-based funding builds a foundation for organizations such as Partners to expand basic services.

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    However, without consistent long-term funding to sustain these services, years of hard work are in jeopardy. During the past two years, a great deal of time, effort, and money has been expended to develop partnerships within the community, the region, the province, and the country to avoid duplication of services and to enhance existing programs and services of the partnership. The unique rural nature of the partnership has evolved from the determination and will of the rural people who believe that we will all benefit from supporting rural families in our region.

    Saskatchewan is a rural province in which all families, urban and rural, are affected by the struggle of the rural economy. The rural family unit in this province has been eroded by the many factors that challenge families during these difficult times. During desperate financial times families are faced with desperate situations involving increased alcohol consumption, drug abuse, and family violence. It is the responsibility of all levels of government to contribute to the well-being of families in rural Saskatchewan. Residents in rural and remote areas must not be penalized as a result of limiting social programs and specialized health care services to urban centres.

    Intervention and prevention will encourage self-responsibility and accountability of personal and family health and will save tax dollars for all Canadians.

    Federal government support will expand and strengthen our partnership, allowing families of rural Saskatchewan to continue to build self-help networks that will inevitably strengthen individuals, families, and communities.

    The provincial Department of Health and the Department of Community Resources and Employment have committed to supporting our efforts, and we encourage the federal government to take action, through the commitment of funds, toward helping families in our province. Tax dollars invested in people learning to help themselves and each other will benefit all of society.

    Thank you for your time, and I appreciate your consideration.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    Now we will go to the Saskatchewan Homeopathic Consumers Protection Group and to the provincial coordinator, Ms. Hughes.

    Ms. Judy V. Hughes (Provincial Coordinator, Saskatchewan Homoeopathic Consumers Protection Group): Good afternoon. My name is Judy Hughes and I'm the provincial coordinator for the Saskatchewan Homoeopathic Consumers Protection Group. We have been in operation for about two years. We represent an estimated 350 consumers in Saskatchewan who use homeopathy as their primary health care.

    Marilyn sends her regrets. Due to the roads and the weather, she was unable to come in from Winyard today.

    Thank you very much, Madam Chair, for this opportunity to come before you.

    The Saskatchewan Homoeopathic Consumers Protection Group has a vision for universal access to homeopathy and is the consumer spokesperson to bring that vision to the government.

    We represent the consumer's point of view for access to alternative health systems; consumer safety in services, products, and practitioners; and cost-effectiveness and cost reduction for government. We offer assistance to other individuals and groups working toward implementing a system of choice and insured services through our federal and provincial health systems. We provide input toward regulations and standards for the practice and education of homeopathy.

    Our consumers' group addresses three main objectives: protection and safety, including consumer awareness and information; freedom of choice of primary care, including service availability and service accessibility; and accountability, including cost effectiveness of services and cost reduction of the current ailing health care system.

    As the numbers in support for homeopathy grow, many issues must be addressed, along with the rapid expansion and market demand for the services. We have contributed countless volunteer hours, heightened over the past decade with the interest taken by the Government of Canada and the Province of Saskatchewan in seeking a renewed and strengthened infrastructure of Canada's health care system.

    Some of the contributions made by our membership include: appearance before the standing committee on herbal studies in March 1998; input into the natural health products directorate consultations on homeopathic preparations; input into the proposed Health Canada and Human Resources Development Canada sector study of complementary and alternative medicines; input into the Romanow commission and the FIC report; input into the Saskatchewan action plan on health; and input into the Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation survey for “The Future of Health Research in Saskatchewan”.

    Over the past several decades, thousands of people have been seeking health care from systems, techniques, and practices different from allopathic medicine. A 1998 health poll stated that 81% of Canadians are dissatisfied with their current health care system.

    Homeopathy is one of the most popular and fastest growing holistic medical disciplines around the world. It advances quality of life with support from other disciplines, working and contributing together towards the maintenance and enhancement of holistic health and wellness of the individual. Currently in Canada, tens of thousands of people have sought out and now utilize homeopathic treatment as their primary care.

    Two reasons for the shift are the effectiveness of homeopathic medicine in dealing with some intractable chronic problems like asthma, bronchitis, diabetes, and obesity; and the emphasis on how homeopathic medicine approaches from a holistic perspective and deals with the whole person, encompassing the physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual dimensions.

    I have been a consumer of homeopathic health services for over five years and have experienced firsthand the many benefits of its healing powers. So have more than 20,000 other consumers across the prairies.

    Marilyn Gillis is one of those consumers. She has graciously agreed to share her story with the standing committee as an example of how homeopathy has improved her family's health status, while lessening the financial burden on the current health system. I will present it on her behalf.

I am grateful to have this opportunity to present today. My presentation focuses on the personal experience of using homoeopathic medicine over the past two and a half years.

My husband, Ed, and I are over 65 years of age so we are in the age category that makes demands on the health care system and drives up the cost by: surgical procedures, including hospital stays; use of high-cost technology, such as dialysis to support kidney function, which potentially could be avoided with the earlier use of homoeopathy; the demand for diagnostic procedures, such as MRIs, ultrasounds, x-rays, and lab work.

The use of the above procedures could be reduced with the inclusion and accessibility of homoeopathic medicine within the health care system. My husband had the experience, almost two years ago, of having the choice of surgery or a permanent catheter. These were the choices given by an allopathic specialist.

·  (1330)  

With the use of homoeopathic remedies, as prescribed by a qualified homoeopathic doctor, my husband was able to correct the symptoms without invasive and costly surgery and without the permanent use of an appliance catheter, which would have compromised his overall sense of well being.

I want to emphasize the contribution that homoeopathic medicine can potentially make to the well being of Canadians through corrections of chronic symptoms, before they become acute and become a case that requires crisis attention that is more costly to the health care system.

My husband and I feel that our general health has improved, and we indeed feel fortunate that we are able to access a homoeopathic doctor. We realize that many do not have the choice because they don't have knowledge of the option, and they cannot financially see it as a choice because it is presently outside of the health care system.

Homoeopathy is not new. I have a book entitled The People's Home Library, copyrighted 1910, which advises use of homoeopathic remedies for human and animal conditions. In fact, I have personally used remedies successfully with my horses.

The fact that homoeopathy already exists in Canada, as well as other countries, indicates to me that the cost of recognizing and including homoeopathy in primary care would not be a costly process. There are indications that desire for this type of medical approach is increasing. It needs government guidelines to be safe and credible.

We feel that a more inclusive use of homoeopathy within our health care system could result in lowering health care costs, and enable people to enjoy good health and be contributors to their community. The present trend of excessive demands on health care resources could be given this positive direction with the promotion and regulation of homoeopathic medicine.

    That concludes Marilyn's part.

·  (1335)  

    The Chair: You are just about out of time, so if you would like to finish up....

    Ms. Judy V. Hughes: I'll go directly to the recommendations, which are just a little different from the text in the paper that you have there.

    Recommendation 1, the freedom to choose. Choice in the management of our own health care is a fundamental right to all people in a democracy. We request that homeopathic medicines be included under our current health care system. A significant portion of the taxes we pay support the existing health care system and health insurance plans. We believe we have a right to our primary care choice with the benefit of coverage through our tax dollars, like all other Canadians. We believe a choice will help to reduce the number one health care issue of excessively long waiting times for diagnosis and treatment.

    Recommendation 2, protecting the public from risk of harm. Safety now leads to preventable rising costs. We request that all homeopathic medicines remain regulated as pharmaceutical products bearing drug identification numbers, and we request that all homeopathic medicines remain on the market.

    Homeopathy is growing by leaps and bounds, unprecedented and without government regulation. The Government of Canada and our province need to hear our voices to give guidance and direction to the natural health products directorate, specifically for changes under the proposed Natural Health Products Act.

    Attempting to degrade homeopathic medicines is a dangerous and very costly and unnecessary endeavour. Removal of medicines will have serious consequences for the health of several homeopathic consumers. We need to work on closing the gaps in the health care safety net, instead of opening them wider. We are committed to taking a leading role to facilitate this growth and the return of homeopathy in Canada.

    On behalf of the members of the Saskatchewan Homeopathic Consumers Protection Group, we formally request the opportunity to continue further discussion with you on this matter. We offer our expertise and cooperation to enhance the Canadian health care system.

    Thank you.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    Now we'll go to the University of Saskatchewan and Dr. Thomlinson.

    Mr. Doug Richardson (Legal Counsel, University of Saskatchewan): Actually, if I might, Madam Chair, could I just split our time very quickly?

    My name is Doug Richardson. I have the privilege of acting as counsel for the University of Saskatchewan. I appear here not as an advocate or as a lobbyist, but rather as a supporter of the university. I just want to add a little thumbnail that I think will be helpful to the members.

    My background, Madam Chair, is that of having worked in Ottawa on two separate occasions. On one occasion I spent a year and a half as the executive assistant to a finance minister, so I know how valuable the consultation process is. And as all of the members of the different panels have said today, we appreciate your coming. We understand that the government is in a transition period now, and it might have been just as easy for you to have stayed home and not to have bothered coming to Saskatchewan. We truly appreciate the opportunity to be heard and hope that we have something valuable to contribute.

    With us today, as the lead spokesperson on the University of Saskatchewan's side, is Dr. Bill Thomlinson. Dr. Thomlinson is probably one of the world's leading scientists and specialists in the area that he will talk to you about today. We have been very fortunate to attract him to Saskatoon in Saskatchewan from Grenoble in southern France. I know that when the present Prime Minister toured the synchrotron a little over a year ago, he was particularly enthralled that we were able to bring back to Canada some of the leading scientists who had left the country, and to attract this man.

    I think his dissertation today on what is Canada's largest scientist project—the largest scientist project—will be of interest to all of you.

    We owe the Government of Canada for your insight and foresight in bringing it to Saskatchewan.

    The Chair: And as a member from London West, where we fought for the synchrotron, I'm jealous.

    Voices: Oh, oh!

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson (Executive Director, Canadian Light Source (CLS), University of Saskatchewan): I will change your mind.

    The Chair: But I know you share.

    Mr. Doug Richardson: But without London's support and without Dr. Bancroft's support, this wouldn't have happened.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Thank you very much, Doug and Madam Chair.

    I want to talk today about a truly national issue, which will be illustrated by the use of the Canadian Light Source synchrotron in Saskatoon, and that is the need for a strategic and accountable operating funding mechanism for national science facilities.

    The innovation agenda has gone a long way, with a great start, in attempting to bring Canada up in the world of R and D countries, the goal being to be number five. It's a daunting task. A great start was made with the Canada Foundation for Innovation, the Canada research chair programs, and so forth. But we can't just stop there, because if we stop at that point—with the building of the infrastructure—we're never going to meet the ultimate goal, that being economic benefit to Canada.

    Canada lacks a mechanism to carry on beyond the creation of the infrastructure; that is, it lacks a truly national agenda for the funding of these particular facilities such as the Canadian Light Source. Without continued operating support that's stable and efficient, we will fail. That's just a fact of life.

    I will introduce the Canadian Light Source as the example. Ms. Leung had the opportunity to visit. I know she enjoyed her visit and got to see what it was all about, and I appreciate and thank her for that. It's Canada's only synchrotron. It will be the only synchrotron. I won't describe a synchrotron; think of it as a giant x-ray source for science.

    It's the largest project in over 30 years, and it's truly national in its scope, with the core funding from CFI. But without the backing up of the matching funds--extraordinary efforts from Ontario, from Alberta, from Saskatchewan, the University of Western Ontario, for example, and NRC, NRCAN, Western Development, and so forth--we wouldn't have made it.

    It has created a great partnership across the country. We're now negotiating with British Columbia and Quebec for additional assistance, if and when we get funding for phase two development from CFI. There's a national base: we have 462 registered users and haven't opened the door; 423 of those are Canadians, 36 in separate universities nationwide and in every province. It's a national effort.

    It will impact aerospace, medicine, pharmaceuticals, environment, health, etc. If you name me a problem, we're going to help solve it. It's available to the international community as well. We compete internationally, and believe me, we have a very sophisticated cadre of scientists who are going to come here from Canada.

    The issue in front of us is to secure the long-term, stable, and secure operating funding. We must operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, or the user community is not going to come here, and the Canadians will continue to go offshore. That's where they do all their work today—in the U.S., France, Germany, Japan, and so forth. We're trying to bring that knowledge base back into Canada. We need to upgrade. We need to support these scientists. Failure to do so makes us second class. We can't afford to be second class. We have to find a way to get beyond what we're going through today, which is an ongoing struggle to find the appropriate operating base for this facility.

    I know our colleagues in the telescope programs and the deep water monitoring programs all share the same problem.

    For example, through tremendous efforts we have been able to secure a base of operations from NSERC, CIHR, NRC, and the University of Saskatchewan. But it's so bare-bones we'll make it through the first year but are then going to be in trouble. We're working nationwide. We're working with the federal government, provincial governments, the funding councils, Genome Canada, and others.

    It's a kludge—just a hodgepodge. It's a tiring and inefficient effort for everyone. There's an urgent need in the short term, but I'm here to request the long-term solution. A long-term solution is required: a one-stop shop. Every successful synchrotron in the world has one-stop shopping. Yes, they compete, they go through peer review, and they justify their existence, but they have essentially four- or five-year rolling futures of stability to deal with to attract the top scientists to do their work there.

    Therefore, on behalf of the University of Saskatchewan, the Canadian Light Source, and our colleagues across this country in similar positions of searching for this single-window model, I'm requesting that the awareness grow to create a single funding agency that would be represented by a single body; that all these funding agencies somehow get together in a single body that collectively oversees multi-year operational funding. It's pure efficiency. Whether it means more money or not, it's pure efficiency. It puts the cards on the table with a single peer-review process that we can go to and deal with. We need to resolve the short term, but this is the long-term solution.

·  (1340)  

    In conclusion, we are going to start to operate early next year. We're going with a bare-bones operation, but we're going to create what will be one of the top scientific facilities in the world. That's year one. Every province is going to be there, and every discipline you can imagine will be there.

    What we really need is this agency, charged with managing the funding to all national science facilities, that will serve Canada in its pursuit of R and D excellence and therefore economic growth for everyone in this country.

    I thank you very much for your attention.

·  (1345)  

    The Chair: Thank you very much, and well done in what you've done to date.

    I would like now to move to the Northern Teacher Education Program. Who would like to start? Mr. Fleury, go ahead, sir.

    Mr. Elie Fleury (Executive Director, Northern Teacher Education Program): Good afternoon. Thank you, Madam Chairperson, members of the committee.

    I would like to start by giving an overview of our program, the Northern Teacher Education Program, and giving some background information, both statistical and in terms of directions our program is looking in.

    About five years ago, our board of governors and our staff and student members sat down together and spent a couple of days doing a strategic plan for the program. We spent about two and a half days. From that came a mission statement for the program, some objectives, some strategies, and some action plans. That was five years ago; now we are in the process of reviewing them.

    I'd like to start off by sharing with you the mission statement of NORTEP/NORPAC. The mission of NORTEP/NORPAC is to deliver a wide range of post-secondary academic programs that will lead to employment opportunities for residents of northern Saskatchewan and enable them to achieve their career aspirations, particularly in the teaching profession, while preserving the northern perspective of cultures, language, and traditional values.

    NORTEP within our program refers to the teacher education program, and the term NORPAC refers to the professional access college. That component of the program is designed to provide opportunities for northern students who wish to pursue careers other than education; hence the term NORTEP/NORPAC.

    NORTEP/NORPAC, which is located in La Ronge, offers a four-year bachelor of education program to prepare northerners to teach at the primary, elementary, or secondary levels. Preparing residents of northern Saskatchewan to teach in northern Saskatchewan has greatly improved the retention of teachers in northern Saskatchewan and has reduced the teacher turnover. In addition to offering a four-year education program, NORTEP/NORPAC also offers three years of arts and science to allow students to pursue other careers, such as law, social work, health, human justice, etc.

    A total of 69 courses are being offered at NORTEP/NORPAC over three semesters, from both the University of Saskatchewan and the University of Regina. In addition to nine faculty and eight support staff, there are 32 sessional lecturers who deliver the program.

    The enrolment at NORTEP/NORPAC ranges from 125 to 140 students per year in the program. Students come from northern Saskatchewan and are provided subsidized housing in La Ronge.

    In view of this morning's presentation from the Northern Lights School Division, I note to you that NORTEP/NORPAC is in the same administration area.

    NORTEP/NORPAC's board of governors is made up of representatives from the three school divisions in northern Saskatchewan and the two tribal councils in northern Saskatchewan. These include the Northern Lights School Division, the Ile-a-la Crosse School Division, the Creighton School Division—and I notice there is a typo in our brief; it should say the Prince Albert Grand Council, and the Meadow Lake Tribal Council. Those are the five large divisions that have representation on our board.

    To give a little bit of program history, the Northern Teacher Education Program was initiated and implemented in 1976 in response to community demands to provide northerners, particularly those of aboriginal ancestry, with access to teacher education and certification. It developed into a well-established program offering a unique delivery model that combines academic theory—and classes are taught at the centre in La Ronge—with practical experience. Students attend from any of the 40 communities of northern Saskatchewan. To date, the program has graduated over 270 teachers.

·  (1350)  

    The Northern Professional Access College was founded in 1989, again in response to demands of northern communities for a program similar to that of NORTEP. That would work for other professions. NORPAC offers arts and science courses required for several professions.

    Upon completion of three years of arts and science courses, students transfer to other universities to complete their studies. NORPAC has now produced graduates in such areas as arts, administration, commercial, social work, and law. By producing graduates, they come to our program and they move on. So they have completed the program at NORPAC and then move on to further studies.

    Now for some statistics on the NORTEP component of the program. Since NORTEP was established in 1976, the program has offered over 950 university credit classes with on-site instruction in La Ronge to students drawn from over 40 communities across the north. The program has graduated over 270 northerners as teachers, most of them of aboriginal ancestry. Over 88% of these graduates are currently employed as teachers or in other educational professions, nearly all of them in the north, with about 85% in northern Saskatchewan. The percentage of Indian and Métis teachers in northern Saskatchewan has increased considerably since the inception of NORTEP, from about 3% to 33%.

    As well as becoming teachers, NORTEP graduates have become school administrators, education directors, university and college instructors, language consultants and instructors, librarians and resources teachers, guidance counsellors and home school coordinators. Those are some stats on the NORTEP component.

    Now for the NORPAC side. Since NORPAC was established in 1989, over 210 students have registered in the program. Of this total, many of the students have gone on to complete their studies at either the University of Saskatchewan, the University of Regina, or other post-secondary institutions. Some of these students have transferred into the NORTEP program and have graduated as teachers. Others have secured employment, after having completed two to three years of arts and sciences, in the field of health, commerce, or the mining industry.

    As for the revenue that our program receives, I have broken it down from the provincial side and the federal side. From the provincial side, our revenue is approximately $1.6 million to the program.

    Operating rental grant...what this refers to is that the province also pays for the use of facilities in the north directly to the landlord. It doesn't come through us. So that's in addition to the grant, and we get an INAC grant of $130,000. That grant has been at that level since the inception of NORPAC.

    From first nations, and many first nations sponsor students, we get tuition to the tune of about $237,000. Other revenue--that is from tuition fees for part-time students who come into our program--is about $44,000.

    In rental income, that is income from subsidized housing that we provide to students, they will pay us rent for the apartments they occupy, about $60,000, and interest income is about $2,400.

    We also raise funds. We submit proposals and raise funds through donations, last year $33,000, so our total budget last year was $2,336,916. That was the level of our—

·  (1355)  

    The Chair: Perhaps you could move on to your recommendations.

    Mr. Elie Fleury: Okay. I have initiatives and planning there that you will have an opportunity to look at.

    We have three recommendations we would like to make. One, of course, is the increase in the revenue we get from INAC, an increase to about a $1 million. That is one recommendation we would need.

    Another one of our initiatives is the renovating of apartments that we have purchased. We have raised money to do that, but there is a shortfall of about $500,000. Our recommendation is that we receive some funding to assist us in completing our renovations.

    Another initiative we have with other post-secondary programs in La Ronge is to build a learning centre or a university centre that we can all share. We need some recognized capital to do that.

    Those are the three recommendations, Madam Chairperson.

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Fleury.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling (Chairman, Northern Teacher Education Program): I would just point out that the INAC funding has remained the same. The majority of the student body originally was non-first nations people, but under Bill C-31 they became treaty people. So roughly half of our student body is treaty, but the funding never changed.

    That's the difficulty we have. We've been working for quite some time for additional funding through INAC and the bands. The problem is we require new money, because we don't want to rob from existing programs; it just can't work that way.

    The original NORTEP was operated by the Northern Lights School Division, and then with the change in the status we invited other representation on our board.

    The Chair: You can negotiate that with DIAND, though? Correct? You would have tried to negotiate directly with the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs?

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: We have tried, but it seems like we get a lot of sympathy—but none of this.

    The Chair: You'd like the money.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: That's right, and we hope you can at least help us in those areas.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    I'll go to a round of questioning.

    We've got seven minutes, colleagues. We went a little bit over time on presentations.

    The Hon. Maria Minna.

    Ms. Maria Minna (Beaches—East York, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I'll start off with Ms. Petry. I should tell you a number of things.

    I was on the subcommittee women's caucus, which was looking, last year actually, at the whole issue of poverty, with seniors living below the poverty level. At that point we were looking specifically at unattached seniors, most of whom are women, living below the poverty line. I think we identified...the data we had showed about 647,000 Canadians living well below the poverty line.

    As a result of work we did, partly from that committee and also from submissions we received during the last round of finance committee hearings last year, there was a recommendation in our last report. It was a dual recommendation. One was to increase the GIS for low-income seniors and the other was to do an overall evaluation of pensions in our country, the seniors' pension.

    This leads me to the third point. The Prime Minister then set up a task force, which is actually now touring the country on a separate track to look at seniors' issues. This is a task force from within our caucus that is looking at pensions as well as other issues affecting seniors. This is to give you a bit of.... I will certainly be sharing this information with them, as I am working with them, in addition to doing something through our own report, of course.

    I think your points are well taken all around, especially the one that deals with spousal allowance. I know that's one that I have pushed myself for quite a long time, since I was on the national council back in the mid-eighties. It has been a constant issue, and it continues to be one. I agree with you, it's one that we need to address.

    I wanted to ask a question with respect to the issues you have raised--seniors' income, seniors' benefits, seniors' services, housing and so on, and the caregiving is very much appropriate. I just want to clarify something with you, though.

    In your recommendation, or in your brief under “Recommendations”, item (g), you say “increase tax credits for homecare expenses to reflect the true cost of service”, which is fine, and then you go on to talk about the silent victims of the home caregiver. Then you say, “We recommend increased funding to include direct compensation for the care givers....” I'm not sure if those two things are mutually exclusive. Are you suggesting that we establish some form of direct income for caregivers because...? Or are you looking at two tracks, tax credits and direct funding?

¸  (1400)  

    Mrs. Verda Petry: I would say both. I think this would probably be administered provincially, wouldn't it, particularly if it's integrated with health care?

    Ms. Maria Minna: Probably.

    Mrs. Verda Petry: So it seems to me it would have to be individualized to some degree. Some families have to hire somebody to do the caregiving. Others can provide some of it. But there are a number of ways, I think, in which support could be provided, depending on what the demand or the requirement is.

    Ms. Maria Minna: When you talk about the silent victims, I know caregiving is an area where a great number of women are being paid without the declaring of cash, and many times it has gone to the underground economy to some degree, because that's the only way they can actually get a little bit of a benefit. But that's no good because they get no benefits. So I can see your suggestion.

    Mrs. Verda Petry: No, I would not recommend that kind of—

    Ms. Maria Minna: I am saying that's the reality today.

    Mrs. Verda Petry: Yes, that is the reality.

    Ms. Maria Minna: And that's what should change.

    Mrs. Verda Petry: And when you're talking about women having to provide the care, sometimes they have had to give up professions or other jobs. This doesn't apply just to seniors; it applies to families with handicapped children, for example. Those problems are more general than are stated here.

    Ms. Maria Minna: It was a good presentation. Thank you very much.

    To the Saskatchewan homeopathic group, can you explain for me very briefly your preference for continuing with the DINs as opposed to having homeopathic medicines under the new natural health products.

    Ms. Judy V. Hughes: I'm sorry, I didn't hear you.

    The Chair: The question was, why is your preference for following under the DINs, the drug number program?

    Ms. Maria Minna: As opposed to the natural. Could you expand on that briefly for me, on what your main concerns are with respect to preferring DINs over having the homeopathic medicines under the natural health products?

    Ms. Judy V. Hughes: In regard to the second one, under the natural health products, why we don't want them moved from there?

¸  (1405)  

    Ms. Maria Minna: Right.

    Ms. Judy V. Hughes: Number one, because they've been regulated. One of the things is that with homeopathy being in such high demand by people looking for alternatives in health care, we need to ensure that there is some kind of regulation and protection of the medicine. Homeopathy medicines are medicines. They are drugs. They are not natural health products. We've been trying to get the ear of the natural health products directorate for over the past two years.

    If they are removed and not recognized as drugs...currently people who don't know how to use the medicine and people who aren't trained in homeopathy are already prescribing, and we've seen some serious problems with people who are using them. So it needs to stay there. It's been regulated that way for over 15 years, and Canada has the widest scope of pharmacopoeias in the world, because we also access the U.S., Germany, and France. There's no need to change it, and it would be a great financial burden to the federal government and the people of Canada to change it when there's no need to change it.

    What needs to happen is more regulation, because there are more and more people who are practising as homeopaths and more and more people who are accessing the service.

    The Chair: Thank you very much.

    Now we'll go to Ms. Leung.

    Ms. Sophia Leung (Vancouver Kingsway, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I want to thank you all for very interesting presentations.

    First, I'm going to turn to friends from the University of Saskatchewan. Welcome, Bill and Doug. I still remember when I visited your synchrotron; I really learned something, and I was impressed with what you have. I have to congratulate you. I think it was just a year ago, and you have already established a tremendous partnership. It's really quite an achievement. I know your centre is going to have great potential for the future.

    On your page 5 you show the proposed annual operating grant. You already have the committed orders from the NRC and the CIHR. They already--

    Mr. Doug Richardson: Yes, those are the ones.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: So you're essentially trying to say that you really need support annually—$17 million?

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: If you take a facility like ours, which had $170 million in capital, the rule of thumb that works out pretty well around the world is for your annual operating budget to be about 10% of that. We don't start at that point, but we work from bottom up, of course, in our budget projections.

    So the number that you see in the budget projection is not year one, but over the next five years it will accommodate the approximate average of our operating budgets. It is meant to be a guide.

    Now, how do we solve that gap? That's the problem we discuss today. There are ways to do that. For example, we are approaching Genome Canada, as suggested by Alan Bernstein at the CIHR. We can't go back to the well to those who are already committed.

    You see, a big problem we have is that we're so multi-disciplinary that if we go to NSERC or CIHR, for example, and say they should fund so much of this, they say, “Well, how much of what you do is going to be ours?” You really can't judge that a priori.

    So we anticipate filling part of that $5 million gap with commercial revenues. Our mission is to partially support operations through commercial revenues; however, the models around the world show that is a tough sell for every synchrotron. We will bring some moneys in, but nowhere near close enough to close that gap. Therefore, we're in a vicious circle: if we don't provide the services, we don't get the revenues as well as the academic community. It's a spiral.

    So our only hope in the short term is that we're working with Industry Canada and WED to do a bit of a short-term, two- or three-year bridge that will allow us to maintain bare-bones operations, though it will not let us expand to meet the mission for which we were founded.

    How do we close that gap? That is our single biggest problem. So we're working hard with Industry Canada. We have national initiatives like we discussed today, to look at a more global or national level in securing that funding, in a way that we can work in a forward projected manner. Therefore, we will be able to attract the staff we need and attract the users we need to truly meet our goals—and ultimately, therefore, provide the economic benefits to Canada from this part of the innovation agenda.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: Thank you.

    I know that my colleague, the Honourable Ralph Goodale, speaks highly of your project, and I'm sure you have his support.

¸  (1410)  

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Yes, he is a great supporter of ours, and we're very pleased with his interest—as with many people at the federal and provincial levels who have been and are interested.

    Mr. Doug Richardson: Can I just add one thing, Madam Chair? What we are seeking is really a national solution. Bear in mind that the Americans, who have ten of these, finance all of them as if they are infrastructure, as if they are a highway.

    In the European approach, which Dr. Thomlinson was a major part of, 19 countries get together and finance them, again, as if they are infrastructure.

    This government, your government, has done an outstanding job on the capital side. Unfortunately, the gap has arisen on the operating side. I don't think it was ever anticipated initially. That's what Dr. Thomlinson is pointing to, not only for this facility but for other national facilities in several provinces in Canada.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: In B.C., for clients, we also constantly have to seek help.

    I agree. This a very important solution that we have to find. I appreciate your presentation.

    I'm going to move on to the Northern Teacher Education Program. I'm really very interested in what you have accomplished. This morning we had another group, which you probably would know, that made a very strong plea. Yes, you probably know. Well, it was very innovative. Thank you.

    Anyhow, I'm very interested in a couple of things. Do your teachers go to the same area to teach?

    I also want to know, in the summer, do you encourage your young people, high school students, to continue and have a working experience? You probably heard that HRDC has the summer placement program. I don't know.

    In our riding, we are all very well established. Each summer, I know I have always had the pleasure to allocate over 70 jobs. I was thinking that would be something you've experienced for your young people.

    Mr. Elie Fleury: Yes. Over the summer we were able to get a provincial grant--

    Ms. Sophia Leung: This is not provincial.

    Mr. Elie Fleury: --for student employment opportunities. Many of our students are hired for specific times as well.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: It is a joint partnership. In the community, we have community organizations from sometimes the private sector. They will apply and say they need two students this summer. And if you have working experience, then HRDC covers so much salary. I think you should look into it, if you have not used it.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: Are you talking the K to 12 students, or are you talking about post-secondary students?

    Ms. Sophia Leung: No, this is high school.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: High school students.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: Yes.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: Yes, that's where NORTEP gets their people.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: Yes, I see.

    The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna): You are out of time.

    Ms. Sophia Leung: Now, I--

    The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna): I'm sorry, Madam Leung. We will move on to Mr. Nystom for now. Thank you. I'm sorry, I hate to do that.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: We'll talk afterwards, then, if you want.

    The Acting Chair (Hon. Maria Minna): You can come back to it.

    Mr. Nystrom, please.

    Hon. Lorne Nystrom (Regina—Qu'Appelle, NDP): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    Welcome to the witnesses this afternoon.

    I will start off with Mr. Doug Richardson and Dr. Thomlinson. How do we compare now with the rest of the world in terms of money we get from our federal government to the scientific community for research and development, science in general, and how much money do we need? Can you give us a bit of a comparison as to how well we are doing compared with the rest of the world?

    I know at one time we were way behind in terms of R and D, and I suspect we still are. Can you maybe give us some idea about how much catch-up we have to do?

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: I can give you some, although, as you may know, I'm a neophyte in Canada. I have been in the States. I lived in the States, although I had a Canadian grandmother and uncle, who I visited often in Toronto. So my heart is in this country and has been since I was an infant.

    It's a complex question and simple answers are not correct. But it's in the order, I believe, of about 1% of Canadian gross domestic product goes back into R and D through the government, and I believe the numbers from industry are somewhere in that same range.

    However, in the U.S., about 3% goes back into R and D. It is significantly higher in Japan, or has historically been, although they are having some problems. But countries like Finland.... And I liken Canada to Finland, not only because my companion is Finnish and I have to, and that's why we love it here so much--of course, I love being in Canada. But the Finns have had to survive on a technological base even though they're completely isolated way up in northern Europe. They've done that by hauling back into their economy, in terms of R and D, in the order of 6% or 7%.

    You can see that in their social system. Many of the problems we've heard about today don't exist in a country like Finland historically. It's not that they.... There are no quick fixes, but you go back in history. A large part of that is because they've been able to build a robust economy, even though they're small, 5.5 million people. So it really is a critical point, how much you put back in, and then you look for the investment on the return.

    Prior to 2002 I had been in Canada a number of times visiting, and it was not a very exciting country in terms of its technology and R and D efforts. When I came back in 2002, early in the year, on a lecture tour across the country, lecturing on synchrotron-based medical applications, I was amazed. That's one of the reasons I'm here. What I saw was a country that was on the verge of huge change by the advent of CFI and the entire innovation agenda. So that's the right start.

    What we're saying today is if you could build on that infrastructure, it's not a lot more money in absolute numbers in terms of R and D. If you took, for example, so much per year.... In our case, what we're looking for is maybe in the order of $5 million a year. That's a large amount to some of our colleagues here, based on the scale of programs, but putting that relative thing aside, and you did that at the major national facilities, the investment back will be well paid for. So it's on that scale. It's not huge.

    If Canada were to go up a few tenths of a per cent or half a per cent in its reinvestment in the R and D world relative to gross national product, this country would in fact climb in the rankings in the world. It's clear to me that this really has to happen. It's so close. I mean, it's right here.

    Before I leave the country in about five years, I want to see government look at science infrastructure funding as--the analogy was used--a highway. It's got to be part of the environment. Therefore, it could ride out.

    For example, we will work yearly to compete with our peers, based on our successes or failures. That's fair and that's honest. But you have to have a base, and that base simply isn't there on the operating side. It's wonderful what's happening on the infrastructure side. Believe me, it's wonderful.

¸  (1415)  

    Mr. Doug Richardson: I'd like to add somenting, Lorne.

    I stand to be corrected. It's a bit risky on the numbers, but my understanding is we've moved to the top three in the world on the capital side. We are probably 18th or 19th, in that area, on the operating side. You'll recall the goal of the innovation strategy is to move us from 15th to the top five places in the world.

    Mr. Lorne Nystrom: Who is ahead of us on the capital side, the Americans?

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Per capita, yes, the Americans are certainly ahead, through their investments.... We are talking about basic science and basic technology sciences, not weapons sciences and things. But on that side the Department of Energy, NIH, and NSF are by far outstripping us.

    Mr. Lorne Nystrom: I'll go back to Ms. Petry and Mr. Coates.

    You mention here there are about 17% of seniors in this country who live below the poverty line. How does this compare to 10 to 15 years ago? What are the trend lines like? I remember studies a while back that said we had done a fair amount with the Canada Pension Plan and other programs to get rid of some poverty among seniors. That was one of the more effective places, I suppose, in terms of the impact of our social policy a number of years ago, and I get the sense it's gotten worse rather than better in the last decade or two.

    I wonder if you have some numbers you can give us or some ideas you can give us as to what's happened, and if it's gone down, what's gone wrong. I see your recommendations. I will ask you about them after, but give us an idea, if you could, as to whether or not we are worse off than 10 or 15 years ago.

¸  (1420)  

    Mrs. Verda Petry: Do you want to field this one, Wally?

    Mr. Wally Coates (Vice-President, Saskatchewan Seniors Mechanism): I'll put my two bits in and then I'll turn to you.

    As I have observed it, and I don't have any direct statistics for you to answer that particular question, what has happened over the years is we have had the influence of bracket creep, of course, to some extent, with the senior population the same as for the others. And in addition to the bracket creep, we have the increasing cost of living, inflation. I will say that it's nice to have the indexing factor on these pensions.

    The guaranteed income supplement, the OAS plus GST, is hardly $1,000 a month, and for anyone who has to have any kind of housing accommodation the rising price of housing just makes it very difficult. If you have any medical expenses, while there are some provincial plans that will give you some relief, it still puts people in a lot of difficulty.

    One of the particular groups we are concerned about and that we should also be looking at is the 60-to-65 group, and even the 55-to-60 in some cases. A lot of these people have trouble getting jobs and still have to pay income tax because they haven't reached the senior category yet.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mrs. Petry, did you wish to add anything?

    Mrs. Verda Petry: No, I don't have numbers to compare well-being now with 10 years ago. I know about the overall income gap having increased due to changing income tax policy, but I don't know specifically numbers to answer your question.

    Mr. Lorne Nystrom: You say in your brief that the income gap overall, for all Canadians, is widening, which we know. I'm wondering about seniors. Is it widening there as well?

    Mrs. Verda Petry: Yes, I think so, but I don't have numbers to prove it.

    The Chair: Actually, I think Ms. Minna could probably give you those numbers, Mr. Nystrom.

    Mr. Lorne Nystrom: Also, in terms of one of your solutions you're talking about increasing the tax exemption. Some people suggest this should be raised to $10,000. Do you have any figure in mind as to what it should be raised to?

    Mrs. Verda Petry: That would be a good start. We didn't attach a number to that. I'm sorry.

    Mr. Wally Coates: The problem, as I see it, with that is that a lot of seniors.... I had an idea, but it's slipped away on me. Maybe I'll come back to it later.

    The Chair: Okay. We'll get that later. Thank you very much.

    Before I go to Mr. Cullen for a final round, I just wanted to get clarification from the Partners for Rural Family Support. You have asked for some core funding, but you haven't given us a quantum amount you are looking at or need. Can you give us some indication there?

    Mrs. Janet Hering: If you're looking for a dollar figure for core funding for the organization, we're looking in the area of $100,000 a year at present. Our programs are expanding--

    The Chair: And that's for the province?

    Mrs. Janet Hering: No, this is for our organization.

    The Chair: Just your organization.

    Mrs. Janet Hering: We're unique, as far as I know. So that's what we are looking for.

    The Chair: Okay. Thank you.

    Mr. Cullen, seven minutes, and I'll give you seven minutes like I gave Mr. Nystrom, so it will be nine.

    Mr. Roy Cullen (Etobicoke North, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you to the presenters.

    I was going to follow up with you, Ms. Hering. Right now your funding sources are what?

    Mrs. Janet Hering: Our funding sources are mostly grant-based, project-specific.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: From whom?

    Mrs. Janet Hering: We do have some federal funding sources as well as provincial. Much of our funding comes from donations and community support.

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    Mr. Roy Cullen: Thank you.

    To the Saskatchewan seniors, when you talk about bracket creep, I think we fixed bracket creep in budget 2000. Not so? We totally indexed the brackets in budget 2000 forever. Well, “forever” is a long time. Are you thinking of something else?

    Mrs. Verda Petry: Those people who are still employed get salary adjustments on a regular basis, but if you are on a fixed income, as most seniors are, they have to pay the additional costs of services without any increase in their income. Now, there are some people on company pensions who have cost-of-living adjustments, but I would say the majority of seniors do not.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: No, I understand that on the income side, and I understand what you're saying with respect to OAS and GIS, that even though they are indexed--I have a lot of seniors in my riding as well who are on a relatively fixed income and yet there are cost pressures that are closing that gap. But I think if you check budget 2000 you'll see that we re-indexed all the brackets.

    I'd like to go now to Mr. Thomlinson and Mr. Richardson. I looked at your operating budget and I took 40% of it, the $12,000,600, and it comes to about $5 million. I added that $5 million to the $12,000,600 and it came to close to $17,000,800. You ask, what's the significance of that? Well, maybe there isn't any, but one of the issues is that it's indirect costs. It comes up more in the university setting, but the case has been made by a number of people that we should be looking at funding indirect costs to the extent of 40% of direct research.

    In your particular organization I'm not sure that--it has always come up in the context of universities, but if you apply the same model, I think there is an argument there, in any case, that you have a parallel kind of challenge in the sense that as a federal government we brought in the university chairs, the CFI, more money for the NSERCs and the SSHRCs, more money for Dr. Bernstein's association, the CIHR. So this money came to these institutions, but they had other indirect overheads to cover.

    I just throw that out as something to help you make your case, and you can comment on that.

    You also talk about a funding gap, but it seems to me you are also talking about some kind of a governance or organizational issue there in the sense that you have all these different donors but there doesn't seem to be--I think if I'm interpreting what you are saying, there is no one sort of looking at the whole picture and pulling it all together, and you are getting nickel and dimed.

    I have two questions. One, is there a better governance model with some kind of different agency? Two, who is the champion of this in the federal cabinet? Is it Industry Canada? Is it Natural Resources? Who would pull this together?

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Let me clarify it. You've raised exactly the problems.

    First, we don't necessarily advocate a new agency. What we would like to see is, within the existing infrastructure—I don't know what we would call it—a committee that would be representative of all the present councils and agencies that have funding authority, to receive proposals each year, to study them, to peer-review them, put them up against each other, and make the decision, so that we as an organization know with whom we're dealing rather than knock on endless doors trying to find, coming to your next point, a champion in each of those organizations.

    The numbers you see there for NSRC, NRC, CIHR, and University of Saskatchewan were augmented—about a year and a half ago now, roughly—significantly over the original when they saw more money. We were in need, and they bailed us out to the tune of an additional $5 million.

    Part of the indirect costs you're alluding to are passed through the University of Saskatchewan, which passes through the indirect costs associated with grants that come for the synchrotron. About one million of that two is already indirect cost support, basically just passed through.

    The champion has been hard to find, although we have been knocking hard on the doors at Industry Canada. Minister Rock and his associates have stated clearly that they understand the problem, although implementation has been another issue, a very difficult one. The progress we're making in the short term with WED has come out of Minister Rock's interest and concerns in these areas. We're working with Industry Canada also on a major initiative to fill the interim gap. That initiative will go forward early in the new year. They know it's coming.

    At the same time, we're working the big national problem. President Peter MacKinnon of the University of Saskatchewan is now president of AUCC, and it's clear that one of their top two or three initiatives will be this national funding program.

    We also know that NSRC and NRC are jointly looking at this scenario as well for future projections. So we have a number of “champions” there, but do we have anyone in Parliament beating on the tables yet? Certainly Ralph Goodale is championing on the CLS side of this thing, but also on a more national level.

    So we're making inroads. This is a process that started really last May on a visit we made to Ottawa.

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    Mr. Roy Cullen: I know Mr. Goodale is clearly championing this, but I'm wondering whether in terms of a portfolio it would logically fit within the industry portfolio as its champion. You're going to have other ministers who are supportive.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: It is the natural home for it, because a large part of our mission is economic development—on the order of 25%—the rest being academic peer-reviewed work, because of the university base we have in Canada, which is extraordinarily strong. So yes, it's a natural home for it, and that's where we have been very well received as well.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Thank you for clarifying that. What you're saying is in the operating moneys now there is some extent of indirect costs.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Absolutely.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: There is still an argument there, I think, which maybe we could look at it in our deliberations, that it's somewhat akin to the challenge universities are facing.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Indeed it is. One suggestion made by Mr. Himelfarb last year in May was that a parallel fund comparable in size to the indirect-cost funding be established for this purpose. That was just in conversation with him; I'm not saying he proposed it formally.

    That's the kind of creative thinking we're starting to find boiling up. We're very pleased by it. We felt it was important for the finance department directly to know. Deputy Minister Lynch is fully aware of our efforts and initiatives through a dinner meeting we had with him in May. So we're pleased, and no one has said no. Everyone has said, “Hmmm, but how do we do it?”

    Mr. Roy Cullen: It seems to me this is the kind of project we should be supporting.

    Do I have time for a quick question to Mr. Fleury and Mr. Ruelling? This morning we had the other group in—Northern Lights, was it?

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: Northern Lights School Division, yes.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: It seems to me one of the messages you brought to us was that it was difficult retaining people, but I thought I heard Mr. Fleury say that your retention rate is improving in your particular enterprise.

    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: We're talking about students. Northern Lights School Division is talking about teachers and support staff.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Okay, we're talking about different things. We're talking about students in one case and teachers in the other, are we?

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    Mr. Bruce Ruelling: Yes.

    The Chair: Thank you very much for that clarification.

    Dr. Thomlinson, I know Dr. Hill, who is the scientific director of the Lawson Health Research Institute in London, also raised the same thing and gave to us very graphically the number of hours spent by the hundreds of researchers there in grant applications.

    It's a little bit difficult to talk about this global processing unit as if it's a university application that got centralized, when you have to have the peer review element and are going to multiple pots. I think that's the difficulty. It's a lot more complex than it seems at first glance.

    But we understand the issue very clearly. It's good that CFI has done somewhat of an allocation of infrastructure and soft costs as well.

    Dr. Thomlinson.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: When CFI funds a project, at the beginning of operation of that project—post-construction, or whatever—CFI in fact now funds for five years an equivalent of about 30% of the capital. We did not hit that window. We were too early. We don't have the CFI operating fund that would close this gap.

    The Chair: You need a grandfather clause.

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: Yes, we do. Good luck.

    Mr. Doug Richardson: We have tried.

    The Chair: Do you have another recommendation?

    Dr. Bill Thomlinson: We have tried every possibility, but no one wants to touch it.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    We'll go for a final comment to Ms. Petry.

    Mrs. Verda Petry: It's a very important point on behalf of non-profit organizations. It's easy for them to be overshadowed by the synchrotron, but the problems for them are the same.

    A tremendous amount of community work is done by volunteers through NPOs, but in order to get some funding the directors spend a tremendous amount of time, as Janet was saying, in asking for grant proposals. Sometimes it might only be $3,000 or some other small amount, and often these are government-offered grants to various departments, but then they always ask for new initiatives.

    So okay, you will get a few dollars for a new initiative, but there will be no operating funds for carrying out the outcomes of the original initiative. So a project will be announced with big fanfare, and after a year or two it fizzles out because there is no ongoing funding.

    The Chair: We've had lots of concern over lack of core facilitation, and I think we're hearing that more and more.

    To all of you, thank you for your input this afternoon. I think we've had a very fruitful day in Saskatchewan, which I'm glad for and appreciate. On behalf of all the members who will be joining us over this two weeks, you're probably well aware of what it's like to catch and miss the planes and have delays. But we think this work is valuable, and we think your input is very valuable to us. So thank you for participating.

    Colleagues, we meet again tomorrow morning in Winnipeg, where I think we start at 8:30.

    We are adjourned.