Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Agriculture and Forestry
Issue 16 - Evidence - Meeting of February 19, 2007 - Afternoon
CORNER BROOK, NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR, Monday, February 19, 2007
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 2:10 p.m. to examine and report on rural poverty in Canada.
Senator Joyce Fairbairn (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Senators, we are at the final phase of our visit to Newfoundland. I want to welcome our guests who have come to speak on their own behalf. We had a very vigorous morning in our discussions with people who, without any hesitation, spoke about the poverty issues here in Newfoundland and Labrador.
We will start with Dr. Ivan Emke. You will have three to five minutes to make your presentation, following which, as you saw this morning, questions will follow. There are a lot of people around this table who like to ask questions.
Please proceed.
Ivan Emke, SWGC, Memorial University of Newfoundland: Thank you very much. It is a little bit of a surprise for me to be here. It is a holiday here in Corner Brook, so I was expecting to lounge for the day, but my arm was twisted.
The Chairman: We were surprised anybody was here when we heard that.
Mr. Emke: Jason referred to a talk of mine last year, entitled, "Rural: Is it worth saving?" In that talk — the title of which got me into some trouble actually — the point I was trying to make is four-fold. The first point is that rural is in danger of being lost; the second point is that we have a choice in the matter; third, the choice is not cost-free, that there is a cost associated with it; and fourth, that it is still very much up in the air.
I want to talk about capacity-building, because that is one of the issues. You obviously have heard much about what is happening with people in rural communities. You have done a lot of work related to education or early education, and I have been fortunate to work with the Community Education Network. I believe one of their representatives was presenting this morning, discussing some of the things they have done around literacy for young people and around communication within the communities themselves. Their model is that the schools are available to 100 per cent of the community 100 per cent of the time. Hence, the school becomes less a place where you send your kids for their education and more a place where the community can come together and talk about the issues. That is under threat with new amalgamation of school boards and so on where the vision for the community comes from smaller and smaller areas.
A couple of years ago, with the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador Rural Secretariat, in relationship to capacity building, we did some studies of Grade 7 and Grade 8 students in Southwestern Newfoundland. We were interested in the possibilities of them staying in the area. This was driven by a concern that we would experience a gap in skilled trades and how we would deal with it. We wanted to know whether a bias exists on behalf of guidance counsellors, parents and so on to get kids to go to universities. We found that there is a demographic of young men in Grades 7 and 8 who are interested in things like being independent, working outside, working with their hands and so on, staying in rural Newfoundland or staying in a rural community. This demographic of young men would have an opportunity, if they were streamed toward those skilled trades and had access to, say, College of the North Atlantic. One of the unfortunate things is that there is still a bias against skilled trades sometimes. The finding was fairly optimistic for us because right now there are more and more people in higher education talking about the danger of young people, young men, not seeking higher education and what to do with this group.
Part of my talk last year, and other talks, is the notion that we pay one way or the other. Either we pay now, or we pay later. This whole burgeoning group of young men without a trade or a career path is an example of paying later; in other words, we will end up with bigger problems, ones we will all pay for, if we do not invest earlier to try to give them some career path.
One of the other areas, certainly, of building capacity relates to post-secondary. It seems a little bit selfish of me to talk about that, because I work for a post-secondary institution right here on the hill. Statistics Canada released two reports not long ago. One report related to the relationship of income and participation in post-secondary education. That report suggested that, while income was one of the factors, it was not the most important factor. Their data indicated that the best predictor for people going on to post-secondary were things like reading levels at Grade 5 or Grade 3. All of these things, I would argue, also have an economic base to them. In talking to a school counsellor afterward, he said to me, "Ivan, we can both go into a Grade 3 classroom and identify who is going on and who is not." It is very clear from the first few years. However, the study indicated things that in sociology we call cultural capital, meaning the ability to understand, how to read and understand, how to use computers and understand all these other things that help you get ahead.
The other study touches us here in Corner Brook, too. It revealed that as new universities are set up in small communities, the percentage of the youth who go on to post-secondary, and not necessarily to that campus, but go on in general, increases. Corner Brook was one of the sites for that study, as well as Prince George, B.C., and a number of other communities where in the last 20 years they have had a degree-granting institution developed. In terms of building capacity, it is important that small universities be set up in smaller regional communities. That was an example that vindicated this argument that indeed, young people realize, by having a university within the local culture, the advantage of going on. The advantage for Corner Brook is that in some other places the university education increases, but the community college level decreases, but that did not happen in Corner Brook. So in our market there have been as many people continuing to go on in terms of community colleges as before, but university has increased.
One of the things that strikes me about rural is that so many people who live in rural areas do what they do because of lifestyle issues they enjoy; it is a habit. They are willing to fund that habit. Farmers do it by getting off-farm income, and you know the stats on the percentage of farmers who survive on off-farm income. You heard Jason this morning talk about an average income of approximately $17,000 for fishers. We have, as a country, benefited from the fact that people farm or fish, and they do so without being fully recompensed for that. It is like the old joke about a farmer who wins $1 lottery and you say, "What are you going to do with it?" "I am going to farm until it is gone." You can say that of fishers as well.
As a country, we have not acknowledged our debt to people who do things because it is lifestyle. I think your committee and others are well placed to remind those of us who live in urban Canada of the debt we have to rural.
The Chairman: Thank you very much. It is a big topic.
Senator Mahovlich: I visited a town in Quebec, Drummondville, and learned of the suicide rate for youngsters in that community. The one particular year I was there, 20 teenagers had committed suicide. Is there anything like that in Corner Brook? Do we have that problem here?
Mr. Emke: I do not know the population of Drummondville, but I do not think it is as high. Now, one thing I would mention though, related to that, is that one of the persistent problems that has a relationship to poverty is access to mental health issues in rural communities in Newfoundland, as well as in urban communities.
I have been on the board of Transition House for quite a number of years, and what we are finding among the clients of Transition House is a real change toward women who have serious mental health issues. We are not prepared for that because the counsellors who are working there are not prepared for some of the dangers that come with that. A transition house is a safe place. It needs to be maintained as such. So it has required staffing changes and so on.
If I needed a psychiatrist, it might take me three years to get to a psychiatrist. Now, obviously, I would either be better by then or not, as the case might be. As a professor I can pull rank and I could probably get in faster; but for the poor and rural, I think access to mental health is, well, it is not non-existent, but it is getting close.
Mr. Mahovlich: You might be beyond help after three years.
Mr. Emke: Yes, that is very true.
Senator Callbeck: I was interested in your comments about the university that was set up in Corner Brook and that the number for community colleges did not go down. How do you explain that?
Mr. Emke: Well, it could be an untapped resource of young people who were not going on just in general, who were then inspired by being surrounded by a university and so on that they decided to go to university. It could be the good work that the College of the North Atlantic has done in terms of increasing the number of programs, especially skills- based programs. In the last 10 years, they have done women in science and engineering programs. So they have brought new demographics into the college. They work very actively at being accessible to students with disabilities, something that the university really has not done yet, so there is a whole market there. I think it involves a combination of activities by the college itself in order to maintain its client base.
Senator Callbeck: How many students are there at the university?
Mr. Emke: At the university, I would say there are about 1,450 students currently, including the nursing school, although 1,500 is the figure you often hear. The College of the North Atlantic has somewhere around 1,000.
Senator Callbeck: How much?
Mr. Emke: Maybe 1,000, something like that.
Senator Mercer: We do appreciate you coming in on this holiday. I am an Atlantic Canadian. I did not even know there was a holiday.
Mr. Emke: It is just for this year.
Senator Mercer: I would have been happy to stay home in Nova Scotia — but, no, seriously, it is good to be here.
I am interested in this discussion about education. My colleagues have heard me talk about the poverty cycle, and I think when that poverty cycle intersects with the education cycle the poverty cycle starts to break down. Has the university, or has the community — let's make it broader than the university — done an analysis of that in Corner Brook? You have had recent data that would be fairly fresh because of the university and the community college not being that old, in relative terms. Has there been any study on that?
Mr. Emke: Not to my knowledge. There have been a couple studies that have looked at the economic impact on the community of the university. That is a somewhat different study than what you are talking about. Those studies looked generally at what a university brings, not just in terms of the wages of the employees and so on. For example, having access to the summer camp program for young people at the university in the summertime, so they get into the university, into the hallowed halls, and start to feel comfortable there; having community members who come in to events going on at the university. I think there have been attempts, especially in the recent administration there, to really get the community involved. At that level, there has been some study, but not at the level, I do not think, in terms of looking at the impact on rates of poverty.
Senator Mercer: There are a lot of people who finish high school who never go either to community college or to university. Several of the programs I have been involved in are working with people who have a high school diploma and who are in that group of people who are in the cycle of poverty. When approached about going to community college or to university they say, "Oh, no. That is not something people in my family do." It seems to me that one of the responsibilities of those of us in public life and universities and colleges is to demonstrate and to provide role models for people who have actually been where those people are, who have been in the cycle of poverty.
That brings me to this document provided by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Reducing Poverty: An Action Plan for Newfoundland and Labrador, dated June 2006, which we have reviewed and had a presentation on this morning. I am very impressed with the document. The fact that the document even exists is impressive. How do you feel as a professor who works in the community? You, obviously, have an opinion on rural. I guess the title of your talk was "Rural: Is it worth saving?" I wanted to ask you what your conclusion was at the end of it, but I want to hear your opinion on this document from the government.
Mr. Emke: I think there has been a recognition in the last number of years of the importance of doing something about rural, and I think for a lot of years we have been collecting data and so on. This is an attempt on the part of the provincial government to do that.
The issues are very tough, though. It is easy to analyse: Okay, we have out-migration, we have skills gaps, and so on. We are currently engaged in collecting information around the province to possibly set up a rural research institute, and one of the questions we ask is this: Tell me of one government program that actually helped this place. All government programs begin with fine intentions, good intentions, but sometimes the intentions are not found or are not realized, or there are problems in terms of people being able to access the programs. It is instructive to find out what kinds of programs people talk about in relationship to things like CAP sites or whatever, which have been very useful.
The intention is all very positive, but it is a very young document. In order to see what is going to come out of it, that is still very much up in the mix.
Senator Mercer: You mentioned a rural research institute.
Mr. Emke: Again, part of the growth of Grenfell College — which is located here in Corner Brook — is the Centre of Environmental Excellence, which was set up about a year or so ago. There has been a sense that there is a gap in terms of understanding what is going on in rural research, in terms of the questions we need to ask or have answered. I do not know if you are aware of the rural and small town program at Mount Allison or at Brandon. What kind of questions would we engage? That is what we are involved in, a feasibility phase, trying to get some answers from people in rural communities.
As a professor, we too often talk and too seldom listen, so this is a chance for us simply to say to the people in the rural communities, these are the questions I want answered, and then to listen to them. We are hopeful about what will come out of that.
Senator Mercer: So the institute is not in existence?
Mr. Emke: No.
Senator Mercer: And we may be a part of the study, I guess.
Mr. Emke: No, but if you wish to be —
Senator Mercer: My final question is this: What was your conclusion to "Rural: Is it worth saving?"
Mr. Emke: Well, it is a bit like a minister's sermon — Hell: Is it worth avoiding? You can anticipate their answers; at least you hope to know.
As to the rural question, I obviously said yes; but as I say, it is not cost-free. It is going to cost us a bunch of money. Health care is going to cost more in rural areas; education is going to cost more in rural areas; transportation is going to cost more in rural areas. However, it is worth making the investment because down the road it is going to be cheaper. It is sort of like that old commercial for Fram Oil Filters.
Senator Mercer: I remember it. Pay me now or pay me later.
Mr. Emke: Pay me now or pay me later. That is basically what I am saying.
Senator Mercer: Yes, exactly.
Senator Peterson: Dr. Emke, as you said earlier, people live in rural areas by choice, more or less. Some are there because they cannot get out, but are still happy to be there. I guess the question it raises is why should not rural people have the same amenities as urban people have? Why should they be denied? By the same token then, how far do we go in trying to meet that need? We have been told on a lot of occasions that a lot of rural poverty is perpetuated simply because they are rural and isolated: They cannot have broadband, they cannot have a hospital and all those sorts of things, or public transit. So how do we deal with that? What are your thoughts on that?
Mr. Emke: I think it is a trade-off. As you say, people live in rural communities by choice. I think we live in a culture where a lot of people have a broad sense of entitlement. "I should be able to see a dermatologist immediately and within my region," or whatever medical specialist it might be. I think that is unrealistic in remote rural communities. In terms of Newfoundland and health care, and other provinces too, there has been a regionalization of services. Hence within a two-hour drive, or so, an individual can get access to all the specialists he or she may need. There are issues of course with the two-hour transportation, because there is no public transportation, and I know you are dealing with that issue as well.
However, it would be fair to say to rural communities that you cannot have everything, that you will have access to a certain service within a certain distance, but that we will subsidize you to ensure that you will keep your schools, some level of primary health care, fire care, and so on. That is a choice people make, just like in the city. When you choose to live in the city, you make a choice to live with the pollution, with the traffic, with noisy neighbours, and so on. They make that decision as well.
Senator Peterson: Yes. In a lot of cases, it is not the rural people who are agitating for this; it is others doing it on their behalf, either because they feel guilty or are politicians who want to make a point or two saying we are going to give them the same thing.
Mr. Emke: Or is it people from urban areas moving in with the sense of entitlement intact, saying, I should have a coffee shop here or whatever here, or I do not want to smell that manure here. Rural areas, being polite sometimes, have not been as forceful as they should have been. If you want to live here, this is how we live here.
The Chairman: Just a question that has been raised over and over again during the morning, that is, the departure from Newfoundland of so many young people into the northern area of my province of Alberta. In a sense, certainly, it is an advantage for them, it is an advantage for the jobs around the oil sands and that kind of thing. On the other hand, there is a sense that, you know, would it not be great if they did not have to do that, if they had their education here, had their families here, if they did not have to do that. Do you have a thought about that as a professor?
Mr. Emke: One of the perennial parts of the litany is out-migration here, The one thing you need to remember, and that I like to remind myself of I guess, is that young people will leave no matter where they are. In Toronto, the rate of young people leaving that community to go somewhere else is very high as well. The difference is that there are lots of people moving into downtown Toronto, which we do not have. In some ways, it is not the out-migration that is the problem; rather, it is the lack of in-migration and the lack of return migration. I cannot say to young people, oh, you should not leave this province, because it is up to them if they wish to do that.
In fact, there was a study of the Northern Peninsula some years ago that looked at return migration. One of the things they found is that for young men, anyway, sometimes leaving that area and going away for several years was kind of a rite of passage or a proving of one's self that you were able to make it in Ontario, but who would want to live in Brantford or whatever, so they came back. It was something they had to do, but it is finding ways to facilitate that coming back.
This morning, I do not know if he is here now, I saw Sean St. George from the Northern Peninsula, the RED Ochre Board. They stay in touch with high school graduates from the Northern Peninsula who leave. For example, if, say, a garage in Plum Point needs a new mechanic and the board knows someone who is interested in mechanics, they email that individual to inform him of the opportunity, should they wish to move back. That is an example of facilitating or lubricating those kinds of return migrations, where you might be able to some success, rather than stemming the tide, which will always be there, to some extent, but to find some return there.
Senator Gustafson: Do you think we have done a good job in some of rural Canada?
Mr. Emke: We, as a nation?
Senator Gustafson: As a nation, as a people. In my area, and in most of these small towns, if a kid wants to play hockey he can play hockey. He is not going to get that chance in Toronto, unless he is an elitist. There are opportunities in rural Canada that are not there in urban Canada, but we do not sell that very well, in my thinking.
Mr. Emke: I very much would agree. I come from a rural area originally, too. In terms of an appreciation that urban Canada should have for what rural Canada gives, not just in terms of amenities and food and water and carbon sink and all those other things, but in terms of a lifestyle, a way of life, and so on, there is not the connection between urban and rural that there should be. We have a rural secretariat at the federal level, but we do not have an urban secretariat. Maybe that is indicative. Everything else is urban. We actually have a separate arm of the government that has to deal with rural. That is all about marginalization, is it not? We have a provincial Rural Secretariat. Somehow, they could not find another name, they used the federal name.
In terms of advantages, even in a place like Corner Brook, which is not rural by your definition, but by other definitions is, there are advantages here that people can experience that you would never get otherwise in terms of career and so on.
Finally, there is a small community at the end 146 kilometres into a deserted road called Burgeo, and down there they have developed a community television station. They have their own weekly television show, a half-hour show, This week in Burgeo. Burgeo has maybe 1,800 people now. They are able to fund that through the cable TV system. I have students who come from Burgeo, and they are surprised to learn that not every community has its own half-hour news show. That is an example of a rural community that has an amenity they are able to fund that is unique, that you would not find in any city.
Senator Gustafson: Saskatchewan is experiencing that right now. The over-inflation of Alberta is working out to Saskatchewan's benefit — in other words, you can buy a beautiful home in Regina for $225,000. In Calgary, you will pay $750,000 for the same house, but you cannot find a wage that will support it. So there are advantages. It seems the only thing that works now is they will go to Calgary and do the job for a while, and then find out they made a heck of a mistake and come back. Not in all cases, but in a lot of cases, that has happened. I think we do a poor job of selling rural Canada. There are the political implications. We do not have any votes anymore, yet, the urban members will say, if you get in with 40,000 votes then I have to put in 150,000 people. So there is that argument.
Mr. Emke: By your definition, you are using the rural small town, which is widely used, you are talking about 22 per cent or 24 per cent of the Canadian population. That is not a marginal group, really. That is a large group. As to how they can speak politically as a body, you make a good point, that perhaps there is not that rural caucus available.
The Chairman: I am just thinking that the young person, if he or she came to Lethbridge, they might have wanted to stay there instead of Calgary.
Thank you very much for attending here. We are pleased that you have raised the points you did.
Mr. Emke: Thank you for being here in Corner Brook.
The Chairman: We will now hear from Mr. Hann.
Israel Hann, as an individual: Good afternoon. My name is Israel Hann. I worked for 40 years, then I retired, and I became a seniors' advocate. I have been working for seniors for the last 15 years.
One of the reasons I started working for seniors is that when I saw the conditions for seniors and realized that that was what I was going to end up with, I decided that the system had to changed, and that is how I got involved. We have been fighting for 10 years for a long-term care facility in the Corner Brook area, as well as dementia centres, which the government has promised to start building this spring and which I think they will. There is no doubt in my mind that they will not follow through on the promises that they made.
As well, seniors were also being affecting by the high cost of living in our region. Everything we eat, everything we buy, comes by ferry across the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and every year the ferry rates goes up, which has had an adverse effect on our cost of living. Whether we travel across the Gulf, or not, there is no difference; we still have to have that ferry in order to get things to eat. Every time the rates go up it affects the cost of living, because everything is handed back down to the consumer. Right now, as you saw this spring, two litres of milk cost $3.69. Within a month or so, there will be another increase, because the cost of cattle food coming across the Gulf is going to increase. The farmers are going to drive up their cost of milk again, and who pays? The poor old seniors will; they will not be able to afford to buy milk anymore. As it is, we cannot afford juices because of what happened down in Florida. The price of that has gone to hell; the quality of what we receive is not fit to eat.
Canada's Food Guide, which is published and sent out, does not mean a thing anymore; we cannot afford to live by it because of the high cost of freight. They tell us that we should eat more fish, but that was taken away from us. When I was growing up, I could go out any day and get a cod fish, which is why I looked so good and felt so good, because I ate a lot of fish.
The Chairman: You still do, you still do.
Mr. Hann: Yes, well, I am only 70. However, the fish was taken away from us. We do not have that right. At times, we can buy fish from the Russians that has been aboard a factory freezer for a year before it comes to the market here, and when we get it, it is not fit to eat. The old way of life we had is gone. We have to depend on somebody else for that now, and that has had an adverse effect on us.
Now, if you came from rural Newfoundland — I was born in a rural community and I spent a long time there — you will know what a beautiful way of life it offers, because the rural communities offered many opportunities to do things that we wanted to do. The first thing we had to get was a gun, because we wanted to shoot some birds, and that was the way of life. For the older people there now, that way of life is all gone, completely. All the young people have left — out-migration — and through no fault of their own. They had to go somewhere to work. I went away to work also, but I came back. For the older people living in the communities now — at one time, the young people were looking after the older seniors. There would be a nephew or a grandchild or somebody who would cut wood, say, for grandfather and grandmother and for uncles and aunts. If the young got rabbits, they shared them; if they got a moose, they shared that also. However, that has all changed.
Some of the residences in the Newfoundland outports were built many years ago, and they are not up to standard anymore, for example, to keep the people warm. The people have to buy oil to heat their homes now, instead of wood, and the cost to heat a home per month is now $200 to $300. You can imagine how difficult that is for a low-income person. Seniors are getting the Old Age Pension, some are getting Canada Pension, and some may be getting the supplement, but they have one hell of a job to try and make ends meet right now.
The government has now stipulated says that you have to have your oil tanks inspected and that if they are not up to the standard you have to have them changed. There are now those who are gouging seniors, charging them $1,200 to $1,500 to bring their oil tanks up to standard. I can buy a tank for $200, and because I know what to do to install a tank, go by the guidelines and put on a line, I can get away with $250. Do you think it is right for those people to be gouged like that? It is the insurance companies and the government that are doing this. It seems like the insurance companies have a free hand to do what they like with the seniors. It is getting harder and harder every day for a senior to live on this island, but it is still a great place to live, because as a senior I can go salmon fishing, I can go hunting, and I can still do a lot of the things that I love to do. However, it is getting limited.
I think it is time we had a look at affordable housing for our seniors living in those communities. The infrastructure in some of those communities is poor, it has to go. However, there are not enough young people around to pay the taxes, therefore, the infrastructure goes and there is nobody there to replace it. So what do we do with the seniors now? They are not all going to move out of those communities. They were born there, they are going to die there. If we had affordable housing to move them into, housing that is properly built and maintained that they could pay for with their old age pension, they would not mind paying the rent. They would have no snow to clear, no grass to cut, et cetera. They would be living more comfortably, like they are in places in New Brunswick. There are places in New Brunswick where there are 300 or 400 apartments in one building, but it is affordable — and "affordable" is the key word. In some places in Ontario, there is affordable housing.
I know I only have three or four minutes, but it would take me three or four hours to cover the areas I am well versed in.
The Chairman: Well, sir, we could not do the three or four hours, but we appreciate that you attended here. You have raised a very important issue, one that is of concern not just for Newfoundland, but for every part of Canada.
Mr. Hann: When MP Thibault was here last year, the Liberal government sent down a Senate committee to study us. We are still being studied to death. Mr Thibault said to me, "Mr Hann, 25 years from now you will have no rural Newfoundland, and we will have no rural Ontario." It seems that that is the outlook for all provinces. I hope it is not a plan, but it has been talked about.
Senator Mahovlich: You and I are about the same age. Do you think we were better off 50 years ago?
Mr. Hann: In some cases, in some areas, we were, yes, but not all.
Senator Mahovlich: I grew up in Northern Ontario. I think we were poor, but everybody was looked after.
Mr. Hann: Yes, everybody was looked after — by a neighbour, by relatives, by somebody, yes.
Senator Mahovlich: We helped each other, it seems. That does not happen anymore down here, correct?
Mr. Hann: Not so much now. As a result of out-migration, we no longer have family togetherness. We are depending on strangers now. A lot of the people who move in — someone spoke about people coming into rural Newfoundland — are strangers.
Senator Mahovlich: They are like city folks; they are all strangers.
Mr. Hann: Yes. They are not part of the community and they are not part of the family.
Senator Mahovlich: That is interesting.
Senator Callbeck: I was just reading an article from you local newspaper —
Mr. Hann: Yes, that was the Liberal Senate hearing.
Senator Callbeck: Was it? In the recommendations, you refer to the Veterans Independence Program, which has certainly been a great program for veterans, enabling them to stay in their own homes longer. That program includes quite a few things — some health services, some housekeeping, ground maintenance and so on. You are suggesting that that should be expanded to include all seniors. Would there be an income test on that, or would it cover everyone at age 65?
Mr. Hann: Well, all seniors would like to keep their independence, and that is one way they could keep their independence. If there were help to maintain their own homes, and help there if they got into problems, some place they could call on and get some help, yes, that would be great.
Senator Callbeck: So that is for seniors, across the board. You would not have an income test on it?
Mr. Hann: The number of veterans is decreasing every year, God bless their souls; there will come a time when there will be no more veterans. If there are any pots of money put aside for veterans that cannot be used, why should it not go to the communities?
Senator Peterson: I would like to get clarity on this going out in a boat and catching a cod fish. You cannot do that?
Mr. Hann: No. Last year, we were blessed. They allowed us to go out and catch five fish a day. I think this year that will be stopped. They will take that away this year.
Senator Peterson: Why did they not just make it two fish a day, and then you could keep going for three or four years? This is astounding, given all that water out there.
You talked about dementia, dealing with people. Is there any facility here at all for that?
Mr. Hann: They use the fifth and sixth floors at the hospital here for people with dementia. However, that is not big enough; we have to find other spaces for people with dementia. The Interfaith Home for Senior Citizens was strictly for levels 1 and 2 people at one time, but that has gone to people with dementia.
No, we do not have housing for people with dementia, not proper housing.
Senator Peterson: When people with dementia are in the hospital, does the hospital classify their condition as a health issue and then they are covered, or what?
Mr. Hann: In some cases, they are covered; however, some of those people could be discharged but there is nowhere for them to go.
Senator Peterson: Nowhere to go.
Mr. Hann: That is driving hospital costs up tremendously.
Senator Peterson: Right, and there are not even any private facilities here?
Mr. Hann: No.
Senator Peterson: I know in Saskatchewan that, once a person is diagnosed with dementia, it is not classified as a health issue and the individual has to leave the hospital.
Mr. Hann: Whereas, here, we have to go in because of the same reasons.
Senator Peterson: Yes, for the same reasons. Yes, it is a big problem.
Senator Mercer: I have the privilege of being a member not only a member of this committee but also the Senate Special Committee on Aging. Some of the topics you have talked about today with respect to aging are very important. My situation is also unique, in that my inlaws are from Corner Brook. As well, at least one of my wife's aunts and one of her uncles did get old as they aged. I liked your comment that all seniors do not get old. I think that is a good turn of phrase.
I want to go back to your comments about the cost of goods coming to Newfoundland by ferry. The Marine Atlantic continues to put up the cost and it continues to be an issue to be dealt with. I know I have heard more than one or two speeches from Gerry Byrne on Marine Atlantic. How much — and you may not have the answer to this question — but how much have the ferry fees gone up in the last few years?
Mr. Hann: By 20 per cent, at least.
Senator Mercer: Twenty per cent, and that 20 per cent, of course, is directly added to the cost of the products.
Mr. Hann: I have a daughter living in New Brunswick. When we first visited her, the ferry rates were about $76; they are now $126, with a seniors' discount of $2 per person.
Senator Mercer: It is a lot of money, when you add it up, and you are trying to do business. It seems to me that it is an issue, not only for Newfoundland and Labrador, but also for Eastern Quebec as well. It is not as much an issue any longer for Prince Edward Island, since the fixed link.
Mr. Hann: In addition, if there is a storm or wind, we are prisoners on an island. The airlines have us for ransom. If we have to get off the island, it costs us a lot. I could go anywhere in North America if I were in Halifax or Moncton for the same price it costs me to get off this island, just 90 miles away. Then when you get on the ferry and there comes to blow out there — and a lot of people are prone to sea sickness — they do not have a proper place. They have one boat. We call it the barf boat — it is not the Leif Erickson's boat. It is the barf boat, because once you get on it, you are bound to get sick. When you get sick, there is nowhere to put you. They do not have a sick bay, nor do they have restrooms. There is nowhere to lie down. They do not even have wheelchair facilities to get one from deck to the other. I have experienced this. My wife was sick for six hours; we thought we were going to have to get a helicopter to get her off. When we got in port, we discovered that the elevators would not work. They found a wheelchair for her, but the elevator did not work because sea water had come over the deck of the boat, went down through the cracks in the decking plates and shorted out the electrical services. That is the type of service we get.
We read daily and see on television problems in Indonesia with ferries, where a ferry sinks and hundreds of lives are lost. Well, the same thing is going to happen out in that Gulf.
Senator Mercer: I looked at your article in the Western Star. There is no date on it, but it was last year, I assume, or a couple of years ago. Some of the recommendations put forward included the appointment of a minister of state for seniors. The previous government had done that, and now this government has recently done that. The minister is actually the Leader of the Government in the Senate. The reinstatement of the New Horizons for Seniors program was done by the previous government, and the current government says that it will maintain the program as well. Are there other recommendations that were in that report that you feel are vital?
Mr. Hann: Well, we felt at that time that people from Newfoundland were not in CARP, which is a great organization in Ontario and across Canada. They have a voice and they have people who can go and speak on their behalf. We do not have that at all in Newfoundland. We have one seniors' group; it is in St. John's, on the east coast of the island. We have recently started a seniors' resource centre here in Corner Brook, because we want to do things to help our own people and then let our own people help themselves. We have to have somewhere to go, somebody who we can relate to, tell them about a particular problem, and ask if anyone can help us. Yes, that would be great.
Senator Gustafson: My colleagues will be sick of hearing me say this one more time — and probably every time I get an opportunity to. Rural Canada produces fish, oil and gas, lumber, pulp and paper, agricultural products, mining products. This all comes out of rural, all out of the land. I make the point that very little goes back into rural Canada. It is all take. Somewhere along the line, we have missed the boat of dealing with that, and now we have an awful backlog of trying to make that up. We have population moving into Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, and they are not going to give up. Politically, we just do not have the clout to do it. I would like to hear your comments on that.
Mr. Hann: There was an interesting documentary last week about an Africa state, about $30 billion worth of oil coming out of that state last year. That is the same companies that are operating off Newfoundland. Thirty billion dollars is a lot of money, and the people in that area are starving to death. Their fishery is gone, everything was destroyed. They are running gun boats everywhere, so the people cannot get out and protest. Are we going to come to that? Is that what the oil companies are going to do us here in Newfoundland? It seems like they are heading that way. They do not want to develop some of the oil fields out there now because they would have to pay a tax to the provincial government. When Mr. Williams told the federal government that you either have to develop it or loose it, we were turned down on that one. It makes a big effect.
The world supply of uranium is going to run out and we are going to develop enough mines in Labrador to supply 20 per cent of the world market in uranium. Are those people going to do the same thing to us?
The story historically is the same. The English came here, they took the fish, they took the seals and the fur. What did they do with it? They took it back to England, where they became lords and barons and ladies and earls and everything else. What happened to Newfoundland? We were starving to death.
All you have to do is visit the archives at Battle Harbour. You will read about Mr. John Spearing, $2 — which is what he got paid for a summer's work. He was in debt to the merchant for so much money for years, but he ended up one spring with $2. Last year, I spent a week studying the archives. This is the way they operated. They even had holes drilled into weights, 56 pound weights, they had little holes drilled in them and a piece of lead stuck up in the bottom of it. That is how they could rob the fishermen. We are gradually going back to that. We are not progressing. We are going back. In Cape Breton, there were the coal mines. Fathers, mothers and children went down into the coal mines and carried coal on their backs, brought the coal out of the mines and dumped it into the ore cars, all to get enough food to put on the table. If they did not produce, they were whipped. In tobacco factories in the late 1880s, they were whipping children in Ontario because they did not produce. History is going to repeat itself; that is the way I see it, sir.
Senator Gustafson: There is a good article in the Western Producer, which is a farm paper, which asks: Is gasohol going to be of any advantage to farmers, or are they going to get taken again? That is the idea of the article. I think you make the point. The question is this: What do we do about it?
Mr. Hann: What do we do about it?
The Chairman: I want to thank you for attending here and for leaving your paper with us.
Mr. Hann: I thank you for the opportunity.
The Chairman: As the days move on, if you have any ideas, please let us know.
Mr. Hann: I have a lot of ideas. The professor touched on education, and I would say one thing. We have been fighting for years. We have government, after government, after government. One government comes in, claims it has all the answers, and shuts down the trade schools. They cut back on education. We had 18 trade schools in Newfoundland, built when Diefenbaker was in power. Successive governments said we longer needed all those trade schools, and we eventually ended up with four or five.
Senator Gustafson: Good old Dief.
Mr. Hann: He was good in ways, sir.
The Chairman: If you have any other thoughts, Jessica Richardson, our clerk, will give you her card.
Mr. Hann: I was going to finish by saying thanks to Gerry Byrne, who did put some federal money into the schools here; courses opened up in welding and millwrighting, and we need them all opened up. So, if we are going to send people to Alberta, we are going to send trained people, and they are going to come back.
The Chairman: Now, you are making me feel guilty again.
Mr. Hann: No, I am not, no.
The Chairman: Now that you have given Gerry Byrne an introduction — he is standing at the back — he is going to say a few words to us as well. Thank you so much for taking the time to come here today. We do appreciate it. Some of the things that you have been talking about are extremely important. I thank you for that.
Mr. Hann: I thank you for the opportunity.
The Chairman: Now, the Member of Parliament for this great area, Mr. Gerry Byrne.
Hon. Gerry Byrne, P.C., Member of Parliament for Humber—St. Barbe—Baie Verte: Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and my colleagues of the higher house.
The Chairman: Thank you for being here.
Mr. Byrne: I do not propose to be able to offer much wisdom that this Senate committee will not be able to gather on its own devices as you travel across the country on what I think is a very important issue. However, I am very pleased to be able to present to you today some of my thoughts as a parliamentarian of 11 years, as a former minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, but most important, I think, someone who has lived and worked in a rural constituency all of his life. I am a biologist by academic trade and worked as an economic development officer on the Northern Peninsula for a period of four years before getting into elected life. While in elected life, I had the opportunity to co-chair special joint house and Senate standing committees and know that the tutelage of this particular committee will be quite in-depth in terms of your own work as a Senate committee.
I wish to begin by saying that the work of this committee is very important because the issue you are studying is very timely. The biggest job that you have as a committee analyzing rural poverty is to define what rural poverty actually is. For example, in Western Newfoundland, what is not factored into most equations that are proposed or presented by economists are such things as home ownership. In rural areas of Canada, in particular this riding, I can tell you that there is a substantially higher proportion of actual home ownership than in other parts of the country. Why? People build their own houses here. Other factors that do not get factored into the gross national product and to the overall productivity of the economy are, for example, that a lot of people grow their own vegetables here and they hunt moose. They can stock a freezer. These are things that policy-makers and economists and statisticians do not even contemplate when they calculate the overall productivity of the particular area.
This is just as much about economic fact as it is about policy perception. There is a bias in this country about rural Canada. There is a bias about whether or not it is an efficient and effective investment to put resources into rural Canada.
I will put it from this point of view. Not many years ago, North American large urban cities, big centres, faced a crisis. It was called depopulation, the ghettoization of the urban core. There was a decision taken by all levels of government at that time that the ghettoization of inner cities was a negative public policy, that it was a negative circumstance that public policy and public financing had to address. Granted, it was cheaper from a public policy point of view to simply let suburbs evolve and expand; it is more expensive to redevelop inner city core infrastructure. However, it was also determined that it was not in the public interest to let our cities and the core of our cities erode to nothingness. Substantial resources were put in place, and a public policy effort actually reversed the trend of depopulation of our urban cores, reversed the trend of the removal of the industry and social services from our inner city cores, and public policy, not the marketplace, because the marketplace was deciding that people should move to the suburbs, public policy revitalized our inner city cores.
Here is the situation when it comes to rural Canada. There is no public policy directive that genuinely and honestly admits there is a problem and says we should reverse it. In fact, most public policy-makers will argue that the real public policy towards rural Canada is the controlled or tempered decline, in such a way that the peripheral regions do not collapse on their own weight, creating huge social chaos, but are simply just allowed to drift on a steady, even field without any substantial disruption to the social fabric. That is the unspoken public policy truth of this country and of North America. Not just our own Canadian example, but North American example.
What is interesting, being here in Western Newfoundland, is that, as you drive up the highway this afternoon to get back to Deer Lake, you will see to the left-hand side of the bus a resort. That resort was created five years ago, at a time when we saw huge depopulation. Quite frankly, the perception that rural Canada does not really necessarily have a strong place in the efficient industrial tiger of Canada — you will see a piece of property called Humber Valley Resort where Europeans are now paying $850,000 for a house and a half acre of land, just five minutes from this hotel. In fact, there is an appreciation, obviously, within some consumer groups, some marketplace, that rural life is a preferred life. That, I think, is the pendulum that we now face. In terms of the decay of the urban core, there was a decision taken that this is not in our national interest — and federal, provincial and municipal governments and industry worked cooperatively to isolate and to reverse that trend. As a country, we have to take a decision as to whether or not the managed decline of rural areas is in our country's best interest.
That is not just about economic fact; it is about perceived fact. Most young people in this country, if asked where milk comes from, will tell you it comes from a box. If you ask them where vegetables come from, they will tell you, very clearly and very honestly, a significant proportion of them, that vegetables come from the store. In fact, there is not a real strong appreciation or understanding of exactly what rural Canada does for the overall wealth of our economy.
In fact, if you think about it, some of the perception about rural Canada is really based on pop culture. Senators, how many of you are aware of the Fox TV show entitled A Simple Life? It features Paris Hilton, who goes to rural areas presenting herself as wanting to participate in rural life; she presents herself to a naïve family who try to adopt her and bring her in. That is what most people think about rural life, and that is what most people think about city life. City life is all about characterless, valueless and "moral-less" people who do not really equate to their own society, and rural life is about naive country bumpkins who quite frankly just do not know any better.
Those are the two extremes, and you know what, they have nothing to do with reality. City life offers a very vibrant, very important lifestyle that is challenging and presents opportunities. As well, the perception is still out there that rural life is about decline, about backwardness, about a lack of innovation or talent, or it is just something that exists because that is where our primary producers are. I believe strongly that that view is inherent in a lot of our public policy-making. If you actually think through most of our public policies, they are done by think tanks and institutions that exist in cities.
I will reference to Dr. Emke's proposal for a centre for rural development. Dr. Emke got it right on — and, in fact, Sir Wilfred Grenfell College, which is a campus of Memorial University of Newfoundland, is now proposing a centre for rural studies. The truth is — and this is not a slate against Dr. Emke or Sir Wilfred Grenfell's College, it is just a statement of reality about Memorial University of Newfoundland — that centre was proposed sometime ago. It was originally called the Centre of Rural Development. It was decided that that centre be established in St. John's. In fact, senators, as you go around this country, I would challenge you to try to locate an academic think tank about rural life, rural development, rural economies and rural social problems and opportunities that actually exists in rural Canada. Most of our think tanks, most of our policy directions, come from urban living Canadians pronouncing to rural Canadians what is in their best interests.
When we study this and look at it from all angles, we must realize that there are huge opportunities in rural Canada. All of us, including rural parliamentarians, have to come to grips with the fact that that needs to be promoted, it has to be accepted and it has to be proven, just as the case was made to prevent the depopulation of inner city cores. That really is one of the many challenges you face in defining what is true poverty. In my opinion, one of the elements that do not get factored on a balance sheet here is a lack of it.
Senator Mahovlich, you talked about why the suicide rate in areas. The feeling that you are held captive or trapped to a particular area without an opportunity for growth is what creates the hopelessness and the despair, because there is no reason in this world why an 18 year old should ever take the ultimate final solution to a problem. There has to be something systemic. There has to be something that has prevented any amount of hope from entering into it. I would suggest looking at the types of services that were available — for example, were educational opportunities readily available to those young people? Were there opportunities for new jobs, for advancement? Was there a perception that in coming from a particular area you were second-class? An unnecessary and unfair perception. Were there language barriers that prevented mobility? What are the factors that actually created those circumstances? I can tell you that you will probably find, through an in-depth study, that those Canadians were not treated as fairly or as even-handedly as other Canadian citizens.
Senator Gustafson: You really hit the sense of the nerve here. The American farmers have had the three best years they have ever had in the last three years. Canadian farmers have had the worst three years. What causes that? Number one, the Americans will always fight for the heartland. It does not matter whether they come from New York or Seattle, or any part in the United States, they will fight for the heartland. Of course, part of it is their Senate. Senators will vote for the heartland, there is just no question about that.
If you go to Europe — and I have chaired meetings in Europe with the European Union — they will say, "Look, you Americans" — they call us Americans — "You Americans do not know what it is to have starvation. We have seen starvation three or four times." They will say, "We are never going to let it happen again." So what do they do? They subsidize, the Americans subsidize. However, we have a global economy and Canadians will not stand for that. They will not stand for it.
You are right on the money with what is happening. I contend that every nickel that we would put in would have somewhat of a level playing field, would repay that again and again to the economy of Canada indirectly, because they buy columbines, they buy trucks. We have Chrysler shutting down, and 2,000 jobs. That will have some impact on the country — a big impact. However, half-ton trucks, bigger trucks, the farmers today cannot afford a new truck for hauling grain. You are talking about $60,000. Instead, they buy an old wreck that has been over the roads, fix it up, and try to get along with it. When I started farming — I have been farming for all my life, that is all I know — we could afford a new truck, we could afford new equipment. It is a different world, and you are right on the money on this issue. How are we going to convince Canadians that we have made a terrible mistake?
Mr. Byrne: I think, senator, Western Newfoundland has a very substantial agricultural industrial base, not as big, however, as the fishery. One of the big issues in terms of one of our primary resource industries is the outsourcing of material to China for processing. We are primary producers here, but it is all value-added, and right now there is a race to China. Instead of using local people to process materials, we are taking a value cut. Instead of processing fresh, we are freezing, defrosting in China, processing the fish in China, refreezing and then bringing it back to the marketplace. This race to China, in my opinion, may be wise in terms of the economic bottom line, but it does nothing for quality; nor does it do anything to get the value or merits of the common property resource back to the people who are most adjacent to it or most attached to it. The bottom line is that most consumers do not even recognize that their food security is not being established by having a base of farmers in Saskatchewan that are capable of providing locally produced goods for consumption in the local Loblaws or Safeway store; there is an issue here.
If we just simply follow a model of economic efficiency, there is probably not a real strong reason why we should have national ownership of our oil and gas resources, probably not a strong reason why we should maintain Arctic sovereignty over the Northwest Passage, but there are things in this country that go a little bit beyond those simple notions of perceived economic efficiency. There is no economic efficient reason why cities should not have imposed upon them the concepts of the marketplace, but, yet again, there was a public policy decision that said having Canadian cities marginalised to the point where they do not exist anymore is not in our best interest. The same goes for the quality of life in rural Canada.
Senator Mahovlich: I think that you are right on. I imagine you can look at the United States and a lot of their cities vis-à-vis what you are talking about. I was in Detroit in the early 1970s, and it was falling apart. The inner city did not know what to do. Everybody was moving out from the downtown. Some of the most beautiful restaurants are closed today. My favourite restaurants are not there anymore. So what did they do? They built a new arena, the Joe Louis Arena downtown, and moved their hockey team out of the Olympia; it was that important to revitalize the downtown. I think that we should look, and I think you are right on, to rural Canada and see what the government can do.
I do not think that subsidizing farmers should be out of the question. I visit France a lot, where there are beautiful farms, and I do not think an individual could afford it on his own. The French farmers must have subsidies, because they are so beautiful. There is nothing wrong with that either.
Mr. Byrne: Senator, even the question of whether or not subsidization is actually required is not, I agree with you. In fact, if you look at most major industrial sectors in our own economy, very few of them do not experience some preferential tax policies or direct subsidies of some sort to be able to establish them. In rural Canada, it is not necessarily so much a tale of a subsidy requirement. Yes, to be able to stimulate some industries there may be some need for some upfront risk-capital investment.
Take, for example, telecommunications policy. If a farmer or a fisherman or a forester today wanted to be able to compete in a global marketplace, to present products not only to the U.S. but to Europe, not having access to Internet resources, to relatively cheap telecommunications, to transportation links — that would be an issue.
Mr. Hann referenced the Marine Atlantic or the Gulf ferry crossing. We have one access point for the entire island of Newfoundland to the rest of the mainland by ground — and that is over water. The Gulf ferry service, Marine Atlantic, is our extension of the Trans-Canada Highway. What Mr. Hann was referring to was a recent policy that, for the next five years, not only would there be a substantial rate increase on that ferry service, but there would be an additional fuel surcharge, along with additional measures. In other words, just having basic access, logistical ground basic access to the marketplace, has been made more difficult for many producers from this particular province.
There are subsidy issues that do come into play, but there is also just simply, senator, level playing field issues.
The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Byrne. You have added a good end to our meeting today, and I think the more we talk about it the more we remember things.
I can remember, in first going to Toronto, being asked by a family friend whether I really had to talk funny — and, of course, I did not think I was talking funny. I only need about a weekend at any point in Southern Alberta and it all comes back. That is my first recollection of being in Toronto; my Western Canada drawl was almost too much for them to take.
One of the encouraging things — and it almost takes a tragedy to shake up people in parts of Canada to realize the importance of the rural area. In my part of Canada, we have gone through the BSE cattle issue, and it shook people right to the ground to think of what might happen, not just to a city, but to all of the towns that give the strength to our part of rural Canada. I think everyone around this table has that sense of respect, if not affection, for the importance of our rural infrastructure.
As you and others have indicated, there are many times when things have been done that are very negative to that. We will hear more of that I am sure as we go across the country. We will hear more of that in the territories, as well. We want the result of these hearings to be reflected in a report that will remind people of the strength of rural Canada.
Mr. Byrne: Madam Chairman, if I could throw one challenge to you as a committee as you go across the country conducting your hearings, it is this: Examine who are the rural voices. One of the issues that I have found repeatedly, and you will not see this as much in the North, but most of the voices for rural Canada — from an academic think tank point of view and public policy-makers — are those of individuals or organizations that are based in urban Canada. That is an issue that I have a real problem with and it is one of the reasons I am a great advocate of the work of people like Dr. Ivan Emke and Sir Wilfred Grenfell College which we referenced. If public policy hopes to hit the nail on the head when it comes to solutions for rural Canada, the voices should indeed come from areas that are directly connected and have a stake and an ownership role in rural Canada and not be patronizing or paternal towards rural Canada, if you understand what I am saying. I think the best points of view, when it comes to that sort of thing, should reflect that examination.
The Chairman: We will try to dig them out.
Mr. Byrne: Thank you.
The Chairman: Thank you very much for staying and cheering us on and for giving us your thoughts. They are very important. I want to thank all of you who have hung in during the day. We will carry on and we wish you all the very best.
The committee adjourned.