NRGO Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON NATURAL RESOURCES AND GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES RESSOURCES NATURELLES ET DES OPÉRATIONS GOUVERNEMENTALES

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, February 16, 1999

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[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Brent St. Denis (Algoma—Manitoulin, Lib.)): We'll call to order the Tuesday, February 16, 1999, meeting of the Standing Committee on Natural Resources and Government Operations.

We are pleased to have with us today the Honourable Lyle Vanclief, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-food, and with him Ms. Michelle Comeau, Associate Deputy Minister. For the record, the minister is here to follow up the government's response to the Think Rural! report. The Think Rural! report was prepared by this committee in the last Parliament.

I know, Mr. Vanclief, you're under some time pressure to be out of here for about 1 p.m. Without any further ado, we'll invite you to start and we'll have questions thereafter. Thank you, sir.

Hon. Lyle Vanclief (Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and committee members, and I thank you for the opportunity to come and share some of the work that has been done. A lot of that work certainly was instigated by the study and report done by this committee, and we'd like to share that with you.

It's a subject that's close to all of our hearts—rural Canada. As we know, our country is a very, very large one, and by far the majority of the area of Canada is easily referred to as rural, and about one-third of the population of Canada is living in that area.

The timing of this meeting is very appropriate. We've come to the end of the first year of the Canadian rural partnership, and it's a good time to review what we've done and look at what we're planning to do next. Again, I want to thank you and acknowledge the work that has been done by the previous members of this committee in preparing the Think Rural! report.

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The fact that I come today with the mandate of minister of coordinating rural affairs is, in part, a direct result of that work. My appointment by the Prime Minister in June 1997 was as Minister of Agriculture and Agri-food. Since that time my appointment has been increased to coordinating minister at the cabinet table for rural affairs, and certainly that was one of the recommendations of that Think Rural! report.

There were 37 recommendations in Think Rural!, and I'm pleased to say that through the Canadian rural partnership, or the CRP, as we refer to it, the government has taken action on almost all of them. Of the 37 recommendations we have, we have already or are taking action on 31. Five of the remaining six require additional policy considerations, which we will pursue as part of the work of the Canadian rural partnership.

The last recommendation in the report suggests an annual meeting of federal-provincial ministers responsible for rural development. We'll take a good look at this as well, with the respective ministers in the provinces.

You will recall that the Canadian rural partnership was announced as part of last year's federal budget, with funding of $20 million over four years. I know this is not a huge amount of money, but as rural Canadians told us in the rural dialogue, addressing their issues is not just about more money. I'll return to the rural dialogue later, but I'd like to say more about the Canadian rural partnership first.

The Canadian rural partnership, colleagues, is about doing things differently. It's about listening to rural citizens and shaping our actions to meet their needs better than probably we did in the past. Our goals are to strengthen the economic and social foundation of rural Canada and to reconnect the federal government with rural Canadians. We're doing this through a number of different activities such as conducting pilot projects, improving awareness of federal programs and services and how to access them, strengthening partnerships, implementing the “rural lens”, and engaging rural Canadians through the rural dialogue.

I'd like to review each of these elements, because they are all very important in helping the Government of Canada serve rural Canadians better and reinforcing the links between us.

The first key element of the CRP is our pilot projects program, which is helping us deliver tangible action and dollars at the local level to address issues identified by rural Canadians. These are short-term projects designed to try new and innovative ways of meeting the needs of rural Canadians. We plan to evaluate their success and then replicate the best projects in other communities.

An arm's-length selection advisory committee reviewed all the project proposals and recommended the ones that best met our criteria. The projects all demonstrate partnerships of some sort, whether with rural stakeholder groups, rural and remote communities, the private sector, or other levels of government. Many of these projects are in the various resource areas of the rural economy.

For example, in Nova Scotia, Fisheries and Oceans are working with first nations to ensure that land and sea resources are protected for future generations. In Quebec, Natural Resources Canada is a partner on a project to ensure the sustainability of Anticosti Island's resources. In Alberta, the PFRA is partnering with the rural communities on developing a woodlot inventory, and Industry Canada is sponsoring a geographic information system initiative that will provide communities, the industry, and government with key planning data. And in British Columbia, Human Resources Development is helping local fishing communities find new sources of economic viability.

We had allocated $3.2 million for projects in the first year, but we got so many good project proposals that we ended up investing $3.8 million in 68 projects. This money has allowed us to leverage almost $10 million in addition. So it's a big investment overall. Even though the CRP doesn't have a big pot of dollars, the projects do have an impact locally. This is one initiative we definitely plan to continue.

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The second key element of the Canadian rural partnership is improving the awareness of and access to programs and services of the federal government. Canadians in rural and remote communities are demanding better access to information. We received confirmation of this when, in the rural dialogue, we asked rural Canadians how programs and services could better assist them. More than 40% of the respondents replied that providing better access is something the federal government could do.

One initiative that we have created to address this concern is the rural exhibits program, which is taking information about federal programs and services to rural Canadians in their own backyards. We have now visited more than 250 communities across Canada—mostly small and remote ones—in the last two years. In addition, we've put together the rural resource handbook, which covers 200 federal programs, resources and services. Every member of Parliament received a copy. At the request of members of Parliament, the original ones were binders, and also at the request of MPs we produced a pocket directory version of the resource book.

I know you've all seen them, and I'm sure you have all handed a number of those out. If not, you have received them, so please make use of them, because your constituents will find them very useful.

Another issue the rural dialogue brought to our attention is that the government doesn't always present information in a user-friendly way. What we did with the pocket directory was organize it around needs rather than departments and programs. I think you will find that very useful.

The 1998 pocket directory was distributed through MPs, through the federal network of offices across the country, and through the rural exhibits program. The 1999 edition is now being planned. The resource book and other information about the Canadian rural partnership is also available on the Internet, at our CRP web site. Of course, I realize that not everyone in rural and remote areas has access to the Internet, so we don't rely on that alone. Nonetheless, this is still a good way to make information available for many rural communities.

It is interesting to note that in the rural dialogue, rural Canadians clearly saw a role for the federal government in providing information and expertise. We just have to do a better job.

Partnership is the third key aspect of the Canadian rural partnership. Our goal is to form partnerships with rural stakeholders and other levels of government. We've made a start in this area by working with organizations such as Solidarité rurale du Québec and the recently created Ontario Rural Council, but we want to do more.

Closer to home, we are building partnerships within the federal government. We created the Interdepartmental Working Committee on Rural and Remote Canada to make sure the federal government takes a coordinated approach to rural issues. It started with just eight departments in the fall of 1996, but has grown to 26 organizations in that interdepartmental working group today. We're doing the same sort of thing at the local level by creating rural teams in each province and territory, with a new one being planned for Nunavut. These teams are developing links directly with rural Canadians and with other levels of government.

The fourth key element of the CRP is the rural lens. This came out of a promise in our 1997 Speech from the Throne, but it owes its origins to the Think Rural! report. That report said the federal government's policy should “take into account the unique challenges faced by rural Canadians”. The rural lens puts us in the shoes of rural Canadians, allowing us to see issues from their perspective. The objective is to look at new policies and programs to ensure, before they are implemented, that they will assist rural Canadians.

This initiative has struck a chord with rural Canadians. They believe it's about time, and that it is going to make a difference. It is still too early to assess the results of the rural lens, but I would note that when the finance minister ruled on the proposed bank mergers, for example, he definitely took into account the impact on rural communities. His colleagues in both the Liberal Party and the opposition can vouch for how the views of rural Canada have been expressed on those types of issues.

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Our fifth key activity was the rural dialogue. The rural dialogue engaged rural citizens in a discussion about their future so that we could better understand the challenges they face, and so that we could identify ways to better respond to their needs. We wanted to get the grassroots input from rural and remote communities. We distributed 27,000 rural dialogue workbooks to individuals and groups. We set up a toll-free line with real operators, not voice mail.

An hon. member: Hear, hear!

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: We held 33 facilitated workshops across Canada. I invited all MPs to take part in the rural dialogue, and I'm pleased that some did. Some even held their own workshops. If you add together the workshop participants and the people who sent in a workbook—and many of them were group submissions—about 7,000 rural Canadians took part in that rural dialogue. I can tell you that very few of those types of consultations in this country have involved that many Canadians.

This process wound up with a national rural workshop at the beginning of October 1998, in Quinte West. More than 200 rural Canadians gathered to review what we heard during the dialogue and to begin shaping the outline of the federal government's rural policy. The meetings are over, but the dialogue will continue in a variety of ways to make sure the federal government stays close to rural Canadians. For example, we have set up an Internet-based online discussion group. In addition, we are now moving to take action on issues that were raised in the rural dialogue.

So what did rural Canadians tell us in the rural dialogue? They sent messages that are important for all parliamentarians and all governments to consider. They are extremely concerned about jobs, particularly opportunities for young people. They are worried about rural health care. They are also worried about education skills and infrastructure, including everything from roads to telecommunications, particularly in the more remote areas.

I'm pleased to tell you that the federal government is already responding to some of those rural needs. For example, the government has developed the youth employment strategy and the millennium scholarship. Health Canada has named an executive director of rural health. Industry Canada's community access program will bring the information highway to 5,000 rural and remote communities. These are some of the ways in which the government is responding to the needs of rural Canadians, but we need to do more. The rural dialogue has given us greater insight into how other federal programs might be effectively focused on rural issues.

Rural Canadians used the rural dialogue to tell us about their key issues and concerns. Some of these aren't new. What is new, however, is the strong message they're sending about how governments do business. This is not necessarily about more money, and they made that very clear. Rural Canadians are telling us to do things differently. For example, they're telling us to involve rural communities in designing programs and services. They're telling us to be more flexible in how we apply our programs. As an example—and I often state this—governments may have a policy or a program, but in most cases it would likely have to be delivered differently in Montreal than it is in a rural community in Saskatchewan, Newfoundland, or wherever the case might happen to be. I draw the comparison that, as parents, we want to get all of our children to the same place, but we know full well that we may have to treat them differently as individuals in order to get them there; we may have to approach them in different ways.

Rural Canadians were also telling us to be present and visible in their communities, and they were telling us to work better with other levels of government. They want us to follow up and work with them to implement solutions. It came through very loud and clear that the success will be greater if things start from the bottom up, and if governments act as facilitators and catalysts. This may be a challenge, but it's also an opportunity, colleagues. Their overall message to us was to listen more closely to rural concerns, which is exactly what we are doing. At the national rural workshop, they told us that these were the right issues. They did not simply ask for more money. They did develop a set of guiding principles that are reproduced for you on slide 12 of the handout.

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Now that we have gone out and asked rural Canadians to tell us about their challenges and priorities, our next step is to show we have an action plan to address their concerns. The rural dialogue gave us a broadly based foundation on which we can develop federal actions that respond to the needs of Canadians in rural and remote areas.

We are now moving from dialogue to action based on what we heard. We will keep on doing the things we have done that have worked well: the pilot projects, the outreach activities, applying the rural lens, and creating partnerships. I've touched on a few of the things we've done, but as I said, there are still lots more things to do. Take my word for it, we will do more. The government is committed to seeing this through.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman and members, I'd like to thank you again for the contributions this committee has made. I look forward to continuing to work with you for rural and remote Canadians.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Minister, for that.

Because of the time constraints—the minister has to be out about 1 p.m.—we're going to start with John Duncan and then go over to Benoît, and then I have Yvon.

Did you have a question, Pierre?

Mr. Pierre de Savoye (Portneuf, BQ): Of course, I always have a question.

The Chairman: I will try to keep members within five minutes.

John, please go first.

Mr. John Duncan (Vancouver Island North, Ref.): Thank you for coming before us, Mr. Minister.

This is a broad subject. I come from a rural riding. In terms of the solicitation you've done, there are obviously a lot of things identified, but there are some very real problems out there that are not identified. They tend to be problems dealing with things like the EI regulations and things like payments related to the immigration process. These are certainly highly applicable within my area, and they discriminate against people in rural and remote communities.

An example would be that as part of the immigration process now, one must send money to Sherbrooke, I believe. The closest bank on Vancouver Island is in Nanaimo, which is hours away. This is not abundantly clear, the closest bank that is part of this interlink process. If you go to any other bank, it's not allowed, because of the rules of Immigration Canada. So when we run into these kinds of rules that don't make any sense and we try to present this to the bureaucracy, we find them very non-responsive within those departments.

My question is, when we run into real problems like this that require a major significant bureaucratic shift, a change in the rules, do we have a rural advocate? How do you cut through all this to try to fix it? That would apply to my immigration example.

The employment insurance example is that I have two communities at the end of 50 kilometres of gravel road. They're resource dependent and they're somewhat seasonal in employment pattern. When people end up under the new rules seeking EI, they basically are told they must seek employment and prove it, and in the only way they can do that they have at least a two-hour drive, half of which is gravel, and they're not in a financial circumstance where they can do that. Either we're going to decimate and deplete those communities, or we're going to somehow make a special case for them. Who do we go to? Where do we start? It becomes very frustrating for somebody in my circumstance to try to deal with it.

I'll just leave it at that.

The Chairman: Thank you. If we have time, John, we'll come back.

Mr. Minister.

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Mr. Lyle Vanclief: I'll comment briefly, John.

As I said in my presentation, one of my roles at cabinet, as a cabinet minister, is to be the advocate. I can tell you it was no difficulty for me to be the advocate of rural Canada. Before that was added to my mandate, I can tell you clearly I was doing it anyway, as were other cabinet ministers there. I've spent my full 55 years in rural Canada, and I know full well many of the issues and the concerns that are there.

When it comes to the specific issues such as EI or immigration payment facilities, which you mentioned, I know you're not bashful in pointing those out to the respective ministers. It's not that I can always get the answer all of us want, but I urge you to make sure that as many of us know as possible, so that we can clearly point out to cabinet colleagues how some of these things can affect rural Canada.

For example, I find it very interesting that from what you're saying there's only one bank, I understand in a fairly large area, that can participate in the payments for immigrants. I don't know what the reason is for that, whether there is a logical reason or whether it's just an illogical reason. So if you want to point these out, we will do all we possibly can to get clarification and work with that.

I've never lived for any great length of time, other than being here in Ottawa for the last 10 years as an MP, in an urban area—none, other than that. I can't understand, naturally, because I haven't been there, I haven't done that, I haven't walked there on a day-to-day basis. We need to point out those peculiarities.

So I'll do my best as far as the EI is concerned. That gets us into the debate of how do we handle special rules for special communities, or where's the division line you fall into or wouldn't fall into? But I appreciate your point.

Mr. John Duncan: I have a short comment and not a question. Very often the bureaucrats we're dealing with on a regional basis fully sympathize and want the rules changed as well, but it's very difficult for them to want to identify themselves, unfortunately, as being a proponent of whatever we're trying to promote. So we have to get past that.

The Chairman: Thank you, John.

Benoît Serré, please.

Mr. Benoît Serré (Timiskaming—Cochrane, Lib.): Merci beaucoup, monsieur le président.

Thank you, Mr. Minister, for being with us this morning. My only regret is that we have only an hour. I certainly hope, Mr. Chairman, that we ask the minister to come back in the near future—and I'm not talking a year down the road, I'm talking the next two months—because there are so many issues in the report that are important not only to me but to all rural Canadians. I think we should at least have another two-hour session to go through some of these issues.

I have a thousand questions this morning, Mr. Chairman, but I'll restrict my comments and questions to the rural telecommunications infrastructure.

I'll start on a positive note. I think that to your credit, Mr. Minister, we've made progress in leaps and bounds in the last couple of years in terms of putting a rural lens to all issues affecting rural Canada.

Having said that, I'll turn critical very quickly. I think that rural Canada has been neglected so much in the last 20 years that even with the policy we've come up with in the last couple of years we're still years and years behind the rest of the country in many different aspects, but particularly in the aspect of telecommunications.

As we all know, the new jobs are being created in the information sector, the high-tech information area, and rural Canada has been left behind. Unfortunately, we're 10 months away from the year 2000 and in my riding we're still in the 1950s. I look at your response to the different recommendations on the infrastructure, and particularly as it relates to the telecommunications infrastructure, and it states here that the phone companies have committed that by the year 2000 virtually all remaining power lines will be phased out. It makes me laugh. I have been working on that issue for the last two years, and almost everywhere I have hit my head against a brick wall. Everybody is trying to pass the buck to the other department.

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I finally met last week with the Minister of Industry, after about six months of trying to get a meeting going with him and department officials. I have met with the CRTC about six or seven times. I have met with all different groups...Bell Canada, and I'm having another meeting with them next week and in two weeks.

The reality is that in my riding alone, Timiskaming-Cochrane, there are 5,000 people still on party lines, and if we cannot access the information highway, there are no jobs. The rest of these issues are almost irrelevant, because something like 80% of jobs are created in that sector.

I have probably 50% of all the dairy farmers in northern Ontario in my riding, yet half of them don't have a private telephone line. They're trying to run a multi-million dollar business, but they cannot have a fax machine and they cannot hook onto the Internet.

My point is this. We are always trying to get private enterprise to do it, and I take exception to some of the statements here, such as that the CRTC has found that there is currently no affordability problem in rural areas. Well, to bring the private telephone line service into my riding and to pass that cost on to the consumer would be about $100 a month if they wish to recover their investment in 20 years. It's impossible.

We, as rural Canadians, have shared in our resources. Of all the exports in this country, 62% are rural-based—agriculture, mining, forestry. We've made Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver rich, yet we don't have the necessary.... I think there is a responsibility for all Canadians to share so that rural Canada has those services, and there is a responsibility for the federal government to make sure it does happen.

The response I get from different departments, different ministers, is, well, it's private enterprise, and we cannot force them. I'm sorry, I don't agree with that. I think we have a role.

I know the CRTC is a quasi-judicial body. It's very difficult for a minister to intervene directly. But if that's the case, let's change the rules; let's change the CRTC and make sure rural Canada gets into the 21st century like the rest of the country—and I'm sorry, it won't happen in ten months.

My question is, what is your department, in charge of rural economic development, going to do to expedite this whole process?

I have participated in the CRTC hearings. I know they're conducting hearings all over the country, in the high-cost servicing areas. I have made recommendations, and I'm optimistic that they'll come up with something that will address these issues when they bring their report in May or June. But again, we're looking at two, three, four or five years down the road, and quite honestly, people in my riding and in rural Canada are not ready to wait another four or five years.

Again, my question is, what is the minister in charge of rural economic development willing to do to expedite this whole process and help rural Canada in that regard?

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Ben, I'm going to be very frank and honest with you, as I have been before.

What I can do is continue the type of pressure that you have been putting on the government, on the CRTC, and so on. I can't in all honesty give you any different answers. I can't sit here today and say it's going to happen. The message is there; it's loud and clear. I suppose the only way for it to happen otherwise is for a government to work with the provinces, or federally, or however it might work, and set the priority and say that they're going to take x number of dollars and do it on behalf of or for the telecommunications companies, or whatever.

I continually stress, and when discussions come up about connecting Canadians I continually remind my colleagues and will continue to remind my colleagues, that we shouldn't talk about connecting Canadians if we have some Canadians who can't connect, and the importance of that in rural Canada.

All I can say is that I will work with everybody to keep all the pressure on that we can. I think that's the best answer I can give.

Mr. Benoît Serré: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you for that, Mr. Minister.

I will go to Pierre, then Gerry, and then Yvon.

Mr. de Savoye, please.

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[Translation]

Mr. Pierre de Savoye: I want to follow up on what my colleague Benoît Serré said. I won't repeat what he said, but I will give you additional arguments which you can use to put some pressure on Cabinet and in particular on the ministers of Industry and Canadian Heritage, since the CRTC reports to Canadian Heritage.

Party lines are in fact a problem, but they're not the only problem. There is also the monthly cost of business lines to consider. Two years ago, Bell Canada applied to the CRTC to set a uniform rate of $47 for business lines and its application was approved. One year ago, however, the CRTC revoked this decision. Now people are requesting different rates. Customers in rural areas pay more for a business line than urban dwellers. The message being sent to businesses is clear: leave rural areas and set up shop in the city. Young people and workers are heeding the message, leaving behind the older generation.

Electricity rates are the same, regardless of whether a person lives in the country or in the city. Drivers pay the same for license plates, regardless of whether the live in the country or in the city. However, when it comes to phone rates, rural customers pay more and this increased cost impedes economic expansion.

Moreover, in terms of basic infrastructures, telephone lines are not the most suitable carrier of information technology. Television cables are more suited to the transmission of massive amounts of data, for example, over the Internet. The problem is that in rural communities, there aren't enough telephone lines in some areas and most of these communities don't have access to cable, because it would be too costly to provide. However, other technologies such as microwave and satellite transmission could bring about rural development. But of course, all of this costs money.

Furthermore, when Bell Canada or other telephone companies lay fibre optic cables between large urban centres, all users ultimately pick up the tab. Why then wouldn't all users ultimately pick up the tab for bringing these advanced communication technologies to rural areas?

On a final note, my riding is no exception. In some areas within the municipality, callers must pay long distance charges simply to contact city hall. We are not talking here about a great distance, only about 10 kilometres or so. In many rural areas, subscribers cannot call the large urban centres without incurring long distance charges. Let me again use my riding as an example. It is home to three major municipalities. Residents of these three municipalities can call Quebec City without incurring long distance charges, but not someone in one of the riding's other towns. How do you think that affects development? Businesses are more likely to have dealings with the large urban centre, rather than focus on rural development. That's only one examples and I have many others.

The regulations governing long distance charges, which date back to 1980 and are stringently enforced by the CRTC, state that the volume of calls placed between two centres must reach a certain level before long-distance charges can be abolished. Here we see the reverse phenomenon occurring. Because of the long- distance charges that apply, the number of calls never reaches the level required to do away with such charges. Instead of accurately reflecting the situation, the regulations artificially change it. These outdated, 20-year-old regulations are counter- productive and the CRTC needs to revise them.

However, the CRTC isn't the one who passes laws or adopts regulations. That is Parliament's responsibility and Cabinet should take the initiative in this area. These are a few interesting points that you can bring up with the Industry Minister.

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[English]

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Thank you very much. I appreciate your emphasizing the challenges in rural Canada. I'm not diminishing them at all, as far as the telecommunications go. But I want to share with you some interesting comments I had privately and otherwise at the workshop we had last fall.

A number of people there very clearly stated to me that there are some challenges and some services they would like to have and don't have in rural Canada that are provided and available to their city cousins, but one of the reasons they live in rural Canada is because they want that. I was on a planning board in my township and county for a long time, and one of the things people kept saying to us—and this wasn't specific to telecommunications—was “Don't let this area develop so much that it's a different area from what we came to.”

I recognize the need for more than just the basic telecommunications that are there. I also recognize the problems of boundaries and long distance. There's always going to be a boundary someplace where it's going to cost you long distance to call your neighbour. If not, there would be no boundaries anywhere in Canada for that. You stated very clearly there is this density rule for them.

It behooves us all to continue what we're doing, and I think collectively we're doing better than we have ever done before. There will likely always be gravel roads in rural Canada, and four-, six- and eight-lane highways where there's higher-density population. But if there are good telecommunications facilities there, a lot of that can be overcome because people can connect in that way, shape or form. It's going to take continued pressure and pointing out to the CRTC and others that it needs to change and needs to move more quickly.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

Gerry Byrne and then Yvon.

Mr. Gerry Byrne (Humber—St. Barbe—Baie Verte, Lib.): Thank you, Minister, for appearing before our committee.

I have just a couple of issues. If I'm correct in my assumptions, one of the roles of the secretariat is to research and analyse rural issues, determine the strengths or weaknesses from a public policy perspective, and provide advice to you as the lead minister for rural Canada, as well as to cabinet on rural issues. Is that correct?

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Yes. I would say their role is probably more than two-faceted, but one of the first things we had to do is the type of process we've gone through in the last year or so, and that's research and consultation. The next one is development.

I go back to the three simple questions I ask, and that I think we all subconsciously ask and act upon on any issue, even within the next 10 or 15 seconds—what, so what, and now what? What? You assess what the situation is. So what? Do we want to do something about it? And then from there we ask, now what? I think we clearly have a good handle on what the situation is. I think we clearly know the “so what”, but the big challenge and the opportunity is to now deal with the “now what”—how to address it and how quickly we can address it.

Mr. Gerry Byrne: Is that what you said? Just kidding.

There are a couple of issues I'm really interested in. One is the issue of migration. From the work in the rural communities, the rural dialogue, two things in particular were pointed out as being main community challenges. One is the issue of youth unemployment and the other is the issue of out-migration.

It's no surprise to me that youth unemployment from a rural perspective is particularly significant. It's difficult enough to start a prosperous business in rural Canada if you're an extremely adept and experienced entrepreneur, let alone a brand-new young entrepreneur. Is it possible to ask the rural secretariat if they could provide some further analysis on the issue of youth unemployment as it relates to rural Canada, just a background document with statistics and a discussion about the implications, that sort of thing?

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Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Yes.

Mr. Gerry Byrne: Youth unemployment does not catch me off guard, but what does is, nationally speaking, out-migration from rural Canada.

Mr. Larry McCormick (Hastings—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, Lib.): You should be quite familiar with that, Gerry.

Mr. Gerry Byrne: I'm not unfamiliar with it from the point of view of rural Newfoundland and Labrador, but I didn't realize that it was a national issue in that other agricultural and coastal areas of the country had experienced significant out-migration.

Is it possible to ask the rural secretariat to do a statistical or demographic overview of the nature of the problem in a quantitative and qualitative context, but mostly from a quantitative point of view?

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Yes, we'll do our best.

Mr. Gerry Byrne: Okay. The final issue is that the rural strategy and documentation—and I think my friends in the rural caucus would agree with this—has a heavy agricultural bent, which represents, I think, the most significant aspect of rural Canada from a size point of view relative to the problems.

Is there any kind of discussion of coastal communities within the federal or rural strategy? Could you, Minister, provide us with some information about what you see as the major challenges for coastal communities?

I'll start again. There is a bit of a dichotomy in that rural Canada has significant problems that are different and unique compared with urban Canada. I'm a strong advocate of the point of view that within rural Canada there's a bit of a dichotomy between agricultural areas and coastal fishing areas. I see a lot of effort on the agricultural issues, and I think my colleagues and I would agree that more effort has to be made, but I see a little bit of a vacuum in terms of the coastal communities' point of view. Could you, Mr. Minister, comment about that and enlighten us as to whether there are specific measures within the package?

The Chairman: Thank you, Gerry.

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Another role of the rural secretariat, as I mentioned in my comments, is research and development. The other very important role is the coordination—and I know we're doing a better job than we did, but we can always improve—of different agencies and different ministries so that the right hand knows what the left hand is doing. I can tell you that there has been more than one issue come before cabinet where I've spoken up and asked, are we going to take a look how this will affect rural Canada and what it will do?

The other challenge we have, which I mention in every presentation I make, is that because I happen to be the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and the rural secretariat is there, it leads some people to believe the rural secretariat only deals with agriculture. I make it very clear that, yes, rural Canada is agriculture, but it's also forestry, fishing, mining, tourism, etc. More and more in this country we have fewer communities that are involved only in fishing, only in mining, or only in agriculture, and our challenge is to get those communities and the residents of those communities to harmonize and mix and mingle, because probably any involvement in any one of those sectors is not going to be as sustainable as others.

For example, Gerry, there were sixty-eight pilot projects, and I'll give you a breakdown: eleven of them were on skills development, nine on access to information services, six in fisheries, seven in forestry, two in agriculture, seven in tourism, fourteen in economic development, five in technology, and then there were mix and mingles of seven others. We and the selection committee recognized that in rural Canada there's a lot.

Just to go on and break it down as to the number of projects, ten were involved with youth, and eleven were involved with aboriginals. Unfortunately, there was only one project chosen that you could say was mainly involved with women. So that's a breakdown there.

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With regard to the other things you've asked, we will do our best to put those together. We've had discussions in the interdepartmental group about the fishing communities you referred to, so that is already at the discussion level as well.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

[Translation]

Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin (Acadie—Bathurst, NDP): Good afternoon. It is a pleasure to meet with you today in Ottawa in your capacity as minister responsible for rural communities and as someone who is working hard to understand the problems these communities face. Coming from a rural area myself, I think I have a fair understanding of these problems.

A number of my constituents earn their living fishing, a way of life which is now being eclipsed. It's not only my riding that is affected, but the entire Atlantic region. In my riding, this as translated into a loss of $69 million in employment insurance earnings. Therefore, as you can see, this community is dealing with a shortfall. I am very pleased to see that you are open to job creation in rural communities.

Further to what my colleague Mr. Benoît said, in terms of high technology, we did get everything we possibly could during the McKenna era, but that hasn't worked. Currently, as a result of the closure of the fishery, 46 per cent of the population of the Acadian peninsula is out of work and receiving EI benefits.

If I understood you correctly, you stated that you are there to provide the necessary tools, not to give handouts. Well, let me tell you that back home, people don't have any money. What should we do? Forget about them? It's all fine and well to educate people and to take certain initiatives, but people need money.

Problems have arisen as a result of the economic development and training agreement signed by the Government of New Brunswick and Canada. I am curious as to the exact role of the federal government in agriculture. What can your department do to help residents of a region like mine? Perhaps we should refocus our efforts on agriculture. Since we can no longer rely on the fishery, maybe agriculture or some other sector represents our hope for the future. We need to consider other economic development options. We need to find solutions, otherwise we're going to find ourselves in a very big hole indeed.

The people back home tell me that they want to take up farming and blueberry growing again. They are also considering several other projects. Will your resources be used solely to set up committees, or will you actually be going to these communities and helping people start up new farming initiatives?

[English]

The Chairman: Thank you, Yvon.

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: I will comment on the last part first. If we're looking for grants to individual producers to start up in business, I don't see the government moving in that direction. I'll take, for example, your comment about blueberries. If there are people in your area who are interested in the feasibility of blueberry farming, it is challenging but can be very successful. The reputation of Canadian blueberries around the world is second to none. They're highly regarded.

There has been a lot of work in this area. It's certainly an area on which the federal government and the provincial government can provide information in the form of seminars or whatever for those who may be interested in that type of thing. They can talk to them about the resources they need, and whether the soil conditions, market possibilities, feasibilities and those types of things are there.

I don't think you're asking our government to say to individual producers—and I know I'm simplifying it—“Here's x number of dollars. Go into blueberry production.” It would be extremely difficult to provide that and wouldn't be fair to anyone.

Agriculture is a shared jurisdiction with the provinces and communities, so whether they are on agriculture or whatever, some of the pilot projects can be very useful. There's a role here for financial institutions. There's a role here for the Farm Credit Corporation. There's a lot of resources and information out there. And yes, I agree that a major role for government is to work with communities and say, okay, unfortunately this resource is gone or this industry is gone; what do we have here, and what can we do with what we have here?

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The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Minister.

It's one o'clock. I do have on my list Larry McCormick and Gerald. I'm not sure if you have five minutes—

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: I have five minutes, sure.

The Chairman: If you gentlemen can make your points quickly, the minister will comment.

Larry, really quickly.

Mr. Larry McCormick: Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Minister, nothing will be more important than the rural lens, as long as it's tied in with everything else, because of the second-class citizens who live in Canada. Now, I'm sure the budget today will give every ministry enough money to help all Canadians.

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: [Editor's Note: Inaudible] ...I did.

Mr. Larry McCormick: But I'll tell you, now we need the political will, besides from your department, to put a small percentage of that money into rural Canada.

I just want to mention one thing here. There are a thousand things we could mention, but if we talk about the outposts and the rural communities, let's always remember those post offices as we're looking at ways to use our federal resources—they are in almost all communities—where we might disseminate information and provide some help and services. I think you could take leadership in some way to look at it.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Chairman: Thank you, Larry.

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: Could I ask that the three people make their comments. It's very important that I hear their comments, and then we can either addresses them later or—

The Chairman: I was going to suggest the very same thing.

Gerald, if you don't mind, be really quick, and then John is next.

Mr. Gerald Keddy (South Shore, PC): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I appreciate that comment, Mr. Minister.

In regard to Larry's comment, that's something I think most of us overlook. We already have a federal institution in most rural communities in Nova Scotia, whether those are farming communities or forestry communities, and it certainly could be utilized to do a lot more. It's a very pertinent comment.

I have two points and one question.

The first point is on the statistics on the demographics of the people living in rural communities versus urban communities. I live in a very small rural community, and the feeling is very much “us and them”, that the rules and regulations come down from the urban centres to the rural communities and that we have to live by them.

I think it's worth noting that you mentioned one-third of the people live in rural Canada. But I'd be very interested in knowing the statistics of how many people living in urban centres are one generation or, at the most, two generations removed from rural Canada. I think you'd be very surprised by the statistics, that the points of rural Canada resonate well in urban Canada.

The question is specifically on taxation treatment. Section 16 states that “including the natural resource industries, is conducive to investment and consistent with the objectives of sustainable development”, which is a term that I think we all sometimes hear too much of. But the tax regime is not set up to favour rural Canadians, especially in woodlot ownership. There's no way in the tax regime you can utilize your forestry maintenance practices against your work.

I'm hurrying, and I'll say thank you very much.

The Chairman: Thank you, Gerald.

John, really quickly.

Mr. John Duncan: Gerald is actually on the same issue as I wanted to bring up, which is that for private landowners who want to tree farm, federal tax treatment is discriminatory as opposed to the treatment for those who are taking off an agricultural crop. There was a federal task force in the early 1990s from Natural Resources Canada that recommended this discriminatory treatment stop, and it has never been acted upon.

I'm trying to raise the issue, just as Gerald has put it back on the radar screen. That needs to happen. The way it is now, Revenue Canada will actually give you favourable tax treatment if you take the crop off only once in your ownership life. If you try to take it off in a sustainable way, you are penalized. So that needs to be addressed.

That's it. It needs to be addressed.

The Chairman: Thank you, John.

Back to you, Mr. Minister, to make your concluding remarks. Then we'll let you get off to your other business.

Mr. Lyle Vanclief: I appreciate everybody's comments very much, Mr. Chairman.

In reference to the last one on woodlots, it's my understanding that Minister Goodale, the Minister of Natural Resources, is having a discussion along those lines—now, how involved it is or the details of it I don't know—with provincial colleagues. So we'll follow up and keep making our points.

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Mr. Chairman, and committee, thank you very much for the opportunity to come here.

The Chairman: And on behalf of all us, thank you, Mr. Vanclief.

We'll call this February 16 meeting adjourned.