Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
National Finance
Issue 14 - Evidence - June 10, 2014 - afternoon
OTTAWA, Tuesday, June 10, 2014
The Standing Senate Committee on National Finance met this day at 2:29 p.m. to study the subject matter of Bill C- 31, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 11, 2014 and other measures.
Senator Joseph A. Day (Chair) in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: Honourable senators, this afternoon we will continue our study of the subject matter of Bill C-31, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 11, 2014 and other measures.
[English]
Honourable senators are aware that there were five other committees in addition to the Standing Senate Committee on National Finance reviewing the subject matter of Bill C-31. These committees have now all reported their findings to the Senate. We are aware as well that this committee will be called upon to do a clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-31, so we have therefore asked each of the chairs and deputy chairs of the various other standing committees that have studied portions of Bill C-31 to help us with those portions that they've studied. This is our last committee meeting to understand what was done.
Today we will be hearing from the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications. We are very pleased to welcome Senator Dawson, who is the chair, and Senator Housakos, who is the deputy chair. They will be discussing the subject matter of those elements contained in Divisions 15, 16 and 28 of Part 6 of Bill C-31.
Senator Dawson, I will give you the floor. We have your report and have had a chance to read it. Maybe you can just give us the highlights.
Hon. Dennis Dawson, Chair, Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications, as an individual: As you know, we did table our fifth report in the chamber, and people have had the occasion to ask questions about it. On most of the divisions, it was well received.
On Division 16 of Bill C-31, on roaming caps for cellphones, it's a temporary measure. The CRTC is studying the issue in depth, and a more complete report will be done on the issue later on by the CRTC. We are expecting that probably in the next few weeks or months, and we will probably be called upon to revisit that subject at that time.
Division 28, Part 6, is basically the yet-to-be-named new bridge for Montreal. Everybody seems to be very happy to have a new bridge.
[Translation]
According the mayor of Montreal, not everyone agrees that this should be a PPP project. As the mayor of Montreal put it, that means: "No tolls at all."
[English]
That is not the traditional way of talking about PPPs, but quite clearly there is a satisfaction of having a bridge. The question of tolls obviously will be debated for weeks and months by both the city and the province.
[Translation]
I have in my hands the unedited transcripts of the committee, the testimony if you prefer. I can submit them to the clerk if you have any questions. As for the rest, I do not know if the deputy chair would like to make any comments.
[English]
Hon. Leo Housakos, Deputy Chair, Standing Senate Committee on Transport and Communications, as an individual: I think the chairman has highlighted our findings very well.
[Translation]
The Chair: I will now give the floor to Senator Hervieux-Payette from Quebec.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: We have seen that some parts of the bill overlap. This morning we studied another document concerning the Champlain Bridge. As I recall, because I attended the meeting, no reference was made to the 1960 amendments to the act that followed the start of major work on the seaway.
In fact, it is because of the seaway that the federal government took control of the Champlain Bridge file. The seaway is binational and borders both Canada and the United States.
No reference was made to that. This morning, other members who are here referred to a replacement bridge and not a new bridge. Do you agree with that? Do you remember if it was mentioned that the federal government took charge of the bridge because of the construction of the seaway?
Senator Dawson: The officials who appeared before the committee at the beginning of the study explained the history of the bridge, and in particular the transfer of authority. With the exception of what has been said in the media, no testimony has been given before the committees concerning any transfer of responsibilities, "Quote, unquote: On the record."
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Did they refer to a new bridge, or to a replacement bridge?
Senator Dawson: Both expressions were used. According to the mayor, it is a replacement bridge. Those who are proposing the new bridge refer to a new bridge.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, senator. Senator Bellemare, also from Quebec.
Senator Bellemare: I wanted to know if the transfer of responsibilities has been brought up and you said that it had not. The document containing the transcripts of all the debates is quite long. Do many of those discussions deal with the new bridge? If yes, could you please give me a summary of the substance, as I was unfortunately unable to attend the meetings.
Senator Dawson: At the last meeting we heard from the mayors of Montreal and Longueuil. The main issue was traffic flow. If the price at a toll booth is too high, will drivers use other bridges or other means of transportation?
As for the first part, which was more technical, the officials who are in charge of evaluating the construction spoke more to the technical issues than to the conflictual issues.
Senator Bellemare: Was toll pricing discussed? Did you address this issue? Not at all, is that correct?
Senator Dawson: The PPP concept, a public-private partnership with tolls, was brought up. There was one point that bothered the mayor of Montreal. To use his own words, when we say that a bridge will cost between $3 and $5 billion, the difference, $2 billion, well, that is not "peanuts."
Senator Rivard: As I was unable to attend the hearing with the two mayors, did committee members ask a similar question to the one I will now ask? They do not want toll booths on the new Champlain Bridge. However, they put tolls on Highway 30 and on the bridge that links Laval and Montreal. Was this question discussed with the two mayors?
Senator Dawson: Yes. We were told that these were two projects that did not exist before and that were built from scratch. Tolls were included in the funding plans. They insist that the next bridge will not be a new bridge, but rather a replacement bridge, as senator Hervieux-Payette mentioned. They make a distinction between tolls and no tolls.
Senator Rivard: Did we remind the mayor of Longueuil of the negotiations that were undertaken two years ago concerning the new bridge? It was indicated that it would have to be replaced by a new bridge because it was impossible to fix the old one. During a meeting with the former mayor, Gérald Tremblay, the current mayor agreed with the idea of a toll booth. Did someone remind her of that?
Senator Dawson: Senator, my deputy chair will answer.
Senator Housakos: Yes, she referred to that issue. I asked Mr. Coderre if the Communauté urbaine de Montréal would manage the new bridge. His answer was no. He has no interest in managing the bridge, but he wants a new bridge or a replacement bridge paid for by the federal government. That is more or less his position.
Senator Rivard: Thank you very much.
[English]
Senator L. Smith: Looking at the first page of the report and Division 16 in terms of the CRTC concluding its study of roaming, during your discussions and deliberations and questions, you just write that the caps will be in place until the study is completed. What did you get out of your questioning with the CRTC in terms of the legislation? Was there a direction that this was going to go in?
Senator Dawson: This is more company to company and the debate about roaming negotiations from one company to the other and not about the final consumer roaming costs. The only witness that came from the industry was from one of the smaller companies being imposed tariffs that he felt were too high. With this legislation, they feel they are going to be treated more equitably with the larger telecom companies.
Senator L. Smith: This was to give the smaller guys a chance to get some breathing space, is that it?
Senator Dawson: I think that was the nature of speaking notes that the people had.
Senator Housakos: Also our sense is that the bill doesn't really affect the large carriers right now. It is more designed for the new entrants into the marketplace. That's the impression we got from the testimony.
Senator L. Smith: Would none of the bigger guys come to the meeting? Was it an issue that people turned you down?
Senator Dawson: If you see the list of witnesses.
[Translation]
Mr. Chair, we took our pre-study very seriously. We had a very long list of participants and we contacted many others who did not appear or who did not show any interest. That includes the private sector, with the exception of WIND Mobile, which did send someone to appear.
[English]
The Chair: Senator Dawson, this morning this committee was dealing with Supplementary Estimates (A) and the report and we found that there is some money in there for this project as well. There seem to be a number of different places we have to go to find out what's happening in relation to what is referred to in this new special act as the "new bridge." You will recall the discussion we had this morning that we couldn't call it a new bridge, but in fact Division 28 of the act refers to it as the "New Bridge for the St. Lawrence Act," a special act.
Thank you for having found that. We apologize for making the change this morning and calling it a replacement bridge when the government has already called it a new bridge.
As I understand it, this legislation is a special act — in other words a new, separate piece of legislation — that allows the government to proceed rather quickly. The intent is to move as quickly as possible so the bridge — help me here, colleagues will be operating and collecting tolls in 2017?
Senator Housakos: To go back to the question that was asked at the beginning, is it a new bridge or is it a replacement bridge, obviously there are opinions that this is a replacement bridge and they're trying to justify not having tolls on that basis. But the reality of the matter is from all the technical representations we've heard from various stakeholders, it is, without a doubt in my mind, a new bridge. The foundations are new, the design will be new and the name will be new. There will be public transit elements incorporated to this project that are under consideration, and the federal government is open to proposals from the local municipalities, the provincial government and the eight AMT authorities in the region. There is talk about putting a track on it in order for public transit to go back and forth, which currently doesn't exist on the bridge. The new bridge will have an extra lane on each side, which the current bridge does not have.
Looking at the project as a whole, anybody who has dealt with infrastructure I think would be hard pressed to call this a replacement bridge when nothing of the current Champlain Bridge will be attached to the new project or involved with the new project. Hopefully it will have no commonalties because this old bridge only survived 50 years, which, according to infrastructure experts, is a shame.
If you look at the bridge right down the river, called Jacques Cartier Bridge, it has been around for over a 100 years and has cost the federal government a fraction in maintenance costs compared to the Champlain Bridge. The explanations we have received from technical people have been simply that the old Champlain Bridge was poorly built, poorly designed and as a result it would be negligent for the government to build on it or refurbish it. They're going to build a new bridge from scratch; that's how I understand it.
Senator Dawson: Some skepticism was expressed about the timetable of 2017 based on the fact that this same Transport Committee, of which I've been a member for seven or eight years, had testimony seven or eight years ago suggesting that we would normally be opening the Ambassador Bridge today had we listened to them. It was scheduled to be open in 2014 but, as you might be aware, it hasn't started yet. There is some skepticism on the fact that it will be delivered by 2017.
A project of this grandeur, on which federal, provincial and municipal negotiations have to take place, has a price tag of between $3 billion and $5 billion. I live in Quebec City so I'm less concerned. For the people of Montreal, I hope they get it by 2017, but, for me, I will take the North Shore when I come to Ottawa.
The Chair: We had some discussion this morning as well about a separate corporate entity being responsible for the Jacques Cartier and Champlain Bridges, the little Pont de I'île-de-Soeurs and a portion of the Mercier Bridge. That was a discussion we had. This is a separate corporate entity from that, so presumably the other entity will still own the Champlain Bridge as part of its property until it disappears. Did you get into that discussion?
Senator Dawson: Not on this bill in particular, but we have had witnesses before. There are a lot of bridge committees on international bridges and national bridges. There are different committees that have responsibility either for one or two or three bridges. Last year about this date we had, on the previous omnibus bill, legislation regrouping the surveillance of three bridges under the same authority. That's a debate to come, I would imagine, with the new or replacement bridge.
The Chair: We also had some discussion on the issue of federal jurisdiction typically being from province to province as opposed to all within one province. Did you get into that discussion as to how the federal government would have jurisdiction all within one province?
Senator Dawson: Questions were asked and the historical context was that it was built over an international body of water called the St. Lawrence Seaway, and that is what justified the presence of the federal government as the owner of the bridge. That's the only historical answer we got.
The Chair: We had the answer of historical reasons but had not had the full explanation of "historical." That's very helpful. Thank you.
[Translation]
Senator Bellemare: Just a quick question. Will the Champlain Bridge be demolished, or will it be kept, as was done in Quebec City with the Pierre-Laporte Bridge and the pont de Québec?
Senator Dawson: To respond in a somewhat humorous fashion, I think it will destroy itself if we keep waiting. The project was moved forward from 2020 to 2017 because the situation is urgent.
Senator Bellemare: So we will not even be able to walk on it or bicycle on it?
Senator Dawson: To our knowledge, according to the information we have received, the objective is to demolish it as soon as the other bridge will be in use.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: I would just like to remind you of one point, unless Mr. Housakos contradicts himself. Earlier on, you were ranting about the quality of the construction of the Champlain Bridge. Who was in charge of the construction of the Champlain Bridge at the time?
Senator Housakos: Who was in charge?
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Who was the contractor?
Senator Housakos: I imagine it was the company, and the government in power at the time.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Who paid the bill?
Senator Housakos: I could not say, I was not born yet in 1962.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Look, you have been managing this file for weeks; I cannot believe that you would not know who in 1960 was responsible for the construction of the Champlain Bridge. You just have to say that it was the federal government.
Senator Housakos: I know that SNC-Lavalin was the company at the time.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Was it the federal government?
Senator Housakos: Yes, it was the federal government.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: That is what I wanted to hear. Therefore, the federal government, with a private company, built a bridge that is falling down today. Is that right?
Senator Housakos: Yes.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: It was very badly built. You used some adjectives earlier on concerning the poor construction of the bridge by the federal authorities.
Senator Housakos: At the same time, there is no other case like it in Canada, where the federal government is responsible for a bridge which is actually in a municipal area within a province. There is no other example in Canada.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Let us expand a bit on the issue that is directly related to the seaway. In your opinion, when access is given to ships from the Great Lakes, such as ships coming from Europe towards the Great Lakes, does the right of way, which requires a significant investment, allow for a contact with Ontario, Saskatchewan and the American states, therefore with two other provinces and another country? Because without that structure, it will be impossible for the ships to have access to the Atlantic Ocean.
Senator Housakos: There are two ways to see that. For myself, as a Quebecer, the way I see the situation is that the Port of Montreal and the St. Lawrence River represent a source of wealth, a significant economic tool for Quebec. Therefore, I think that with all this wealth, the Government of Quebec should invest in our economy and in the Montreal region and not transfer the bill to others for infrastructure that the city of Montreal and the province of Quebec will derive practical benefit from.
If we look at any other jurisdictions in North America, whether it is in the United States or in Canada, name one bridge for which the federal government would pay for a regional economic tool, like a bridge, in the greater Montreal region.
In my opinion, in 2014, given the current economic situation, it would be hard to convince Canadians to pay the $5 billion cost for an infrastructure located in the Montreal region. I do not think there is anyone here in Ottawa who would be able to convince our colleagues that this is an intelligent economic decision.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: So you deny that there are American ships — grain producers in particular — that leave the Great Lakes and move through the seaway, sail under the Champlain Bridge in order to deliver their goods to Europe?
Senator Housakos: Once again —
Senator Hervieux-Payette: Is it only of use to Montrealers or is it also of use to other provinces?
Senator Housakos: It clearly serves other provinces, but at the same time, the Port of Montreal is an asset for Montreal. It is an economic engine for the greater Montreal region. In my opinion, it is up to Montreal and to Quebec to look after it.
Senator Hervieux-Payette: I do not know if my colleagues are familiar with the geography of the area, but is the Port of Montreal not the final destination for some goods, whereas other ships continue along the seaway? I live right across from the Port of Montreal. There are ships belonging to Quebec companies that stop right in front of my place, but in order to move from the St. Lawrence through to the Great Lakes, they have to go under the Champlain Bridge. Do you deny this?
Senator Housakos: No, I absolutely agree with the fact that they must sail under it.
The Chair: I feel there is a great deal of interest, particularly from Quebec senators.
Senator Rivard, would you like to add something?
Senator Rivard: I would like to add to Senator Hervieux-Payette's comment. The bridge is 54 years old and it was built with the knowledge we had at the time. Using calcium to de-ice was not popular 54 years ago; sand was used then.
The south shore of Montreal is like a mushroom, the population has exploded. If we go back to 1960, I wonder if in Brossard, there were not still stables and farmland across from the bridge. So given the current situation, I do not think that anyone can deny that we must replace the bridge. The only point of debate — and it is a substantive discussion — is to determine who should pay. Canada, or the users?
When you enter the city of New York, you pay once, whether it is on the way in or on the way out. I therefore have the impression that it will be the same situation with the new Champlain Bridge toll; we will either pay going in, or leaving. I hope that the cost of the toll will be $2 or $3 and that drivers will choose to take it rather than using another route.
I travel between Ottawa and Quebec, and I am happy to pay the $2 toll on highway 30, because I save time and I save on gas. Moreover, it is less tiring, because it is a major highway. The new bridge will provide benefits the old one did not. I am thinking about the light rail or bus networks. I do not believe that we can compare the new bridge with the situation of bridges from the 1960s.
Senator Housakos: I would like to add that I am a Montrealer living on the Island of Montreal. I am a Montreal taxpayer. I have thought for a long time that there are several municipal politicians in Montreal who, for several years now, share the opinion that many people come onto the Island of Montreal and have done so for years and do not pay for any of the infrastructure nor make any contribution to Montreal structures. At some point, we will have to start asking people to do their fair share. As a Montrealer, I find it sad that people living on the north shore or the south shore come into Montreal every day and do not contribute to the development of its infrastructure.
The Chair: Senator Mockler, do you have a bridge in New Brunswick?
Senator Mockler: Given that we are talking about bridges, we should maybe take this opportunity to get the historical details right.
History clearly shows that it was on August 17, 1955 that —
[English]
— then federal Transport Minister George Marler first announced the construction of the new bridge connecting Montreal to the South Shore via Nuns' Island. The National Harbours Board was placed in charge of the project and it was opened officially on June 28, 1962; and it is also in 1967 that the final approach to the bridge from Montreal was completed. I just want to set the record straight regarding who was in power.
Senator Dawson: I would like to thank Google for the research done this afternoon, but I would like to add that it's not the first time that a government blames another government for what was done under its watch. After 50 years, part of it was your fault and part of it was our fault, or their fault, because we're not there anymore.
Senator Hervieux-Payette, it wasn't well maintained. It was probably a bad concept to start with. Nobody made a serious study of who to blame, but the reality is that obviously after 50 years it was announced by a Conservative and the ribbon was cut by a Liberal and another government did not maintain it in a proper fashion. Let's spread the blame.
When I come back in a few years, Senator Rivard will say I had said it was going to cost $3 billion, I'll have to tell him that that's not exactly the price they are charging.
The Chair: I won't ask Senator Mockler to do any research on the Jacques Cartier Bridge that was built in May 1930 and who was in power at that time. Whoever did it did a good job.
Thank you very much, Senator Dawson and Senator Housakos. We very much appreciate you coming and engaging in conversation with respect to the work that your committee has done.
That concludes our work, colleagues, with respect to Bill C-31. We now wait for the bill to come and then we can use all of these reports and all of the work for second reading. I expect that it will be referred to us for clause-by-clause consideration early next week.
(The committee adjourned.)