Hon. Gary Goodyear addresses the House as the new Minister of State (Science and Technology)

February 03, 2009

Hon. Gary Goodyear (Minister of State (Science and Technology), CPC):
   
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to address the House here today as the new Minister of State (Science and Technology).
   
Mr. Speaker, I am splitting my time with the member for Prince Edward—Hastings.

I am proud to stand here as the Minister of State for Science and Technology to talk about our government's commitment to science and technological excellence in Canada, a commitment that has been reinforced by substantial additional investments in every one of our budgets, most especially in budget 2009, Canada's economic action plan.

Prosperity today is measured in the currency of knowledge. Countries that succeed in the 21st century understand that the capacity to innovate, to capitalize on change, to embrace change, to generate new ideas, to take greater risks, is essential to remain prosperous, productive and competitive in a challenging and changing economic environment.

That is why two years ago the Prime Minister launched our government's science and technology strategy, which we called, “Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada's Advantage”. This is an ambitious strategy that is charting a new direction, one that links the competitive energy of our entrepreneurs to the creative genius of our scientists. It is a bold plan designed to build a national sustainable competitive advantage through science and technology. It cannot be done overnight, or even in one budget. That is why we started three years ago. We will continue to push hard each necessary step, each essential aspect.
   
Our goal is to help Canadians turn their ideas into innovations that provide solutions to environmental, health and other important social challenges. We want to provide solutions to our environment, health and other important social challenges and to improve our economic competitiveness and meet the current and future needs of this great nation.
  
Canada is an international leader in post-secondary research. We rank first in the G7 and second among the OECD member countries in terms of research and development expenditures for colleges and universities as a percentage of GDP. That is very good news. We have come a long way, but that does not mean we can rest and it certainly is not the time to coast.

We want to attract the best researchers, provide them with the best equipment and help them get our innovations and their innovations from the laboratory to the marketplace. To accomplish this, the government has embarked on a major program of strategic investments. These are well thought out, well planned and well timed.

In total, the Government of Canada invests just over $10 billion every year to support science and technology and innovation. In this year's economic action plan, our government announced a series of new investments to support our nation's science and technology strategy. Over 10% of this budget is focused on science and technology. Let us talk about some of the examples.

This government is providing $750 million to the Canada Foundation for Innovation to attract and retain the best researchers in the world.
   
We have embarked on an unprecedented $2 billion program to repair and refurbish, to build and to expand the world's finest research facilities at colleges and universities all across Canada.
This year we are adding $200 million to the National Research Council's industrial research assistance program, IRAP. This program helps small and medium size businesses innovate and conduct their own research.
   
We have increased the funding for Canadian graduate scholarships by $87.5 million, as well as other scholarship programs, to encourage Canadian students to develop and improve their skills and choose research in Canada as a career.

In the last three years every one of our budgets has increased money to the granting councils in Canada, including the National Research Council, so that scientists and researchers across this country can do more research.

We created the Vanier scholarships and the industrial research assistance program. The Vaniers will award 500 international and Canadian doctoral students with generous three year support scholarships in order to build a world class research capacity here in Canada. We have funded new, large-scale science projects like Canarie, Canadian Light Source, Triumf and Snolab, in addition to the Institute for Quantum Computing in Waterloo that will receive $50 million from the government.

We have also opened centres of excellence for commercialization and research, and the business-led centres of excellence all over the country to commercialize Canada's leading edge technologies, products and services, because this will create jobs and wealth for Canadians and diversify and stabilize our economy going forward.

In the previous two budgets we have also provided $240 million over five years to Genome Canada to provide it with stable, predictable, long-term funding that is helping it conduct world leading genomics and proteomics research to benefit Canadians.

Under the Canada excellence research chairs program, up to $10 million over seven years will be awarded for each chair to enable Canadian universities to recruit, retain and equip the most brilliant and promising researchers the world has to offer. Doing top-notch research in Canadian universities will help maintain and advance Canada's leadership in the global economy.

These investments are clear and solid indicators that we not only get it but we are getting it done. We understand the importance of supporting the very best ideas wherever they may arise, and we know that basic inquiry into the big questions at the heart of academic disciplines may not yield quick results, but can yield results that are beneficial to Canadians down the line, and that the obvious path is not always the one we should take.

Canada's potential for innovation is limited only by our individual and collective imaginations. I look forward to working with our researchers, our scientists, our innovators, our businesses, and our educators so that we can continue to see success in science and technology.

I am eager to work with my parliamentary colleagues and with all Canadians in order to realize this enormous potential.

I look forward to working with my parliamentary colleagues and all Canadians to see the tremendous national potential crystallize.

Mr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.):
   
Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his commentary on a very important area.
The principles sound fine. The delivery is always the question that has to be looked at as well. Have the Conservatives followed through? Has the money flowed? Has the regulatory framework been put in place for these agencies to do their work?

I could give the member a brief example. The reproductive technology centre, although it is in medical research, is still in the same vein of the intent for excellence. We passed a bill, and that bill required regulations to be put in place, which were mandated by the legislation itself. Part of the bill's requirements was that those regulations would have to go to the health committee for review because they involved establishing a committee, which would review research projects and make recommendations for funding. Here it is. It is a number of years later. Those regulations have still not gone to the health committee, which means that the committee has not actually been started, which means that projects that could probably get funded have not been funded.

I wonder if the member would care to advise the House whether or not we can deal with this problem where the mechanisms for the research and technological assistance can be put in place in an efficient manner and in fact money can flow and authorization be given.

Hon. Gary Goodyear:
   
Mr. Speaker, indeed, the money from past budgets is already flowing. I have had the honour of announcing funding for research for everything including the diagnosis and early detection of infant neuropathies with respect to hearing, which is very important. As the member may know, it is very difficult to diagnose hearing impairment in infants three months old.
   
We have also funded advanced research already from previous budgets. Of course, as the member knows, this budget has to pass for this money to flow. However, we have provided support research for organ transplant methodologies trying to inhibit the rejection capacity and for using biomass for fuel. We have even funded a research centre out in Winnipeg, I believe, where it is inventing techniques to help municipalities find leaks in pipes, which I understand is a big issue in the city of Toronto. Some 30% of the water used is through leakage. This technology will not only save water, but also help municipal workers find the leak and use a shovel in the ground instead of ripping up an entire a street.
    
I want to assure the member that a number of mechanisms are already in place. The granting councils, for example, are already there. NRC is already there. IRAP is an existing program. We are supporting them because they work. That is our intention.

Mr. Ed Fast (Abbotsford, CPC):

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the minister of state for an excellent intervention and highlighting the things in our economic plan that are going to help Canadians get through this crisis. I think he will have also noticed how much glee our Liberal friends across the floor take in trying to sell Canadians on whether or not the $12 billion surplus that they supposedly left Canadians was squandered. In fact, the minister knows that we built on that $12 billion and paid off $40 billion worth of debt.
    
I would ask the minister to explain some of the strategies that we as a government took as far back as two years ago to cushion Canadians against the economic crisis we are presently experiencing.

Hon. Gary Goodyear:
   
Mr. Speaker, indeed, the reason Canada is doing so much better than other countries is particularly and primarily because of the intervention of this Prime Minister in 2007. We saw the storm coming and when one looks at the charts, Canada is better in almost every sector. However, we are facing an enormous offshore crisis.
   
I want to point out, because I am the minister of state for science and tech, that during the best of times in the late 1990s and early 2000s the Liberals actually cut spending to all the granting councils. They cut spending to the NRC and they even cut the minister of state for science and technology. Now, we are facing a bit of a crisis. This government saw it coming two years ago and put forward a solid strategy because we know that intervening and funding science and tech creates jobs and improves our economy.