Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Agriculture and Forestry
Issue 8 - Evidence - Meeting of March 13, 2008
OTTAWA, Thursday, March 13, 2008
The Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry met this day at 9:09 a.m. to consider a draft budget.
Senator Joyce Fairbairn (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good morning. We will go through the budgets first and then get into the report.
I will ask for your authorization with regard to the legislation budget for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2009.
Senator Mahovlich: I so move.
Senator Segal: Is that the $4,000 number?
Jessica Richardson, Clerk of the Committee: It is amount of $4,250 for legislation.
The Chair: Is everyone agreed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: We will move on to the budget application on rural poverty for the fiscal year ending March 31.
Senator Mercer: Under ``All Other Expenditures,'' we see ``Promotional Materials.'' Can someone enlighten me on that line item?
Eric Mikkelborg, Communications Officer, Communications Directorate, Senate of Canada: That item is for the production of features, as indicated in the communications plan that we presented to the committee before Christmas. It relates to features for regional media — weekly use of small media in rural Canada and also radio features. We sent our first package to the regional media two days ago and the radio features will be going out today.
Senator Segal: Does the $1,000 amount relate to production dollars?
Mr. Mikkelborg: Yes. It is just to the end of this fiscal year.
Senator Mercer: What happened to the money we allocated before? I thought that when we presented budgets before we covered this item.
Ms. Richardson: That was for this fiscal year. We are now talking about next fiscal year, which starts April 1.
Senator Mercer: I have the same question on the next phase in relation to the amount of $28,000. This is a serious amount of money. Are we getting good value for our money? Have we not done some of this already in this fiscal year?
Mr. Mikkelborg: As I indicated, we have just started this month, which is what the $1,000 was for. To put out a package to reach all the regional media and for radio across Canada for each committee session where witnesses are heard will cost about $700.
Senator Mercer: How do we send it out?
Mr. Mikkelborg: It goes by email.
Senator Mercer: Email does not cost a lot. That is why we use it.
Mr. Mikkelborg: We use a contractor to do some of the writing and also to do production work for radio.
Senator Mercer: It is not apparent here that it is production. Are you talking about audio tapes? Will we tape Senator Segal and I arguing and send that out? That would be very entertaining.
Senator Segal: Perspectives on the northern tour, for example. Senator Mercer and I together could do that, carefully.
Senator Callbeck: How many of these have we done?
Mr. Mikkelborg: The extracts tend to be of witnesses speaking about the issues, and they are extracts from the committee testimony.
Senator Callbeck: Ten have already gone out?
Mr. Mikkelborg: We sent two features to the regional weekly media, and there will be three features going out to radio stations this week.
Senator Mercer: What is the pickup? Are we getting good value for our money? If we are sending this stuff out and it is going into the round bin —
Mr. Mikkelborg: As I said, we only sent it out two days ago. I have had three or four calls from weekly media that have indicated they will be putting in their publications; a couple in Edmonton, one from Ontario and one from the Maritimes.
Senator Callbeck: What is in the package that we send out?
Mr. Mikkelborg: They are brief features relevant to testimony before the committee. For example, we might feature the testimony of the witness from Australia. It is always relevant to what the committee heard in terms of testimony.
Senator Segal: I know that every morning we get reviews on everything that appears about agriculture and forestry, which is helpful and very well done. In response to Senator Mercer's question, are you able to connect those reviews with what you have sent out? Is there a sense of the extent to which the things we have sent out end up in the morning reviews of relevant stories? It would be good to have a feel for that without getting too precise.
Mr. Mikkelborg: Certainly, senator. In fact, when I presented the communications plan on rural poverty to the committee before Christmas, we had had 283 media hits — 77 radio, 20 or so TV, 60 dailies, 13 smaller dailies, 22 print media and 90 websites. Since then, the number has increased by about 100, so we have had 300 to 400 media hits on the issue of rural poverty.
Senator Mercer: To clarify, these are clips of witnesses such as our friend from Australia. Are we inventing this or have other committees done it? If so, what has the feedback been on the value of this expenditure?
Senator Segal: I would venture a guess that compared to the National Security and Defence Committee, our expenditures hardly register on the Richter scale.
Mr. Mikkelborg: No other committees have done this before — radio, per se.
Senator Mercer: We will have to share this with Senator Kenny and he will add it to his budget next week.
Mr. Mikkelborg: We have a long practice of sending out feature material to regional media, but this is the first time for radio.
The Chair: The purpose of doing this has been to get our work out there so that people not only know what we are doing but are ready to listen to what we will be doing in the future.
Senator Peterson: This is a draft budget on our rural poverty study. Is this just to finish off what we are doing now because the fiscal year ends in two weeks?
Ms. Richardson: Yes.
Senator Peterson: What is the larger budget for? Is that for something that we may or may not do in the new fiscal year, or is it again a continuation?
Ms. Richardson: The committee's agreement to look into the input costs will fall under the ``present state and future'' order of reference and will come out of that budget. If the committee decides to take up a study on forestry later in the fiscal year, that might fall under this budget as well. I wanted to ensure that the committee was fully funded for meetings for the entire year under that order of reference. These are all Ottawa-based expenses; there is no travel. It is just working meals and a little bit for postage, books and things like that. The big bite is the promotional materials that Mr. Mikkelborg is speaking to.
Senator Peterson: If we were going to undertake a new study, would we have to come back with a new budget part way through the year?
Ms. Richardson: If it is a study under a different order of reference, yes.
Senator Peterson: This would indicate that we are not going to do much other than finish what we are doing.
Ms. Richardson: It does not preclude the committee from starting a new order of reference. If you decide to do more under this order of reference, you can go for a supplementary budget. It does not tie the committee's hands in any way. It is just to ensure that if the committee decides to hold most of its meetings in Ottawa under the ``present state and future'' order of reference, we are fully funded. I will prepare the appropriate budget for anything the committee decides to do in the future, which will be submitted at a later time, but I cannot prepare a budget when the committee has not decided what it will do.
Senator Peterson: I am trying to figure out what we are doing here. All of this together would not cover the miscellaneous expenses in the National Security and Defence Committee budget, so we should not agonize too much over it.
Senator Gustafson: This goes to March 31, 2009, right?
Ms. Richardson: Yes, April 1, 2008 to March 31, 2009. It is for the next fiscal year.
Senator Mercer: If we decide in June to do another major study, we will submit another budget. I am curious about how we can request more money in the middle of the year. Is there not a global budget that restricts us somehow? If another committee uses up all the money, will there be no money left for us?
Ms. Richardson: It depends on whether there are clawbacks from committees because they did not spend all the money for the activities included in their budgets. That frees up money.
Senator Mercer: This committee has not spent all the money we were allocated.
Ms. Richardson: No, and that will be clawed back.
Senator Segal: To be fair to colleagues on the National Security and Defence Committee, they usually come in under their budget.
Senator Mercer: I did not specifically referring to that committee. I was trying to get at the point that we did not spend all the money allocated in this fiscal year for this committee or for this study.
Ms. Richardson: That is right.
Senator Mercer: Mr. Mikkelborg, you said we are hiring someone to do this. Does the Senate not have the resources to do that ourselves? Is that not what Senate Communications does? There are some talented people there, and I have a good deal of faith in their ability to communicate. They are professionals.
Mr. Mikkelborg: We certainly do have talent in the Communications Branch, but we are also quite limited. Communications advisers like me are assigned to three committees, and in order to handle the needs of committees we sometimes need to get production help. This person is an expert in production, particularly for radio. He has a long track record of doing this for a number of departments and agencies around town. It is a bit of a special art to produce for radio. We could perhaps do it ourselves, but it would have impacts on our ability to serve committees in other ways.
Senator Gustafson: These are monies that have not been spent.
Ms. Richardson: This is for the next fiscal year.
Senator Gustafson: What was the total spent for the past year?
Ms. Richardson: I do not yet have all the bills in from the northern trip, so I do not have that figure with me. I would be happy to report that to you in April. I know that we will come in well under budget, as usual, for the trip.
Senator Gustafson: What was the budget?
Ms. Richardson: The budget for the trip was $293,000, and I think we will come in under $200,000.
Senator Gustafson: That is just the trip. What about all the other items?
Ms. Richardson: There was only approximately $20,000 for all the other things, and I would have to look at that. I do not have the figure with me.
Senator Gustafson: So $310,000 should cover everything?
Ms. Richardson: Yes, but only for this fiscal year. Anything we do not use is lost because the fiscal year is over and we start with the new budgetary year.
Senator Gustafson: I am trying to get at the total that this committee used in the whole year.
Ms. Richardson: Unfortunately, I do not have that figure with me.
Senator Gustafson: That is the bottom line.
Ms. Richardson: I would be happy to bring that figure to the first meeting of the next fiscal year.
Senator Gustafson: It would be well over $600,000, would it not, with both?
Ms. Richardson: No. Our entire budget, including the trip, was approximately $313,000. We will probably come in, for the whole budget, at around $200,000 for the entire year.
Senator Gustafson: Are you including about the trips to B.C. and Alberta?
Ms. Richardson: That was in the previous fiscal year.
Senator Gustafson: I would like to know how much we spent in total on rural poverty.
Ms. Richardson: I will get those figures and report them back during the first sitting week in April.
Senator Mahovlich: What happens if there is an election?
Senator Mercer: We win.
Ms. Richardson: The committee ceases to exist until Parliament resumes and the all committees are re-established. We then start from scratch with budgets. We will structure the order of reference motion to refer all the previous work we have done. The committee would restart at this stage in the study on rural poverty, just to finish up the report.
Senator Gustafson: Then we have until June 20.
Senator Segal: A dissolution of Parliament, should that transpire, is a dissolution of this committee.
The Chair: Could I ask someone to move that we adopt this?
Senator Segal: I so move.
The Chair: Thank you.
Is the rural poverty budget agreed to, colleagues?
Senator Segal: I so move.
The Chair: Thank you. We now go to the budget for the present state and future of agriculture and forestry in Canada.
Senator Segal: I so move.
The Chair: Thank you, Senator Segal.
The Chair: Is that agreed?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: We will suspend briefly to go in camera.
The committee continued in camera.