INST Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON INDUSTRY, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE L'INDUSTRIE, DES SCIENCES ET DE LA TECHNOLOGIE

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Tuesday, October 2, 2001

• 0903

[English]

The Clerk of the Committee: Honourable members, I see a quorum. Your first item of business is to elect the chair.

[Translation]

Are there any motions to this effect?

[English]

Mr. Walt Lastewka (St. Catharines, Lib.): I'd like to nominate Sue Whelan for chair of the industry committee.

The Clerk: Sue Whelan has been nominated for chair of this committee. Are there any other nominations?

Congratulations.

The Chair (Ms. Susan Whelan (Essex, Lib.)): Thank you very much.

I now would like to move to the election of two vice-chairs.

Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson (Peace River, Canadian Alliance): I'd like to nominate Walt Lastewka.

The Chair: Mr. Penson nominates Mr. Lastewka to be a vice-chair for the first position.

And for the second position of vice-chair?

Mr. Walt Lastewka: Madam Chair, I'd like to nominate Charlie Penson as the vice-chair.

The Chair: Seeing no other nominations, I declare both of them duly elected.

• 0905

What I thought we should do this morning, since we're all here, is take a look at future business for the committee. The clerk has prepared what you would call “proposed items for discussion”, and if there's any willingness to proceed, I thought we should have some discussion this morning. They're not in any specific order on the agenda that he's passing around. There may actually be other business that people may bring today. You should be receiving, I think, two pages.

Monsieur Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron (Verchères—Les-Patriotes, BQ): Madam Chair, I don't know if it's somewhat premature to discuss this matter this morning, but before the larger committee proceeds to talk about future business, perhaps it might be a good idea to strike the sub-committee on agenda and procedure. At the very least, this would allow us to do some preliminary work in terms of future business, before ultimately meeting as the larger committee. Moreover, this might save the committee some time. How do you feel about my suggestion?

[English]

The Chair: We actually already have a subcommittee. All the motions from the last one still survive, so we already have one. I just felt since we're here this morning and there are some new members on the committee, it would be imperative everyone be part of the initial discussion.

I just wanted to bring people up to date on what is before us as a committee, what options may be before us. We don't have to make any firm and final decisions this morning.

There is one thing I did want to bring to your attention with regard to Bill C-23, an act to amend the Competition Act and the Competition Tribunal Act. It has been referred to the committee before second reading, which means it has not been adopted yet in principle. This allows for a number of different options on how to deal with Bill C-23.

We may wish to hear from the Commissioner of the Competition Bureau before we make that final decision, and that puts another timeline on it. He would be available to come on Thursday morning; however, he is not available the first week after the break. So I thought we might want to have some preliminary discussions on Bill C-23 today, perhaps hear from the commissioner on Thursday morning, and make a final decision as to how we wish to proceed.

There are several options that should be coming to you. One of them would be to look strictly at Bill C-23 as it is, with no further discussion outside of it. The other option would be to look at getting responses from the different witnesses who will appear.

For those of you who don't know, this committee did an interim study on the Competition Act. We called it an interim study in June 2000. We've never done the final study. It may be an opportunity to finish that study while we're doing Bill C-23, so we don't have witnesses coming before the committee twice. The other possibility is while we're doing that, if we wanted to take Bill C-23 and look at other issues at the same time, we may have other amendments we wish to make while it is before us. So Bill C-23 is not complex as it is drafted. However, there is a possibility there may be other items we'd like to see in Bill C-23.

We probably should move in camera to deal with the items for the agenda. Is everyone okay with that, or does it matter? No, it doesn't matter? Okay.

Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson: I thought the study we did on competition policy was overtaken by the work that was done by the Public Policy Forum, which led to the bill that's coming forward as Bill C-23. I'm not sure it's necessary to go back to do another study of it. We did hear a lot of witnesses and there were a lot of people who testified before the Public Policy Forum in the summer of 2000.

• 0910

The Chair: Okay. There are a number of people who have already asked to appear on Bill C-23, and the reality is it has been referred to us before second reading, which does mean we could be looking at a large number of other items in the Competition Act, in addition to what's there.

Unfortunately, Mr. McTeague is not here this morning, but he has an issue he would like to have addressed during the study of Bill C-23. I really don't want to speak out of turn, because he's not here, but we have had several discussions.

If you look at our interim study, we knew the Public Policy Forum was going to be conducting their study during the summer months, and we had agreed we would wait until after they had finished theirs to come back and do a final report, which we haven't done. We didn't have an opportunity last fall, nor did we have an opportunity in the spring. So we've left it. It's kind of open-ended.

The most recent opportunity I had on behalf of the committee was to appear before the Competition Bar about two weeks ago. They had a big meeting here in Ottawa. It was raised there that we haven't finished our study as a committee. So there is a feeling out there in the community that this committee has not finished its work, and I just felt there's an opportuntiy now with Bill C-23 before the committee. We need to define, though, what it is we wish to do.

Mr. Charlie Penson: Can you give the nature of the concerns the people who want to appear before the committee have? Are there any specific issues they want addressed?

The Chair: There are several different items. First of all, some don't think Bill C-23 does address our interim report. There is still some opposition to some things in Bill C-23. There is the issue of private access, which is not addressed at all by Bill C-23. And as we're going to have a number of witnesses before the committee who have expertise in the area of competition, instead of bringing them back three or four months down the road, it may be the time to take a look at these issues at the same time. That's something we'd have to try to define a little more narrowly, because we don't want to open up everything in the Competition Act. Otherwise, we would be here for months and months. Whatever we do, we want to do in a very thorough manner, and give people an opportunity.

There's a letter, as well, from the Minister of Industry. I haven't seen it.

Madam Torsney.

Ms. Paddy Torsney (Burlington, Lib.): In your outstanding issues for consideration in competition, the final sentence of the paragraph reads: “The following issues have been suggested for consideration”. My question is, considered by whom? Whose agenda is this?

The Chair: This is no one's agenda. These are issues that have come up over time, which have not been resolved by the committee. There has been discussion, and we also have a number of witnesses who have asked to appear on Bill C-23.

Ms. Paddy Torsney: Right.

The Chair: So there are a number of outstanding issues that are not resolved in the Competition Act. The process for revising the Competition Act has been somewhat tedious, or slow, in the past. So there's opportunity before us with Bill C-23 to look at some of these issues and make some changes if we so wish. If we don't wish to do that as a committee, then we will proceed with Bill C-23. However, it is before us, before it has been adopted in principle, and that does allow members to ask questions on other issues. It's not for the chair to decide it would be limited in scope to what is Bill C-23. What I'd like to do is try to come to some kind of consensus, if we could—and it doesn't have to be today—on what issues we'd like to discuss under Bill C-23, so we can give some direction to our witnesses.

Our witnesses are asking us what it is we're willing to talk about when it comes to Bill C-23. That's where I'm looking for some direction from the committee.

Mr. Bergeron.

[Translation]

Mr. Stéphane Bergeron: Madam Chair, if I do say so myself, I think it's an excellent suggestion. To the extent that the bill is being preliminarily reviewed by the Industry Committee, I think that if we base ourselves on the preliminary study conducted in June 2000, it might eventually be a sound idea to improve the bill's provisions, as you suggested. We could base ourselves on the suggestions of witnesses and in the process, conduct a much broader review or examination of the Competition Act.

Therefore, Madam Chair, I would tend to be in favour of broadening the scope of our study.

• 0915

[English]

The Chair: Monsieur Drouin, and then Ms. Torsney.

[Translation]

Mr. Claude Drouin (Beauce, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

My initial inclination is to go with Mr. Pearson's idea and complete our review of Bill C-23 quickly. We are mindful that each year, thousands of Canada are defrauded by con men. Therefore, it's important to move quickly on Bill C-23, even if this means we need to meet again to go over the Competition Act. I do feel we should proceed as quickly as possible to consider Bill C-23, if committee members are amenable.

[English]

The Chair: Ms. Torsney.

Ms. Paddy Torsney: I think there's actually a fair bit of consensus here.

Mr. Bergeron talked about hearing witnesses on Bill C-23. If people bring other issues or it needs to be elaborated further, or if there's something that needs to be changed based on their testimony, we have that capacity.

Beyond Bill C-23, there could be other things that other people want to address with us, and I think that should be examined when we have that testimony or if there are people who want us to study something else further or make other changes to the act. But I think in the beginning we should focus fairly narrowly on Bill C-23 and get the best of the witnesses' testimony on that.

If, for some reason, someone comes and testifies on Bill C-23 and sometime later another group starts steering us in another direction, we should make sure that we contact those people again to see if they want to come back or submit some supplementary testimony on something that it appears we might change.

But as somebody said, these issues have been before us for a long time. In fact, the minister references three members of Parliament who have had private member's bills on some of these subjects. Mrs. Redman took over the bill from me because I was a parliamentary secretary—that was a long time ago—and it's now back in my hands because she is a parliamentary secretary. We've been trying to deal with this since two elections ago. So I'd rather do Bill C-23 and get it done, and if there's something else that comes up, we can look at further study.

The Chair: With all due respect, Ms. Torsney, and I don't disagree with you on that, there is another member of this committee who has been very actively involved in the review of the Competition Act as well, and that's Dan McTeague.

Ms. Paddy Torsney: Sure.

The Chair: Mr. McTeague's issues, his private member's bills, were also to be addressed by Bill C-23 and have not been. So there is that issue still outstanding.

I think maybe we should wait until we hear from the commissioner and maybe have the opportunity for everyone to take a look at the analysis that has been done by the researcher on Bill C-23, because we have some new members of this committee who haven't had an opportunity to be part of previous discussions. But with everyone's time constraints involved—that is, the witnesses and ourselves—I'm not sure this committee is willing or has the ability or the time to have witnesses here for three months, up until December, and then have them come back for another three or four months after Christmas—

Ms. Paddy Torsney: Why would they have to?

The Chair: —to finalize our study on the Competition Act, which we haven't done as a committee.

We haven't finished our review of the Competition Act. We've left a number of things open-ended in our interim report, based on what was going to happen from the public policy forum. I think it would be an opportune time when we have witnesses before us, if we have any intention of finishing that study, which I believe we do as a committee, to use their time and ours wisely. So I think we should take a look at that, and if everyone would take an opportunity to review the information....

Has that been sent to their offices?

The Clerk: This is the legislative summary.

The Chair: There was a binder on the competition—

The Clerk: It will be sent to their offices.

The Chair: There is a huge binder on Bill C-23 of information on the Competition Act to which some members won't have had access. There are two binders that will be coming to your offices. They're not here today.

I'm just looking for some consensus that we start with the competition commissioner and then make a decision thereafter.

Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson: I think that's fine. I'd like to hear what he has to say on this issue. But in terms of trying to keep up to private member's bills or some active member who has an agenda for competition, we'll never get there.

• 0920

I don't see it on our work sheet here, but as you will recall, when we were doing the compliance in the drug patent act last year, there was some talk about the need for a study on the notice of compliance. We tried to keep it down to the narrow issue of compliance with the WTO rulings and said we may deal with that later. Is there any pressure or any indication that anybody wants that issue brought before the committee, to study the matter of notice of compliance on regulations in the drug patent act?

The Chair: I haven't had any members of the committee approach me on that issue yet, but we will get to other business as we keep moving along. I'm just trying to deal with—

Mr. Charlie Penson: That's right, but in terms of looking at our overall schedule, if we are going to take on something like that, which is a huge issue, we have to keep in mind that we have been on this Competition Act study for an awful long time, combined with the Public Policy Forum. Maybe we need to finish it off. I don't disagree, but—

The Chair: That was why I wanted to finish it without bringing them back.

Mr. Charlie Penson: —I don't think we should spend a whole lot more time on it.

The Chair: I'm not disagreeing, Mr. Penson. I'm suggesting that we need to finalize our report, and if we're going to have the witnesses here, experts who are going to take time out of their schedule and travel some distance, if we have one or two other questions we want to hear about from them, we might want to do so at that time.

It's not to prolong the study of Bill C-23 but to set a timeframe within which we can work on that and make some decisions.

Madame Desjarlais.

Mrs. Bev Desjarlais (Churchill, NDP): I would agree. It seems rather silly to have them come twice in a matter of so many months. Certainly we should be able to combine it all into the time we have when they appear for this discussion.

The Chair: Okay. Then we'll try to schedule the commissioner for Thursday morning. Maybe after the meeting with him we can make some decisions and give an indication to the witnesses over the break what we would like to hear from them and continue on with Bill C-23 in a relatively orderly fashion. That would make some sense.

There's also a legislative summary that has been distributed on Bill C-23.

If you look at reference number 2, on science and technology, this is again something that we don't have to decide on right today, but I want to raise it with the committee. We did a report that we tabled last June on science and technology. In it, we left a number of things that we wanted to do this fall and in the spring.

In particular, there were the three different studies that we had left or had suggested. One would be the three granting councils, the issue of peer review funding and the Canada research chairs program. The second one was the CFI, the mandate, the funding, peer review, the governance structure, and so on. The third was the clustering strategies of the NCE and the NRC, the networks of centres of excellence and the National Research Council.

Mr. St. Denis.

Mr. Brent St. Denis (Algoma—Manitoulin, Lib.): Being a new member, you'll forgive me if my question is one that is obvious to experienced members.

Regarding the task force report on broadband for the country, is that something that has been looked at by the committee in the past?

The Chair: That report wasn't finished before we adjourned last spring. In fact, they had asked to appear to present the broadband task report. We haven't yet set a date for them to come and do that; we probably should.

Mr. Brent St. Denis: So would that be under number two?

The Chair: No, number two is referring specifically to the report we did last June.

Mr. Brent St. Denis: Oh, sorry.

The Chair: We had some follow-up that we left. There were certain areas where we didn't make specific recommendations, because one of the reasons we did the report and tabled it when we did was because of the potential for the white paper on innovation to be finished. We wanted to have some input into that.

That being said, there were a number of issues that we weren't satisfied we had addressed fully, the three issues I just raised.

For those of you who don't know our researchers, Dan Shaw is the researcher who worked on our science and technology report. Geoff Kieley is our researcher who works on Bill C-23.

Mr. Dan Shaw (Committee Researcher): We have a new addition, Lalita Acharya, who has a science background and has helped in producing the document before you right now.

The Chair: Okay.

This document talks about the different issues and the different things we could do. One of the things we may wish to do in this completion, if we wish to proceed, which I'm assuming we do, is the possibility of travelling to other areas. One would be to the United States, possibly later this fall. Another would be to Europe in the new year. These would be fact-finding missions on how things operate in other countries when it comes to the issue of peer review and research.

• 0925

Are there any comments? We don't have to make any final decisions. I merely wanted to raise the issues with you and give the researcher some direction as to how we could proceed in organizing our meetings. We did undertake to do this in our study, so I want to make sure it is still the intent of the committee to do it.

Mr. Penson?

Mr. Charlie Penson: Would the travel to Europe, for example, be to try to find out how jurisdictions like Britain handle the issue of big science projects and the issue of chief scientist, those kinds of ways of assessing big scientific projects? Would that be the intent?

The Chair: It would mostly be with regard to the peer review, which would be the first part of the study.

What's been suggested, if you look at page three under proposed travel, is a fact-finding mission to the United States. But the other countries that have been identified are Finland, which also faces a north-south challenge for economic development; Germany, which is a federated state and may offer parallels for Canada; and the United Kingdom, because of the different granting agencies there, which have been a model for the Canada research chairs program. So we thought there may be an opportunity to take a look at what's happening elsewhere as part of this study.

Mr. Charlie Penson: In that regard, then, we're not far enough along to decide.

I seem to recall a number of groups coming to us last year for our support on big scientific projects, and the issue of how other jurisdictions handle this came up. Britain was identified as having a chief scientist who was available to advise parliamentarians. If we were going to be doing something like that, it should be included in our....

The Chair: Yes, if we do decide to travel as a committee, we may want it to be a little more encompassing. If we're going to take the time and expend the money and effort, we should get more information.

Did you want to say something?

Mr. Dan Shaw: Yes, I'll make a comment.

The travel is organized to get a good comparison peer review. If we just looked in Canada, we'd get the status quo issues. By going to foreign countries we get a good comparison, but just because we're over there we don't have to restrict ourselves to peer review. We could also ask about their clustering strategies and financing of R and D infrastructure, the other two mandates. We only need to go over there once, broaden the topic, come back, and use the information according to the different timetable we choose on projects. To add what you suggest is clearly in the realm of possibility.

The Chair: Okay, then if everyone is in agreement, I'll have Dan and Lalita continue to work on this proposed study. As you can see, a number of witnesses are listed in the attachment. If you have any other ideas....

Ms. Torsney?

Ms. Paddy Torsney: Would you mind seeing about meeting with someone from the internship program they have in the U.S. for scientists to advise parliamentarians? It's some kind of an internship program where they hire a couple of bright scientists in the U.S. and make them available to all the Congress and the Senate. It's like our parliamentary internship program, only it's science-based. It would be helpful if we could add them to the witness list.

• 0930

The Chair: We thought about looking at a different format for our meetings this fall. Perhaps for some of them we'd actually have a real round-table discussion on some of the different issues, bringing in a larger number of witnesses at one time without any formal presentations. This could result in very interesting interactions on some of the issues, whether it's Bill C-23 or its expansion, or on science and technology. We're looking at the possibility of trying some different formats as well as those that have been used in other committees to see if they may allow for a broader discussion. We are proceeding with this.

If everyone is in agreement, we'll keep the same time slots that we had last spring for our committee meetings—Tuesday morning, Tuesday afternoon, and Thursday morning.

That being said, the debate going on right now in the House on the modernization report could change the timeframes for committee meetings. Until that's finalized, we'll continue with the way we were operating. We may at some point have better direction from the House as to how and at what times it wants committees to meet.

Does anyone have any comments on that? Okay.

To update you on number three, you should have received the report on the statutory review of the BDC. This report was referred to the committee, although the committee has not been designated pursuant to subsection 36.(4) of the act as the committee responsible for the review. We won't undertake the review until this happens. At the same time, we anticipate that it will happen sometime this fall. I wanted to make sure you all have this review in your offices and are aware of it.

Monsieur Drouin, do you have anything to add to this review at this time? No?

[Translation]

Mr. Claude Drouin: No. Thank you.

[English]

The Chair: All right.

Let's turn to number four, business lending to small and medium-sized enterprises.

As a committee we've been meeting with banks on quite a regular basis. It was to be quarterly; it's worked out to about twice a year. After we last met with the banks we talked about having them in individually, instead of as a group. This would give them the opportunity to provide information to us.

There is some work being done by Industry Canada and by StatsCanada on statistics, and there are other individuals we may wish to have in. There may be some other ideas from committee members.

Mr. Lastewka, do you have some input on this area?

Mr. Walt Lastewka: Yes, I do.

I've been concerned that when we talk small and medium-sized businesses we have many, many definitions across the country, and I've been working on this issue with businesses for the last 18 months. I'm finding out that people like to hide behind the notion that they're helping small business, but they're really helping large corporations. When I was doing some work this summer I found a classic example of this when Nokia tried to hide itself as a small or medium-sized business. I thought, well, perhaps it's time for us to decide what's a micro-business, what's a small business, and what's a medium-sized business.

With 2.4 million businesses in Canada, and 80% falling into the category of 50 employees or fewer, when I hear financial or helping institutions say they're helping small business and this business has 900 employees, they're using the tag of small business so they can say they're helping small business, but they're really not. It would be good for us to review what the definition of a small business is in this day and age.

We have a lot of home businesses. Are they the micro-businesses, or are they the small businesses?

Then, what assistance is government and various associations, including banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions, offering to help these small businesses?

It would be good for us to start to table this. What is the definition of small business?

The Chair: Do you think, Mr. Lastewka, that this is something we could do in conjunction with our meetings with the banks, if we were to bring them in on an individual basis? They want to talk about what they're all doing individually? Could we also raise that? Could we have each of them identify their own definition?

• 0935

Mr. Walt Lastewka: We could do that. But if I remember correctly, during a time when I wasn't on the industry committee, a guideline was given to the banks such that anybody who borrows $1 million or less is determined to be a small business. I think they work it in that manner. I'm not sure whether the industry committee gave them directions to do that or not. But every time we have banks and financial institutions here, we could ask them to come prepared to discuss their definition.

The Chair: Someone can correct me if I'm wrong in this, because I wasn't part of the committee when this report was written. However, a report called “Access to Small Business” was produced by a subcommittee under the leadership of Andy Mitchell. My understanding is that at that time they came to some type of agreement with the banks on the definition of small business. But I'm not 100% certain about that.

I do think that you're right. There needs to be a fuller discussion on what it is we're talking about as a country when we're talking about small business. Who are we designing our programs or regulations for? We need to take a look at that.

Mr. Walt Lastewka: Madam Chairman, may I just add, we need to also have people from the tax department, because they determine the tax for small business. Are they just helping the larger businesses or medium-sized businesses and not the smaller businesses? Maybe that's one of the reasons small businesses have so much paperwork and so many things to do.

Maybe we could make things easier for small businesses to get into business and to give them an opportunity to grow. Then after they've grown and have become larger, we can worry about imposing heavier tax. The paperwork is very expensive for a small micro-business.

The Chair: I'll try to have some type of preliminary schedule for Thursday in order to give you an idea of timeframes for the fall. If committee members agree, we could have an additional meeting at a set time once a week—perhaps on Wednesday afternoons, as an example—where we deal specifically with this issue. We'll try to outline something in the schedule to deal with the issue of our responsibility or our follow-up with the banks—that is, what other institutions are out there lending money, because not only banks, or what we call the traditional sense of banks, are lending money any more—and how we can deal with this issue to assist Canadian businesses.

Let's move on to number five, “Optimizing Federal Government Industrial Regulations”. This is an issue that has been raised because of correspondence I've received and because we've heard from several industries over the past number of years about the difficulties they are having. As reference five says, this is

...a study aimed at reviewing federal government regulations affecting Canada's business sector (goods and services), with a view to understanding their objectives and economic impact. The goal of the study would be to ensure that these regulations achieve their objectives (i.e., the objectives will not be questioned) while minimizing any adverse economic impacts they impose on industry. As circumstances change, federal regulations that were once optimal (in the sense of balancing prevailing economic and social constraints) may no longer be so.

There are two examples.

(1) Federal government automotive fuel emission standards that are significantly different than U.S. and/or state government automotive fuel emission standards, may not only hamper the productivity of Canadian petroleum producers that export to the U.S., they also adversely affect the productivity of Canadian automotive manufacturers that sell to both the Canadian and the U.S. market.

That's one example where there are some real discrepancies on how we're doing business.

(2) In the wake of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, new security regulations such as air and train terminal security measures, airline safety measures, port and border measures, and export-import clearance rules, will likely be adopted. The economic conditions of industry and trade will be affected.

In attempting to reform existing regulations, we may also want to consider other regulations imposed on a number of Canadian industries.

• 0940

I raise it as a topic for discussion for the committee. I know that I have heard from a number of industries, particularly in recent days, about some of the difficulties and challenges they are facing. We've heard in the past, in particular from the automotive industry, about some of the concerns they have with regard to production, and the differences that result from things being done in Canada versus the United States, and how decisions are made.

Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson: Madam Chair, I think this is the most important item our committee can address this next year. It also involves things such as interprovincial barriers—different regulations across our borders—which is a huge issue. I think that the committee should undertake the study. Some groups have put the costs of compliance to all levels of government regulation in Canada of over $100 billion per year. Just the federal government's cost of compliance of administering a program is at $5 billion or $6 billion a year. I think it's a huge issue. I hear concerns from industry and businesses all the time about the amount of regulation they have to undergo. I think we should go ahead with this to see whether there are some redundancies that can be cleaned up.

The Chair: Are there any other comments at this time? I see none.

We'll work on that as well, as part of our plan. I do think that there are a number of issues at stake right now in light of what has happened. A number of businesses are going to be making decisions in the very near future, especially in border communities. We should be aware of them. As a committee, we may want to move this issue along a little quicker than in the past.

Number six on the agenda is “Main Estimates/Plans and Priorities Performance Report”. I thought maybe we should just start to talk about this. I'd like some feedback on this, although not necessarily today.

When it comes to the main estimates, we seem to do them the same way every year. The plans and priorities performance report seems to be shoved in there but not dealt with. Maybe we should look at estimates from a different perspective this year. Perhaps we should look specifically at the plans and performance priorities report to determine what the department was planning on doing, whether it has met its commitments, and how it is meeting its commitments. We may actually have a better discussion on what it is we're accomplishing or not accomplishing in the Department of Industry, and how the dollars relate to those accomplishments or things that aren't happening. We need to delve more into what is proposed and what is actually being done, rather than into numbers. We might actually have a more fruitful discussion at the committee.

Mr. Lastewka?

Mr. Walt Lastewka: I agree with you. I know that the minister's time is very precious, but I believe we should be able to have a little bit more time for discussion when the minister comes here. I would prefer us to outline what you've just completed, and give him enough advance warning so that we can try to get at least another 30 minutes into the discussion. This past year I noticed that members on both sides did not have a chance to have the minister respond to their questions. I think it's a good time. This committee has put strong effort into working as a team and trying to make people accountable, and I would request that you ask for some additional time.

The Chair: Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson: I would support that. Not only is the minister before the committee, but also his officials are with him—the people who can answer questions on specific issues. Sometimes, as the discussion moves around the table, questions will arise out of the comments that you've just heard, and you don't get a chance to express that in the form of a question on a second round. It seems to me that we could use more time at the estimates.

The Chair: Maybe one of the other things we could do in this regard is to take a look at the plans and priorities performance report in advance, as a committee, and maybe come up with some issues that we'd like specifically addressed. In that way we do have the opportunity to have those full discussions on certain aspects of it, and we don't just hear all the good things, but rather we can have a very balanced meeting.

• 0945

A lot of work is going into these reports, and we're not using them to the best of our ability. I don't think we're giving the feedback necessary to the department on them, either. So if we take it from a different perspective this spring, we might actually have some better discussions on it. I just raise that, and we'll leave it for future business.

The other business I have identified on this issue is Order-in-Council appointments. We have a motion that exists—if I'm correct—that says that curricula vitae will be circulated. I know that some have been requested by some members' offices and they haven't received them yet. They will be circulated. If anyone has any issues, please raise them.

With regard to reports and returns.... I've already briefly discussed the schedule of meetings, which we'll leave a little bit tentative, until we have this final debate in the House—until it's resolved on the modernization of Parliament.

Now with regard to other business, Mr. St. Denis raised a very interesting point this morning about the broadband task force. Something we have not done and should probably do, in the near future, is meet with them and get an update on that. It actually fits into some of the earlier few....

If you have a chance to look at our science and technology report, we did a number of reports over the last four years. One of them specifically dealt with infrastructure, including not only infrastructure for rural, as in roads, but infrastructure for technology. Monsieur Brien was very active, as a member, in that recommendation in the past, as well.

If the committee's in agreement, we'll also try to schedule a meeting with that task force as soon as possible, to bring us up to date, if that's an interest you have. I know a number of others have the same interest.

Is there any other business? Mr. Savoy?

Mr. Andy Savoy: I don't know if it's pertinent to this committee, but presently there are CRTC hearings going on that are looking at different phone rates for rural and urban users. I think there's a 20% increase proposed for rural users. Is that something that would be pertinent for this industry committee?

The Chair: CRTC is actually—

Mr. Andy Savoy (Tobique—Mactaquac, Lib.): On the regulation side, they're under Industry.

The Chair: Yes, they are. They have appeared before this committee in the past, on a number of other issues and legislation. We could ask them to appear.

I'm not sure it would be prudent to have them appear while those hearings were going on. Maybe once those hearings are completed we can ask them to appear, so we can discuss what they are doing and what direction they are taking on, I guess, phone rates. We have had discussions with them here in the past, but it would be timely to meet with them again, as well. So make a note of that.

Mr. Penson.

Mr. Charlie Penson: Considering how much time the minister and his department have put into the innovation strategy, I think it would be appropriate that we ask the minister to come to the committee to give us an update on where he's at on that issue.

The Chair: That's actually a very good point. I skipped right over it in number two. I did ask our science and technology study whether there'd be any relationship to the innovation white paper. We did our report to have some input into it. I have had several discussions with his office. I know that they are looking at our report from June in a very thorough manner. Hopefully they are going to incorporate part of that into the innovation white paper.

We are scheduled for a response to that on November 9, as a last possible date. Maybe we should have him here right after that. We'll be able to give him some notice, and will know that the response will be tabled. Then we can have a meeting with him to discuss what he agreed with or didn't agree with in our report, to keep that part of the agenda moving.

Is there any other business or are there any issues that members may have? I just want to put them out on the table today. If not, I will proceed to adjourn the meeting. I'll ask that the commissioner appear on Thursday, and will try to have some more definitive schedule for you by then.

I will also try to follow up. There is a meeting scheduled for tomorrow, organized by the Alliance of Manufacturers and Exporters of Canada, on the whole issue of industry and how it's being effective. I will talk to them about the possibility of meeting with us as a committee in the future, as well.

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That being said, we'll adjourn for today and hopefully meet on Thursday.