Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Agriculture and Forestry
Issue 16 - Evidence - Meeting of February 20, 2007 - Afternoon
CORNWALL, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, Tuesday, February 20, 2007
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 12:35 p.m. to examine and report on rural poverty in Canada.
Senator Joyce Fairbairn (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: We will now open our afternoon hearing here on the beautiful Prince Edward Island. We will hear from several individuals who are involved in a variety of issues through l'Association des femmes acadiennes et francophones, the PEI Senior Citizens' Federation, the National Farmers Union, the School of Nursing, and the Advisory Council on the Status of Women. We have a broad group of people here this afternoon for our hearings and we welcome you all.
First, we will hear from Colette Arsenault. We look forward to your comments and thank you for appearing today.
[Translation]
Colette Arsenault, Director, Association des femmes acadiennes et francophones: Madam Chairman, the Association des femmes acadiennes et francophones wants to thank you for inviting us to state its opinions on the issue of rural poverty.
We are a non-profit organization working with the Acadian and francophone population of Prince Edward Island. The association deals with social and economical inequities regarding problems with accessing a decent income, preventing family violence and promoting health.
We work in cooperation with several francophone and anglophone partners on Prince Edward Island, in the Atlantic region and at the national level.
We have the privilege of receiving this information; however, we have doubts about the usefulness of a further consultation. Over the past years, we took part in several consultations with representatives from the federal and provincial levels, dealing with issues of poverty, health, rural community development, employment insurance, the programs of Condition feminine Canada and the National Council of Welfare. Nevertheless, we have not yet had any commitment by politicians who would place the well-being of Canadians among their political priorities. Moreover, our governments did not follow up with implementing the commitments they made when they signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and when they unanimously adopted a motion in 1989 to put an end to child poverty by the year 2000.
However, we must realize one thing: children are not poor. They have no income. They are living in poverty because their parents cannot earn a decent income.
According to Prince Edward Island's Working Group for a Livable Income, a livable income would allow a family or a person to afford paying their rent, paying their monthly bills, purchasing medicine and healthy food, using transit and child care services, and have a little left over for some small treats. For instance, participating in sports, celebrating a child's birthday, and to face emergency such as a car or a furnace breaking down, the loss of a job or an accident in the family. A livable income would allow them to live in a dignified manner.
In fact, our society still excludes certain persons and discriminates with regard to sex, race and ethnic origin, age, physical appearance, sexual orientation and physical, intellectual and developmental skills. Statistics on wages, poverty, child benefits, employment insurance, literacy, victims of violence, health, access to services in both of Canada's official languages, prove that discrimination still exists at all levels and in all sectors towards certain individuals and groups in our society.
Even if the standard of living of Canadians has slightly improved over the past years, statistics as well as people's experience show that we still have a long way to go before including everyone in a fair and equal manner.
Women and men do not choose to live in poverty, in violent situations, in illness, with literacy problems or in situations of systemic discrimination. They live in such conditions because of social and economic injustice. Moreover, such situations are as prevalent in rural regions as they are in urban regions.
If our governments sincerely want to abolish poverty in Canada, we must allow Canadians to progress from a survival mentality towards a mentality of development that will allow them to take full part in developing their community, in which they are included and appreciated, and to which they can contribute. We need a political commitment, a clear and precise vision, and performance indicators that will make governments accountable to their community, namely the Canadian taxpayers.
The Association des femmes acadiennes et francophones plays a leading role in the domain of social and economic inequity in the Atlantic region and at the provincial and federal levels. According to the profile of the social and economic situation of women and men whose mother tongue is French in the Atlantic provinces, prepared for the Sommet des femmes 2004, 69 per cent of women earn less than $20,000 a year as compared to 44.8 per cent of francophone men, and 37.5 per cent of francophone women earn less than $10,000 a year as compared to 22.9 per cent of francophone men.
Currently, half of the Canadian labour force has had a full-time job for at least six months. Only one out two Canadians is eligible for employment insurance benefits because of the new requirements and new types of work. Less than a half of non-union employees can take advantage of fringe benefits and pension plans offered by the employer.
The situation of Acadian francophone women in rural regions is as follows: there is less schooling, less income, higher unemployment, less participation in professional training, fewer women working full time, an increasing exodus of the younger generation, a lack of public transit, less access to health services, a lack of services for people living in violent situations, and a greater risk of being isolated.
Many research projects have shown that an individual's health varies on the basis of his social and economic situation. According to the working document on addressing inequity and chronic disease in Atlantic Canada, the Atlantic region has lower income, higher unemployment and a small share of national wealth as compared to other regions of the country.
We feel that enough research and consultation has been done to guide governments in making decisions that will allow all Canadians to be born equal. It is time to implement the recommendations made by, for instance, the National Council of Welfare, the study on employment insurance, the Workplace Partners Panel, the Challenge of a Greying Workforce, the Tides of Change: Addressing Inequity and Chronic Disease in Atlantic Canada.
It is time to stop working in silos. All departments, federal, provincial and territorial, must adopt a vision of the principles of development that will allow Canadians to earn an income on which they can live with dignity.
In 2007, to put an end to poverty and to respect the agreements signed by governments, we need the commitment of all political parties, federal, provincial and territorial, that will enable policies to be based on individual well-being aimed at providing Canadians with decent incomes and a dignified standard of living. All existing policies and all new policies will have to be scrutinized through the lens of Gender-Based Analysis developed by Status of Women Canada to ensure that no policy discriminates against any social group, men, women, youth, seniors or others. Parental leave policies will apply to everyone, to mothers and fathers, and not only to those who have access to employment insurance. Women and men entrepreneurs will have the same access to social programs as others on the job market. Welfare recipients will receive income that will allow them to live above the poverty threshold and to be treated with respect and dignity. Employment insurance recipients will receive an amount at least equal to 80 per cent of their salary as compared to the current 55 per cent. They will no longer have to wait for two weeks without any income, and the amount of the benefits will not be less than the minimum wages in their province. Employment insurance and welfare recipients will be able to earn much more than they currently can before their income is deducted from their benefits. Clients of government services will deal with people in their regions and not with automatic machines and services will be available in both official languages. All Canadians will have access to postsecondary studies at a price that is much more reasonable than the current one. Every kind of work that is done for an income, in services, trades, technology or other fields, will be recognized and fairly remunerated. Programs and services will be made available to meet the needs of communities and they will not be developed by the federal government and the communities will know where to go.
We want all policy both federal and provincial to be developed following steps similar to those developed by the working group. Every Canadian deserves a decent income. We are aiming for excellence in the active population. We are aiming for appropriate development, a healthy society and a healthy economy. To have a vision like that of the Prince Edward Island Working Group for a liveable income, we must ensure decent income and rates that will allow people to avoid poverty. We must see Canada as a country with provinces and territories that give priority to community health and that are a visible centre of excellence with regard to labour standards. The Canadian government and those of the provinces and territories must take courageous steps to break the cycle of short-term planning. They must implement an action plan for social and economic community development that will be scheduled to last for at least 15 years. We want a Canada with provinces and territories where the business sector is more concerned with its labour force; a Canada whose provinces and territories offer viable career opportunities for the younger generation; a Canada that squarely faces the chronic illness rate and recognizes that income is the chief factor in determining health.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to attend this meeting.
The Chairman: Thank you, Colette.
[English]
Annie Boyle and Irene Larkin will now share their time and comment on behalf of the Prince Edward Island Senior Citizens' Federation. We will wind up with Catherine McAleer who will speak on behalf of the Advisory Council on the Status of Women.
Annie Boyle, President, PEI Senior Citizens' Federation Inc.: The PEI Senior Citizens' Federation is a provincial not- for-profit organization whose membership includes 40 clubs across the Island and individuals. The federation acts as a voice for seniors and advocates for a better quality of life on their behalf.
Our objectives are to: link member clubs across P.E.I. and provide a vehicle for a stronger voice; consult with government and other decision makers about seniors' concerns and advocate on their behalf; coordinate and organize workshops and seminars that meet seniors' social and educational needs; increase understanding of the aging process; encourage seniors to participate in decisions that affect their lives; act as a resource and determine information for the benefit of all seniors; and collaborate with other seniors' organizations.
The federation has 40 senior citizens' clubs across P.E.I. with approximately 1,500 members. Our membership is largely in rural Prince Edward Island. Members keep us apprised of issues that concern them which impact on their quality of life. Therefore, our definition of poverty relates directly to the quality of life.
The following are concerns that affect the lives of seniors on P.E.I.
Irene Larkin, Executive Director, PEI Senior Citizens' Federation Inc.: The first concern is income. Seniors make up 14.1 per cent of the population here, which amounts to 19,458 people. According to Statistics Canada, 52 per cent of these seniors receive the guaranteed income supplement, GIS. Single seniors receiving the GIS have incomes ranging from $13,354 to $14,903 and couples have incomes between $18,000 and $20,000. These incomes are below the low- income cut-off by close to $2,000.
We know that only 5 per cent to 7 per cent of seniors live in institutions. In rural areas, seniors are maintaining the same family home where they brought up their children, the same home they maintained when they were in the workforce and making a living wage. For seniors who rent, the average gross rent in Charlottetown in 2001 was $543, which equals 53 per cent of their old age security, OAS, and GIS. The OAS pension is indexed but, on P.E.I., the taxation system is not. Therefore, the increases in the OAS pension due to indexation may be lost due to the provincial taxation system. It is hard to get ahead.
Many more women than men live alone. In 1997, 49.1 per cent of unattached elderly women lived in poverty compared to 33 per cent of elderly males. Five years after being widowed, the standard of living for widows declined more than six times the decline among senior women who remained married. As well, more widowed women fall below the low-income cut-off.
The second concern is housing. Research on seniors' housing includes three areas where policies and programs may focus: home maintenance and repair programs for older homeowners; affordable and appropriate rental housing for those who live independently; and affordable supportive housing. By 2046, 25 per cent of the Canadian population will be over 65. In Atlantic Canada, that percentage will be even greater; 30 per cent will be over 65. We have a great deal to do to ensure that housing needs will be met by 2046.
An increasing number of seniors are healthy longer and want to stay in their homes in communities of their choice and, in many instances, surrounded by their children. There are few support services to allow them to do this and, at present, few affordable housing options in rural areas that will provide assistance to seniors as their health goes through different stages.
Turning to health care, on P.E.I., the seniors' drug cost assistance program covers all seniors equally with no consideration to income. Every year, the number of medications used by seniors increases as do the costs. What does not increase is the number of drugs that are covered under the formulary. In 2004, the average cost to seniors per year was $625.
Home care remains a huge issue as seniors can not have nursing care under medicare if they choose to stay in their own homes. The health care system no longer reflects today's demographics and social realities. Health care must be realigned to accommodate the changes that have occurred in the four decades since medicare was introduced. Realignment must serve everyone, including the aging population.
The increasing infiltration of private for-profit delivery of health care is also worrisome and alarming. Research has shown that private for-profit delivery does not relieve pressure on the public system. Instead, it drains funds, staff and other resources from that system. This inevitably results in longer waiting lists and poorer care. It is even scarier when you realize that our medicare system is exempt from the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, only because it is a public system and not a for-profit system.
Another concern is transportation. In rural P.E.I., there is no public transportation. In fact, the only system of public transportation we have is in Charlottetown. This lack of transportation has a deep impact on the quality of life for seniors. If you live in the country, your only means of mobility is the car. Seniors refer to their car as their symbol of independence. We have heard many say, "If I could not drive my car, I might as well be dead." This translates into seniors driving long after they are comfortable on narrow roads, often with poor driving conditions and increasing traffic. They drive long after they should because they have no choice. Transportation becomes a main determinant in where you live. If you live in the country, you need your car for everything — shopping, church, health care and, last but not least, for social reasons. If you are forced to give up your car, it often means you must move to the city and perhaps to a home. Consider even buying a car if you make $12,000 a year or even trying to maintain one. The poor then have even less options. Their choices of housing are limited and their chances of being socially isolated greater. In order to address the needs of rural transportation, there must be a greater emphasis on programs for rural transportation in the federal funding received by cities and municipalities.
We have some recommendations. In light of the burgeoning numbers of baby boomers coming on to the senior rolls, and acknowledging that the federal government has a responsibility for the welfare of seniors, we recommend that the OAS pension and GIS be increased to reflect seniors' cost of living, and that the GIS be adjusted to remove the gross- up amount of actual dividends when calculating the guaranteed annual supplement. For example, right now, if the 2006 actual dividend was $1,000, it becomes $1,450 for tax purposes. Small amounts of income funds from a RRIF, registered retirement income fund, could be allocated over a number of years so as not to reduce or cancel out the GIS in any one year. We have many examples of people who take out $1,000 from their RRIF and there goes their GIS. The GST should be removed from home heating fuel; medicare should be realigned to allow seniors more home care to meet the needs of aging in place; and housing supports like the veterans independence program which enables seniors to stay in their family home should be developed. This should be for more than veterans; it should be for everyone. Supportive housing would enable seniors to age in place and new housing would enable seniors to leave their older homes for modern, environmental units. Finally, the municipal rural infrastructure fund, which is shared by federal, provincial and municipal governments, should be targeted to provide funding for rural transportation systems as well as roads, sewage and water management.
We have brought along a couple of brochures. One is about our seniors peer helping program which we have in place to look at social isolation. It has been working well but, of course, always needs more funding.
Catherine McAleer, Member, PEI Advisory Council on the Status of Women: Senators and fellow presenters, for those of you who are not from here, welcome to P.E.I. and, for those of you who are, welcome home.
I read the report on rural poverty and most of it reflects our own findings. I am here to put another face to this issue. You have our handout which I am not going to read verbatim. I am going to read excerpts with stories and, hopefully, this will bring home the plight of some of our people around P.E.I.
I live and work in rural P.E.I. I work as a counsellor with people who have multi-barrier problems in their lives, big problems they find hard to deal with on a day-to-day basis. We help them get on their feet and decide where they should be and what they should do. This is partly why I was asked to present today because this is a passion of mine and a part of my heart.
The face of rural poverty in Prince Edward Island, particularly for women, is partially hidden in current snapshots of life in this province. Islanders value hard work and self-sufficiency and they take a great deal of pride in their ability to get by. We all know senior women who remember the deprivations of the Depression and now consider themselves fortunate to have a steady source of toast and tea. Many of these women would not define themselves as poor and would attach a social stigma to the label of poverty.
I spoke to a lady yesterday who has six children. She is about 34 years old. Her oldest child is 20. She got married at 14. Up until two years ago, this lady lived in a home without electricity or plumbing. She was pleased to have a new pump put in her kitchen so that she did not have to go outside to get water. She raised six children in rural P.E.I. on this kind of background. Two years ago, people got together and she now has indoor plumbing, et cetera, which is a big thing. I asked her and her children yesterday, "Do you feel like you were poor?" Her children answered for her and said they thought not because they grew up knowing their parents gave them everything they could. That is very, very powerful. I asked the parents who said they cried constantly, wishing they had more to give their children and more avenues to turn to. Their parents got by and they would get by, and they were going to teach their children not to be raised on assistance. That is pretty powerful. That is not just one isolated case here in P.E.I. either. There are a lot of cases like this.
The realities of low wages and seasonal work mean that families in rural Prince Edward Island can rarely survive on only one salary. If one of these salaries is threatened or cut off, the family's well-being is in immediate jeopardy. Many households, especially those of senior and single women, are only one crisis away from catastrophe. A lady I will call Mary — that is not her name — works in security an hour from where she lives. This is her only income. Last fall, her car broke down. She managed to borrow a small eight-foot camper and, to this day, is still living there beside where she works so that she can get up in the morning, unplug her electric heater, and go to work because she does not want to live on assistance. How many of us could live in a tiny camper during a P.E.I. winter? This is a reality for her and when I asked, "Is there any way you could get help?" there is no way. That is not an issue there. Again, this is not an isolated issue.
The Prince Edward Island Advisory Council on the Status of Women believes that women's equality is the foundation for equality for all people. Women's inequality continues to influence discriminatory attitudes and actions that affect our society, culture, politics, laws and economics. The council believes that women's independent social and economic security is key to equality and to freedom from physical, emotional and sexual violence. The following points suggest some of the compounding factors that contribute to impoverished living for many rural Island women and their families. These comments are based on our understanding of women's experiences in communities throughout the province and are not presented as a detailed gender analysis of women's economic standing. As well, this submission is not an exhaustive list of pressing poverty-related issues. It does not address the important matters of universal violence prevention and front-line services, access to quality health care including abortion services and literacy programs for example, nor does it speak to the need for federally supplied legal aid for the resolution of legal matters affecting family or voting system reforms. We think it does offer a few of the current pressing issues relating to poverty.
Concerning homes and property, poverty measures often focus first on an individual's and household's ability to pay for food and shelter. One of our lines is that, while able to pay month-to-month bills, many people can not pay month-to-month bills. That is a dream. They make enough money to rob Peter to pay Paul. If they pay for the phone this pay, then next pay they have to pay for something else. When they are told to save at least 10 per cent of their income to be able to have something to fall back on, they laugh because they do not have that extra money. It is just not there.
Families are vulnerable because of ill-maintained houses. If anything happens like a furnace breaking down or needing to be replaced, a roof leaking significantly in heavy rain or causing structural damage, they have no money to pay for it. One lady had half her roof torn off in Hurricane Juan. She had no insurance. She can not afford to pay for insurance. If she paid for home insurance, she would not be able to buy groceries. She had plastic on her roof until December because she did not have the money to pay someone to fix the roof. Under the disaster committee that was set up, it would take too long. Finally, neighbours got together and helped fix her roof. She and her four children lived in that home with plastic on the roof and that is how she survived.
Affordable rental housing for workers, families and seniors is also needed in rural P.E.I. to mitigate the effects of low wages. To be practicable, rural housing must be coupled with effective and affordable public transit or it only increases isolation and decreases access to opportunity. Out-migration, especially of young people, is reaching critical levels in rural and urban P.E.I. This week alone, I arranged for two people from Souris to go out West to work. We managed to obtain work for them. Right now, there are 1,200 people working in this factory and they are looking for 600 more. These two are flying out next week. We managed to get them affordable housing out West, transportation, a flight out, and now they are going to actually bring home a pay cheque. One of them is 19 years old; the other is 32 and a father of four. He is leaving his wife and four children because he works seasonally and can not find employment.
The lack of public transportation in rural Prince Edward Island means that rural Islanders almost always have to own and maintain their own vehicle. As my fellow speakers have both said to your committee, this is a major issue as well. Sometimes people in rural P.E.I. can ask for rides but what happens if they have three children who have to be brought to daycare first? The car or the van is usually filled with other people who have to go to that work site. They can not take the children and drive them to daycare first. There may be subsidies for them to go to childcare but they can not get them there. Again, it is living in rural P.E.I. and it just adds to the poverty state they already live in.
Women tend to be under-represented in construction and other trade employment. Islanders need our federal government to enhance women's economic equality and support citizens to obtain livable income for their families. It requires an appreciation for work, workers and excellence in the workforce. It requires a national plan for social housing.
Since income is the most important social determinant of health, livable income must be recognized as a pillar of health care in Canada. With a higher income, people can afford better quality groceries. They do not have to live on macaroni and cheese or potato soup which, believe it or not, is still a big meal in rural P.E.I. The better quality of life is there for them if they have higher incomes, like the availability of health care plans to purchase drugs. When sick, many people go without drugs on P.E.I. because they can not afford them; they do not have a drug plan. The doctors are wonderful as I know of many who give out samples — and thank God they do — because these people are sick, have the flu and ear infections, and can not take anything because they do not have the money to purchase it.
I briefly touched on access to licensed childcare. Childcare in rural P.E.I. is severely limited. Ocean Choice is a major fish plant operation in Souris. They employ over 300 people. There are over 100 children. We have two childcare centres to handle all those children. Grandparents and family members living in a home do not get paid because they are considered living there already. If they babysit, they can not go out to work themselves, or the mother stays home so they are back to being a single income.
The last area I want to touch on is volunteerism. Traditionally, Prince Edward Islanders in rural areas have been shielded from some of the most serious and harmful effects of poverty by formal and informal volunteerism. Women's unpaid work, at home and in the community, drives both the formal and informal structures of the social infrastructure. I organized a fundraiser in the rural community where I live. There are 125 families at the school. I phoned all of them and 118 had both parents working. That says a lot about the changes that have happened over the years. Many years ago, at least one parent was home. The seven who did not work in a formal work setting volunteered full time. Ultimately, for this fundraiser and for the evening that I needed help, 15 people showed up. They were all women. Not to be gender biased but, again, it is women who really push through the fabric. We see women volunteering just as much even though they are now working. They are working full time right alongside men. Men will often work if they get paid but they volunteer to coach or whatever.
I briefly covered our areas of concern. I would like to end with a handout that was passed to me from a woman who was in the newspaper yesterday here in P.E.I.:
The provincial government was real quick to loan $8.1 million to transform Cows store into a bigger tourist attraction, and another $125,000 to construct a new wine boutique, which it hopes to open in May. . . . How many seniors on this Island have a shortage of food as well as heat in their homes? Also, there are a lot of children who do not have enough food for three meals a day. Sure there are food banks but some people have no transportation available to pick up the food. For heaven's sake, look around and see the poverty here on this Island. I can see why young people are leaving here.
This was in yesterday's Charlottetown Guardian written by a lady from Prince Edward Island.
The Chairman: Thank you.
Senator Mercer: I am going to ask the same question of all of you and I have one other for our friend from the P.E.I. Seniors Citizens' Federation.
Where do you get the funding for your organization and how secure is your funding for future years? Specifically for the P.E.I. Senior Citizens' Federation, what do you identify as seniors' educational needs which you talked about in your brief? It is not a term we have seen in our studies before. It is under your objectives column. I have a final question as well. The current government introduced a $100-per-month childcare allocation to replace the program the previous government had signed with the 10 provinces and three territories to create daycare spaces. Has the $100 had an effect? Somebody earlier today said that the price of childcare just went up $100 a month in many places so it ate up the money before they even got it. Those are my questions.
Ms. McAleer: Can I answer that one right away?
The Chairman: Yes.
Ms. McAleer: It not only jumped up $100 but a third of it is lost in taxes. At first, many were excited to get it. Now they are doing their taxes and saying, "What do you mean I have to pay taxes on this money?" They did not have to pay taxes before. This money is taxable so they lose a third of it.
Funding is also being cut at an alarming rate. As you know, funding was cut for the Status of Women — different offices have been closed — as well as funding for programs that affect women and people who live in rural P.E.I. In fact, the program of which I am coordinator was cut and will be finished at the end of March. We have been there for six years. It leaves us with the question — who is going to help these people? Workers are now asking, "Where are we going to send these people? How are they going to get help?" They are all crying in rural P.E.I., saying the same thing. In the Montague and Souris areas, our programs have been cut due to federal funding cuts. Where are they going? Are we just going to bury them under the rug a little bit further? They are still there.
[Translation]
Ms. Arsenault: With regard to projects, the situation is the same for the Association des femmes acadiennes et francophones. It is very worrisome. We used to receive several projects from Health Canada and from Status of Women Canada, but the criteria have changed to the point that it is difficult to receive any funds. We are less frequently invited to propose projects. We are lucky to receive a few projects, with some funding for our programs from Heritage Canada because we are a francophone Acadian organization in Prince Edward Island. Nevertheless, $32,000 a year does not go very far to pay for programs that will help women.
Regarding the $100, I agree with Catherine. It might have been a good thing at the beginning because they did not know that they had to claim it as a tax deduction, and now, it no longer works at all. Currently, families cannot even meet the basic needs of their children.
[English]
Ms. Larkin: You asked about our funding source and why we would have social and educational needs. We get a certain amount of funding from the provincial government and scramble for the rest. Our peer helping program is wonderfully successful and everybody embraces it, including government, but we have to scramble for funding. At the end of every fiscal year, we start again to keep that program going. We also have to find other projects with the theme of what our organization is trying to do with seniors. It is a familiar refrain. I am sure you have heard it.
For our social and educational needs, I want to tell you about a program we put on this year teaching seniors on computers. The average age of our membership would be over 75. We were deluged and could not believe the response. We had clubs asking for two and three courses and I had to redo the project for Service Canada because I did not think we were going to get that response. So, yes, seniors want to keep on learning and they demonstrate it over and over.
Our clubs provide big social needs just by their activities. If you look at our brochure, we have an insert on our clubs like dancing and cards. There are numerous activities that they do. There is no end.
When we have membership meetings with a speaker on an issue that concerns seniors, we get 115 to 125 people out.
Senator Callbeck: Irene and Annie, when you talked in your brief about housing — the veterans independence program which is a marvelous program — you said to "Extend it to all seniors." Does that mean you would not have an income test? Would you extend it to a senior regardless of how much money the senior had?
Ms. Larkin: I do not think we mean that, do we?
Ms. Boyle: No.
Ms. Larkin: I think it would be available and, for those who could pay a little, then they would be asked to do it. I do not think we have any problem with that.
Senator Callbeck: In the next sentence you say, "Creating supportive housing will enable seniors to age in place." By age in place do you mean age in their community?
Ms. Larkin: Yes, or age in the same building, in the same home.
Senator Callbeck: One of the problems are the senior citizens' units we built across the Island years ago, so many of them in rural areas. In my own community of Bedeck we built one and I think there are vacant units now. It is difficult because seniors want to be near the doctor, medical services and the hospital.
Ms. Boyle: I have been talking with the head of senior housing here who says there are vacancies in all the senior units and they are trying to do something to fill them. We do not know why people want to stay, but there is an issue that came up last fall. Some people residing in rural areas like to get into senior housing handier to Summerside or Charlottetown where they have more access to everything. There are senior homes across the Island that have been closed and we do not know why — like the one up in Tyne Valley.
Ms. Larkin: We do know one of the reasons is that they are inadequate. They are old. They were built in the 1960s before the pension came in. Once the government gets that idea, and I think they are getting it, seniors will stay in their communities. We have heard from different communities where they say, "Build two units. We do not want these small, cramped one-bedroom units. They are not appropriate for seniors today."
Senator Callbeck: If they were adequate or appropriate, would seniors stay in their own community rather than go out to Summerside or Charlottetown where the doctors and medical services are?
Ms. Boyle: I think so.
Ms. Larkin: They would because there are medical centres now in a lot of the larger communities. In Rustico, for example, they are happy as pigs in muck because they have their community, their medical centre and a wonderful inclusive atmosphere of camaraderie.
Senator Mahovlich: And they are dancing.
Ms. Larkin: They are dancing. You give them a fiddle and they are dancing. They are gone.
Aging in place is a new concept. It is probably only 20 years old. We have one in Mount Alberton, the Phillips Residence, and that means you can go from one area of the residence to another when your needs change. We would like to see more of them in communities in rural areas.
Ms. Boyle: There is one in Crapaud.
Ms. Larkin: We have high-end ones like Whisperwood but the people we represent are not high end.
Senator Callbeck: Thank you for clearing that up.
Colette, you talked about post-secondary education and I certainly agree with the importance of it. You talked about the importance of access. Do you think more should be done here in loans or grants or what are you talking about?
Ms. Arsenault: Access to education right now is expensive. I have a graduate with a Masters degree in Social Services from the University of Ottawa who is coming out with a debt of $90,000. She will never have a salary in the community sector — where she is really interested in working — to be able to repay her student loan,.
The price of education keeps going up. When I graduated in 1976, my debt for four years was $4,400. My daughter will come out of four years of university with a debt of $40,000. Something has to be done. We have more and more students not keeping up their education at university. They will go but they see that they can not continue their education because of the money involved. This even happens in high school — my son is graduating this year and the amount of money we have to put up for different activities at the school is incredible. Parents do not have the money. Students are being eliminated all the time. More grants, more student loans — there has to be a cut-off somewhere where the tuition to go to university can not keep going up.
Senator Callbeck: There are some huge debts out there.
Catherine, you mentioned civil legal aid which is so important, and we have not had any witness address that need at this committee. Perhaps you could talk on that for two or three minutes.
Ms. McAleer: For legal aid?
Senator Callbeck: Yes, why is civil legal aid needed?
Ms. McAleer: Many people have absolutely no access to it. They can stand in line for legal aid. They can put their name in. It can take them a long time. If you have four or five children and you are both working and you are over the allowable income level — it could be by $50 — you do not get legal aid. It is so important for people to have that equitable access. They have to have the opportunity to be equally represented in what their needs are and that is not happening. It is a long wait. Personally, as a single parent with four children, I was told by legal aid about the work and worry I was going to have to go through to try and get my spouse to give some kind of financial funding for our children, and that he would just leave the province or change jobs. Their advice was, "Just forget about it." I raised four children on my own. It was not even a possibility. Civil legal aid is there on paper, but it is not there in a satisfactory manner that people can access it and have their needs met.
Senator Callbeck: No, you do not have to convince me. I agree with you. Many people have talked to me about the need for this, and a lot of people are representing themselves because they can not get any assistance from a lawyer.
Ms. McAleer: Yes, very much so. On the other side, the RCMP and the law are really coming on board realizing that these issues of violence against women are paramount. I have seen such a turnaround in the last several years of them helping the victims compared to what it was even six or seven years ago. I am seeing good advancement there. In some cases, we are seeing education and that improving.
The Chairman: Thank you all very much. You added a great deal to our hearings today and we are grateful that you took the time to come.
We now welcome representatives from the National Farmers Union. Ranald MacFarlane is the Maritime Board Member and Karen Fyfe is Women's Vice-President.
Ranald MacFarlane, Maritime Board Member, National Farmers Union: My name is Ranald MacFarlane and I am from Bedeque. I am a dairy, beef and pork producer. This is my friend, Karen Fyfe. I do not have many friends in this world but I count her as one of them.
Karen Fyfe, Women's Vice-President, National Farmers Union: Good.
Mr. MacFarlane: I did not know about this committee until a month ago when I ran into Catherine Callbeck at the Village Store in Bedeque and she asked, "How is everything going?" I do not normally complain but I represent a lot of farmers in P.E.I. and across the country. Catherine got the brunt of about 25 minutes of me telling her what is going on in the countryside.
Farmers are broke. A lot of them are in desperate trouble out there. Rural incomes are falling because we are not getting paid.
I am one of the lucky ones. I have my family farm. I milk 17 cows. Everything I do, I do for money and if it does not pay, I get rid of it. I do not have any borrowed money and that leaves me extremely flexible to take on positions like this. No man is the boss of me and only one woman.
The Chairman: Now, would that be Karen?
Mr. MacFarlane: No, my wife. Let us be clear on that.
The Chairman: Okay, I just wanted to clear that up. Carry on.
Mr. MacFarlane: I told Catherine there are a lot issues out there. In agriculture, we are just being completely abused by the situation. Agriculture has been in crisis for 20 years and the crisis has been building. We keep putting forward the solutions and no one does anything.
My net income for 2005 was $13,500 and I am one of the lucky ones. I was questioning who was going to qualify for any of these programs. If I do not qualify for the farm families options program, who is the poor schmuck that did qualify? I put that in a letter to the editor in the newspaper and accidentally declared bankruptcy because then creditors were phoning, saying, "What do you mean, you are broke? Pay up." I am the only one I know that is dumb enough to accidentally declare bankruptcy, but it did not cost me a cent either.
In the ensuing month-and-a-half right up until now, many people have come up and said, "We do qualify," and then tell me their stories. I did not realize your net income can go below zero on line 150. A perfectly good hog farmer, who has done everything right and you could not ask for a more organized and better hog farmer, told me his income for 2005 was negative $141,000. This person has not done anything wrong.
I also am a hog farmer and I have never bought the government's spiel about export, export, export, Japanese markets, complementary markets, Korean markets. I have been to Japan. They do not eat a handful of red meat in a month but all this brainwashing was presented to hog farmers across Canada.
I have tabled with you a report called The Farm Crisis & Corporate Profits. Maple Leaf has had record years of profits off the equity of these farmers and now the company is leaving the Maritimes. They raped these farmers — sorry for the word — took their equity and are moving on.
The Chairman: To where, do you know?
Mr. MacFarlane: They will go to Central Canada. Maple Leaf is doing whatever Maple Leaf is doing, but they have left the Charlottetown plant and they are leaving Nova Scotia. The hog farmers there are bereft of income now from all these corporations. I have left this with you. I hope you are all readers.
Ms. Fyfe: I would like to highlight a few things.
Mr. MacFarlane: Where records are available, you will see where all the major corporations have record or near- record profits.
Ms. Fyfe: Pages 5 through 8.
Senator Callbeck: We did not get them.
Ms. Fyfe: Oh, you did not get them?
Senator Callbeck: Just hold on.
Ms. Fyfe: I will just highlight. Ranald is right. The agri-food industry is doing quite nicely off the backs of the farm men and farm women across Canada.
I know we are pushed for time. We want to get some clear points across to you today but we do not want to leave you in the dark, thinking that nothing can be done. There are solutions out there. The National Farmers Union has put solutions forward. The UPA, the farm organization in Quebec, has put solutions forward. We work well with the UPA. We analyze the issues in similar fashions and, therefore, our solutions are similar.
I would like to draw your attention to the charts on record and next-to-record profits corporations have been enjoying at our expense and also at the expense of consumers. On page 10, economist Richard Levins quips, "The shortest possible economic history of . . . agriculture during the twentieth century would be this: non-farmers learning how to make money from farming." I wish they had let us in on the secret. If we knew how they were making money from farming, we may be able to stay in farming.
Moving to page 11, there are a number of ways the industry has created their good times out of the farm families' bad times. I was at a meeting yesterday about the next new vision of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's policies. I read this quote and no one could believe it came from the CEO of Archers Daniel Midland Corporation, ADM: "The free market is a myth. Everybody knows that. Just very few people say it. . . . If I'm not smart enough to know there's no free market, I ought to be fired. . . . You can't have farming on a total laissez-faire system because the sellers are too weak and the buyers are too strong."
I would ad lib here that farmers have not been treated in as equitable a way as the other stakeholders of the agriculture and agri-food systems, that our concerns, issues, experiences, analyses and solutions go by the wayside. That has led to the current financial crisis that we see not only in family farming in Canada, but our family farm comrades to the south are suffering. They are suffering in the European continent. There are a lot of factors that come into play which you can read at your leisure: cost externalization; pricing power; fostering farmer dependency; pursuing corporate independence; sharpening profit extraction tools; and destroying the non-corporate competitives, the farmers' collectives, the consumer producer groups and the Canadian Wheat Board. I am sure you have all been following the struggles of the Canadian Wheat Board and the underhanded backroom tactics of our current federal government — the firing of CEO Adrian Measner, the gag orders, the fraudulent barley vote question, and all of the other manipulation that is going on. The Canadian Wheat Board is actually one vehicle that puts farmers in the driver's seat. It makes sure that a fair return is going back to those farmers.
Mr. MacFarlane: We were at the agricultural policy framework, APF, consultations yesterday. This is supposed to be our vehicle into agricultural policy. I call it an "autistic policy failure" because the government has a policy of free trade and has said, "On the inception of free trade, we are going to quadruple our exports." And we did. Canadian farmers did what they were told and we have quadrupled our exports out of this country. Net income now is below zero, the worst farm net income in history. The APF did not listen yesterday to all the solutions and everything we told them — all farmers, not just a few people.
Do not dismiss me as an angry farmer radical because people were coming up and saying what a great job I did in presenting the facts. Everyone came in with the same attitude, the same concerns, the same solutions, and it is all in the Empowering Canadian Farmers in the Marketplace report commissioned by Andy Mitchell. How many people here have not read this report?
Ms. Fyfe: We just call it the "Wayne report."
Mr. MacFarlane: But it is not.
It was commissioned by a federal minister to look for solutions. It is not the "Wayne report." Wayne Easter went across the countryside and consulted with all farmers. Everything I heard at the APF consultations yesterday is in here. If you refuse to read it, I am fine with that. For those who do read it, I am glad to have you on my side. Now, let's talk solutions.
Ms. Fyfe: That is right. We do not want to leave you with the opinion that things are so bad there is nothing we can do and that we are just going to lie down and accept more farm families leaving their businesses, the countryside, and rural Canada declines in terms of population and services. There are things we can do. The crisis did not just fall out of the sky. It was not like Chicken Little running all over this country and saying, "The sky is falling." The crisis was caused. It has its causes. It was deliberate policy that has led Canadian farm families to the point of almost near extinction, at least extinction in terms of recovering their costs of production from the marketplace.
In holding an elected position with the National Farmers Union as women's vice president, part of my mandate is to make sure that farm women's voices are heard at the table, such as this, because our analysis is a little different. Because our everyday living experience is a bit different from that of our male counterparts, we took the initiative, with generous funding from the Status of Women, and put together a report called Farm Women and Canadian Agricultural Policy. I have provided you with an executive summary of this report.
There are solutions in here and I would draw your attention to the two pages, which your assistant put inside the little booklet. If you add these two pages to the solutions that farmers themselves presented to Mr. Easter, you have the solution in your hands. It is all right there. The question now becomes — is there the political will to reverse the tide, to change direction and implement a domestic food security, made-in-Canada agricultural policy? As I said to the folks yesterday, we do not have an agricultural policy. We have a trade policy for agricultural products and that is the problem in a nutshell.
The direction we have gone has hurt rural Canada. I am sure you have heard that. Your very report starts off saying that the genesis, the impetus, for this committee to tackle the issue of rural poverty came about because you recognize there is a farm financial crisis. Where does farming occur? In rural Canada. Where do farm families live? In rural Canada. We have been disempowered through the current agricultural policy framework and are now asking for your attention and deliberations to let us regain some of that power. Let us be decision makers in our lives instead of having everything imposed on us and directed from global competitiveness, innovation and export-oriented markets.
Let us start talking about some of these solutions that we and farmers across this country have put forward. We have the knowledge and expertise in how to best put forward an agricultural policy that benefits everyone in the system and does not leave farm families at the expense of the other players in the system.
Senator Mercer: To a certain extent, you are preaching to the converted. When Wayne Easter was doing his consultation in Nova Scotia, I attended one or two of the sessions he had with farmers. I sat in and listened to the process. When Wayne finished, he appeared before our committee once or twice and did not have a hard time selling us on the issues. You have hit the nail on the head in that the crisis in farm income is what motivated us to have this study. We are not yet at our recommendations point — and it will be some time before we are — but it is obvious that we need to address the crisis of farm incomes because it is directly related and tied to rural poverty. That is not just the people who own farms, but the people you employ or would like to employ because most farmers can not afford to employ anybody any more.
Recognizing that government moves slowly, is there something that could be done immediately? The current government is going to introduce a budget in March. Is there something they could do in the budget that could have some immediate effect? Obviously, I do not think it can solve the problem. It took us a long time to screw it up this bad, so it may take us some time to fix it. Is there something the government could do in a budget that might help start the process?
Mr. MacFarlane: Farmers are innovative people. We are adaptable and we know where the problems are. My first suggestion would be to take agriculture out of the World Trade Organization, WTO. Farmers are great negotiators on their own. We know how to haggle and know when we are getting ripped off. All this free trade and the WTO are a threat to supply management. The Wheat Board always give in to the Americans on everything. The WTO has done nothing for us. Are we an exporting country? Yes. Has it done us any good? No. A made-in-Canada policy and the WTO can trade cars, planes, trains, automobiles, I don't care, but take agriculture out of the WTO. If you as a farmer have something that is losing you money and position, you get rid of it.
The Chairman: I was reminded of something you may know. In the spring of 2006, after a study we were doing on a form of agricultural support that would quickly provide funding, this committee recommended a per-acre payment to farmers especially for those in need. Is that something you would find useful?
Mr. MacFarlane: As I said, I did not qualify for any of the welfare programs. Some farmers did. It is complicated. The CASE program is a disaster. I know fellows who desperately need CASE money but it does not work for them. It will cost you more in accountants than it is worth. I do not want welfare. I want a fair price for my product. Farmers do not want welfare. I am a progressive and conservative individual — not that I am a card-carrying Progressive Conservative. Do not get me wrong. Thank you but I do not want government money. I want action to keep farmers farming. Yes, there needs to be emergency money but I have yet to see a delivery system that actually works, so forget that route. If you can come up with something simple that works, fine, but I do not think you can actually do that. Farming is far too complicated. What I want is a policy that keep farmers farming in Canada. This export, export, export, "bigger is better" business, is not going to work.
I have a bigger concern. You might have missed it but the UN convened all their scientists on global climate change. The scientists have said all this intensive agriculture is killing the planet. I have a friend in Guelph who did a Master's thesis on land resource science and studied nitrous oxide emissions and, sure enough, all the nitrogen fertilizer industrial agriculture uses is killing this planet. It would take me an hour to tell you what the problem is. We are doomed. The human race on this planet is doomed if we stay on this path.
You need a whole new generation of innovative farmers to do things differently. Countries should be producing their own food to minimize both CO2 and nitrous oxide emissions and save this planet. The next generation is not going to be there because they sees mom and pop starving on a farm. They are leaving perfectly good farms.
I have been in Blaine Lake, Saskatchewan, and the youngest farmer in that town is older than I am. I have been deer hunting for 14 years and have watched that Prairie town die. They had elevators and now the elevators have been shut down. The stores have all been moved to the two gas stations on the highway and the young people are not going to farm there. That is just plain wrong because Canada needs them. No amount of welfare is going to keep them there because that is not what those people want. So, no disrespect intended —
The Chairman: Yes.
Mr. MacFarlane: — but do not come to me thinking that a band-aid or welfare solution is going to fix this. I know that is not where you were going.
The Chairman: No.
Ms. Fyfe: Yes.
The Chairman: Well, the reason for having this committee or these hearings —
Mr. MacFarlane: Is?
The Chairman: — is precisely what you are talking about.
Ms. Fyfe: Yes.
The Chairman: It is to get on the land, get out there across the country, hear what people have to say and come back and do a report that will —
Mr. MacFarlane: Just let me reiterate.
The Chairman: Our goal is to keep our farmers on the land.
Mr. MacFarlane: The generation that has been lost right across this country is the generation you need to deal with all these challenges in the future.
The Chairman: Exactly.
Mr. MacFarlane: And they are not going to be there.
Ms. Fyfe: That is right.
The Chairman: Well, we are going to give it our best shot.
Ms. Fyfe: Senator, if I might again draw your attention to this report. I think you are probably the first person who has ever been able to hear this definition of a farm crisis from me. One could describe the farm crisis this way. A consumer puts $1.35 on a grocery store counter for a loaf of bread. Powerful food retailers, processors, railways and grain companies take $1.30 of that $1.35, leaving the farmer with just a nickel. The powerful energy, fertilizer, chemical and machinery companies take six cents of that nickel away from the farmer. Taxpayers make up the penny in order to bring us back to a zero net realized income from the marketplace. Your suggestion of a kind of emergency crisis payment really is a band-aid solution.
The Chairman: Yes.
Ms. Fyfe: I am sure there are a few farmers who would benefit by it but they would be your larger, corporate agri- business types who have the accountants, who know how to do the paperwork, and who have the time to do the paperwork in order to access those types of programs and services. The problem is there has to be a redistribution of that food dollar. There has to be a way of making sure that more than just a nickel gets back into that farm family's pocket.
The Chairman: Yes.
Ms. Fyfe: There is no need for government support payments. There is no need for subsidies going towards the agricultural community because we are the most efficient and most innovative.
The Chairman: Yes.
Ms. Fyfe: The changes that have occurred in this country in agriculture wiped out all the inefficiency in it. It wiped out all those people who did not adapt, who could not adapt, who felt that it was time to get out. As Ranald said, we just want a fair return. We want our cost of production from the marketplace.
Senator Callbeck: I have a short question on seasonal workers. Right now, they are in short supply. You hear this complaint everywhere.
Ms. Fyfe: Yes.
Senator Callbeck: Is there anything the government can do in the short term to make it easier to hire seasonal workers?
Ms. Fyfe: That is a good question and I am going to tell you a little story. I met my husband, Alfred, way back in 1981 because at that time, there was an outfit called the Canada Farm Labour Pool. Someone like me, who was studying agriculture and wanted some real, hands-on experience, could go to the Canada Farm Labour Pool and present yourself. "What kind of sector do you want to work in? Do you want to work in dairy, beef, potatoes?" They had a list of farmers who needed summer help. There was a service connecting someone like me who wanted to work in the industry with someone who needed someone like me to work in the industry. They looked after the logistics of putting those two partners together and I believe there was a wage subsidy. So my future husband paid half my wages for that summer and the Government of Canada and the Government of Prince Edward Island topped those wages up because I was a university student. I certainly accumulated debt. I am in total agreement. I have three daughters in university right now who will come out with debt that I would never be able to assist them with. They have to do it themselves because there is just no money on my farm — and I work off the farm from May to November in order to make sure the farm survives the rest of the year.
Yes, there are a lot of non-cost things that can be done. We need the Canada Farm Labour Pool back. We need an administrative body that can make those connections for us. We need a little bit of money in there. Perhaps one of the easiest ways is for the farm family who hires a student or outside help to get a tax break. That would not cost much to implement. I am speaking of a real tax break, not just pennies and nickel-and-diming us.
Mr. MacFarlane: I have no trouble getting help. I pay my help well, I treat them well, but I do not have any money. I do not believe they should be subsidizing me and I pay them well. Another thing that the corporate sector seems to abuse in agriculture is the farmers' good nature and the fact that we can use unpaid work and child labour. I am not saying this to be funny but we just have that pool. We always have had that pool. Traditionally, that is how you raised little farmers that grew up on the tractor with the big farmers. And do not think that is not part of the labour situation.
As far as getting help goes, no, if the equity is out there, if you treat people equitably, I do not have a problem getting help. There are lots of young fellows who want to work for me.
We have recently become foster parents. This is a whole new world to me. I consider that subsidized labour now, but it is going to be great.
Senator Mahovlich: It sounds like you are searching for a level playing field.
Mr. MacFarlane: That is exactly right.
Senator Mahovlich: When did we have a level playing field? How many years ago was it worthwhile to get into farming?
Mr. MacFarlane: The 1970s treated people pretty good.
Senator Mahovlich: In the 1970s, you were okay?
Mr. MacFarlane: Back in the 1970s, there was some money in agriculture. I was not there; I was three back then.
Senator Mahovlich: Your father was doing well?
Mr. MacFarlane: Everyone was doing better. The problem is the efficiency keeps getting pressed down on us. The farmers of 20 years ago are gone. The inefficient farmers of 10 years ago are gone. When I was born in 1967 in Fernwood, there were 12 functioning farms; now there are three.
Senator Mahovlich: Three.
Mr. MacFarlane: Soon there will be two and the playing field is far from level. The Americans have had their best year ever, as have the European farmers, because they are subsidized. There is darn all we can do about it but like I told you before —
Senator Mahovlich: We should not be subsidized?
Mr. MacFarlane: — I do not want subsidies. I just want —
Senator Mahovlich: No, I do not know what you want but in order for us to compete with the Americans — and we are in the World Trade Organization — what are we going to do? We can not get out of it.
Mr. MacFarlane: Why not?
Senator Mahovlich: Because we are part of the world. This is what is involved.
Mr. MacFarlane: Well, let me reiterate. We are not making any money on the agriculture side of the WTO. If you want to trade planes, trains and automobiles, I am fine with that but take agriculture out of the WTO.
Senator Mahovlich: No, unless we get subsidized.
Mr. MacFarlane: I do not want your subsidies.
Senator Mahovlich: We want a level playing field.
Mr. MacFarlane: Let me put it this way to you, senator.
The Chairman: Okay, folks, cool down.
Mr. MacFarlane: You subsidize me, but you are just subsidizing Tyson and Cargill and the big corporations take my product. Why should the Government of Canada subsidize the big corporations?
Senator Mahovlich: Because they are doing it in the United States. You talk about cheap labour. If you go down to Los Angeles, the Mexicans are coming over that border and they are paying them nothing.
Mr. MacFarlane: Yes.
Senator Mahovlich: They are doing it all the time.
Mr. MacFarlane: So, the net benefit to agriculture from WTO is?
The Chairman: Not much.
With that thoughtful silence, we are going to move on to Senator Gustafson and Senator Peterson will have the last word.
Senator Gustafson: Well, I am not going to go where I want to.
The Chairman: I know you are not.
Mr. MacFarlane: Oh, bring it on, Leonard.
The Chairman: He is a really good farmer.
Senator Gustafson: I think there is one common thing for Canadian farmers as a whole. Things are quite different, probably, in the Maritimes from what they are in Ontario, and they are quite different in the West from what they are in Ontario and so on. At the same time, where we make our mistake is when we turn it into a political football. We go nowhere doing that. We as farmers, and I am including myself, have been very good at doing that.
Our problem now is we have no price for our commodity. I have said this so many times that people are going to carry me out of here. In 1972, we got $2 for a bushel of wheat and a barrel of oil was $2. Now, we can argue all the politics we want of how to do it or how not to do it, but when you are getting oil at $60 and I am selling wheat at $2.50 or whatever I happen to get, there is no way we can come out of it.
Mr. MacFarlane: I agree.
Senator Gustafson: Something has to change. Senator Mahovlich got it right on, the old hockey player. The global economy has changed. If we are going to export product, whether it is your beef or my wheat, there has to be some kind of a level playing field. We do not have it and we can not convince the bureaucrats that control agriculture in Canada to even take a look at it.
Ms. Fyfe: That is right.
Senator Gustafson: You are right on the WTO. I was in Seattle and watched the WTO and they came out of there without anything. It is a serious thing but until we get a commodity price that is fair, we have troubles.
Mr. MacFarlane: I do not mean to take up too much time and will be quick. There is huge money in pork. I am a hog farmer. If I sell you or any of my neighbours a box of pork and cut it up for $120, I am undercutting the stores and making $70 a pig. The Maritimes are not self-sufficient in pork. The hog farmers say they are losing $50 a pig. There is a huge inequity there and we can not blame that on the Americans.
Senator Gustafson: At the same time, the Americans have been selling Canadian cattle for a hundred years.
Mr. MacFarlane: Yes.
Senator Gustafson: The minute that border closes, cattle prices drop in half.
Mr. MacFarlane: Would you agree that most of the cattle being custom fed in feed lots in Canada are owned by American companies such as Tyson and Cargill?
Senator Gustafson: A lot of them are but an awful lot of cattle are being fed in Canada, too.
Mr. MacFarlane: There are but I can not help but notice that an American company can manage to get Canadian cattle across that border to make money.
Senator Gustafson: Yes. I happen to believe that we should cooperate with the Americans. They buy our oil, gas, lumber and cattle and I truck my canola to Velma, North Dakota, to ADM where they give me 10 cents more and pick it up free. It is not free. The cost is hidden in there somewhere, but it is more than I can get at some of the other elevators. We need that American market as Canadians and I think it is important.
I am not here to argue that point. I have argued it for 20 years with Ottawa and, seemingly, they have not got very far with it. We do have problems. I agree with you. We have problems in agriculture that should not be there and, hopefully, we can find some answers.
Senator Peterson: At an earlier agriculture meeting this year, we were told that, to even start fixing the shortfall, to make it revenue neutral, would be $6 billion. Is that a number you have heard?
Mr. MacFarlane: It sounds about right.
Senator Peterson: It sounds about right?
Ms. Fyfe: Yes, I would say so.
Senator Peterson: That is just to get started today to prevent this from happening again. To try to solve the problem with made-in-Canada solutions, as a consuming nation, we are not that many people. Even on your analogy of a loaf of bread, if we were to give more to the farmers, could we sell enough bread in Canada to make that work because there are only so many people? We could do that and then we would have made all this bread and tried to get as much as we can back to the farmer and there would still be a lot of grain left over. Are there other things we could try to do within this country to get more money back to the farmers? Once you start selling on the open world market — forget about the WTO — you have to compete with the Australians, the French and the Americans. If the buyer is China or Japan, they are going to say, "What is your price?" and take the lowest one.
I would appreciate your thoughts on this. Is there a solution in there somewhere? You have indicated you think there is.
Mr. MacFarlane: Like I said before, as a farmer, if you are losing money on something, you stop doing it. With all this export, export, export to foreign countries, you are subsidizing ConAgra and all the American grain traders and companies that make the actual money off the product.
Look at the environment in P.E.I.. The environment is subsidizing the potato corporations that are buying potatoes here for two cents a pound. Is that right? You can say, yes, we are an exporting country but hold the phone. We have starvation and poverty in Canada. People do not have enough to eat. For all this food, we do not have an equitable situation so why do we export, export, export? Why are we starving to death in our own land?
Senator Peterson: Would you say that we should match our production to what we can do domestically and forget about exporting?
Mr. MacFarlane: I would suggest putting order in the marketplace with the Canadian Wheat Board or something like that. If you want to grow a million or zillion pounds of wheat, that is your business, but have some order in the marketplace so farmers get a cost of production domestically. If that is how it has to be, that is how it has to be, but this business is a treadmill to nowhere.
I do not want you subsidizing Western wheat farmers if all they are doing is making record profits for ConAgra.
The Chairman: On that note, we thank you. You certainly brought some spark to the debate this afternoon. We wish you the very best and we will do our very best.
Mr. MacFarlane: I have had worse things said about me.
The Chairman: Senators, our next witness is Dr. Kim Critchley who will talk about the School of Nursing at the University of Prince Edward Island.
We are eager to hear what you have to say.
Dr. Kim Critchley, Dean and Associate Professor, School of Nursing, University of Prince Edward Island: I am the Dean of Nursing at the University of Prince Edward Island, but I am also co-director of the Children's Health Research Institute on Prince Edward Island. My purpose here is more to talk about the research that we do on the youth here on Prince Edward Island. Our research involves youth in rural communities on P.E.I.. I really see that the purpose of my visit today is to bring some insight and perhaps a voice to the children on Prince Edward Island.
I brought a document with me and will quote a lot of it. A recent article that was published in the Journal of Community and Rural Health talks about the research we just did in knowledge translation. In this research study, communities in Prince Edward Island were chosen and we did some in-depth research into the children's health issues of each of those communities. The community I was responsible for and that I have grown close to is O'Leary.
Let me give you some background on the situation in O'Leary. It is a small community 130 kilometres northwest of Charlottetown, where the median age of the population is 45 years of age. The average family income for that community is $37,000 and that is per family. The unemployment rate in O'Leary is 25.7 per cent. If you look at education, 47.1 per cent of people 45 to 64 years of age have not completed a high school education; 52.9 per cent of those between ages 35 and 44 have not completed high school; and 37.9 per cent of those between 20 and 34 years of age have still not completed high school. If you look at education and unemployment as being issues of health, or determinants of health, you can see that we are not off to a good start.
Prince Edward Island, being a rural community, faces a lot of health issues related to the health and the future of our children. Sixty-seven per cent of Islanders are overweight. The highest death rates for cancer in Canada are in Nova Scotia and in Prince Edward Island. The highest rates of cardiovascular disease are in the Atlantic Provinces, more so than other provinces in Canada. The overall socio-economic level in P.E.I. places us second last to all other provinces in Canada.
These major determinants of health do not speak positively for the future of children's health here on P.E.I.. There is a call for new initiatives to increase the awareness of health issues and to alert residents to this situation.
As I said, the research done on the rural communities in Prince Edward Island looked at the health issues of children. When referring to the issues children face in their communities, our focus group interviews tell us that the problems and issues are around limited activities, transportation issues, easy access to alcohol and drugs, bullying, violence and peer pressure. Parents, children and prominent community members all say that activities cost money and they are limited, particularly in O'Leary where there is hockey. However, hockey costs a lot of money and many parents can not afford to put their children in hockey or, if both parents have minimum-wage jobs, they are too busy trying to feed their children to provide extracurricular activities.
One parent, a service provider and prominent community member, was quoted as saying, "Around here, there is a problem that they have their activities in the school, but that is a long distance for a lot of the parents to travel. Then they are stuck at home, hanging around the streets, the parking lots, exactly, and then we are chasing them around." Service providers are saying that, even if there are activities in the schools, which are far less costly than other activities, children have no way to get home from school. If children were to stay for after-school activities, because there is no transportation system, they can not participate. They must go on the school buses. Then, at home, they do not have anything to do and that is when they get into trouble. We know that physical and recreational activities are barriers to high-risk activities and, if the children are not provided with them, they do get into trouble.
Parenting was also looked at as an issue. In these rural communities, there are many young parents, single parents, parents without a lot of time, and they do not have role models for parenting. Here is another quote from a service provider. "I agree with parenting, but I also think that poverty plays a big deal in it because I think that parents are so busy that it is hard for them just to feed their families, and oftentimes, they are not there in those early years when they need to be there to sort out their goals and that sort of thing."
When we asked this community about some of the strengths of living in these rural communities, one service provider said, "When I think of the positive, it always strikes me that it's the resiliency of these kids that I work with, and the things that they have lived through at a very young age, where I think as an adult, I don't know if I could cope with the things that these kids are coping with."
When the kids talked about stresses, they talked about lack of money for sports in school, children leaving school because they go to work at minimum-wage jobs, transportation, a lack of sense of right or wrong from parents, and poverty issues. One child said, "Well, if I wanted to go to hockey or a lot of sports, you can't do it if you don't have money. You just can't go to buy the equipment and all that." One parent said, "And people not from our church, but from the youth group, have offered to come and pick up the children and drive them home. That means so much." Another service provider stated, "We are so financially strained with all the services that we can provide, I mean, it's an investment. It's an investment in our future."
They are saying that the money we put into these children now should be considered an investment for our future to help these children on Prince Edward Island.
Senator Mahovlich: You mentioned transportation and how difficult it is. When I was a youngster, we had problems getting the ball team seven miles to South Porcupine. We had to get over there and my dad had a truck and we jumped on the back of the truck.
Senator Mercer: It is against the law now.
Senator Mahovlich: It worked. We always had problems of getting to certain places, but some parent would come along with a truck or a wagon and we all hopped in and we played our games. We got there. We used buses all the time. We had that transportation. Are you saying the town does not have a proper bus system there?
Dr. Critchley: There is no bus system.
Senator Mahovlich: There is no transportation at all?
Dr. Critchley: There is no public transportation system on Prince Edward Island.
Senator Mahovlich: Well, we had it in Northern Ontario.
Dr. Critchley: I know and we should have it here.
Senator Mahovlich: I would think so.
Dr. Critchley: We should absolutely have it here or there should be arrangements made so that buses could be later.
Senator Mahovlich: Yes.
Dr. Critchley: For kids who want to stay for activities, perhaps a bus could run at an alternate time or leave a community at a certain time to go to these activities, but it is not the case. A lot of times the way kids who are involved get to activities is because their father or mother is seasonally employed so they are then available to take them. That is the only way.
Senator Callbeck: Yes.
Senator Mahovlich: Are there Rotary Clubs and Lions Clubs here that sponsor teams for youngsters?
Dr. Critchley: I do not know whether they sponsor teams, but there was a sports program that was providing funding for hockey equipment for kids in rural communities and it was discontinued. Actually, O'Leary protested that. I do not know how much money they would give per family, but it was enough to outfit a kid in hockey.
Senator Mahovlich: I hate always going back but, when I was a youngster, the Lions Club looked after me and we really appreciated that. If it had not been for the Lions Club, I would not have had the youth that I had.
Dr. Critchley: Yes.
Senator Mercer: Doctor Critchley, I am curious. There was a word missing from your report that was in almost everybody else's testimony today and that was "literacy."
Dr. Critchley: Oh, yes.
Senator Mercer: You did not mention literacy. In your research, did that come up as a problem both for children and parents?
Dr. Critchley: In this research study, literacy did not come up as a problem, although I did quote the population rates that complete high school.
Senator Mercer: Right.
Dr. Critchley: We have also done a lot of work with Aboriginal youth and literacy is a huge issue. We have two Aboriginal communities here on Prince Edward Island and only 5 per cent of those children complete high school. It is a real problem.
Senator Mercer: Would you suggest as others would — and I am one of them — that one of the fundamental ways we can attack the issue of poverty, rural or urban, is by putting money into proper education, teaching young people and adults to read at a level that allows them to function well in society?
Dr. Critchley: Certainly, as I said, education is a determinant of health. I will quote my own personal belief because I do not have the research to back it up.
Senator Mercer: Right.
Dr. Critchley: My belief is that we need to do two things for our children. We need to keep them in school and we need to keep them involved.
Senator Mercer: Senator Mahovlich, of course, was benefited by a community that provided facilities for him to become what most considered a pretty good hockey player.
Senator Mahovlich: My Grade 5 teacher happened to be a Mr. Critchley, by the way.
Dr. Critchley: Oh, really?
Senator Mercer: There you go. This is your family's fault.
Dr. Critchley: I would like to think that I could credit him for your hockey success.
Senator Mercer: I have spent many years coaching sports and transportation is a huge problem in communities, both rural and urban, but it is multiplied in rural areas because of the added problem of transportation and distances. Is the cost of sports the reason that soccer is the fastest growing sport in Canada? It does not cost much. Kids have the running shoes on anyway and a pair of shorts and shin pads are a lot cheaper than hockey equipment.
Are you suggesting that government somehow get involved in subsidizing rural recreation more than they already do to address the issue of young people getting into difficulty?
Dr. Critchley: I do not think it would take a lot. It would just take some creative planning. There are kids that want to be involved. The thing about sports is unless kids are involved early, they do not have the confidence to be involved once they are growing up, so you have to start early. I was listening to the radio coming back from Halifax and they were saying they want to make physical fitness mandatory in high schools. Personally, I think that is the wrong place to start. By the time kids gets to high school, if they have not been doing physical fitness, they are definitely not going to do it in Grade 10, 11, 12. There are a lot of inexpensive activities and the places they are most inexpensive are in schools, church halls and community centres where you do not have to pay a lot for rental fees or equipment. The equipment is there. We just have to be creative in getting these kids to and from the activities and make them available.
Senator Peterson: This is my first visit to your island and, when we drove here from downtown, I noticed there was an quite an urban spread that makes up Charlottetown. Is that the issue here? When I went to school, everybody walked or rode their bike to school. What is this transportation problem? Is that just for rural areas or because you are so spread out? Is it a problem within the city as well?
Dr. Critchley: We have a recently established bus system in Charlottetown. It has been established for a year. Once you move outside Charlottetown, there is no transportation. There is no alternate transportation system on this island.
Senator Peterson: The schools are out there. Is that where the children go to school, out in the rural areas?
Dr. Critchley: Yes. Another huge issue concerns built communities, particularly for rural communities. A small community like O'Leary has perhaps a couple of stores, a community centre and a church, but the main things like schools and rinks are all outside the community area. It is not like kids can walk to them. They can not walk to school or the rink because they were built outside even the rural centre. It is poor planning.
Senator Peterson: Yes, well, that is done. It would be the responsibility of the school board to solve that problem.
Dr. Critchley: It is a cost issue.
Senator Peterson: The school should buy a bus and drive them to the rink that is so far away.
Dr. Critchley: Yes. It is definitely a cost issue.
Senator Peterson: Yes, if you are running a regional school system, you have to do that.
Dr. Critchley: I am not arguing with you. I am right there.
Senator Peterson: It seems to me that the parents should go back to the school board.
Dr. Critchley: It just makes so much sense, does it not?
Senator Peterson: Well, I do not know.
Dr. Critchley: It does make sense.
Senator Mercer: He is a simpleton.
The Chairman: On that note, Senator Callbeck.
Senator Callbeck: Thank you for coming today. You have not mentioned childcare. What is the situation regarding early childhood development?
Dr. Critchley: There is kindergarten in O'Leary that the children attend. As far as the availability of daycare or childcare, I do not know. It did not seem to be an issue. From working in these communities, I know that oftentimes grandparents, aunts or uncles take the children. Surprisingly, childcare did not come up as an issue.
Senator Callbeck: That is strange.
Dr. Critchley: It is strange because I know in Charlottetown, it certainly would be. I am sorry but I do not have an answer.
The Chairman: You have left us with things to think about. Thank you for coming, Dr. Critchley.
This is a good time in the course of our committee hearings for people to come on as a "walk-on". We call them at the end of the day to express their own views or concerns on something that is important to them. One of these people here today is Winnie Fraser MacKay, President of Canadian Pensioners Concerned Inc. and Past President of the Prince Edward Island Seniors' Federation.
You have been a real sport sitting throughout all of this. Tell us what is on your mind.
Winnie Fraser MacKay, President, Canadian Pensioners Concerned Inc., as an individual: First, I want to say what a wonderful job you have done all day of keeping everybody together and everything going so smoothly.
The Chairman: Thank you. They are a good lot, really.
Ms. MacKay: I come wearing a couple of hats because I am a national president and have been very concerned with aging, especially because I am involved in seniors' organizations, and with the changes I see with seniors in the rural areas. I want you to take this away with you; you may already have been discussing it. I have been trying for years to find out what is the interpretation of poverty. Everyone you ask has a different answer. As far as I know, unless a definition has popped out somewhere in the last few months, Canada does not have an interpretation of what poverty is.
I do not know if you are familiar with the Seniors in Canada report card or not. This is put out by NACA, the National Advisory Council on Aging in Ottawa and you may want to look at it. I am not going to saturate you with stats but this is important because every senior should have the opportunity to have this. From a national perspective, we are going to be pushing people to read this.
We hear a lot of negative things about seniors and, "Oh, they are old." I even heard that today and I cringed because —
Senator Callbeck: Winnie, I am one, too, and I do not feel old. We are just fine.
Ms. MacKay: I like what Art Linkletter said, "Sixty is like 40 today."
Senator Callbeck: I will buy that.
Ms. MacKay: Seniors are more proactive than they have been, especially here in Prince Edward Island where I see a big difference and, Senator Callbeck, I am sure you do as well. Welcome back to our soil. It is great to see you.
Great information comes out of the NACA office in Ottawa. One paper is called, "Expression." There is another on aging and poverty in Canada entitled, "Seniors on the Margins," and there are some other great papers, as well. I just sent for these the other day and I am sure the department will give them to you if you are interested.
The Chairman: Yes.
Ms. MacKay: There is great stuff here about Newfoundland, where you have already been, and there are a lot of wonderful things happening in rural areas and, as you heard, some really sad things happening. I heard a question asked today about why are seniors not in all the homes that were built in P.E.I. a few years ago. I will tell you why. A lot of them want to stay in their own homes, especially in the rural areas, if they can. The barriers are transportation and, if you live alone, it is difficult if you are over the age for driving a car.
They are interested in some of the homes but the new ones need to be more open. Some seniors are in their homes longer and can not stand these small, cut-up rooms, especially if there is one bedroom. That is one reason. There are several others.
The other area I want to mention is that poverty and aging in rural areas brings forth other serious situations such as mental health and depression. We have many great doctors. We do not have enough. Our seniors who are getting depressed because they can not have their independent living are given medication to make them feel happier and that is a serious situation. That is all across Canada, not just here on Prince Edward Island. I hear this from other members in our national organizations because Canadian Pensioners Concerned has a chapter or division in every province.
We have tried to find funding to look at these areas of mental health and also to look at aging and poverty in rural areas but it seems like funding for national organizations has dried up. We would gladly get all the Canadian organizations or all the provinces across Canada involved in a project that would touch these areas. It is difficult to see ministers when we are in Ottawa.
I urge you to listen to seniors and their groups, especially the national groups. You are doing a great job listening to people all across Canada and hearing from the provincial groups, like you did with ours today. We need people in your position to encourage our politicians and bureaucrats to listen to seniors. Not all seniors today are 80 years old. We have wonderful 90-year-olds who are able to give great advice. We find that a lot of bureaucrats are not listening to seniors.
A serious situation coming up is that our baby boomers are not prepared for retiring. I am not retired, I am rewired because I am always doing something else. We see seniors now as 50-plus. We really have to start preparing them for what is ahead in the economy and have them start preparing more for their retirement years.
Seniors do not feel that politicians are listening to them and they are frustrated and many times when we are out speaking to groups they will say, "What is the difference? They are not going to listen to us anyway."
The New Horizons program has been very beneficial in several areas. However, our funding is based on population and here in Prince Edward Island, we have 40 to 48 clubs with 1,500 seniors with the average age being the late sixties and seventies in those clubs. I am on the New Horizons committee and it is heartbreaking to get all of their submissions and have to cut them back. They all do such great work for their communities and it keeps them active and brings out history.
As well, the seniors are volunteers. I was happy to hear you ask the Federation how they get their money. I have been involved for a number of years and it is not easy to get funding. I do not think seniors who have worked hard and kept their communities going should have to nickel-and-dime as much as they do, not getting paid for lunches if they travel for three hours in a day for meetings or having to stand for hours Xeroxing. Those are some of the smaller things.
I have more to say but you have a long day ahead tomorrow in Edmundston.
The Chairman: I have one comment and some of my colleagues may want to ask a question. When you say how active seniors are, they certainly are. In every large city or small town in Canada, they are a huge part of the population. It should also occur to people in our profession that seniors vote. One should think of that.
Ms. MacKay: I am glad you brought that up. Most of my colleagues bring it up all the time.
Senator Mercer: Thank you for being patient and hanging in all day to listen to us ramble. I want to draw your attention to the fact that there is another committee chaired by Senator Carstairs from Manitoba, which is a special Senate committee studying aging. I happen to be a member of that committee as well, so I am cheating by doing two pieces of work at the same time. I encourage you to follow those proceedings. They are telecast on CPAC, probably at three o'clock in the morning. People tell me they see me on television; I tell them they better get a life if they are up at that hour of the morning watching me. However, I draw your attention to that and am also interested in getting the proper name of the report you had so that I will be able to fill my files on my other committee.
You raised the issue of the definition of poverty, but I think the definition of seniors is also an issue. You mentioned your organization considers it 50-plus. As I approach my sixtieth birthday, I think seniors are somewhere around 70 or 80. I do think that my 87-year-old mother is a senior. It is a moving target and someone used the phrase in the last couple of days that seniors are not necessarily old.
Ms. MacKay: Absolutely, yes. Your comment is interesting because in one of our clubs in the eastern end of the Island, there are two groups and the 95-year-old mother in one group says, "My son-in-law and daughter will not come over here because they do not want to go to all the meetings and they do not see themselves as being seniors and they are in their seventies." Yes, there is some difficulty with the term. They say we should change it but I think that we have to be realistic.
Senator Mercer: I was at recent international conference on aging. They never used the word "aging" once. They talked about "older people."
Ms. MacKay: Yes.
Senator Mercer: I had a heck of a time getting my head around all that. Anyway, thank you.
Senator Callbeck: I am in agreement when you say you are not retired, just rewired. I think that is true. You are extremely active in the province.
You said funding for the New Horizons program is per capita. Is that per senior citizen or per overall population?
Ms. MacKay: It is for overall population.
Senator Callbeck: Regardless of whether you —
Ms. MacKay: Oh, that is a good question. I am not sure. I thought it was for population. All our funding comes per population, so that is a good point. I do not think it is, senator, because they would not have the exact numbers. I think it is the population of our province but I will certainly find out.
Senator Callbeck: But they have the percentages of seniors.
Ms. MacKay: Yes.
Senator Callbeck: Yes. I just wondered.
The Chairman: Thank you again for your patience.
Ms. MacKay: I will send that material.
The Chairman: Colleagues, we now have a person who would certainly be close to my heart if I was here, Dr. Els Cawthorn from the Prince Edward Island Humane Society, and she wants to say a few words. I will be listening carefully because I have been taking in abandoned and abused strays for about 33 years now.
Dr. Els Cawthorn, Veterinarian and Shelter Manager, P.E.I. Humane Society, as an individual: Great. That is what we want to hear.
The Chairman: They drive you crazy but you have to love them.
Dr. Cawthorn: I will try and stay in the time limit. I know there is a plane waiting for everybody to leave.
There is an issue here of animal welfare as well as people welfare. Historically, the method of population control in the rural areas, especially for small animals, for what we call "companion animals," was that they were part of the tough cycle of life.
The Chairman: Yes.
Dr. Cawthorn: If they got sick, they died. If there was a problem with them, they were killed by the farmer. If there were too many kittens, they were put in a sack and drowned.
In this day and age, that kind of control of animal population is not really relevant any more. It should not happen. It does not happen any more. People are much more aware of animal welfare and so these animals, these cats and dogs in the rural areas, are better taken care of now, which is great. I have no problem with that whatsoever. The result is, though, that the number of animals in the rural areas, the cats and dogs to a certain extent, are increasing and there has to be a different method of population control.
The most common method of population control is to spay and neuter your animals. Of course, if you have no money, you are not going to go out and spay and neuter, 10, 15 or 20 barn cats. There is just no way. What happens is that the number of animals, in particular the cats, increase exponentially. These cats do tend to go in the barns. They also tend to become feral. They go out in the neighbouring properties. They do bother other people. They encroach on the smaller municipalities. They cause problems. What happens is that these cats often are brought to us at the Humane Society. Some of these cats are really nice. It is not that they are nasty cats. Some are truly feral and would not be able to be rehabilitated.
The number of animals coming into the Humane Society is such that we do end up euthanizing a lot of them. To switch from animals dying and being killed on the farm, so to speak, to switching and taking these animals into the Humane Society and euthanizing them there, is not an acceptable method of population control either. It is something we need to address. We need to address the number of animals; there are just too many of them.
We need to have access to either subsidized spay and neuter for people in rural areas or some sort of support for private organizations that work with people in the rural areas to help them take care of the overpopulation of animals on farms.
We do not know for sure how big the problem is because there never has been any real research done on the actual numbers of animals in the rural area that are loose, but we get a lot of complaints and a lot of animals are brought to the shelter for that reason.
Right now, we do not have rabies on P.E.I. In the last four years, we have had two cases of bat rabies transmitted to cats. The danger to people from those rabid cats is small because once it goes from the bat to the cat, often it does not go from the cat to the human any more. If we ever got real rabies on the Island, like fox or skunk rabies, we would be in trouble because cats are a perfect reservoir for this disease and then there would be a real danger to people as well.
I think it is important that the problem be addressed.
The Chairman: Are you thinking in terms of a special kind of law or legislation?
Dr. Cawthorn: I do not think legislation will help. I think most people are willing to do something about population control, but I also think most people just do not have the means to do it, to actually get their animals spayed and neutered. Legislation would be incredibly difficult to enforce and without the money to support it, I do not think it would make a difference.
Senator Mercer: What is the cost to have a cat spayed?
Dr. Cawthorn: A cat spay itself is approximately $100 to $120. Often, veterinarians would like the animals vaccinated before they actually take them in, so you are looking at about $45 to get your cat vaccinated, and then two or three weeks after that, you can take her in to be spayed. It is not a cheap procedure.
Senator Mercer: I see the problem.
Senator Callbeck: I am thinking of a group in my area that looks after a lot of cats.
Dr. Cawthorn: We have a wonderful program on Prince Edward Island called "Cat Action Team," which does what we call a trap/neuter/release program. It is specifically aimed at cats that are not owned or very loosely owned, the feral ones, the ones that roam around municipalities. We have done a number of barn cats as well that are loosely owned. It is a private organization. They raise a lot of money. They do a lot of fundraising and will actually pay for the health care for these animals. They catch them, take them to veterinarians who will do the surgery and vaccinate and check them for infectious diseases, and then they are returned and released in the area where they came from. The nice thing about trap/neuter/release is that it maintains a population pressure so that there is less chance of the other cats that you have not spayed or neutered yet reproducing faster and more efficiently. So you have maintained the population pressure with the animals that are spayed and neutered and they will not reproduce, so, eventually, over approximately 10 to 15 years, the number of animals will go down and down and down, and you will have a measure of control that way.
The problem, of course, is that right now there is a waiting list of, something like 500 or 600 animals. They have done over 3,000 in the last five years.
Senator Callbeck: They spay?
Dr. Cawthorn: Spay and neuter, yes.
I am currently also involved in a community organization that is trying to get low-cost spay and neuter off the ground. Again, this is a community initiative. It will involve a lot of fundraising, hopefully some grants. Then we would have a method where people could apply to the committee, we would screen and probably go with a cut-off income for these people as well — perhaps by LICO, low-income cut-offs, or LIMs, low-income measures — and then we would subsidize for two-thirds. Our own community organization would pay one-third of the cost, the client themselves would pay one-third of the cost and, hopefully, the veterinarians would donate one-third of the cost. It would be a win-win program for everybody once we got it off the floor and as long as we can raise enough money to go with what we get for applications.
The Chairman: Thank you for coming and reminding us of that.
Dr. Cawthorn: Thank you. That is great.
The Chairman: Not at all, and all the best.
Have a good trip back, everybody. Thank you.
Dr. Cawthorn: Thank you for doing this. It is great to be able to be heard.
The Chairman: Thank you.
The committee adjourned.