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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION
Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities
EVIDENCE
CONTENTS
Wednesday, November 20, 2002
| » | 1725 |
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The Clerk of the Committee |
| » | 1730 |
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Ms. Anita Neville (Winnipeg South Centre, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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The Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.)) |
| » | 1735 |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral (Laval Centre, BQ) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Joseph Peters (Director, Systemscope Information and Technology Partnerships) |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Bill Young (Committee Researcher) |
| » | 1740 |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Joseph Peters |
| » | 1745 |
| » | 1750 |
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The Chair |
| » | 1755 |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Joseph Peters |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Wendy Lill |
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The Chair |
| ¼ | 1800 |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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Mr. Norman Doyle (St. John's East, PC) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Norman Doyle |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
| ¼ | 1805 |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Mauril Bélanger |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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Mr. Bill Young |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral |
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The Chair |
| ¼ | 1810 |
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Mr. Larry Spencer (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, Canadian Alliance) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Larry Spencer |
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The Chair |
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Ms. Wendy Lill |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Tony Tirabassi (Niagara Centre, Lib.) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Joseph Peters |
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The Chair |
CANADA
Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities |
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l |
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EVIDENCE
Wednesday, November 20, 2002
[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
» 
(1725)
[English]
The Clerk of the Committee: Honourable members of the subcommittee, I see a quorum. We can now proceed to the election of the chair. I'm now ready to receive nominations to that effect.
» 
(1730)
Ms. Anita Neville (Winnipeg South Centre, Lib.): I nominate Carolyn Bennett.
The Clerk: Are there any other nominations? I'll take it that nominations are closed.
I'd invite Carolyn Bennett to take the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.)): We have a great deal of work to do. There are a lot of details to be worked out concerning our agenda.
[English]
We have very few weeks left in order to get going on this fantastic little piece of work.
The first job will be to get ourselves some money with which to do the work.
And we thought because there were some people here who perhaps did not know what the former committee was up to in terms of a spectacular e-consultation on CPP disability, as to what's working and what's not....
We have some dates to decide on. I'd like to introduce you to Joe Peters. Joe is going to walk through what we hope to do, and then it will make it more legitimate when we go and ask for the money.
The liaison committee meets next Tuesday, so we need to get the approval for a budget today.
Are you ready, sir? And then we have a few huge numbers of requests for dates. International Day of Disabled Persons is December 3, and about 105 people want our attention that day. With the approval of the committee, we were hoping it would therefore be a perfect day to launch the actual on-line study, if we get the money to be able to go forward and have a press conference and do the launch on December 3, International Day of Disabled Persons .
Okay, we have to suspend for a second.
» (1735)
The Chair: There is nothing in the Standing Orders to do anything other than elect the chair today. Seeing that we're so far behind, do I have unanimous consent to get ourselves a little information and then a budget? Then I think it would be really good if we left today knowing even what times and dates we want to meet, as we're all feeling a huge pressure on our time in this section.
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral (Laval Centre, BQ): I would like to propose a change.
The Chair: To the agenda?
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: A small project.
[English]
A small project. I have an idea. You'd better be interested in my idea.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.): Madam Chair, I have a procedural question. Is it possible for you to have unanimous consent only for 25 minutes? In other words, past six o'clock I get in a grumpy frame of mind.
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Thank you.
The Chair: Go for it, Joe. You have a little show and tell.
Mr. Joseph Peters (Director, Systemscope Information and Technology Partnerships): Perhaps in the interest of time we'll dispense with the show and just go to the slide presentation, which I think Mike will be distributing right now.
The Chair: While he's handing it out, we could just make sure everybody knows that the DTC issue will be at the HRDC committee tomorrow--the briefing notes, the questions, everything. I think most parties knew we were hopefully going to try to replace some of the regular people on the HRDC committee, knowing a little bit more about the topic. That is tomorrow.
Maybe we'll do the rest of the dates and times after Joe finishes. Are we going?
Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Madam Chair, can I ask another question? So that we can be prepared for this meeting tomorrow morning, who is going to be there? Whom are we questioning and what are we trying to achieve at this meeting? It's important that we achieve something.
The Chair: Bill did the briefing.
Mr. Bill Young (Committee Researcher): I'll tell you who is going to be there. It's going to be David Miller, who is the assistant commissioner of CCRA, with one of his directors general. Then there will be officials from the Department of Finance. Serge Nadeau was the one who was listed. He's director of tax policy, I believe.
The issue was the nature of the response, and I guess the question that was to be decided was whether the standing committee wanted to follow up by asking for a better or different response: how did you plan to proceed? The HRD committee have also scheduled a meeting for December 3, I believe, which will, if they decide to follow up, be devoted to the consideration of any product or report to the House that you or they want to make at that time.
» (1740)
The Chair: When we met informally as a group, we decided the government response was so inadequate that we might just want to resubmit it, with the analysis the library has done on the, what, three-quarters of our recommendations that weren't even mentioned in their response? I think we were led to believe if it was exactly the same report, they could table exactly the same response. So I think tomorrow we just have to decide whether we agree upon a letter to send to the minister requesting a better response, outlining the facts--
A voice: Or a new report.
The Chair: Or a new report that's short, with the old report appended, or whatever. The clerks will help us with what the procedure is. Not to tell tales out of school, but I think even some of the other ministers felt that an elegant way to get the issue back before cabinet would be to have a go at this again, pointing out all the things in our recommendations that weren't there, such as the advisory committee. I think what we've learned over this last experience is that if there had been an advisory committee of the disability community, plus the doctors, after such a thing as the Hamilton decision on a gluten-free diet, you might have the advisory committee advising the finance department what to do, rather than having these knee-jerk responses that get into trouble. Hopefully, by the end of tomorrow we'll have some direction for the finance department.
The other thing that seems to have happened over the summer is that CCRA has become much more flexible--has agreed to an advisory committee, has agreed to use the old form and not to press on with a worse form, and they seem to be listening. I think by having CCRA and the Department of Finance in the same room at the same time, we can start with some forward progress on this.
So go, Joe, and then we'll just talk a little bit about where we go.
Mr. Joseph Peters: Thank you very much for having me back today.
I just wanted to bring you up to speed on where we've come, from the information-based site, to having an e-consultation site for the subcommittee on the Canada Pension Plan disability consultations. Since the June launch, we've come a long way. We established awareness of the site with an information focus. The Library of Parliament provided some excellent research and background information on the Canada Pension Plan disability program. That will be supplemented with additional information we weren't able to add as a result of prorogation.
We do have a great momentum of interest, especially based on the fact that there has been so much attention on the Canada Pension Plan disability issue in the media of late. We had over 1,000 unique visitors in October, which is absolutely incredible compared to where we were just a couple of months ago. So a lot of people are interested in it. We're starting the relationship with those people who are interested just in information. Many sites are now linking to the CPP site. The clerk can attest to the fact that there are inquiries coming through our “contact us” on a daily and weekly basis. Close to 100 people have signed up, and we have relationships established with those people, who want to receive additional information on the consultations and further activities of the subcommittee.
Since that launch, we've moved from strategic assessment and sponsor review from the three sponsors within the House of Commons and Library of Parliament. The multimedia branch, the Library of Parliament research branch, and the committees directorate are the three funding sponsors for phase one and the work that was done in the interim period. They provided interim financing for us to develop all of the e-consultation tools to run once the consultation is approved. I believe that in the last session a project charter was circulated to committee members in August, outlining what we are trying to achieve. Since that time we've developed the tools, the content, and the communications.
On this slide we have an introduction to the three tools. We'll have a combination of qualitative or text information and quantitative or numerical or data-counting information through three tools. One is an issue poll, which is a little bit different from an opinion poll. It provides people with information on issues and allows them to answer questions after they've had a chance to consider those issues. There is a “share your story” part, which will allow people from different backgrounds and experiences with the Canada Pension Plan disability program to share their story not only with the committee, but also to have their story posted on the site so that they can share their experiences and lessons with other Canadians. The third area is a more structured approach where we outline six different challenges facing the program and ask people to provide solutions to those problems. In a nutshell, those are the three consultation tools. In combination with that there is an off-line or paper-based version of those for those people who don't have computer access and things like that.
The next slide shows the research pillars. These are basically all of the areas we have identified and presented to people. Although we're not stopping anyone from going outside the scope of this research spectrum, we are trying to guide people into the areas that would be helpful to our research program.
The first three have to do with the “share your story” part. We'd like people to tell us what worked well and what didn't with their application, the appeal process, and the medical assessment process, and to tell us about the financial challenges of being on the CPP disability program, whether or not that's an adequate support mechanism, although it was designed to be a partial support mechanism, and their experiences with other programs, in the sense that there's some overlap in social assistance programs at the provincial level, and how they actually combine with the federal program. Those are the three areas we're pushing.
Then on the other side, where we're looking for solutions or presenting issues in the issue poll, we're talking about raising awareness; the adequacy of support; whether there should be a return to work and CPP mix; provincial integration, which is similar; improving the CPP process, where there could be refinements; and the eligibility requirements.
» (1745)
All these areas could be supplemented by other issues that you, the members of the committee, feel also should be added. This is just our first attempt at presenting those to you, and it is flexible in the sense that if there are other things we need to ask, we can make those adjustments.
The next slide, like this one, is the issue poll, to which I want to give you a quick introduction. This is actually an on-line mechanism that provides the person with contextual information, and the next slide shows questions to follow. So the person always has some amount of background information before we ask them a question. This is keeping in line with more of the deliberative aspects of consultations and moving away from top-of-the-mind opinions that are common in market research activities.
So between the issue poll, the stories, and the solutions, we feel we'll have a great mix of input into the research that will allow the committee to have a broad range of participation from a variety of Canadians, outside the usual suspects that generally present at committee hearings, the national associations and stakeholder groups. It will be a chance for Canadians at the grassroots level to actually have a say and participate in the work of the committee in a structured process.
So the development of those three tools has been done in the interim period. We were working with the idea that there wouldn't be prorogation. That has actually thrown a little wrench into our planning time lines, but we've been able to overcome that, and we're very happy that the committee is back meeting again.
The next step after this is that we need to approve a budget. It needs to go to the full HRDC committee, and then it has to be approved by the liaison committee before we're allowed to actually proceed with the consultation.
Ideally, we are thinking of a launch date of December 3, which is the International Day of Disabled Persons, which would be an excellent day to launch the consultation. There couldn't actually be a better day for that.
To do that, it would be important to have that presented to the committee tomorrow so that we can get to the liaison committee on the Tuesday, so that we don't have to wait for the next liaison committee meeting, which could be in a week or two, after next Tuesday's meeting, which would then mean that we couldn't start on December 3, the International Day of Disabled Persons.
The budget as proposed would be for $75,000, plus a $10,000 contingency. That is for consultation, advice, content development and advice, technical advice, communications, development before the launch and during the actual life of the consultation, and evaluation after the fact.
I should mention that we are proposing that the consultation would run for eight to nine weeks. We're considering nine weeks, because of the Christmas week, where no one will generally ever participate in your consultation. So that would run from December 3 effectively to the week of February 3, which would give enough time for the momentum of interest of participants to grow, for them to share their experiences and really make it a worthwhile venture. So we're working with the idea of it being an eight- or nine-week process.
That is the budget item. The next item is the communications, and this is an important area where it would be helpful to get your input. We feel there are three real groups that we need as either facilitators or enablers of the communications. Internally, we feel it would be important to understand what would be the best way of communicating with your caucuses or assistants, to allow them to understand about the CPP disability consultation, as well as what would be the best way of potentially contacting the constituency offices within your caucuses, because those are the front-line people dealing with CPP, with the inquiries, on a daily basis.
» (1750)
For example, the Liberal caucus have Liberal caucus and Liberal research assistant briefing sessions. I'm not sure if the other parties would be interested in having a presentation to their assistants' meeting or to their caucuses. Those are both options for you. If you feel it would be helpful, we'd be willing to brief them and provide them not only with a run-through of how the consultation would work but also give them the materials.
I think I have also provided you with a background document on the consultations--it's available in French and English and it's in draft content at this point--and a draft press release.
The Chair: So this would be the equivalent of a 10 percenter members could use if they wanted, and then a draft press release.
Joe, Mauril had a question, but if the members have some questions about a communication rollout, it's so important in terms of getting this working that maybe it would be almost a basis for a meeting next week. We could brainstorm how we would make the launch work the following week.
Mr. Mr. Joseph Peters: Sure.
The Chair: I think we should also acknowledge the fact that Peter and Claude, and the two interns who are working on this over here, worked all summer on this stuff. It's spectacular. Also, the library and the House spent a lot of their own money doing this, which has been, in terms of a pilot, a way of maybe looking forward in terms of Parliament. They saw it was worth their while spending some of their own money. This is very exciting. We're very thrilled and grateful.
I know there's some sensitivity about tomorrow morning's HRDC meeting that we wanted to be on the DTC, but I also think, seeing all of us are there who are pretty keen about this, we might be able to persuade people there wouldn't be a whole bunch of wrangling about the budget if we could just make it happen tomorrow. I think it would make all of our lives simpler in that we're so late getting started compared to where we had hoped to be in September.
We have Mauril with a question, maybe Joe, and then maybe we can go through the details of the budget and see where we get, because Mauril wants out of here in ten minutes.
» (1755)
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I'm the new kid on the committee, Madam Chair, so I'd like to know who this gentleman is.
The Chair: Go ahead, Joe.
Mr. Joseph Peters: I'm Joe Peters. I'm from Systemscope. It's an information and technology consulting firm here in Ottawa. I've been working with the Library of Parliament and the House of Commons since March of this year developing, first, the information-based site and then the strategy and the implementation of the consultation.
The Chair: And Joe had been involved in some of the beginnings around Romanow.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: The second thing is, I've not yet taken the habit--and I hope not to--of approving budgets like that. So I was hoping to see a formal budget.
The Chair: Yes, it's here.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Thank you.
The Chair: We'll hand out the budget and people can just look at it for a minute or two. While you're looking at the budget, since this is a tiny, perfect committee that's able to multi-task, we could then talk about December 3, where, as far as I know, we're busy over breakfast, lunch, dinner. Everybody wants part of our time.
The CACL reception with the Speaker is around five o'clock. The Centres of Excellence in Women's Health have a whole disability lens. They want to treat us to breakfast about it that day. We have the possibility obviously of a committee meeting and hopefully the launch. That also may be the day the HRDC committee will look at the new, improved DTC report.
Then, on December 10 we've been asked by Joan Westland, again around the whole issue of disabilities.... There's a Mexican delegation who have been asking to see if we would deal with some of the international issues on a convention on disabilities, just to follow up on that one hearing we had on international issues. It may end up a reception or it may end up a hearing, or whatever you want to do in terms of the work. But the Mexican delegation dealing with disabilities will be here on December 10. Those are the other things before the committee, while you're looking at the budget.
The other thing we have to figure out is how on earth we will find time for this meeting, with everybody else's schedule. As you know, subcommittees end up being a bit at the mercy of other committees. Is there a time the committee members would prefer? Technically we've been given the slot of Tuesdays from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. That's the slot this subcommittee has been given. It's not a great time.
Ms. Wendy Lill: It's a terrible room.
The Chair: Yes.
Was this supposed to be our regular room?
No. Mike will negotiate that.
Subcommittee times used to be Wednesdays from 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Now is that a problem?
¼ (1800)
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: It depends: when the Citizenship and Immigration Committee sits at the same time, it is difficult.
[English]
The Chair: They're on Wednesdays. Okay. Well, let's see what the clerk can do with that, and then it's just a matter of a room. So we'll see.
[Translation]
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: There is a word for that, the art of ubiquity. There you have it!
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: It must be the same word in English, in fact.
The Chair: The budget.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Madam Chair, I don't understand why $40,000 has been allocated for the appearance of 34 witnesses. How does this fit in with this electronic survey? If we are conducting an electronic survey...
[English]
The Chair: At the same time as the electronic survey, there were some usual suspects we felt we needed to hear from in order to interpret what we were seeing in the survey. The people who studied this issue and maybe have more than a report for us would be able to dialogue with us, whether it's the Council on Canadians with Disabilities, or the Canadian Medical Association, or people with whom we actually would want to have a conversation, to be able to ask them some questions as opposed to just having a compilation of the e-consultation.
A couple of the groups, Mauril, that I think we know we want to talk to are the insurance companies, any of the workers' compensation boards--anybody who is clawing back the pension--in terms of how these things interact.
There will be certain things we can do just on the test in terms of what the clients feel. But also, I think, in order to be able to write a proper report, we need to see what the intent and the approaches of the other providers are: some of the people like the commissioner of the tribunal, the pension.... Some of the things are structural, right? I think what we're going to hear is that people think there are too many levels of appeal and they are just tired out and worn.
Among the people who expressed interest in it was the former banking ombudsman. He has a particular interest in a simplified approach to this that might inform our deliberations in terms of hearing witnesses.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: This would seem to be such a precise number, 34, when we're not sure.
The Chair: It's an average.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: And at $1,200, that's $28,000, yet we're claiming $40,000. It's just that I have been on the liaison committee.
The Chair: That's a typo. One of the other problems--
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: It's a $12,000 typo.
Mr. Norman Doyle (St. John's East, PC): Madam Chair, I have to get to the House. I'm afraid I'm going to have to sneak out.
The Chair: Yes, that's great. Merci.
Mr. Norman Doyle: Thank you.
The Chair: One of the other things, Mauril, with a person with disabilities is that quite often we have attendant expenses, which is--
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I don't have a difficulty with that.
The Chair: It's just that the math is wrong? Okay.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: To maximize the chances of getting funding through the liaison committee, having been a member of that committee, I know how stretched--it's not a matter of stretched any more, it's how overspent the budgets are. To increase our chances of having approval, I'd encourage, perhaps, a little more probity.
The Chair: This also gets absorbed into the HRDC committee budget, which then gets presented, I guess.
What is the actual number we're asking for, then?
A voice: It's $134,300.
The Chair: So it's just over here that it's wrong; in the add-up column it's right. Okay.
We're thrilled that Mauril is on the committee because he'll also sit on the liaison committee. We want everybody on the liaison committee who loves this project.
¼ (1805)
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: It's not a given that I will be on the liaison committee.
The Chair: Oh, yes; moi non plus.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: The official languages committee hasn't met yet.
The Chair: Neither has the Library of Parliament committee, sir.
Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Don't count my chickens before they're hatched--please!
The Chair: Okay. Who would like to give a motion to approve the budget? It is moved by Anita. Do we have a seconder? Wendy.
(Motion agreed to)
The Chair: Perfect; we've almost got Mauril out of here in time.
[Translation]
Madeleine wants to raise a point, briefly.
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: This afternoon, there was a unanimous vote in the House which had a direct bearing on handicapped persons. The odds of this event being highlighted by the media being just about nil, it would be interesting in my opinion that the subcommittee express its satisfaction; it would be a matter of saying that we appreciate the hand up that this gives us to go forward. Tomorrow, if we obtain the unanimous consent of the full committee, we could issue a press release or organize a press conference. People must...
The fact that this motion was passed unanimously does not necessarily imply that things will be easy. That is why I feel that it might be interesting to take advantage of this opportunity which has cropped up. I would like to know what you think.
[English]
The Chair: I think it's a good idea. What's the will of the group? Do you want a communiqué, a press release, just saying how thorough we were? The wording of the motion was to act on our report. We think that's a good thing, right?
Also, on your behalf, even though we didn't exist, I sent a letter to Minister Manley with my concerns about those proposed amendments. So both are totally consistent with the work of this committee.
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: Will we be able to obtain the support of the full committee tomorrow? That would be good. Normally, we should be able to get it. What do you think?
[English]
The Chair: So are you comfortable that the communiqué go out with Bill, and the intent is okay? Do you want to see the actual wording of it? We'll send the wording out. We'll make sure you get it; we'll include everybody's name.
Anybody who has a quote or a sentence about how thrilled they are should just let Bill know--if you have a quote, Wendy or Larry. If anybody gets a sentence with their name next to it to Bill tomorrow, we'll include it in the thing.
[Translation]
Madeleine, do you have a sentence, a quote?
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: The Sub-Committee on the Status of Persons with disabilities is extremely pleased with the unanimous motion which was passed today, which recognizes on the one hand the role of the State in the lives of handicapped persons and the importance of a serious follow-up...
Prepare something and I will revise it.
The Chair: And if you want a personal word, we have a brief quote from Ms. Dalphond-Guiral.
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: So Bill, does that suit you?
Mr. Bill Young: Yes, as ever.
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: As ever, fine. Things are always fine, even when they are not.
I think we absolutely have to do this, we cannot act as though nothing had happened.
The Chair: It is fantastic.
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: So that was my good idea for today.
The Chair: Yes, it is a little bit of behind-the-scenes work,
[English]
behind the scenes.
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: Yes, that is it.
[English]
The Chair: How many can come tomorrow morning?
[Translation]
Ms. Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral: It is at 11 o'clock, is it not? I am going to be there. I have a committee beforehand...
[English]
The Chair: Larry, who'll be there from...?
¼ (1810)
Mr. Larry Spencer (Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, Canadian Alliance): I'm filling in for Reid this week because he's somewhere else.
The Chair: But you'll be at HRDC tomorrow morning?
Mr. Larry Spencer: Yes.
The Chair: Great. Room 209 at 11 a.m.
Ms. Wendy Lill: That's right.
The Chair: As I said yesterday in the House, this is the best of Parliament. I just can't thank you all enough. No matter how much of a circus it is around this place, we have these little gems that work and focus on the content and what is in the best interests of Canadians. We just hope it's the beginning of a movement.
The only other thing on the CPP disability promotional item, in terms of our caucuses and our research bureaus, is whether between now and the launch, if Joe.... He said if we want it to come to the caucus, or whatever, that would be fine. The other thing is selling it to our colleagues.
One of the things I talked to our Ontario caucus about this morning was that a lot of people have drawers full of bad cases, where we're not actually able to help the person. But we might, as members of Parliament, have our constituency assistants at least call those people and say, “We can't help you with your file, but would you help us fill out this issue poll, or help us get the rules changed? It is our job to try to get the rules changed. We can't help in your particular case because you don't meet the criteria, but if you think you should have met the criteria, we need you to help us change the rules.” That's sort of what the job of members of Parliament is, and we could do that.
So we need a motion to continue the CPP disability study.
Mr. Tony Tirabassi (Niagara Centre, Lib.): I so move.
(Motion agreed to)
The Chair: Joe.
Mr. Joseph Peters: We'll send you a link to the test site so you can have a look at things, with some explanation. We'll try to get that out to you later tomorrow.
The Chair: Great. Thanks so much.
The meeting is adjourned.