The committee met at 2:15 p.m.

[B. D’Eith in the chair.]

B. D’Eith (Chair): Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Bob D’Eith. I’m the MLA for Maple Ridge–Mission and the Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services.

I’d like to start by acknowledging that our meeting is taking place on the traditional territory of the Tsimshian people.

We are a committee of the Legislative Assembly that includes MLAs from the government and opposition parties. Usually, we travel in the fall, when we hold public consultations and visit different regions in the province to hear directly from British Columbians about their priorities and ideas for the next provincial budget. This year we’ve moved our consultation to June to enable the committee to deliver a final report to the Legislative Assembly earlier in the budget process. We will be reviewing this change to the timeline and welcome your feedback.

Our consultation is based on the budget consultation paper that was released by the Minister of Finance last week, and there are copies of this paper available at the back for anyone who’s interested in reading.

Last week we visited eight communities throughout the province, and we continue our travels this week with stops in Kitimat, Prince George, Fort St. John, Quesnel, Abbotsford and Surrey. We have a few spots available in our remaining hearings, and anyone who’d like to register for a spot can contact the Parliamentary Committees Office at 1-877-428-8337. We also invite British Columbians to provide their thoughts in writing or by filling out the on-line survey. Details are available on our website at www.leg.bc.ca/cmt/finance. The deadline for input is 5 p.m. on Friday, June 28.

All of the input we receive will be carefully considered as the committee develops its recommendations to the Legislative Assembly on what should be in the next provincial budget. A report will be available in late July or early August. Thanks to everyone who took the time with us today to share their input.

As far as the meeting format, I would kindly ask that people respect the following time limits. Each presenter has five minutes to share their input, followed by five minutes of questions from the committee. Of course, you’re welcome to provide any information that you’re not able to share in the oral presentation in writing if you’d like.

If there is anyone who hasn’t registered in advance but would like to speak to the committee, please see Stephanie at the information table, and we will do our very best to accommodate you.

Today’s meeting is being recorded and transcribed. All audio from our meetings is broadcast live via our website, and a complete transcript is also posted.

Next, I’d like the members of the committee to introduce themselves, starting with Ronna-Rae Leonard.

R. Leonard: I’m Ronna-Rae Leonard. I’m the MLA for Courtenay-Comox.

D. Clovechok: Doug Clovechok. I’m the MLA for Columbia River–​Revelstoke.

N. Simons: I’m Nicholas Simons. I represent Powell River–​Sunshine Coast.

M. Dean: I’m Mitzi Dean. I’m the MLA for Esquimalt-Metchosin.

R. Coleman: I’m Rich Coleman. I’m the MLA for Langley East.

D. Ashton (Deputy Chair): Good afternoon. My name is Dan Ashton. I represent Penticton to Peachland.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Once again, my name is Bob D’Eith. I’m the MLA for Maple Ridge–Mission.

Assisting us today is the Parliamentary Committees Office — Susan Sourial and Stephanie Raymond. We have Steve Weisgerber and Amanda Heffelfinger from Hansard Services who are recording our proceedings.

First up we have the B.C. Real Estate Association — Trevor Hargreaves and Sheila Love.

Great. So if you wouldn’t mind, five minutes. Please go ahead.

Budget Consultation Presentations

B.C. REAL ESTATE ASSOCIATION

T. Hargreaves: Indeed, I’ll try and go as quick as possible. We have forwarded our full policy of recommendations in digital format for your review. A quick background in terms of who the B.C. Real Estate Association is. We are the blanket non-profit provincial representatives of the 11 real estate boards across the province and 23,000 realtors across British Columbia.

Accordingly, we try to make appearances right across the province, which is why we’re here today. I’ll get right into our recommendations. I’ll just give you a top-flight overview.

[2:20 p.m.]

First and foremost, regarding the property transfer tax, we have a set of recommendations: a 2 percent, 3 percent and 5 percent threshold adjustment, a first-time-homebuyers exemption threshold adjustment and a newly built home exemption threshold.

On the topic of the PTT, it continues to have an adverse effect on housing affordability in B.C. We, within British Columbia, have the highest provincial transfer tax rate in Canada. If you combine this against our home prices in many British Columbia regions, the PTT has the ability to put home ownership out of reach for many families, especially in large urban areas. So our perspective is that unless the thresholds are indexed, their effectiveness erodes over time. Accordingly, we would like to see them adapted to be more representative of the very difficult-to-afford prices in certain regions within the province.

In terms of the first-time-homebuyers program, what we are recommending is that the PTT exemption threshold is raised to $750,000 from the current $500,000. We believe that increasing the exemption for all first-time buyers will expand choices and make it a little bit easier for first-time buyers to get into the market. Again, much of our policy is based around trying to frame measures that will further affordability when it comes to people right across the province trying to get into the market.

On the topic of the B-20 stress test, which is actually a federal, not a provincial, measure…. The B-20 stress test, for anyone that isn’t aware, was put into place federally as a buyer protection act. The way that it works is it tests you at a higher mortgage rate than the prevailing mortgage rate so that if you buy a property and it goes up, you can afford the climb in interest. We are finding, in terms of our data, that what has significantly impacted the British Columbia market is the B-20 stress test. We have put together a series of recommendations federally for them to relax these measures.

Very often a lot of the dialogue, provincially, is around the spec and vacancy tax, which, as we know, the current government instituted. But our data does not show that that tax has actually had any notable impact on the actual house prices. Again, it’s very much federal. We don’t base that subjectively, but we base that on looking at the prices from provinces right across the country and seeing a very similar price decline, from here right across the country, matching the B-20 implementation.

Our recommendations around the spec and vacancy tax — what we would like to see are some actual statements as to what the spec and vacancy tax is trying achieve. If it’s trying to achieve a certain affordability measure, we would like to see dollar figures as to what those measures are. And once those thresholds are reached, we would like to see that tax put to an end.

What we are finding, in terms of the tax and its larger impacts outside of Metro Vancouver…. We’re seeing in areas like the Okanagan, for example…. One, it is greatly impacting investment from places like Alberta. Why would Albertans invest in a property in British Columbia when they are saddled with an extra provincial tax that is causing hardship within that market? Secondarily, the spec and vacancy tax, statistically, is taxing for the most part British Columbians, not foreign owners. So it’s an additional tax hardship amongst provincial property owners.

The other aspect that we would like to endorse today is using PTT revenue to assist with creating gentle density in low-density neighbourhoods. What we advocate — in an increasing supply-and-demand issue when it comes to housing right across the province — is that we start addressing supply by following increased densification measures. What we’re suggesting is that the PTT could be used in a strategic way to increase the capacity of urban spaces while maintaining the charm of neighbourhoods. We’re not advocating dramatic densification but densification that could really start moving in a manner that is helping to adjust to supply and demand — certainly, increased demand — without it being extremely dramatic.

We outline the ways that this can be done in our documentation. I won’t go into them right now. In the essence of time, I will pass it over to Sheila to speak about an issue known as limited dual agency. She is here as a regional representative because this is a particular issue in outlying areas across the province.

S. Love: I’m a managing broker. I have three offices: one in Kitimat, one in Terrace and one in Prince Rupert. I have 26 realtors under my licence. I’ve been personally licensed since 1992, and I became a managing broker a few years ago. Throughout my career, I was involved in numerous limited dual agency scenarios — never had an issue. Sellers want to sell; buyers want to buy. It’s the same today.

[2:25 p.m.]

The impact of losing limited dual agency for the smaller areas is that we don’t have the pool of buyers. We don’t have millions of people in our area. We have a very small limited of buyers and a very small limited of sellers. Between my 26 realtors in all three communities, the average usually has between 12 to 15 listings, which means they also have buyers looking at those same properties.

As it is now, when we go to a seller’s house, we go through our market analysis, and we tell them: “We can list your house, but I can’t bring you a buyer, because we are not allowed to do limited dual agency.” The first question is: “Well, why am I getting you to sell my house? I want you to sell it. I expect you to sell my house. You’re a top seller — whatever. I want you to sell my house.” That has greatly affected when we go to list a home for a seller.

Same as buyers. We have buyers that are looking in the same price range. If two buyers want to put an offer on the same house, all of a sudden, we have to say: “I’m sorry. I can’t work with either of you, or I have to release one of you versus keeping another one.”

We have found it is consumer confidence. When we sit down and go through all the forms that we have to go through, buyers just say: “Look, I just want to buy a house. I just want to write an offer.” We’re saying: “No, we cannot do it, because the government has regulated that we cannot be in a situation where if it’s our listing, we cannot sell you that property.”

The public isn’t happy. We have had people come in, basically get angry and walk out. “Well, if I can’t buy a house because you can’t write the offer, I might as well go somewhere else.” Or a seller saying: “Well, I might as well list my house privately. Why am I hiring you if you can’t sell my house?” We have had a few brokerages shut down.

I actually got a call from one of my realtors in Rupert that is going to be quitting. Since June, she’s struggled. She’s an older realtor, not as old as I am, but she’s been in the industry. Her clientele base is previous clients that she’s dealt with — family members. Now she’s having to tell them that if they’re interested in buying one of her listings, she can no longer deal with them. The buyers just want someone who they have fostered a relationship with, someone who they have trusted. They want them to represent them in a sale.

There’s no problem with limited dual agency as long as it’s done correctly. We don’t disclose what a seller is prepared to sell for. We don’t disclose what a buyer is prepared to pay. We just set the limits. We write the contracts. We’re not lawyers. We don’t have winners and losers. We have sellers wanting to sell their house and buyers wanting to buy it. As a result of losing the opportunity with….

Sorry, I’m talking fast, because I know you’ve said I’ve only got a couple of minutes.

It’s very frustrating to see. I had one lady — quickly, I’ll just tell you — come in. She sat down. I happened to be walking by, and she just burst into tears. “All I want to do is buy a house, and I can’t buy it, because all the realtors had buyers who were also interested in that house. What do we do?”

That has affected our industry in smaller communities. Bigger centres — I get it. A lot of them never ever do a limited dual agency. Up here, we are continually involved with representing, having buyers and sellers wanting to buy homes that are listed by the same person.

Anyway, I’m sorry if I’ve gone on too much, if there are any questions.

T. Hargreaves: While it isn’t directly a budget question, you may ask: “Why are we adding that in a budget presentation?” At the end of the day, it is greatly affecting the community aspects of our industry in many of the remote areas of British Columbia.

We have two different regulators. They both have two different interpretations on our recommendations for an exemption and what we would like to see moving forward. We wanted to take this opportunity today, with such representation of MLAs across the province, to really speak to the fact that we would appreciate your advocating moving forwards to put into practice a logical northern exemption, or a remote area exemption to be specific, so that in towns where there isn’t a lot of opportunity for two real estate agents to work in tandem, it would be a logical policy fix.

That concludes our presentation for today. Why don’t we turn it over to Q and A?

B. D’Eith (Chair): Great. Thank you very much.

N. Simons: Thank you very much for your presentation. I’m wondering, as I represent a rural area, and I’ve heard some concerns about it as well — specialized property sellers. Can you just explain why that would be difficult for them as well?

S. Love: For example, up in this area here, we have wells. We have septic systems. There’s no way somebody in downtown Vancouver has a clue about areas where there are issues with wells, where there are issues with septic systems, where there are clay deposits. Or let’s say, for example, in the Interior, where they’ve got ranches and cattle and stuff. I am not experienced whatsoever with that, so I wouldn’t want to be representing a buyer purchasing a property in some place like Horsefly or Quesnel.

We are seeing, because we don’t have…. When it was very busy in Kitimat when that LNG announcement was, we had realtors in Vancouver writing offers for buyers. How is that representing them in their best interest? They don’t have a clue about the market, the area, the catchment areas. They don’t understand what our market is doing versus what theirs is.

[2:30 p.m.]

M. Dean: What happens in other rural and remote parts of the country?

S. Love: They basically have to get someone from out of the area to write an offer. There have been a few brokerages I’ve heard of in the remote areas where there’s only been one office. They’ve just shut down because they cannot provide anything.

T. Hargreaves: I think she means outside of the province.

M. Dean: But in other provinces, have they…?

S. Love: Oh yes. They have limited dual agency.

M. Dean: So are we the only province that has…?

S. Love: No. Alberta and Nova Scotia also have given up limited dual, but they have transactional agency.

Where it is right now…. Let’s say I listed your home and had a buyer that wanted to buy your house, and they had a house to sell and wanted me to write the offer to sell. I couldn’t sell the house to them, and I could not list their house either. Whereas in Alberta and Nova Scotia, as long as it’s not to do with that transaction, you can also be involved in that.

D. Clovechok: Just thank you for your presentation. I represent remote and rural in the East Kootenays. This is a huge issue — a huge issue — for the people that I represent. I just want to thank you for bringing that to our attention, because it’s a big deal.

S. Love: It’s very frustrating. The biggest issue I have is…. My realtors are calling me continually: “What do I do? These people want to buy this house from me. But it’s my listing, and I can’t refer them because they’ve got someone.” It’s like honestly, you have to refer them to someone else, or else they go unrepresented. That is not acting in the best interest of the buyer.

D. Clovechok: Or the client goes to another province or city.

S. Love: Absolutely, yeah.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Great. Any other questions?

Well, thank you very much for your presentation. Really appreciate all the ideas that you have, and we really appreciate you coming in.

Next up we actually have a teleconference from Anastasia Butcher.

Just if you wouldn’t mind, if we could keep the initial comments to about five minutes — then that leaves us time for questions — we’d appreciate that.

ANASTASIA BUTCHER

A. Butcher: Thank you for the opportunity to present my recommendations today. My name is Anastasia Butcher. Last year I presented recommendations to this committee when you came to Victoria, B.C. I am back this year to share my story again.

My daughter is 19 years old, and she just transitioned into adulthood with autism, developmental disabilities and complex mental health challenges. The process of transition into adulthood has been emotionally exhausting, very stressful and painful, and it is still filled with uncertainty. Many families in British Columbia experience the same, and one cannot imagine how frustrating and draining this process is.

The majority of the services that were available when my daughter was a youth are no longer available — speech therapy, supported child development, physiotherapy, counselling, occupational therapy, autism funding, behaviour consultant, consistent overnight respite and other services.

We have been working with Community Living British Columbia since February 2018 to develop a plan. Although I appreciate the efforts to find supports for my daughter, it has become very clear during this process that CLBC is financially unable to meet the needs of people with developmental disabilities, especially those who have complex needs, because of inadequate funding. Many families in B.C. are told that there is not enough money to go around to support everyone. If you’re lucky and get services, the options for living arrangements and community inclusion support are very limited due to lack of funding.

I want my daughter to live her life with dignity and supports that will meet her complex needs, but I feel afraid for her future, because she does not fit the standard limited options offered by CLBC. This fear is shared by many families who have been standing in line for a long time waiting for support for their adult family members, and still they do not have what they need.

The United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities is Catalina Devandas Aguilar. During her visit to Canada in April 2019, she stated: “I am extremely concerned about the lack of comprehensive responses to guarantee the access of persons with disabilities to the support they need to live independently in their communities.” As a highly developed nation, Canada still lags behind in the implementation of its obligations under the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities.

[2:35 p.m.]

Catalina Devandas Aguilar stated that unfortunately in Canada, “access to support is not considered as a right but rather as a social assistance program dependent on the availability of services.” It is important to remember that the provision of support to persons with disabilities is a human rights obligation of Canada under the UN convention.

Inadequate funding is preventing my daughter and many people with disabilities from enjoying the everyday free­doms that people without disabilities take for granted — for example, the right to choose where to live and the right to appropriate supports to achieve an education and employment.

When the government makes a decision to provide inadequate funding for support services, the message is clear: my daughter matters less than other citizens of this country. I want to know that this government considers my daughter and people like her to be worthy of funding. If she receives support now, in these important years, it will impact her future trajectory of life and her being a contributing member of society.

My recommendation is to increase Community Living British Columbia’s annual budget to support adult services, with targeted funding for young adults with complex needs, and to ensure flexible options for living arrangements and community inclusion support that respects the right to live independently and be included in the community on an equal basis with others, with enough support that meets their complex needs, as per article 19, UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities.

I want to thank the committee for giving me the opportunity to share my recommendations.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Thank you very much, Anastasia.

N. Simons: Thank you very much, Anastasia. It’s Nicholas Simons.

I really appreciate you taking the time to share your situation with us as MLAs. I think it’s very important that families tell us how the system is or is not working. The information you provided us today is helpful, so I just want to thank you for that.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Thank you very much for your presentation and your passion for this issue. We really appreciate your time.

All right. Next up we have B.C. Seafood Alliance — Christina Burridge.

Christina, we’re trying to keep the initial comments to about five minutes. That would be great. Thank you so much.

B.C. SEAFOOD ALLIANCE

C. Burridge: Thank you very much, everyone.

I am here today for the B.C. Seafood Alliance. That’s an umbrella organization whose 17 members represent fisheries that account for about 90 percent of the value of wild seafood from Canada’s Pacific coast. Our members are associations representing commercial fishermen, licence holders and vessel owners and operators in most major fisheries in B.C. Vessels generally range from less than 30 feet, so pretty small, to over 150 feet. This makes us, by far, the most representative commercial fishing organization on the west coast.

Thank you so much for inviting me to Prince Rupert, especially. The key issues that I wish to raise are extremely important for the coastal economy.

The first is the northern shelf bioregion marine protected area network — quite a mouthful, I know, so I’m going to call it the NSB in the future. The second is recommendation 7 from the House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans’ recent report on west coast licensing policy. It recommends that Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the province of B.C. explore the concept of a loans board for fish harvesters.

The NSB first. A few months ago there was the release of a network zoning plan for this marine protected area network. It proposes to reduce commercial fishing access by 40 percent. The NSB runs from three-quarters of the way up Vancouver Island to the Alaskan border, so it certainly covers Prince Rupert. At least three-quarters of the total coast-wide value of wild B.C. seafood is harvested here.

[2:40 p.m.]

We estimate that the draft plan would take at least $100 million annually out of the B.C. economy, devastating fishing families in coastal communities. I’m here to ask you whether this is what the provincial government intended for this initiative.

The draft zoning plan has been developed by the federal government, the provincial government and several First Nations partners. Canada has made an international commitment to protect 10 percent of its marine and coastal area, and that’s by next year. According to the federal government, 22 percent of B.C.’s marine waters are currently protected, while the rest of Canada’s marine area is protected at just under 7 percent. Using the same metrics, B.C. will have protected 37 percent of its coast by 2020, based on initiatives already underway, and that’s before any of the northern shelf bioregion MPA network zones are taken into account.

We ask that the committee seek the province’s agreement to take the time to get the MPA network right. There needs to be time to fix methodological flaws in the process that do not take into account current conservation and management measures. We need to complete broad consultation with fish harvesters through a process that we have developed, and we need to conduct a full socioeconomic analysis of the implications — $100 million annually and the devastation of families and coastal communities. That’s simply too great a price to pay when more than a third of B.C.’s coast will be already protected.

Moving on to recommendation 7 from the standing committee report. This recommendation proposes that the provincial and federal governments explore establishing a loan board for fish harvesters to encourage new entrants and intergenerational transfer. A loan board exists in every other fishing province in Canada. It exists in Alaska — there are two of them there, actually — and in other U.S. fishing regions, but not in B.C. The federal government, by the way, has just introduced a similar program for young aquaculturists but not for wild fish harvesters.

The Nova Scotia fisheries and aquaculture loan board, for instance, is a Crown corporation holding more than $127 million to support fish harvesters and aquaculturists by providing low-interest, long-term loans of up to $5 million to help young fishermen purchase licences and quota. It’s the Nova Scotia loan board that makes it possible for a young fisherman to purchase a $1 million lobster licence. It’s the absence of one in B.C. that makes a similar purchase difficult. Establishing a loan board for B.C., along with a public registry of licences and quota, would be amongst the two most practical ways to encourage young fishermen and new entrants to the industry.

I would like to commend the province for its role in establishing the B.C. salmon restoration and innovation fund, but I would urge a very strategic approach to funding projects so that there’s really a good legacy left at the end of this.

Lastly, a more strategic cooperation amongst B.C. ministries that deal with fisheries so that the province can deliver clear and consistent positions on fisheries issues would be really helpful.

Thank you very much for your time. Happy to answer a few questions.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Thanks, Christina. I appreciate that.

Questions?

R. Leonard: Good to see you, Christina, in a different…. I didn’t recognize you. This woman looks familiar. Wrong context.

C. Burridge: Ah yes. We only saw you a month or so ago.

R. Leonard: Yes. The question that I have is…. You made a comment about the B.C. salmon restoration and innovation fund, and you talked about being strategic. Have you got some examples of the kind of direction you see those funds being spent?

C. Burridge: I think the fact that you got almost 200 expressions of interest for that fund for the first date tells you that there’s a huge gap in B.C. for good science research and good data. Obviously, you can’t do all of those things.

I think there’s very much a desire to see salmon restoration projects, enhancement projects. But we really need a framework for evaluating restoration and enhancement — enhancement in particular because of the impacts of enhancement on wild fish — and we don’t have that. DFO has never done that. So we really need the province to push DFO to come up with a good framework so that as you move into funding more projects, there’s actually something to assess whether they’re successful.

[2:45 p.m.]

R. Leonard: Thank you.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Very interesting.

Any other questions?

I guess the balance is finding that sustainability with the ability to ensure that our commercial fisheries are strong and remain strong, and we don’t end up with what happened in the Maritimes, when it was so over-fished. Everybody lost in the end there.

C. Burridge: In fact, on the west coast, almost all our fisheries are recognized by the Marine Stewardship Council, which is the gold standard for sustainability, or by the Monterey Bay Aquarium or by Vancouver’s Ocean Wise. So we’re pretty confident, certainly compared to Atlantic Canada, that our fisheries are sustainable and well managed.

I think the oceans certainly do have problems, but ocean acidification, climate change, pollution are far more significant in terms of the health of B.C.’s waters than commercial fishing. If we take out 40 percent, that means that, say, perhaps half the halibut fishery and its fishermen go away. Same for some of the dive fisheries. It just has enormous implications.

I know the province has been keen to see more young fishermen come into the business, but this kind of an approach, which is really suitable in some areas of the world, is generally thought by scientists to be not particularly helpful in areas that have good fisheries management.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Very well said. Thank you very much. We really appreciate you coming and presenting. It’s very nice to see you.

We’re just going to take a short recess. Thank you.

The committee recessed from 2:46 p.m. to 3:05 p.m.

[B. D’Eith in the chair.]

B. D’Eith (Chair): Well, we’re back with the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services. Next up we have Prince Rupert Unemployed Action Centre — Paul Lagace and Dave Smith.

Welcome, nice to see you. Just a reminder, if we could keep the comments to about five minutes, then we have time for questions.

PRINCE RUPERT
UNEMPLOYED ACTION CENTRE

P. Lagace: Thank you for having us. Thank you for coming to Prince Rupert.

My name is Paul Lagace, and I am the coordinator and legal advocate for the Prince Rupert Unemployed Action Centre. I’m funded by the Law Foundation of B.C., who fund about 100 poverty law advocates in the province.

D. Smith: My name is Dave Smith. I chair the board that runs the action centre. We maintain two full-time employees, including Paul. The funders that we obtain money from include the Law Foundation, union donations, B.C. gaming and some federal money as well.

P. Lagace: I do poverty law, which is a whole range of things — employment insurance, income assistance, residential tenancy, employment standards.

Today I want to talk about something that’s called persons with persistent multiple barriers, PPMB. It’s under the Ministry of Social Development, under the income assistance spectrum. Under income assistance, you have three basic categories. You have regular income assistance, persons with persistent multiple barriers, and you have PWD, persons with disabilities.

Persons with persistent multiple barriers is a little bit less known than the other two. What is it? It’s a category that provides assistance to recipients who have long-term barriers to employment that they’re not expected to overcome in the short term, despite all reasonable steps by the recipient. There are also certain special earning exemptions available for them.

It is recognized that some recipients in this category may overcome their barriers over time and improve their employability while others may not. Some may have medical conditions that worsen over time and require additional support.

I’ll give you a couple of very quick examples of a person that may fit under this category. An example may be somebody with fibromyalgia and osteoarthritis who has extreme fatigue, resulting in the patient barely managing self-care on most days.

Another example would be a schizophrenic. Maybe somebody who has a university degree and has an extensive employment history, but their schizophrenia is kicking in, and they’re not capable of focused attention on anything for any length of time and have delusions regularly.

Maybe one other example would be somebody with epilepsy that’s still having daily seizures, unable to drive. Extra time is required to complete daily living activities.

These forms…. If you know anything about the persons with disabilities forms, they’re quite extensive and time-consuming. The persons with persistent multiple barriers forms are two pages. They need to be filled out by a medical practitioner. There’s an employment screen with it, and there are different scores. It factors in not only the health issues but the level of education, the work history, whether they’re literate or not.

[3:10 p.m.]

On regular income assistance in British Columbia, a single person would get $760. On PPMB in British Columbia, a person gets $807. That is only $47 more than a person on regular income assistance. The person with a disability, PWD, gets $1,183. You can see a significant jump.

What I’m proposing is…. If these folks are as vulnerable as the government suggests they are, $47 a day seems not much.… I don’t see how that’s really better than regular income assistance. For context, to rent a one-bedroom in Prince Rupert, it’s $908. We are well $100 before even a basic rent.

What I’m proposing is doubling that $47. That’s it. It’s simple math — a $47 increase to these very, very vulnerable folks. Yeah, it’s about a buck-50 a day. They might be able to go to Tim Hortons for a coffee, but it’s something. It’s something for vulnerable people. Since this is the budget committee, the question is around money. Well, I think it’s great bang for the buck.

As of April 2019, the Ministry of Social Development just confirmed with me that there are only 2,443 recipients receiving PPMB. Right now, technically on the system, there’s 3,300 folks. But right now, there’s only 2,400 accessing.

What does that mean? That’s $114,000 a month we’re talking about and, over a year, $1.377 million. What I’m asking is a $47 increase for some of the most vulnerable people here. Some of these people can transition to PWD. Those forms do take time. Dependent on the barriers, that’s very difficult. It’s much more involved for the doctors.

Some of these folks would qualify for PWD, but due to barriers and different reasons, aren’t always able to complete the forms. That’s my proposal.

N. Simons: Thank you very much for advocating for people who rely on people to speak for them and talk about the issues that we don’t always see every day.

Can you tell me…? The $760 is the regular social assistance rate. You said $807 is the persons with multiple barriers rate and then $1,183 is for people who have received the PWD designation.

P. Lagace: That is correct.

N. Simons: What is the barrier for the individuals who have the multiple barriers? What’s stopping them from being eligible for PWD?

P. Lagace: Persons with disabilities — it’s about daily living activities. What happens…. Some people have various medical conditions, and they can do certain things, and they’re physically actually, maybe, quite well. If their mental health isn’t too far and they’re able to do the daily living activities, which is the whole umbrella, they may not qualify. That’s the main barrier.

So they have significant issues. It’s not like…. An example: just because you have hepatitis C, you’re not necessarily going to qualify for PPMB, even though you may be fatigued. So you have to have significant enough but maybe not enough.

I quickly said a lot of issues are, sometimes, getting doctors to fill out these forms. We work very close with the doctors in this community. Some doctors, it’s just about ticking all the boxes and getting all the information.

[3:15 p.m.]

Some doctors have issues doing that. Some clients don’t have doctors. These are extensive things. Sometimes, due to their own barriers…. I once helped a woman that spent ten years trying to complete a PWD application due to her own barriers. But the two pages — it’s something the doctors can quickly do, without much back and forth. And I mean back and forth — doctor fills something out; we need clarity. It goes back and forth a few times. Some clients, because of their barriers, just can’t go through that.

N. Simons: My understanding is that under the current rules, someone who is “employable” has to show that they’ve made efforts to find work. Do the people with the multiple barriers have to fill…? They have a slightly different designation. What are the requirements that we expect of them?

P. Lagace: They are work-exempt, doing the job search. Many of these people are often out of the workforce for a number of years. So they are exempt for that, but the other great thing is that they’re also encouraged to work. So they get…. I believe they could earn up to $700 on PPMB.

N. Simons: And $400 under regular…?

P. Lagace: So $400 on the regular income assistance. I think those numbers sort of reflect…. If you have 2,400 people receiving it and there are 3,317 registered, I think it’s a fair assumption that some of these folks have moved towards employability, which is kind of the goal and the support of it.

N. Simons: Thank you for bringing that to our attention.

M. Dean: Thank you so much for your presentation and the work that you do and for coming here today. Where did you get the $47? I know it’s just a doubling the difference between income assistance and PPMB allowance, but where did you get the $47 figure from?

P. Lagace: I’ll be happy to leave this with you. This is the income assistance rate table. It’s on the Ministry of Social Development, and it gives you the whole breakdown.

M. Dean: What change in quality of life do you see that that extra $47 would provide for this population? You could’ve picked a different number, then, I’m thinking. So what was your thinking behind that amount increase?

P. Lagace: Obviously, I’d like to see more. That was just kind of a minimal thought. You know, the thought was that these folks really should have an additional $100 extra. I think some of that could maybe lend itself to more. I know $50 isn’t a lot. But, you know, if they could go get that coffee, they’re socializing in the community on some level. Obviously, it’s not going to be life-changing, but I think it can allow folks to maybe integrate more in the community, which is the goal, I think — to integrate these folks to employment.

N. Simons: For some that would be life-changing.

P. Lagace: Yeah.

N. Simons: So I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad you made the request.

P. Lagace: I mean, to us, it’s not a big deal, but….

N. Simons: I hear what you’re saying.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Any other questions?

R. Leonard: Thanks for your presentation. It was pretty clear. The question that I have is around doctors filling out forms. Do doctors charge for filling out these forms? I got the sense from you that there are challenges that doctors just simply don’t want to fill out forms. Is this one of the barriers that you’re facing?

P. Lagace: Yeah. I mean, it really depends on the doctor. The ministry…. When we’re talking persons with disability, the doctor is paid $60 to fill out their portion, which is not hugely extensive. The issue is that there’s also the assessor, which can be a nurse practitioner or mental health person. Ideally, the thing is not to overwhelm the doctors and then try to get other people to do the assessors, but that can’t always be done. Yes, they’re paid, but the reality is that doctors, certainly in this community and, I know, in many communities — there’s a real shortage. It’s just a time thing for them.

[3:20 p.m.]

Some doctors are much more willing to engage in that process. That’s usually done with an advocate. We, as poverty law advocates, engage that. There are organizations such as Disability Alliance of B.C. and other organizations that…. But yeah, you really need an advocate for these.

The thought with the PPMB is…. I think that a client could take those two pages and just bring it to the doctor, and the doctor could do it in five minutes. It doesn’t require the back-and-forth — maybe a stopgap to PWD, possibly. It lowers that barrier. I think a client could do that without the support of an advocate. I think it would be, just simply, a case of going into the local ministry office and asking for these two pages. They’re not overwhelmed by it, and it’s accessible for them.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Well, thank you very much for your presentations. We really appreciate the time that you’ve put into this and advocating for people in need.

I did want to mention that we have the MLA for North Coast, Jennifer Rice, who is also the Parliamentary Secretary for Emergency Preparedness.

Next up we have the Prince Rupert District Teachers Association — Raegan Sawka.

R. Sawka: I have two colleagues that were looking to join me, so they may arrive at any moment. I had said 3:35, so that’s all right. They can just come in if they make it here.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Sure.

So if we can try and keep the comments to about five minutes, then we have time for questions. That would be great. Thank you so much.

PRINCE RUPERT
DISTRICT TEACHERS UNION

R. Sawka: Thank you all for having me today. I’m Raegan Sawka, the current local president of the Prince Rupert District Teachers Association. A group of our colleagues have come together to help us put together a presentation for you today. Thank you so much for coming to our community and allowing us this presentation. We had hoped to be here under different circumstances, but the situation with public funding and education for British Columbia has unfortunately not improved since our last presentation in 2016.

The Minister of Education claims the largest funding increases to B.C.’s public education system ever, with nearly $1 billion in new money to give to students, allowing more support in the classroom. He is correct in there being new funding, but other stakeholders are responsible for it, not the Ministry of Education. Nearly all of the new money for the K-through-12 system is due to enrolment growth and restored teacher collective agreement language on class size and composition, as well as previously agreed-to salary increases. These are all non-discretionary factors over which the ministry has no control.

When the ministry has had the opportunity to put real resources into the classroom — for example, resourcing and supporting our curriculum implementation and the revised grad program — these have fallen short, including, next year, that we no longer have the implementation day that we’ve been provided in previous years.

These funding changes for the 2019-2020 school year amounted to just 1.3 percent per student, so this is far below the inflation rate. Prince Rupert students and staff are experiencing further budget and service cuts instead of restoring student supports and services.

Students in B.C. and Prince Rupert deserve better. We are being shortchanged in comparison to the rest of Canada. Our province invests $1,800 less per student in public education when compared to the national average. As sources have told me, this is closer to $1,900 per student now. Just like when we visited Jennifer Rice, recently — to her constituency office — we’re asking as well, at this committee: why are our kids worth so much less? They’re significant, and their future in this province is less of a priority than other provinces.

Teachers in Prince Rupert are urging and appealing to the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services to increase to sufficient education dollars. We need to reverse the current underfunding and provide educational services our students deserve.

[3:25 p.m.]

In this brief, we’ll outline how the situation is in B.C. compared to other provinces and how we can at least come up to the average of Canada. We’ll also be providing some recommendations in our report, especially around the Funding Model Review Panel’s No. 6 and No. 8 that came out in December. This would further erode services to our students and deny students and their families vital advocacy rights for their well-being in the K-through-12 system and beyond.

We believe students are currently being shortchanged services that are vitally important to their social and economic health as well as for the future of our province. Despite winning our case before the Supreme Court in 2016, teachers and students in Prince Rupert have still been waiting for the restoration of these services that were lost when our contract was illegally stripped in 2002. This is a situation that should not exist in a province that’s endowed with such natural wealth and human potential. Our students deserve better.

While class sizes have improved moderately over the last couple of years, our students requiring support for special needs continue to decline — those supports. We’re definitely moving in the wrong direction. For example, the two teachers that were going to come here today that weren’t able to arrive — I guess they’re coming out of school — are grade 6 teachers that are in middle school, and their classes are being built for five or more students on individualized education plans. Their classes are being built with five or more students with high needs as well as other diverse abilities — kids that are waiting for, say, a psycho-educational assessment from a school psychologist.

The needs in these classes range from severe communication delays to autism, a range of learning disabilities and students requiring intervention for behaviour supports. Their EA time is divided amongst multiple classrooms, so my colleague Ms. Murphy, in the audience there, can’t rely on the same person every day to provide the supports for students.

Much of our EA time at the secondary and middle schools has been shifted to our elementary schools, as higher needs have been identified there, so teachers are often left alone. The speech and language support has also been ushered towards the younger students. At our middle and secondary school, teachers are coming up with these plans to prepare and meet individual needs for higher numbers of students very much on their own.

This is also leading to not only a lack of support for our students but a recruitment and retention crisis in our community. We have a number of our teachers working on letters of permission in many specialized teaching areas. These are people that don’t have teacher training, or a professional degree in that way, providing education to our students.

We have failure-to-fill issues for short-term leaves. If teachers are sick or have to be away for a small period of time, we have uncertified people who don’t have a letter of permission coming in to fill in for those people. It’s created stress and declining working conditions for all of those involved. The senior management is having to go out and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars recruiting teachers, and they’re not staying for more than a couple of years. The gaps are continuing to grow.

As far as recommendations Nos. 6 and 8 from the report from the funding model review, this was aimed as a solution to this problem, but in fact, it’s compounding the issues.

Recommendation No. 6 states that the ministry should create a single inclusive education supplement. Component No. 2 of this recommendation is “a prevalence-based model using a comprehensive range of third-party medical and socioeconomic population data.” This is similar to what’s been tried out in Ontario and New Brunswick, and it’s failing to meet the actual needs of students, as their data is showing. A prevalence model for special education will remove the vital link to services, information that families and other advocates for children rely on to ensure that their disabilities are supported in their public education.

Then recommendation No. 8 is based on a false claim. The recommendation states that the ministry should eliminate the classroom enhancement funding and allocate the funding as part of a school district operating grant. This will require negotiated changes to collective agreement provisions.

[3:30 p.m.]

The recommendation of negotiated changes to the collective agreement to provide flexibility and choice for students is the same failed argument that the government of the day had to provide, in multiple court challenges, to the flexibility and choices act. This is how the teachers led to their 2016 landmark Supreme Court victory, and it’s another way of attempting to underfund or deprioritize B.C. students.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Raegan, we’re just about eight minutes now. If we could wrap it up, that’d be wonderful. Thank you.

R. Sawka: You’ll see from the copy that you were furnished with ahead of time that I have my three recommendations: to increase K-to-12 funding, especially with downloaded costs; to remove 6 and 8 from the funding model review; to consider removing funding to independent schools in order to meet the needs of the K-through-12 public schools.

Thank you very much for my five-minute overview, but please have a moment to read the full report. I’m open to any questions you may have.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Just for the members, there was nothing on our iPad before, but if you refresh your iPad, it’s there now. It wasn’t there earlier. Thank you very much.

Any questions?

Did you say there was someone else who wanted to speak briefly?

R. Sawka: Or at least to come along for the presentation. Kathy Murphy in the audience there. She’s here to chime in.

B. D’Eith (Chair): I just wanted to make sure that she didn’t expect to speak.

Interjections.

B. D’Eith (Chair): You’re more than welcome to come up if you want to speak.

Interjection.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Okay, sorry.

Mitzi, a question.

M. Dean: Thanks for your presentation. Recommendation No. 3 in your submission is to eliminate the funding for independent schools. What you’re talking about there is the provincial funding that goes with each student, and then whatever else gets paid privately. Do you know what that…? Can you explain to us what that figure is.

R. Sawka: From what I understand, for this current school year, $426 million has gone to independent schools. I don’t know the per-student breakdown. I don’t have those figures in front of me. But our concern is that is similar to some of the dollar amounts that we’re missing from the public system.

When I began teaching in 2001, as a proportion of gross domestic product, or a proportion of government spending, about 20 percent of government spending went into public education. We’re now between 11 and 12 percent. We know a lot of those funds have been diverted or are being spent elsewhere, like independent schools. That might be part of the issue for generating the money to properly support our K through 12.

Hopefully I’ve answered your question.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Any other questions at all?

Well, thank you very much for your presentation. We appreciate that. Thanks for coming. Just to explain again, because this is being recorded, we can’t have people speak in the audience. That’s the reason. It’s not because we don’t…. We’d be more than happy to hear what you have to say if you wanted to come up.

Interjection.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Okay. Thank you so much.

All right. Next we have a new addition, Anna Zanella from Friendship House Association of Prince Rupert.

FRIENDSHIP HOUSE ASSOCIATION
OF PRINCE RUPERT

A. Zanella: Good day, everyone. My name is Anna Zanella. I’m the executive director of the Friendship House Association of Prince Rupert. The Friendship House is an inclusive organization that provides programs and services to the community at large in the areas of education, health, culture and recreation, with an emphasis on assisting Aboriginal people in an urban setting. Last fiscal year we had over 35,000 clients walk through our doors and over 350,000 points of service.

I also sit on the boards of the B.C. Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres and the National Association of Friendship Centres. Currently this province boasts 25 centres, with 123 across the nation.

I’ve been working on strategies for projects that are in line with many of this government’s priorities, including the poverty reduction strategy. I think that the following would be of some significance.

My hope is that…. I propose to this Budget 2020 select committee renewed and additional funding for transportation projects that were formed with the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure. Currently the Friendship House runs a transportation program called Friendship EVAW, which is ending violence against women and children. We run a van service from Prince Rupert to Terrace, B.C. twice weekly.

[3:35 p.m.]

The program is extremely successful, as it boasts a cost of $5 per seat each way — the only program of its kind. The Friendship House is appreciative of the funding opportunity as one of the 12 recipient organizations of this funding in the province for the Highway 16 Corridor, the Highway of Tears, project that began in 2017.

We’d like to continue with the program and with the current pricing for the seats, but with the increasing gas prices, we are concerned that we may have to raise the cost of seats. That’s definitely not our intention.

Renewed funding for operations would be very helpful — and, eventually, additional funding to purchase a new, larger bus. The Friendship House pays for part of this, and Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure funded the cost of a van and some of the funds for the start-up costs. The success can be measured by the fact that the seats are full each way and we have waiting lists. But the van seats only 13 passengers per trip.

We pay for a qualified driver who is screened and cover operation costs by doing charters. This works well, as we did apply for a licence that allows us to do so. We were able to bring this social enterprise out of the red, so to speak, in a short period of six months. It is also a safe and practical transportation option.

My submission is that the provincial budget continue to provide renewed and additional funding for the possibility to purchase an additional bus to run more trips. We’ve actually been requested by different groups to do that, and they would like us to run more frequently.

Currently our biweekly trips are in line with connecting to B.C. Transit, connecting transportation routes. There are limited modes of transportation in and out of Prince Rupert and northern communities, and it’s a growing concern. People use this van service we provide for various reasons, including but not limited to connecting to B.C. Transit routes, airlines in Terrace; to connect to employment and education opportunities, medical appointments, family and pretty much anything that the former bus lines provided for.

We could provide additional trips and days with another vehicle and support our operations more if we had two vehicles. One could be home to do charters. In addition, we could be able to carry parcels with the larger vehicle. Currently, we cannot accept charters that fall on days of transportation service for the EVAW project.

We also addressed a provincial and national issue, first by providing transportation options for the Highway 16 Corridor, ending violence against women and children. We also support the economy of the province by connecting people to jobs and providing jobs for dispatchers and drivers, being the only service of its kind as it connects communities along the highway in the north in and out of Prince Rupert.

It also addresses social issues, reduces barriers of connectivity and promotes participation in the economy and safety inclusively. The van service also provides transportation to medical appointments for individuals, promoting health and well-being. This service is available to anyone who wishes to ride and is a social enterprise for not-for-profit that is financially sound.

I would like to thank the select committee for your consideration and hearing me today in making this presentation. I also have another written submission. The person that takes care of that project is for employment and placement and training. We would like to submit that later on in writing, if that’s okay.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Sure, of course. Absolutely.

A quick question for you. In terms of budget, how much is being spent on this transportation service now? It sounds like you’re talking about expanding the service by adding another van. What is the cost of all this?

A. Zanella: Well, the start-up cost for the particular van we have right now was just under $60,000. The operation costs — we provided a few reports and received about $30,000 in addition for operations. We subsidized that ourselves with our charters, and we’re really quite in demand.

B. D’Eith (Chair): So the funding is coming from the Ministry of Transportation, or did the initial…?

A. Zanella: The initial start-up funding, yeah. Then we provided a report about halfway through, and we received an additional $30,000.

N. Simons: Thank you for your support on this important project. Can you tell us what it’s meant for people to have this transportation? Just give us sort of a human-level understanding of what it’s meant for people to have this.

A. Zanella: I think it gives people peace of mind. They know it runs twice weekly, no matter — rain or shine or the really bad weather situations along the highway in the wintertime. It makes them feel like they can get out of Prince Rupert and kind of connect. Also, we have only one airline in this community. This way, they’re able to connect to other airlines.

[3:40 p.m.]

Even the B.C. Ferries group — there were some people that actually made a recent request to us to ask if we could run a charter on Wednesdays for them to connect on a flight back to Vancouver to be with their families and that sort of thing. It also provided additional travel for people who had day appointments for medical or things like that.

Connecting along the route to get to Prince George is pretty difficult if you don’t have a car — or a lot of money, even — but it’s attractive to people from all different walks of life. We have contractors that get on. They’re connecting to go to jobs in Kitimat or coming here to work at the port and things like that — and for the college.

R. Leonard: Thank you very much for your presentation. It was exciting to hear that it has turned into a…. I don’t know if the plan always was for it to be a social enterprise, but you are capturing a wide array of people who have the need. I think that’s really terrific. I guess my question is in terms of the business model of adding another van. That’s the capital investment. Future costs, in terms of maintenance and stuff — is that built into your business plan, to be able to make ends meet as time goes on?

A. Zanella: Yes. We had to provide a budget plan to the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, and we had to make sure that it was viable. So yes, replacement of the van and that sort of thing is also a consideration in about five years’ time or so.

R. Leonard: But you’re not in a place right now where you can grow the profitable end of it sufficiently to be able to upgrade into two vans from one. I guess that’s where I’m going.

A. Zanella: I think eventually we could. I guess it would be really helpful — either-or. If it’s not a capital purchase that we get funding for, some assistance with the operational costs would be really useful. I can see that in a couple of years, possibly, we could purchase a new one from the revenue we bring in, but I’m thinking that with an additional van right now, the revenue could be increased that much quicker. I hope that makes sense.

R. Leonard: That’s what I wanted to hear. Thank you.

M. Dean: Thanks for your presentation, for all your services and for being here and sharing all of this with us today. I’m interested in the people who are on the biweekly trips. Also, I’m just following up on Ronna-Rae’s question. If you increased the revenues, does that mean you would increase the $5-a-day trips, that there would be an increase in that aspect of the service?

A. Zanella: Yes.

M. Dean: Is it women and children, vulnerable women, who use the biweekly service?

A. Zanella: It’s everybody, timing-wise, I guess, because our bus lines were no longer running right around the same time that I started this. My plan was actually to run a women’s taxi service — for everybody. It wasn’t just for women. It was just about getting people from one place to the other safely, because that was a national issue, not only in this province.

You know, I grew up in this town in the 1970s, and there were lots of issues and people going missing. It addressed a social issue for the inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women. That, to me, isn’t really just about the Indigenous women. It was for everybody, because people were frustrated. They couldn’t get to their jobs or start up with something, connect to their families and those sorts of things.

I’ve been doing interviews for this, quite a bit. I did a presentation to the B.C. transition society in Vancouver last year at their annual conference. People were really excited about this and said: “This is actually something that’s doable. This is a project that we can make work.” It did raise a lot of interest.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Great. Any more questions?

Well, thank you very much. It sounds like a wonderful project.

A short recess.

The committee recessed from 3:44 p.m. to 3:52 p.m.

[B. D’Eith in the chair.]

B. D’Eith (Chair): Next up we have Ecotrust Canada — Tasha Sutcliffe, who’s on the phone.

Tasha, can you hear us?

T. Sutcliffe: I can, yes, loud and clear. Can you hear me?

B. D’Eith (Chair): Okay. Tasha, if you could try to please keep the comments to five minutes, and then we have time for questions, I’d really appreciate it.

ECOTRUST CANADA

T. Sutcliffe: Sure. I’ll do my best. Thanks for the opportunity to speak to you today. I am currently the lead on fisheries programming at Ecotrust Canada, and that’s the focus of what I want to talk about.

I was honoured to be a member of the provincial government’s Wild Salmon Advisory Council. I and others were really pleased to see the government’s willingness to act on many of the council’s recommendations, including the protection and restoration of salmon habitat. Of course, we were thrilled to see the investment made by the province in the wild salmon innovation fund. These will significantly help key concerns of coastal communities, First Nations and fish harvesters, who depend on fish stocks for their livelihoods.

We also agree strongly with the need to establish focused and coordinated leadership capacity in government to champion and deliver these commitments as well as economic development commitments in fisheries. We hope that this commitment will be a priority for the government in the upcoming budget cycle. We are also very happy to see acceptance of recommendations around expanding education and training related to fisheries conservation, habitat protection and new opportunities in communities dependent on fisheries.

[3:55 p.m.]

There are, however, very serious demographic challenges facing the commercial fisheries sector. We’re hoping that this commitment includes strategic initiatives and investments to address the need for labour force renewal, dealing with succession and intergenerational transfers of fishing assets in community-based fisheries.

There were also a few key areas coming out of the province’s response to the Wild Salmon Advisory Council recommendations that we’d like to see further commitment and investment in to ensure that we’re effectively addressing some concerns that are current and policy priorities raised by community and industry groups, who contributed both directly to the council’s report and also through public consultations. The provincial government stated commitments to enhancing local social, cultural and economic benefits for adjacent communities and their active commercial and recreational fishermen and actions to raise the value and profile of not just wild salmon but all seafood products.

We look forward to seeing how these commitments will be pursued through policy initiatives and programs and also new investments. But in pursuit of these objectives and, specifically, the strategy 2.3 in the Wild Salmon Advisory Council report, we want to emphasize the continued need for the province to collaborate with the federal government in policy areas that impact heavily on social and economic development in coastal communities and First Nations that rely on commercial fisheries.

We’re particularly focused on this right now because a lot is hanging in the balance. Right now there is the impending passage of the new Canadian Fisheries Act and the recent report out from the federal Standing Committee on Fisheries on B.C. licensing in the Pacific region for commercial fisheries. We know that, just like in every single fishing province, input from the government of B.C. will be critical in shaping the federal government’s direction on licensing policy reform and related issues.

Meaningful progress is going to require collaboration with the province and supportive initiatives in areas of common interest, such as labour force renewal, fish harvester organization, financial instruments supporting intergenerational transfers of enterprises and the many aspects of fisheries related to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, and improving transparency in ownership of fishing assets and the lack of transparency in beneficial ownership of our public B.C. fisheries resource. The negative impacts of that on communities were also made very clear in the province’s own recent report Dirty Money.

These are all areas of shared jurisdiction and overlapping program responsibilities where, in considering transformative change, the federal government is going to rely on active collaboration and investment from the province — investment not only of political but also financial capital. So this is not about allocation. This is about ensuring that the economic, social and cultural benefits coming from our public resource are fairly shared with our own adjacent communities and the people doing the work on the deck of the boat.

There’s been broad cross-sectoral support for this kind of change recommended in the FOPO report, and we need to ensure that our local fisheries resources are first and foremost benefiting our local harvesters, our First Nations and our fishing communities, not speculative investors and multinational companies. We need a strong message of support for local and sustainable fisheries from the government of B.C. and to see this activated through a real commitment of investment in the upcoming budget.

The Wild Salmon Advisory Council recommendation under goal 3 is to protect and enhance the economic, social and cultural benefits that accrue to B.C. communities from wild salmon and all fisheries, placing emphasis on adjacent communities. That goal in that report provides a great platform to convey this message and make commitments. We hope that this is a line item in the new upcoming budget.

With that, I just want to say thanks for your continued commitment to the sustainability of wild fisheries resources and our fishing communities that rely on them.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Great. Any questions from the committee at all?

Thank you very much. That was a very thorough presentation. We really appreciate your time, Tasha.

Ronna-Rae Leonard has a quick question for you.

R. Leonard: That was very comprehensive, your comments. One of the ones that I caught was your reference to needing labour force renewal investment. We had a previous presentation regarding a loan system for harvesters. I was wondering if that is within the realm of what you’re talking about.

T. Sutcliffe: Yeah, absolutely. In terms of intergenerational transfer, a key part of ensuring that fishing access stays in the hands of local people is finding ways for them to access capital to be able to afford to do that. Licences are incredibly expensive.

We’re hoping policy changes can help to deal with some of the overcapitalization happening. But ultimately, there’s going to need to be systems in place for people to be able access different forms of capital to continue to be able to stay in the fishery. There are many good examples of that, including in Atlantic Canada and Alaska — different kinds of loan boards. The provincial governments are very engaged in those. So yes.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Great. Well, thank you very much for your presentation.

T. Sutcliffe: My pleasure. Thanks for the time.

B. D’Eith (Chair): Okay, motion to adjourn.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 4 p.m.