The committee met at 8:31 a.m.

[Paul Choi in the chair.]

Paul Choi (Chair): Good morning, everyone. My name is Paul Choi. I’m the MLA for Burnaby South–Metrotown and Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services.

I’d like to acknowledge that we are meeting today in Surrey, which is located on the traditional territories of Coast Salish people, including q̓ic̓əy̓, SEMYOME and qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓ First Nations.

I would like to welcome everyone who is listening to and participating in today’s meeting. Our committee is currently conducting its annual consultation with British Columbians on their priorities for the next provincial budget. British Columbians who are not presenting to the committee can still share their views by making written comments. The details on how to provide submissions are available on our website at bcleg.ca/consultations

I will ask the members of the committee to introduce themselves, starting with the Deputy Chair.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Good morning. I’m Elenore Sturko. I’m the MLA for Surrey-Cloverdale. Welcome to Surrey. I’m glad to have members of this committee and members of the community here in our hometown. In addition to being MLA for Surrey-Cloverdale, I’m the critic for public safety and the Solicitor General.

Sunita Dhir: Good morning. My name is Sunita Dhir. I’m the MLA for Vancouver-Langara, and I’m also the Parliamentary Secretary for International Credentials. Thank you.

Bryan Tepper: Hello. I’m Bryan Tepper, the MLA for Surrey-Panorama and the critic for community safety and integrated services.

Steve Morissette: Good morning. I’m Steve Morissette, MLA for Kootenay-Monashee and Parliamentary Secretary for Rural Development.

Claire Rattée: Claire Rattée, MLA for Skeena and critic for mental health and addictions.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Good morning. I’m Jennifer Blatherwick. I’m the Parliamentary Secretary for Gender Equity and the MLA for Coquitlam-Maillardville.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that. Assisting committee today are Jennifer Arril and Kayla Wilson from the Parliamentary Committee Offices, and we have Simon DeLaat, Dwight Schmidt and Danielle Suter from Hansard Services. Thanks so much for your assistance.

We are now going to hear from a number of organizations and individuals about their priorities for the next provincial budget. Each participant will get five minutes to speak, followed by up to five minutes for questions from committee members.

At this time I’d like to call Danielle Synotte from the B.C. Agriculture Council to come to the front, please. Thank you so much.

Budget Consultation Presentations

B.C. Agriculture Council

Danielle Synotte: Yes. Good morning.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks for coming. Thank you. You have five minutes to present and five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready. Thank you.

Danielle Synotte: Thank you very much. Thank you for the opportunity to present to you today regarding the needs of B.C. farmers and ranchers.

My name is Danielle Synotte, and I’m the executive director of B.C. Agriculture Council. Our organization represents the unified voice of 29 distinct commodity groups, accounting for 96 percent of farm-gate sales in the province and more than 20,000 agricultural producers from across British Columbia. Our mission is to advocate for policies that will not only sustain but strengthen agriculture, ensuring food security for our communities and supporting the livelihoods of those who work so hard to feed British Columbians every single day.

[8:35 a.m.]

As you know, the Premier has launched a task force on agriculture and the food economy, and I’m honoured to serve as one of the co-chairs of that task force on behalf of the BCAC’s membership. While I can’t go into the details today about all the discussions underway, I can share that the task force is engaged in work that is critical to the food security of our province, and we will be coming forward with practical recommendations very soon.

The question before us today is this: how do we ensure that the recommendations emerging from this task force

With all the discussions underway, I can share that the task force is engaged in work that is critical to the food security of our province, and we will be coming forward with practical recommendations very soon.

The question before us today is this: how do we ensure that the recommendations emerging from this task force are effectively implemented? How do we move from identifying needs to resourcing those needs adequately? This task force is more than just a policy exercise; it’s a lifeline to the future of food security in British Columbia.

Putting those recommendations into action will require government to commit serious resources. Currently, the operating budget of the B.C. Ministry of Agriculture and Food is quite limited. Therefore, BCAC is seeking support from this committee to advance two specific proposals related to the task force’s mandate.

First, we are seeking a formal recognition that agriculture is deemed an essential service. There is plenty of precedent for this. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the government of Canada recognized farms as critical infrastructure. When international borders were closed due to the pandemic, coordinated actions by multiple levels of government still allowed temporary foreign workers, who were employed on farms, to enter Canada under certain conditions. This was because, again, their work was deemed essential to the food security of our communities.

What would treating agriculture as an essential service look like in practice? Among other things, it would mean provincial leadership in ensuring farmers can shelter in place or have an expedited process to return to their farms in an emergency situation. It would mean credible deterrence to trespassing on farm properties such as through fines and other penalties. It would ensure that farmers transporting livestock or poultry can reliably count on space on B.C. Ferries. And of course, it would mean adequately funding the B.C. Ministry of Agriculture and Food.

Second, we’re seeking this committee’s support for strategic investments in water storage. Water is essential to grow food. Agriculture is dependent on water. Yet many of the regions of our province are facing the impacts of prolonged drought. While government support for on-farm dugouts and storage ponds have been appreciated, we now need broader, systemic solutions. This requires a comprehensive analysis of current and future water needs, existing storage capacity and a full cost of building and maintaining community-scale infrastructure.

Government must commit to crunching the numbers. What are our water needs? What is our current capacity? How do we scale from individual on-farm solutions to large-scale shared systems? We are no longer managing water supply; we’re managing water scarcity. Investment is not only urgent; it’s overdue, and it’s non-partisan.

BCAC will continue to work together with other members of the Premier’s task force as well as other stakeholders in B.C. and across Canada. But your support on our two recommendations today, recognizing agriculture as an essential service and government investment in community-level water storage, are crucial to ensuring that the hard work of the task force bears fruit. Let’s put our money where our mouth is and invest in the farmers and food that sustain us all.

Thank you once again for your kind attention this morning. I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing being first up, but you have a long day ahead of you. Thank you very much.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that. We will now turn to questions by members.

Steve Morissette: Thank you for the presentation, Danielle. That was great. Very concise.

Investments in water storage. So I guess first thing is to study what we have and determine where the needs are and….

Danielle Synotte: Yes, and we just had our first meeting of the Premier’s task force, actually, on May 7th, and the very first topic was water. We’ve gone really good at managing scarcity, and now we’re talking about increasing supply. So there are a lot of really big questions in there about how much water do we have, how much do we need, what does large scale infrastructure improvements actually mean and where.

So it’s a regional watershed-based planning. There’s a lot to that topic, and it’s very complicated. But what I can see is this task force will be pushing up recommendations after each meeting versus waiting until the end of a 10 to 12 month period. So we’re actually going to be pushing up some recommendations within the next couple of weeks around that.

Steve Morissette: Okay. Thank you.

[8:40 a.m.]

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for your presentation, and thank you for recognizing the essential need we have for food security here in this province and the work that people in the agriculture industry do.

When you’re talking about

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for your presentation, and thank you for recognizing the essential need we have for food security here in this province and the work that people in the agriculture industry do.

When you’re talking about analysis of water storage and water capacity, the possible areas of water scarcity, are you also asking for consideration and budget around water assignment?

Danielle Synotte: [inaudible recording] the Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship.

There have been some issues and complications with the way that things have currently been done, and there have been a lot of resources poured towards that. We are still in a bit of an issue when it comes to the processing of these applications. So some recommendations are going to be forthcoming about ways to improve those efficiencies around resourcing.

Maybe doing things the way that we’ve currently been doing them for the past several years hasn’t been the most efficient, but compliance and enforcement are an important piece of the puzzle as well in terms of the allocation of water. There are definitely many, many stakeholders and First Nations communities that are involved in the conversation of water as well. So a lot of needs are going to have to be consulted along the way.

Bryan Tepper: We’ve got a few seconds left, I guess. I’m going to guess your answer is going to be that it’s coming up, forthcoming. With the licensing problems that we have now, how is that going to affect the request on the water storage? Do we have to get through the licensing first, or can we run them concurrently, do you think?

Danielle Synotte: We believe that they can be done concurrently. There’s the issue of the backlog, which can be dealt with through various ways. Then there’s the streamlining. Only 50 percent of the applications that need to be made have been made. So we know there are half of the people out there that need to still make an application, and there needs to be a better way to do that.

Then on the water storage, we need to increase supply. We need to ask the question: “Do we have enough to appropriately service the needs that we have?” If not, then we need to increase the supply, and do we have a way to slow it down and stop it when it does come?”

Bryan Tepper: I’ll be interested in the report when it comes.

Danielle Synotte: It will be, yes.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, thank you so much for that, and for your presentation.

[8:45 a.m.]

We’ll move on to the next presenter, Zoe Ahnert, Deep Sea Trawlers Association of B.C. Thank you so much for coming to present to us. Again, five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions. When it goes yellow, it means you have one minute left

Zoe Ahnert, Deep Sea Trawlers Association of B.C.

Thank you so much for coming to present to us. Again, five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions. When it goes yellow, it means you have one minute left. Whenever you’re ready.

Deep Sea Trawlers
Association of B.C.

Zoe Ahnert: Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Thank you for the opportunity to present today. My name is Zoe Ahnert. I am the executive manager of the Deep Sea Trawlers Association. I represent the stakeholders of the commercial groundfish trawl industry.

Before I present my main request, I’d like to provide some brief historical context on how we’ve arrived at this point. In 1985, Bill C-65 was passed by the government with assurances from the then minister that there would be no changes to the treatment of the existing fuel tax exemptions. Prior to this, commercial fishers, like farmers, were included in those exemptions. However, when the legislation came into effect, fishers were quietly excluded from the exemption list, despite the verbal commitment. This oversight has never been corrected and we have been bearing the cost ever since.

I am here today to respectfully request that British Columbia extend a fuel tax exemption on both motor fuel and carbon tax to seafood harvesters in line with the treatment already afforded to the agriculture sector. During COVID-19 pandemic, our industry was recognized as an essential food producer, yet today we continue to bear high and inequitable operation costs that hinder our competitiveness, threaten our survival and limit our contribution to the provincial food economy.

British Columbia is currently the only province in Canada that does not provide a provincial fuel tax exemption to its seafood sector. This puts our members at a significant disadvantage, especially when we are facing compounding challenges, from the economic uncertainty by the U.S. and Chinese tariffs to issues surrounding transboundary hake stocks and implementation of DFO licence reform.

Our sector is an essential pillar of the B.C. food system. We support over 5,000 jobs and contribute nearly $1 billion annually to the provincial economy. We are committed to sustainability and have been global leaders in responsible fisheries management, yet we are taxed in a way that our counterparts in agriculture are not. Despite both sectors feeding British Columbians, we export high-quality sustainably harvested products to the world.

The B.C. Seafood Alliance and its members, including our association, have been clear in our message: if the province values food security, regional economic development, Indigenous participation and climate-aligned industries, then parity across the food production sectors is essential.

It is important to note that the cost pressure from fuel tax is not isolated. It is compounded by federal decisions such as the implementation of marine protected areas. These challenges are expected to reduce access by up to 50 percent of our traditional fishing grounds in some regions. According to the B.C. Ministry of Agriculture, this could result in $125 million in lost revenue and $55 million in lost labour income for our sector.

We understand that the province has limited tools to address all of these pressures, but harmonizing fuel tax policy with the agriculture sector is one tool that is clearly within your jurisdiction. It would send a strong message and a positive signal that British Columbia supports all of its food producers on land and at sea.

Thank you again for the time and consideration of this important issue. I would be pleased to answer any additional questions you may have.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that. I will turn to questions by members.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thanks for the presentation. You might have said this in your presentation, but is there an estimate on what the cost would be to the government if they went ahead with the harmonization?

Zoe Ahnert: Yeah. It’s relatively low, from our perspective. It’s $800,000 annually for the motor fuel tax. We’re charged three cents a litre on marine diesel. And then, obviously, currently, the carbon tax has been removed from the federal government. So it’s about an $800,000 annual cost.

[8:50 a.m.]

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you so much. Actually, MLA Sturko asked my first question. But my second question…. In terms of the marine exemption zones, there’s an anticipated loss to the industry.

thank you so much. Actually, MLA Sturko asked my first question.

But my second question. In terms of the marine exemption zones, there’s an anticipated loss to the industry. Of course, the provincial government can’t affect the federal exclusion zones. So in terms of like…. Are you expecting, obviously, some slowdown in the industry? Outside of that, is there any resiliency programming within the industry? Is there any planning for job loss or the slowdown?

Zoe Ahnert: In my sector, specifically the trawl sector, we’re going to be losing a significant amount of ground. All of the sectors, ours is actually less of the impacted than some of the other sectors. As far as I know, there has not been any sort of resiliency programs that have been discussed on displaced fishers.

Also, the seafood sector is on the downward trajectory. We’ve lost many jobs over the past 15 years. I mean, the B.C. salmon industry itself is down 93 percent since the ‘90s. It’s affected all of the coastal communities and we’re not competitive on a global scale. We’ve really put sustainability at the forefront and having some level of exemption on the fuel tax is just a starting point for us to be competitive on a global scale.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Bryan Tepper: Simple question. How many members are we talking about for your organization?

Zoe Ahnert: I represent the stakeholders. I have 31 members and six associate members. They employ…. Our vessels are crewed with anywhere between four fishers and 26 fishers. The, sort of, tailspin from that is significant.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, any other questions? That is it. Okay. Thank you so much for your presentation.

Zoe Ahnert: Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, we’ll have our next presenter up, Lee-Ann Lalli from CUPE Local 1936.

CUPE Local 1936, Community Services
of Greater Vancouver

Lee-Ann Lalli: I’m a bit nervous. I’ve done this three times already, and each time, it’s nerve-racking.

Paul Choi (Chair): It’s my first time, so you’re all good. Thanks so much for coming today. Again, you have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions. You can begin whenever you’re ready.

Lee-Ann Lalli: Great. My name is Lee-Ann Lalli. My pronouns are she/her. First I would like to acknowledge that the Canadian Union of Public Employees 1936 is located on the unceded territory ancestral lands of the qiqéyt people in New Westminister.

I’m proud to be the vice-president of CUPE Local 1936. We represent over 1600 workers, 24 agencies delivering core community social services that make our neighbourhoods run. Our members work in non-profit agencies. They care for the vulnerable people who need support and deliver community inclusion programs.

First thing I would like to talk about today is investment of our province’s community social services system, specifically addressing the crisis of recruiting and retention of the workers that do the vital work.

We recommend that the projects adequately fund community social services providers to address staffing, recruitment and retention. This province’s past work to close the compensation gap between sectors deserves credit. That was the first step in addressing long-term recruitment and retention issues in community social services sector, but still more needs to be done.

Community social services remains severely underfunded and results in ongoing worsening recruitment issues that negatively impact workers in this sector and the services we provide the public. Finding gaps results in staffing facing unsustainable workloads while dealing with complex issues. Employees often find themselves working alone handling unreasonable workplace situations in isolation.

Recently, one employee was driving a client in their car. Something triggered the client, causing the client to kick the seat and unbuckle themselves. Though he parked the car on the side of the road to de-escalate the situation, it would have been more beneficial to have another employee in the car. However, due to recruitment and retention challenges in this sector, most employees must choose between their safety or the safety of their clients.

[8:55 a.m.]

Without increased funding, community social services providers will remain in crisis, unable to address challenges with recruitment and retention, resulting in staff burnout, mental and physical injuries, ultimately loss of workers in the sector.

Our second recommendation in relation is to Anti-Racism Act. The current government has done some great work on

increased funding. Community social services providers will remain in crisis, unable to address challenges with recruitment and retention, resulting in staff burnout, mental and physical injuries and ultimately, loss of workers in the sector.

Our second recommendation is in relation to the Anti-Racism Act. The current government has done some great work on bringing in the Anti-Racism Act to create and support anti-racism strategies that will identify and address racism in public policies, programs and services.

The next step in the act would be focusing on programs and services that would focus…. The government prioritize funding to address food insecurity in racialized communities, developed in consultation with those communities to ensure culturally appropriate, effective solutions, including funding for food banks, school meal programs, Indigenous food sovereignty projects, local food systems to address the food insecurities.

The final ask is the government will also establish a permanent budget item to ensure the dedicated funds to programs and policies tackling the root cause of food insecurities.

Finally — the closest to my heart — I’m here to talk about child care. My career with CUPE Local 1936 started as an early childhood educator here in the Lower Mainland. Without ECEs like me, our communities just wouldn’t function. The ECEs do work that allows our parents to re-enter the workforce after having kids. I’m a proud early childhood educator. I’m also proud of the work this government is doing in recognizing how important my work is and increasing child care spaces in the province.

In closing, I want to talk about a final recommendation, which is that the province expand affordable, accessible, public-delivered before- and after-school care to every school district and that parents pay no more than $10 a day. B.C. needs a public option for child care. Before- and after-school care as a part of public education is a natural fit. It means easy access to affordable child care, parents not having to juggle dropping off their kids in multiple locations and having to make their jobs work in the same time and kids having high-quality and fewer transitions in the day.

The province should be making these spaces available in every school district in the province. This is what the government campaigned on in 2017, and that is what still is needed today. The transition to public child care in schools could happen very quickly. It is frustrating that this has not already been expanded provincewide, given how simple it can be to accomplish and how critical it is to support working families.

What B.C. needs is a public option for school-aged children, one that provides reliable, stable, accessible child care in every community and that ensures that people like me, who do this work, are valued. Thank you.

It started out a bit rough. Two minutes, two seconds.

Paul Choi (Chair): No, that was good. You’re good. Thank you so much for that. We’ll turn to questions by members. Recognizing MLA Blatherwick.

Jennifer Blatherwick: You touched on a lot of topics that are obviously really important to you and matter in trying to support the community that you live in.

You did mention the Anti-Racism Act. I wasn’t clear what the budget ask was around that.

Lee-Ann Lalli: There is no budget ask because I think the first consultation the government has done is to put that in. Then talking about community food security is already funding food banks that are doing that work. So it’s not adding additional money to it. It’s just improving it and putting it towards the communities that need it. We know that Indigenous and Black communities need that more.

So it’s already there. It’s just putting a little bit more money into it.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Sunita Dhir: I just have a question about the kind of work that you guys are doing in your non-profit. Can you please name some organizations that you’re representing?

Lee-Ann Lalli: I represent the workers that do the non-profit work. So Community Ventures is one in Port Moody. There’s Aspire Richmond. There is Battered Women’s Support Services.

Our members are not just community support workers, but they’re all counsellors. There are early childhood educators. They work in neighbourhood houses. So Collingwood Neighbourhood House would be one of them that’s out in that community.

So there’s a bunch of social services, non-profit self-care. So yes.

Sunita Dhir: Okay, thank you so much.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thank you for the presentation. I’m obviously concerned to hear safety issues identified between clients, possibly putting themselves at risk, and workers being put in harm’s way.

[9:00 a.m.]

Is there anything within the current contract that you have that would stipulate that high risk situations must be staffed by two people?

Lee-Ann Lalli: Each agency has a contract. The contract comes from CLBC, let’s say. CLBC funds it. They fund it in a

that would stipulate that high-risk situations must be staffed by two people?

Lee-Ann Lalli: Each agency has a contract. The contract comes from CLBC, let’s say. CLBC funds it, and they fund it in the notion that the funding goes to the individual. Therefore, the individual then decides what agency they want to go to. Let’s say that CLBC has a wait list of people, and therefore they will then choose an agency.

When the agency gets these clients, they don’t really know the whole scope of what their behaviours are. Or they might know a little bit. Maybe they haven’t been in community, but they’ve been in home share — so maybe at home — and now they’re coming into the community, coming into agencies.

Therefore, when you start getting to know the individuals…. Because relationships is the most key part that you have to do. The employer has to build it, and the employees also have to build that relationship, work on it, and then they find out that there are behaviour needs. Therefore, once there are behaviour needs there and there’s a behaviour plan, maybe behaviour consultants come in.

But those take a long time if you don’t know it ahead of time, so if they don’t already have a team in place, you have to make that team for the individual. Therefore, then you have to go back to the funder and say: “Okay, well, I need double staffing.” “Well, why do you need double staffing? Prove it. How do you need?”

Then WorkSafe things go up. WorkSafe claims and missed incidents happen. So that’s when you start proving that violent acts are already happening in the workplace before you can even get the funding.

Paul Choi (Chair): Follow up.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Would you agree, then, that it might be a priority of the next budget to include funding to do earlier assessments?

Lee-Ann Lalli: Yes, I think earlier assessments are also good, but also a global funding model that does not just go to the individual but is a pool of money that agencies can use in order to determine where it needs to go and how it needs to go.

I think there are also the recruitment and retention issues in other sectors too. We don’t have a lot of behaviouralists that can come in. We don’t have access to wait lists of who is qualified to do that work, right? Doctors, pharmacists — there are multiple factors that play into it that don’t allow these individuals to have a good, valued life, and that our workers are safe in that environment.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Okay, thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No, okay.

Thank you so much for your presentation. You did really amazing. Thank you.

Next, we will have Sawsan Hamie from Pacific Immigrant Resources Society come up. Thank you so much for presenting to us and coming today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready.

Pacific Immigrant Resources Society

Sawsan Hamie: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Sawsan Hamie. I’m here today on behalf of Child Care Leadership Group, a collective of community leaders, immigrant and refugee women, educators, parents and front-line advocates who know firsthand the challenges that the child care sector faces in British Columbia.

Before I share the recommendations, I would like to highlight that immigrant and refugee women are vital contributors to British Columbia’s labour force, bringing diverse skills, resilience and cultural knowledge to a wide range of sectors. In a field like child care, we fill essential roles that support both economic growth and community well-being, facing systemic barriers such as credential recognition, discrimination and community well-being.

With limited access to training, immigrant women continue to show strong leadership, adaptability and entrepreneurial spirit. Our contributions not only strengthen the workforce but also enrich B.C.’s social and cultural fabric. Investing in our success means investing in a future of a more inclusive and resilient province.

To advance the province’s child care system, with a focus on affordability, workforce stability and equitable access for immigrant and refugee women, we would like to present the following recommendations that will create a more inclusive, sustainable and high-quality child care system in British Columbia, benefitting families, educators and communities across the province.

[9:05 a.m.]

First recommendation. Increase funding to expand the $10-a-day child care B.C. program. The $10-a-day child care B.C. program has significantly improved affordability for families, covering full-time child care fee at $200 per month per child.

The $10-a-day child care B.C. program has significantly improved affordability for families, covering full-time child care fee at $200 per month per child. This bridges a fourth, the amount remaining high, with only 16,000 of the 159,000 licensed spaces in B.C.

Designed as a $10-a-day spot, this shortage has disproportionately affected immigrant and refugee women who often face systemic barriers to employment and rely heavily on affordable child care to participate in the workforce. Expanding funding for the $10-a-day program will help reduce wait lists, promote economic inclusion and support the province’s commitment to universal accessible child care.

The second recommendation: Increase funding for a comprehensive support package including province-wide wage, rate and injury prevention benefit program with WorkSafeBC for early childhood educators in B.C.

Recruitment and retention of the quality remains a significant challenge in B.C. The current wage program increases median wage up to $29 per hour; however, it’s insufficient to address the high turnover rate and staffing shortage report indicates that B.C. is falling behind other provinces in ECE compensation, stabilization. A minimum wage rate of at least $30 to $40 per hour, as recommended by sector experts, with increased funding for WorkSafeBC to provide extended benefit coverage to ECEs will reduce work-related injury, stabilize and workforce, and address recruitment and retention challenges, promoting stability, well-being of ECEs and enhancing the quality of child care services in B.C.

Recommendation three: Allocate funding for training programs for immigrant and refugee women to be successful in B.C. economic growth. As I mentioned before, immigrant and refugee women constitute a significant portion of the workforce in B.C. Investing in training and initiatives will empower us with the skills and certification needed to thrive in a competitive market. No-cost training tailored to the need of newcomer women will address workforce shortages and promote diversity and inclusion in the program. Thank you very much.

It's my pleasure to receive any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Yes, thank you so much for your presentation. We’ll turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I just want to make sure that I fully understood your three recommendations. So one was for increasing the number of $10-a-day spots.

Sawsan Hamie: Yes.

Jennifer Blatherwick: The second one was creating a minimum wage for ECE educators to be within $30 to $40 an hour.

Sawsan Hamie: Exactly.

Jennifer Blatherwick: And then to additionally allocate funding for immigrant women to be trained in ECE? Is that…?

Sawsan Hamie: Yes. ECEs, ECE assistants. We need them.

Jennifer Blatherwick: And that was to allocate funding, which would specifically be for alleviating workplace shortages.

Sawsan Hamie: Correct.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay, perfect. Thank you.

I think you’ve highlighted all of the things that we struggle with in the child care sector right there. So I appreciate your presentation.

Sawsan Hamie: Thank you very much.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay.

Well, thank you so much for your presentation.

Sawsan Hamie: Thank you. And hopefully, we can raise our voices with you and put our hands together to solve this problem.

Paul Choi (Chair): Absolutely. Thank you

Okay, we’ll move on to the next presenter. If I can call Mr. Keir Macdonald from Coast Mental Health to come to the front, please. Thank you very much for coming today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready.

Coast Mental Health

Keir Macdonald: Good morning, committee members.

At a time when so many of our loved ones are struggling, at Coast Mental Health, we welcome a continued focus on community-based mental health, housing and support services. We’ve all seen what happens when people don’t have access to housing or mental health care. The consequences are visible in hospitals, in our justice system and on our streets.

[9:10 a.m.]

We’ve made progress, and we thank the province for its continued investments in new mental health and addiction services, but we still have work to do.

Coast Mental Health is here to support those most in need. With over 50 years of experience, we empower people with mental illness to live healthy lives as valued members in thriving communities. We deliver publicly funded services to more than 3,000 clients annually.

investments in new mental health and addiction services, but we still have work to do.

Coast Mental Health is here to support those most in need. With over 50 years of experience, we empower people with mental illness to live healthy lives as valued members in thriving communities. We deliver publicly funded services to more than 3,000 clients annually, including over 1,100 homes across the Lower Mainland. We are proud to be trusted partners in helping the province deliver on its ambitious plans.

Today, we ask you to consider three recommendations for Budget 2026. Our first recommendation is to invest in appropriate housing and supports to reduce pressure on emergency systems.

Marnie moved into Coast’s Timber Grove Apartments shortly after it was opened, following years of unstable housing and the loss of her mother. Thanks to on-site support, she began trauma counselling, reconnected with her Indigenous roots and has remained stable and hospital-free since 2019. She now helps others as a peer mentor. Stories like Marnie’s show that when housing is paired with the right supports, people can thrive.

Two of our most stable and successful supportive housing programs at Coast are Timber Grove and Dunbar Apartments. Both have active partnerships with health authorities. I believe these health services are key to their success. We require a more comprehensive and integrated approach to supportive housing, one that not only addresses basic needs but a system that promotes well-being and includes access to vital services that promote physical and mental health.

Our second recommendation is to support alternative justice models and post-release services to reduce recidivism. Too many individuals with mental health conditions are criminalized for behaviours rooted in untreated health issues. It’s time to shift towards a system that prioritizes care, and we are advocating for investments in alternative justice models that focus on treatment, not incarceration.

Post-release services are also crucial. Without access to stable housing and comprehensive, community-based services, individuals are set up to fail. In British Columbia, over 60 percent of individuals under provincial supervision are diagnosed with mental health or addiction challenges, yet many face barriers accessing housing, employment and health services upon release, leading to elevated risk of recidivism.

A recent study found that nearly 61 percent of individuals released from provincial custody in B.C. experienced reincarceration within three years. Those with concurrent mental health and substance use disorders had the shortest time, of just 220 days.

Providing supportive housing and timely access to mental health services can significantly reduce these risks. By addressing the root causes of criminal behaviour, we can reduce recidivism, lower incarceration rates and, ultimately, improve the long-term well-being of individuals and communities.

Our third recommendation is to fund specialized employment and training programs to support recovery. For many of us, employment gives us purpose, social connection and the financial independence that allow us to live full lives. It is no different for people with mental illness. The benefits of work are vital in supporting a stable recovery.

Brayden’s journey from a hospital ward as a mental health patient to Coast peer support worker at B.C. Children’s Hospital is a remarkable story. Brayden took Coast’s peer support training in 2024 and then started working at B.C. Children’s Hospital on a substance use response team. He recently stated: “I really feel complete for the first time in my life. I would say that peer support has been a big part of that. I don’t think I could have incorporated the skills that I had in me without the direction from Coast and their training program.”

Last year, Coast created over 200 employment opportunities through our social enterprises and peer programs, but most of these rely on short-term grants. With stable funding, we can expand these opportunities so that more people can move into employment supporting others, themselves and their path to recovery.

Coast Mental Health sees every day how people thrive when they have housing, support and purpose. We urge you to invest in a system that meets people where they are and helps them move forward. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for your presentation. We’ll now go to questions by members.

Bryan Tepper: The employment training programs — obviously there’s a cost to that, as you were saying. What’s the cost you’re looking at there of that?

Keir Macdonald: So we have three key components. They’re all supportive employment programs, I guess, which is the key. So it costs a little bit more to deliver. We have our primary programs funded by our foundation — our street clean team and our social enterprises, which run a youth culinary training program.

[9:15 a.m.]

In terms of annual cost right now, that’s over a million dollars in just these programs alone. The city of Vancouver does contribute to the street clean team in Vancouver. But it really is our social enterprises, both the Landscaping with Heart and our Social Crust Café, that also help supplement, along with our foundation, for those services. So no provincial government funding, currently, for any of our employment services.

Claire Rattée: When you’re talking about alternative justice

our social enterprises, both the Landscape with Heart and our Social Crust Café, that also help supplement, along with our foundation, for those services. So no provincial government funding currently for any of our employment services.

Claire Rattée: When you’re talking about alternative justice models, I’m guessing you’re talking about like restorative justice, things….

Keir Macdonald: Diversion…. I mean, there are very few. We’ve tried a few things here, drug courts and others, but I think taking a real serious look at what does incarceration look like today and the lack of health services there, and really sort of trying to find, whether it’s through restorative justice models, which we’ve been looking further out of the province….

But why haven’t drug courts been working as hoped? Don’t do away with the models. People that are experiencing mental illness and substitute disorders need health care, not incarceration, so how can we sort of really dig deeper into those?

Claire Rattée: And when you’re talking about some of the work opportunities like street cleanup and stuff like that, you mentioned not having any provincial funding, but I don’t know if you guys have spoken to any municipalities. In my experience, typically that would be something a municipality would be more likely to help out with than the provincial government necessarily as far as help with funding.

Keir Macdonald: And city of Vancouver funds that street clean too.

Claire Rattée: Yeah, okay. That’s kind of what I figured. Usually I would say that’s kind of something that you would see more with a municipality funding than provincially necessarily, but I do think that there are avenues for the province to get involved with helping with work programs like that to try and get people back into a routine of working.

Keir Macdonald: Well, the big one I touched on in the story was the peer support training program. Again, over $250,000 a year, completely funded by our foundation, and you heard Braden’s story.

We are generating training opportunities and placement in health authorities. This is doing the work, in many places, to advance this is the workforce of government, yet there are no provincial investments in those programs.

Jennifer Blatherwick: This is a really good conversation about transition to employment. It sounds like a lot of the programming is what I would call first-stage employment, when you’re….

Keir Macdonald: Yeah.

Jennifer Blatherwick: And so those programs require a lot of investment of employee time, but they’re worth it, because they are transitioned to independent employment later. But that comes with a significant cost — a million dollars for your street-clean program. So is it the intention for Coast to also provide like kind of second-stage employment transition or to partner with other non-profits that do?

Keir Macdonald: Yeah, the big opportunity for us is we think we’re doing really well with this supportive employment piece up front. And so where we do then partner is we have partnerships with YWCA, we have partnerships with SUCCESS, people who do large WorkBC contracts.

But there are gaps in the system in the WorkBC model. The model is not kind to this supported employment aspect. And so that’s where we believe we really have a strength in coming alongside, giving them those early skills, those early gains, just taking those steps back in, because WorkBC really rewards full-time employment and ongoing employment.

So I think this piece to really help give people opportunities back into the workforce is an important one. I think that’s the role we see Coast playing.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions by members? No. We are good.

Thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

Next, we will ask Monika Dean from CUPE Local 402 to come up to the front. Thank you.

Monika Dean: Hi there. Good morning.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you. Morning. Thanks for coming to present to us today. As you know, five minutes for the presentation, five minutes for questions, and you can begin whenever you’re ready.

CUPE Local 402, City of Surrey
Workers Union

Monika Dean: Thank you. My name is Monika Dean. I’m the president of CUPE Local 402. We represent the municipal workers here in Surrey, B.C. That includes Surrey public libraries and the Surrey policing support workers.

Normally I have a little more hair, but I just reached 6 grand and shaved 25 inches off to donate to Wigs for Kids.

Paul Choi (Chair): Amazing.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Oh, nice.

Monika Dean: I’d like to acknowledge that we live and work on the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the q̓ic̓əy̓, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓ and SEMYOME.

I’m here today to speak on three priorities that are essential for strong, inclusive communities in B.C.: municipal funding, public libraries and workplace safety.

First, we urge the provincial government to modernize the way local governments are funded and to treat this as a priority. Municipalities like Surrey are being asked to do more than ever: deliver affordable housing, upgrade infrastructure, respond to the climate crisis and support fast-growing populations.

But the funding model hasn’t kept up. Most local government revenue still comes from property taxes, which don’t reflect people’s ability to pay and which don’t grow with the economy. This creates real impacts: staff shortages, delayed maintenance and service cuts that affect both residents and workers.

[9:20 a.m.]

In Surrey, that means delays in permitting and inspections for critically needed housing stock as well as overcrowding of community facilities and limited programming capacity, which

and which don’t grow with the economy. This creates real impacts: staff shortages, delayed maintenance and service cuts that affect both residents and workers.

In Surrey, that means delays in permitting and inspections for critically needed housing stock as well as overcrowding of community facilities and limited programming capacity, which impacts whether or not kids are going to get their next swimming or skating level this year.

The Union of B.C. Municipalities has been calling for a review of local government revenue tools. CUPE members agree we need a more fair and flexible funding model. This could mean sharing or provincial revenues with local governments, like the property transfer tax, or enabling new tools, like a local sales tax. Other jurisdictions are already exploring options, and B.C. needs to catch up.

Second, we need increased operational funding for public libraries. Libraries are one of the last truly public and accessible spaces. People use them to apply for jobs, access government services, cool off during heat waves or simply find a safe place to be. Our members at Surrey Public Library are proud to deliver those supports, and they know, better than anyone, just how much of a lifeline libraries are for so many people in the community.

Most library funding comes from municipalities, which are already stretched thin. Provincial funding helps, but much of it is one time and project based. Those investments matter, but they don’t help pay for what actually helps keep the libraries running, which is the staff.

Without adequate operational funding, libraries are forced to reduce hours, limit programs and stretch too few staff too far. That not only affects the quality of service; it makes workers less safe. Library workers are increasingly responding to mental health crises, overdoses, volatile situations, often without proper training or enough backup. Many are in part-time, precarious jobs, and their wages lag behind other public sector roles. We’re asking the province to increase dedicated operational funding for libraries so they can meet the growing needs, support stable jobs and ensure safe working conditions.

This brings me to my third point. We need stronger health and safety protections across the public sector. What we’re seeing in libraries is part of a broader pattern, especially in front-line jobs that interact with vulnerable populations. When employers fail to provide safe workplaces, the consequences are serious: burnout, mental health impacts and physical harm, not only for workers but for the people who we serve.

Our members in library and recreation centres are not equipped to deal with these complex issues like overdoses or violent behaviour, yet they’re responding to them on a regular basis. At one Surrey library, workers arrived in the morning to find a deceased individual outside. At the city planning office, across the plaza, the front desk had to call the police after someone threatened to return with a gun, and they did show up later the same day. Lifeguards regularly face personal threats, harassment, verbal abuse, and have to escort people from facilities.

These roles are often filled by younger workers in their first jobs. They’re in precarious positions without access to paid time off or benefits to deal with psychological impacts. Yet they’re showing up every single day to serve their communities. That’s why CUPE members are calling on the province to direct WorkSafeBC to hire more enforcement officers. We need stronger oversight and meaningful penalties for employers who don’t comply with health and safety laws.

Safe workplaces aren’t optional. They’re the foundation of strong public services.

Thank you for your time today.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation. We’ll turn to questions by members. Recognizing the Deputy Chair.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): I love the library. It’s one of the last free spaces where everyone’s welcome.

Stories from across the province have come forward, as you’ve said, about increased risk to people working in libraries. What would you say would be…? What would help the most in terms of mitigating some of the risk that’s currently…? I want to see libraries growing, in fact. We do know that for, especially, people who have nowhere else to go, libraries often are a refuge.

What would be the most important or priority thing to see to make libraries safer?

Monika Dean: Staffing. It comes down to them running really lean. So when an incident happens, and people are trying to call off and deal with that psychological harm that they’ve experienced or sort of share the load with other coworkers, and vent, it’s really, I think, staffing and training that these folks need access to. In some of our libraries, we do have security guards, and they can help. But they’re obviously only so useful.

[9:25 a.m.]

In public spaces, it’s very difficult to get somebody banned, right? In community rec centres and libraries, it’s known individuals who keep coming back repeatedly. You know, when they show up, that there are going to be incidents. I think just having more staff around to deal with those sorts of things, because it’s next to impossible

community rec centres and libraries. It’s known individuals who keep coming back repeatedly, and you know that when they show up, there are going to be incidents. So I think just having more staff around to deal with those sorts of things because it’s next to impossible to tell somebody they can’t enter some place like a library or a rec facility.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions?

Well, thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): And congrats on your hair. Good for you. Really awesome.

Monika Dean: It’s a great time of year to do it.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay. At this time, we’ll take a ten-minute recess, and then we’ll reconvene.

The committee recessed from 9:25 a.m. to 10:10 a.m.

The committee recessed from 9:25 a.m. to 10:10 a.m.

Paul Choi (Chair): All right, I think we’re good to go. I would like to call the committee back to order. I will go to the next presenter, Mr. Blair Qualey from New Car Dealers of British Columbia. If you could come to the front, please.

Thanks so much for coming today to present to us. You have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions by members. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

New Car Dealers Association of B.C.

Blair Qualey: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thanks very much. Good morning, everyone. It’s great to be here.

I am privileged to serve as the president and CEO of the New Car Dealers Association of B.C., representing more than 400 new car and truck dealers in 55 communities across the province that provide about 30,000 family-supporting jobs. Our sector is responsible for close to $17 billion in retail sales in the province and contributes about $775 million annually in taxes to three levels of government.

The NCDA owns and operates the Vancouver International Auto Show. The association’s charitable arm, the New Car Dealers Foundation of B.C., provides educational and career grants to those applying to upgrade their skills in our sector.

The NCDA is proud to have administered the CleanBC go electric vehicle rebate program since 2011. Our partnership with the provincial government has delivered nation-leading results, with more than 109,000 rebate applications processed during that period, including a record 25,000 in 2025. The program is currently on pause, but we look forward to continuing our partnership in whatever form it may involve moving forward, through rebates or another form of incentive.

The actions of our American neighbours have created a great deal of uncertainty for government and for many sectors across the economy, including ours. However, there are levers available to the provincial government that will support consumers, our sector and a more resilient economy.

I thought I’d touch on three of those. Firstly, B.C.’s so-called luxury vehicle tax threshold hasn’t been adjusted for almost 20 years and doesn’t reflect today’s reality. The tax kicks in at a $55,000 level when the average cost of a new vehicle now in Canada is $66,000. And, I might add, that’s largely because of the latest innovation and technology that makes today’s vehicles safer than ever before.

As a result, many cars, SUVs, vans and pickups that families and individuals require in their day-to-day lives to shuttle their kids to soccer or hockey practice are subject to that luxury tax. We recommend that you eliminate what in effect has become just a vehicle purchase tax. If you’re intent on maintaining a luxury tax on vehicles, it should be applied to high-end purchases, as initially intended, without penalizing working families.

Two, the zero-emission vehicle mandate. Without market support for the sale of zero-emission vehicles, the ability for government to reach its mandatory zero-emission vehicle sales targets — which are 90 percent of all new light vehicles sold by 2030, less than five years from now, and 100 percent by 2035 — is simply not possible.

The standards are very stringent and largely unaligned with consumer demand. Without intervention, automakers face a $20,000 penalty for every vehicle falling under the quota, and those costs will undoubtedly be passed on to the consumers. In fact, manufacturers are already limiting ICE vehicle allocations to B.C. to be able to meet these arbitrary quotas.

At this particularly challenging time, with tariffs and affordability challenges facing consumers, we recommend the provincial government put the brakes on the zero-emission vehicle mandate policies and its enforcement provisions.

Finally, skilled-trades training. B.C.’s auto sector faces a labour shortfall of some 20,000 workers over the next decade, particularly technicians trained in electric vehicle systems and diagnostics. At present, there are too few seats in automotive trade programs and limited EV-specific training opportunities to meet the growing demand. Access gaps are even more pronounced in rural and northern communities.

[10:15 a.m.]

We recommend increasing funding for auto trades and EV-focused training, partnering with the post-secondary institutions to grow training capacity and support individual industry-led pathways like our New Car Dealers Foundation car career education grants.

New car and truck dealers are dedicated

for auto trades and EV-focused training, partnering with the post-secondary institutions to grow training capacity and support individual industry-led pathways like our New Car Dealers Foundation car career education grants.

New car and truck dealers are dedicated and passionate about our industry and the communities in which they operate in our province. They want to be part of the solution and to contribute to the collective effort that will ensure British Columbians not only weather the present economic storm but excel in spite of it.

On behalf of the franchised new car and truck dealers around the province, I thank you all for the opportunity to present our thoughts and recommendations. I look forward to any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for the presentation. We’ll now go to questions by members.

Steve Morissette: Thanks for your presentation, Blair. Are you seeing any impact yet in cost or availability of vehicles due to the tariffs?

Blair Qualey: We’re not quite there yet. When we knew the tariffs were coming — we knew for a while — the manufacturers and the dealers did all they could to sort of load up, to preload with as much inventory as possible, whether it was parts or vehicles. We’re still working our way through some of that, but at a certain point, the rubber will hit the road as far as the availability of vehicles.

One of our big concerns is the parts manufacturers, the small-parts manufacturers that supply so many of the large vehicle manufacturers. If you have one or two of those key ones falter as a result of the added costs of all the tariffs, you’re going to be in a big problem.

It’ll be a lot like what it was during COVID, with the supply-chain challenges of just not being able to get vehicles in. We all saw what happened to the prices of vehicles; both new and used went up. We’re not quite there yet, but it’s coming.

Bryan Tepper: The luxury vehicle tax. I would have asked you.... Obviously, you support removing it entirely, so it kind of makes my question moot. The work vehicle exemption that occurs right now with the larger vehicles....

Blair Qualey: If it’s a one-ton, it’s excluded, yes.

Bryan Tepper: Yeah. I see workers that don’t really require that large of a truck but that are buying that large of a truck at an extra $5,000 or $10,000 — actually, probably a little bit more than that; it’s probably more like $15,000 or $20,000 — paying that, just to avoid the tax on it, and then having a larger vehicle.

Is there some push...? Without eliminating the entire tax, would that be something that makes sense — to remove it for, basically, all light-duty trucks?

Blair Qualey: Well, pickup trucks for sure. It’s something that people all around the province use for their lifestyles, for work, etc. It doesn’t seem right that somebody who needs a vehicle for those purposes is paying a luxury tax. Those vehicles are not a luxury for most of the people that use those.

The problem with the exemption for the heavier vehicles is that you’re forcing people into more vehicle than they need. There’s more gas consumption, because they’re larger, and more weight on the roads, so more requirements to fix roads. It’s kind of forcing people into things that they don’t really need.

I mean, we’d love to see the thing go away, but perhaps there’s a way to transition out of it in a proper way — you know, take it off EVs, and maybe shift the threshold up to what’s considered, maybe, by most people, more of a luxury level than just $55,000.

I think you could do a lot by just doing that and, quite frankly, shifting it onto things that are actually a luxury vehicle. Don’t just pick on the automotive sector. There are other big, luxury items out there that are way more than that and that don’t capture a luxury tax, like some soccer mom’s minivan does.

Sunita Dhir: I was just going to follow up on that. Do you have a threshold that you think is fair for the luxury car purchase tax?

Blair Qualey: Well, if you look at what the federal government has done, it kicks in at $100,000 — their luxury tax. That’s already an example from another government that we’re aware of.

[10:20 a.m.]

If you talked to our members, they would probably say $150,000 now would be.... We all forget how much technology and safety features, etc., have now been built into vehicles. That’s part of the cost increase in all of this. The technology is spectacular. You have radars and all sorts of other things that will keep

now would be…. We all forget how much technology, safety features, etc. have now been built into vehicles. That’s part of the cost increase in all of this. The technology is spectacular. We have radars and all sorts of other things that will keep people much safer. All that costs more. It’s really not a luxury. It’s something everybody should have, and we shouldn’t be penalizing people for that.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you so much for advocating for skilled trades in this province. Very appreciated.

Blair Qualey: So important.

Jennifer Blatherwick: It is. I’m wondering…. You’ve mentioned, of course, that we’re going to have a global shortage of skilled trade workers, but what for your particular industry? Do you have any numbers on what the shortage would be?

Blair Qualey: The 20,000 number I quoted is for B.C.

Jennifer Blatherwick: It’s for B.C., but just for your sector?

Blair Qualey: Broadly for the automotive sector, yes. So new car dealers and everybody else that are in that sector.

Jennifer Blatherwick: What are the particular trades where the shortages are most acute?

Blair Qualey: It’s acute in particularly service technicians — those people that lift the hood and start fixing your car or truck. As you know, if you’ve lifted a hood lately, the new ones are pretty complex places requiring you to have some pretty good skills with a laptop and a few other things. Then, of course, you have the electric vehicles and all of the issues and the safety requirements of working on those as well. The average age of a service technician in this province today is 56 years old. We have a huge problem coming at us.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Yeah, absolutely.

Blair Qualey: And there’s just not enough people in the funnel, all the way from high schools through colleges, etc., where it’s a real challenge.

Jennifer Blatherwick: One of the things that we’re looking at in other sectors is micro-credentialing in order to make sure that people are earning while they learn. Is that a viable possibility for your industry?

Blair Qualey: We’d be happy to sit with government and have a look at all sorts of ways we can look at getting people trained to a point that they can properly and safely work on vehicles. Absolutely.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Sunita Dhir: I just have another question, about this skill training as well. We might have this limited number of institutes that provide training. Would you be considering foreign-educated professionals who could come here to B.C.? Then maybe our ministry can advertise for foreign-educated technicians and mechanics.

Blair Qualey: That is something that dealers across the country are looking at now, just because everybody is facing the same challenges, and here in British Columbia. I was privileged to join our Ontario colleagues for a trip to the Philippines in January to look at the training and evaluation program that they do there to bring skilled trades folks from the Philippines. We’re exploring every possible option because we need to keep British Columbians moving, and if you can’t get their vehicles fixed, we have a big problem for both the economy and everybody’s lives. So we’re open to exploring as many different ways. Of course, we want to, first and foremost, hire Canadians and British Columbians. But if there are not enough of them in that funnel to do so, then we need to look at other opportunities.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, thanks so much for your presentation.

Blair Qualey: Thank you all very much for your time.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you. Okay, I’d like to call for the next presenter, Mr. Brent Graham from FortisBC to come to the front please.

FortisBC

Brent Graham: Hello. Bifocals don’t work for me so I got to….

Paul Choi (Chair): It’s all good. Get yourself comfortable. Thanks for coming to present to us today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions after. You may begin when you’re ready. Thank you.

Brent Graham: Thank you. Good morning, committee members, and thank you for having me here today. My name is Brent Graham, and I’m the director of government relations and public policy at FortisBC. I’d like to begin by expressing how grateful I am to be speaking to you today from the traditional territory of the qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓, q̓ic̓əy̓, SEMYOME and other Coast Salish peoples.

For over 150 years, FortisBC has proudly delivered the energy that B.C. needs to drive prosperity. In today’s political and economic environment, this is more important than ever. Our first recommendation is to develop the policies, programs and infrastructure to establish Vancouver as the LNG port of call in the west coast of North America.

[10:25 a.m.]

A global energy transition is underway to reduce the environmental impacts of the marine shipping sector led by the United Nations with increasingly stringent emissions and air quality regulations, giving rise to an opportunity for B.C. to diversify the use of our natural resources. Our province can support this transition as ship owners and operators increasingly are returning to LNG over the alternatives.

the marine shipping sector, led by the United Nations, with increasingly stringent emissions and air quality regulations, giving rise to an opportunity for B.C. to diversify the use of our natural resources.

Our province can support this transition, as ship owners and operators increasingly are turning to LNG over the alternatives. In B.C., we’ve been using LNG in the marine sector for many years. For those of you that take the ferry from Vancouver to Victoria during parliament, there’s a good chance that the ferry is run on LNG from our Tilbury facility in Delta.

The innovative approach we developed with our partners to fuel these vessels saved B.C. Ferries customers through avoided infrastructure costs, operating costs and lower emissions. In total, B.C. fuels ten domestic vessels with LNG from Tilbury. Our Tilbury facility is powered by hydroelectricity, which means it can produce LNG nearly 30 percent less carbon-intensive than the global average.

In 2018, we completed our first expansion at Tilbury, and now the rising global demand for LNG-fuelled marine vessels has accelerated the need for additional expansion. For example, you may have seen recently a news release from the port describing Seaspan Ferries refuelling a cruise ship moored at Canada Place with LNG from Tilbury.

Fortis believes that developing the port as the preferred LNG refuelling hub along the west coast of North America presents a great economic opportunity for the province, resulting in jobs, training and business for contractors during planning and construction and new long-term jobs once construction is complete. The overall expansion envelope will be an investment of nearly $2.8 billion, which includes expansion of our storage capabilities for energy security.

Throughout the expansion of Tilbury, we’ve engaged with Indigenous communities and connected Indigenous businesses and workforces with the project to ensure meaningful benefits. We have an agreement in place with the Musqueam Indian Band that includes options from Musqueam to acquire equity ownership at Tilbury. FortisBC also assigned benefit agreements with 11 other First Nations.

As we collectively focus on economic diversification and reconciliation, we encourage government to use all of the tools at its disposal to accelerate the Tilbury expansion.

Our second recommendation is to provide the necessary tools to meet B.C.’s affordability and resiliency needs through renewable and clean electricity and the use of hybrid energy systems. Kelowna is one of the fastest-growing cities in B.C., which is why we are seeking to urgently upgrade our existing power infrastructure in the South Okanagan, where we serve more than 190,000 customers with electricity.

Similar to B.C. Hydro’s RFEOI, we recently successfully initiated a process to expand our supply of renewable and clean electricity in the region. FortisBC seeks government’s continued leadership in supporting the streamlining of approvals for major projects like ours that enable FortisBC to meet the demand for affordable, resilient energy.

We also recommend that government provide support for hybrid energy systems. You may be asking yourself: what is a hybrid energy system? A hybrid energy system uses an electric heat pump the majority of the time, coupled with a high-efficiency gas furnace for days when it’s colder. It’s funny that I followed the car guy. Like a hybrid car, hybrid systems provide the best of both worlds, where the electric and gas systems work together. Specifically, hybrid systems advance strategic electrification through investment by FortisBC and energy efficiency incentives.

Our energy efficiency program uptake has been highly successful, and it’s allowed our customers access to energy choice and lower costs from the province’s elimination of the carbon tax. We also see benefits at the local, provincial and regional levels with the avoidance of costly, challenging expansion of the electric system.

With the province’s support, we seek to expand the adoption of hybrids throughout B.C., and we see this as a natural outcome of the CleanBC review process.

With that said, I’d like to thank the committee for your attention and would welcome any questions you may have.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you very much for your presentation. We’ll turn to questions by members, starting with MLA Tepper.

Bryan Tepper: I’ve got two questions. It is interesting you followed up Blair with the New Car Dealers because I had been bugging him about natural gas vehicles.

On your website, it actually says rebates for LNG vehicles outfitted from factory. Do you have any…? Apparently, there are none in Canada that come from the factory — I mean, retrofit as well — but do you know of anybody that’s producing LNG vehicles?

[10:30 a.m.]

Brent Graham: Yes. We have, through government legislation, approximately 1,000 vehicles on-road powered by either compressed natural gas or liquid natural gas. Historically, there has been a bit of a deficit in terms of a certain size for LNG vehicles in that space. That’s enabled through something called the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Regulation and also with the low-carbon fuel standard.

Bryan Tepper: So personal

liquid natural gas. Historically there has been a bit of a deficit in terms of a certain size for LNG vehicles in that space, and that’s enabled through something called the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Regulation and also with the low-carbon fuel standard.

Bryan Tepper: So personal light vehicles aren’t being produced — just all commercial, basically.

Brent Graham: Medium- and heavy-duty. Correct.

Maybe just to clarify, we can incent the capital cost differential between the incumbent, and if there’s a higher cost for a natural gas vehicle, we can incent that difference, enabled through legislation.

Bryan Tepper: Oh, nice. Is it a heat pump system you’re talking about for heating, or is it different?

Brent Graham: Yeah, so imagine…. In your house, you typically would have a furnace, or some of you might have a heat pump. What I’m suggesting is to bring the two together. The vast majority of the time you would be using your electric heat pump, so it is electrification. But when it’s really cold out, you would use the furnace.

We have 50,000 kilometres, covering the majority of the province — the gas side of Fortis’s business — and what it’s built for is cold days. The electric system is not meant for cold days, so by bringing these two together, you get the best of both worlds, like a hybrid car.

Bryan Tepper: I’m sure the people up north would be happy with that.

Brent Graham: Well, one of the barriers that we have is the provincial incentives for hybrid heating. Unfortunately, it’s only north of 100 Mile House, which never made any sense to FortisBC, so we’re advocating that it should be province-wide. For example, in Kelowna, we can’t provide government incentives for hybrid heating.

Steve Morissette: You spoke about a power system upgrade in Kelowna. I wasn’t clear, exactly. Are you specifically just asking for streamlining approvals for that?

Brent Graham: Yeah. If you think of B.C. Hydro, they did the clean call for power. We did the same thing on the electric side of our business, and so the exemptions that B.C. Hydro got through the province — were asking for the same thing.

A wind farm. There are certain exemptions the province has enabled, and Fortis — the electric side of our business — is asking for the same treatment, which essentially expedites the project.

And then more at the local level, like for a substation, a very similar kind of reasoning where B.C. Hydro has certain tools at its disposal enabled by the province. We want the same on the electric side.

We’ve had huge population growth in Kelowna, and, candidly, we haven’t been able to keep up. Though kind of a combination of building out the infrastructure and innovative solutions like hybrid heating, that’s how we’re coming at the issue.

Steve Morissette: I’ve got one more question, if I could.

Paul Choi (Chair): Yes.

Steve Morissette: Around the LNG fueling of ferries and so on, is there any move around shipping? Are there ports around the world that can refuel?

Brent Graham: 100 percent. Maybe I can back up a little bit. If you think of that cruise line that was sitting at the Canada Place…. Wherever it came from, it’s moored at Canada Place. Seaspan ferries would come to Tilbury facility, fill up on LNG and then go out into the harbor and fill up that ship. Other types of ships…. If you just look out in the port at any given time, for those ships, ultimately, you’re going to transition to lower carbon fuels, where LNG is one of the options.

You have refueling in Southeast Asia and then North America. What I’m advocating for is that B.C. should be the port of call for LNG. When those vessels come here and they’re going up and down our coast and then back to Asia, that’s effectively the route that they’re following. We have support with the province and port and Seaspan ferries.

Steve Morissette: I like that.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I’m hoping we can go back to ask No. 1, which was the $2.8 billion. Now, can you just walk me through a little bit more clearly…. The $2.8 billion is funding port expansion. How is Tilbury connected, and where’s the differentiation between them?

[10:35 a.m.]

Brent Graham: If you think of…. I’m not sure if you know…. We’re on the Fraser River in south Delta, and our Tilbury facility there — historically we’ve had an LNG facility for really cold days. We’ve evolved that facility now to do things like the Seaspan ferries. But the infrastructure that we’re building, going forward, would be something called a jetty. A jetty is kind of a fancy word for a dock, so the Seaspan vessel can come up to the dock and fill up.

We’re also seeking infrastructure to liquefy the natural gas, increased liquefaction capabilities. And then the third piece would be increased

going forward would be something called a jetty — jetty is kind of a fancy word for a dock — so the Seaspan vessel can come up to the dock and fill up.

Then we’re also seeking infrastructure to liquefy the natural gas, increase liquefaction capabilities. And then the third piece would be increased storage for resiliency purposes.

We are currently enabled through direction 5, by the province, a certain envelope for the liquefaction piece, and we’re looking to expand it, just given the market demand driven by this initiative through the United Nations.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay. So sorry. If I can just repeat that part to you. You’re looking for funding for the jetty, for additional storage and for additional liquefaction capacity?

Brent Graham: So maybe just to clarify, we will do the investment. We’re seeking an expedited process of approval so that we can invest and build. Part of that is the…. As this market is growing, you want to be able to take advantage of it, because if we don’t, somebody else will — “we” meaning British Columbia.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay. Any other questions? No?

Well, thank you so much for your presentation.

Brent Graham: Greatly appreciate it. Thank you, all.

Paul Choi (Chair): I’d like to call the next presenter, Mr. Jasroop Gosal from the B.C. Real Estate Association.

Thank you so much for coming to present to us. You have five minutes for presentation and five minutes for questions by members. You can begin whenever you’re ready.

Jasroop Gosal: Thank you very much. I’m Jasroop Gosal. I’m the government relations manager at the B.C. Real Estate Association. Good morning.

I want to highlight that B.C. stands at a pivotal moment. As we look to the 2026 provincial budget, we must confront a pressing reality. Our economy is underperforming in productivity, and our housing system is underdelivering for British Columbians. But with the right investments and policy shifts, we can change that.

Let me begin with productivity. Canada’s multi-factor productivity, how efficiently we use labour and capital, has been declining relative to our G7 peers. Since 1988, we’ve fallen behind every G7 country except Italy. Nowhere is this more evident than in construction, where productivity has stagnated and housing starts have remained flat despite growing demand.

To address this, we urge the province to invest in innovation, particularly in modular and prefabricated housing. These technologies allow homes to be built off site, faster and more efficiently.

But innovation isn’t enough. We also need people. BCREA estimates that even scaling up the construction workforce by 130,000 workers would only modestly improve affordability. That’s why we need a dual approach: boost productivity and expand the labour force.

Now, this brings me to trades education. We must expand access to training programs and apprenticeships, especially for underrepresented groups and newcomers. Immigration policy should be aligned with labour market needs, and ensuring that skilled trades people can contribute to our economy and help meet our housing goals is essential.

As part of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s housing plan, the Liberal government pledged to create a new federal entity called build Canada homes, which will lean heavily on the manufactured and prefabricated home sector to provide more affordable homes in a faster process than current construction mandates. This $25 billion investment in financing to expand the capacity of this sector will issue bulk orders of units to ensure that they can maintain their workforce and supply chains.

The provincial government should be focusing on ensuring that these businesses have the workforce they require to keep up with the soon-to-be-expanding demand for this type of product. Skills training could be funded through the province, through programs like the project-based labour market training programs.

We also need tax reform in the housing sector. We recommend a collaborative approach to development cost charges. These charges, when levied up front, can delay or derail projects We propose allowing municipalities to defer DCCs until project completion, giving developers more time to secure financing by working with municipalities to ensure that they are still able to fund necessary infrastructure upgrades.

[10:40 a.m.]

We encourage the province to work with federal and municipal partners to explore alternative funding mechanisms to reduce the burden on builders and accelerate housing supply. We also believe that we need to ensure that there are loans available for developers, for builders, for not-for-profit housing providers to build housing.

to explore alternate spending funding mechanisms to reduce the burden on builders and accelerate housing supply.

We also believe that we need to ensure that there are loans available for developers, for builders, for not-for-profit housing providers to build housing. Similar to CMHC funding available at the federal level, B.C. residents and B.C. representatives know what B.C. needs. A specific fund that is established for private developers will unlock housing for all, especially the missing middle.

Finally, I want to highlight the importance of modernizing the Strata Property Act and introducing mandatory training for strata council members. Strata corporations govern a growing share of B.C.’s housing stock, particularly in urban centres. Yet many council members, who are often volunteers, lack the training to navigate complex legal, financial and maintenance responsibilities. This can lead to poor governance, deferred maintenance and costly disputes that affect homeowners and renters alike.

Mandatory training would ensure that council members understand their fiduciary duties, the fundamentals of strata governance and the implications of decisions on long-term building health. This is all to ensure that residents are able to afford to live in a safe and productive economy.

In closing, the path forward is clear. Invest in innovation, expand our skilled workforce, reform outdated tax structures, and modernize housing programs. Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for the presentation.

We will now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay. That was a lot, and you condensed it very well, so good job.

I just want to have a touch-in here about DCCs. I’m most familiar with the city of Brooklyn, because that’s where I’m from. The collection of DCCs up front is what cities use to build the amenities that support the houses that are built later, so to upgrade the roads and make sure there’s a community centre and a fire station.

Of course, projects can often, especially large projects, take between five to like 15 years. So if we’re delaying the collection of DCCs until the end of the project, when the project is already there, how does that help municipalities have the supportive services that their residents need by the time they move in?

Jasroop Gosal:That’s a great question. The process that we are recommending is to…. At this point in time, the DCC is being levied up front and some developers are able to negotiate with municipalities to defer those DCCs, but that is adding cost for projects to be financed. That is an additional carrying cost that they must take a loan from the bank to finance. They’re not going to be able to pay it out right away. So what we’re saying is that, yes, we need to ensure that infrastructure is in place. That is why the federal, provincial, municipal governments need to work together, to ensure that these infrastructure pieces are put in place ahead of time so that when DCCs are paid, then that can be paid back, similar to loan structures as well.

We think that in order for us to reach the housing targets that we want to achieve by 2030, we need to ensure that projects are viable, and right now in the current market, projects are not penciling. That means that their developers, private market developers, they require about 15 percent of profit, and that is just not present in many other projects to date.

Jennifer Blatherwick: So a big chunk of reduced profitability in construction is, of course, rising interest rates and also the enormous jump in the cost of materials over a short period of time, committing to a certain price point for building and, then, the price of materials and labour just shooting up in that time.

I think we both agree that innovation is an amazing thing, and prefabrication is a wonderful tool we can unlock here in British Columbia. But cost of land is one of the most challenging things in real estate, especially in the Lower Mainland. I think that’s where we’re kind of stuck in the real estate market, is that the cost of land is the biggest piece.

[10:45 a.m.]

I’m wondering, like, where is that? Is there a proposal? Are there thoughts that you have around cost of land and how we’re going to tackle that as the biggest piece of the cost for real estate?

Jasroop Gosal: Yeah, absolutely. There are a lot of pieces that make up the reason why the cost of land had shot up so drastically

Where is that? Is there a proposal? Are there thoughts that you have around cost of land and how we’re going to tackle that as the biggest piece of the cost for real estate?

Jasroop Gosal: Yeah, absolutely. There are a lot of pieces that make up the reason why the cost of land has shot up so drastically over the last couple of years, especially after COVID and the buying frenzy and the liquidity of cash. So everyone was liquid.

We know that there are going to be some adjustments in the market right now. However, the problem remains that all of these projects that are potentially in the middle of being built aren’t going to be able to be completed with the current taxation, the current fee structure that exists. That’s why we need to make sure that we are working with the business community, working with, even, not-for-profit developers that are building not-for-profit housing, housing below market value, so that they can build and complete those projects without going under and without it causing more delays in trying to achieve the housing targets that we need by 2030 for our growing population.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay. Thank you so much for your presentation.

Next, I will call up the next presenter, Karla Olson from the B.C. NDP Persons Living with Disabilities Caucus to come to the front please. Thank you so much for coming today to present to us. Good morning. Take your time. It’s all good. Thanks for coming.

You have, for a reminder, five minutes for a presentation, five minutes for questions. You will see the light as it turns yellow. That means you have one minute left. You can begin whenever you’re ready.

B.C. NDP Persons Living
with Disabilities Caucus

Karla Olson: My name is Karla Olson. I am a resident of New Westminster. I am an active citizen, which is why I’m here today. I’m a voter, and I’m also a person living with disabilities. So right now, unfortunately, the impacts of adrenaline are hitting me.

Paul Choi (Chair): It’s okay. Would you like a break? No? Okay, take your time.

Karla Olson: Thank you for this opportunity. I’m here to ask for you to consider three things: PWD income rates, grants for advanced education for students with disabilities and aligning the residency requirement for PWD income assistance to MSP.

PWD income rates. Increases are needed for both the housing and support portions, as well as the support for prescription glasses, which hasn’t been updated in approximately 20 years. This is really important, as we consider how much of the applications are online, and the current coverage doesn’t allow for those types of prescription glasses. Rather than thinking of this as a deficiency in the budget, I’m going to suggest that it is not.

The shelter rate has had one increase since 2007, so only once in almost 20 years, and sits at the implausible amount of $500. I’m asking you to raise it to a minimum of $600 to better reflect the actual cost of renting in this province. For those who are in social housing, their rents go towards maintaining and possibly upgrading these buildings. Protecting this existing housing infrastructure aligns with our government’s commitment to housing, and it makes no sense to build more homes without investing to protect the existing ones.

For those individuals who don’t live in social housing, the support portion, which has been going to offset their actual rent amounts, can now be used for other necessities. These necessities of living are why I’m also asking for an increase of a minimum of $100 to the support portion for PWD income assistance.

[10:50 a.m.]

My mayor is in his first term, and already he’s reporting work exhaustion with how many times he’s had to use the word “unprecedented.” People who are low income and living with disabilities are the most vulnerable to these adverse effects. The research shows that when low

income assistance.

My mayor is in his first term, and already he is reporting work exhaustion with how many times he has had to use the word “unprecedented.” And people who are low-income and living with disabilities are the most vulnerable to these adverse effects.

The research shows that when low-income people get money, they spend it. They spend it on buying food, clothes, paying bills and taking care of their medical needs. So rather than seeing this amount as a deficit in the budget, I’m asking you to see it as an injection of funds into our local economy. This money will get spent in the communities where people with disabilities live.

Another area of vulnerability for people living with disabilities is employment. And this increases when we consider the need for specialized skills and high-level expertise to meet the needs of the digital revolution. To make the future work inclusive for people with disabilities, having access to postgraduate studies is needed. This is why I’m asking our provincial government to invest in study grants for postgraduate studies for students with disabilities.

While there are some to attend post-secondary, I couldn’t find any to take part in master’s programs. While some universities do offer part-time employment to help offset these costs, this is likely not an option for students living with disabilities, as pacing and managing their condition makes it prohibitive to add yet another responsibility to their study load.

As a marginalized population, PWD experience not only economic inequalities, but also cultural and social inequalities. By offering grants for graduate studies, this investment provides another tool to work — that’s a joke — towards overcoming these effects.

My last request is to align the residency requirement for PWD income assistance to MSP. Limiting freedom of movement of a marginalized group is part of Canada’s history involving the abuse of Indigenous people, and it is equivalent to the isolation and control of movement found in intimate partner violence. My argument is that aligning the residency requirement for people with disabilities to be the same as every other British Columbian who receives MSP is an investment in upholding human rights.

Thank you for your time.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation. Take your time. We are ahead of schedule, so we’re okay.

Karla Olsen: Thank you. It’s the adrenaline. Like I said, it impacts disabilities.

Paul Choi (Chair): Absolutely, absolutely. I freeze when I get full of adrenaline too. But you’re among friends here. We’re all a friendly bunch here.

Karla Olsen: Yes. I really appreciate this. And this a part of my active citizenship. So I’m really proud to take part.

Paul Choi (Chair): Absolutely. Okay, so we’re going to go to questions by numbers.

Karla Olsen: Sure, let’s do it.

Jennifer Blatherwick: All shocked that I have a question.

Hello. Thank you. That was a great presentation. I’m hoping, for those of us that aren’t familiar with disability and the residency requirements in MSP, if you could go into it a little bit further about what the differences are and how that causes issues.

Karla Olsen: So right now, people on PWD income assistance are not allowed more than 30 days outside of the province or outside of Canada. And while it’s unlikely that they’re going to be staying in hotels when they do travel, they will be relying on the help of friends and family to go to these places.

And that’s also the social part. If I were to travel, I’m going to need days to recover, and even if I do anything, and I want to contribute to that time, it’s going to take efforts. And I, again, need it. And plus, just the cost of going somewhere and all the planning in the first place.

I really don’t imagine that this will be used by many people, but it’s the human rights part. Why are we being restricted when everyone else, regarding their MSP, is allowed, I think, even seven months? I said six; it sounded like a nice number. So that’s it. I think it’s just unjust.

Jennifer Blatherwick: That’s a really excellent point. Thank you for bringing it up.

[10:55 a.m.]

And so, talking about advanced education, you’re asking for grants to help people. Very, very similar to the grants that exist for people at the bachelor stage or the diploma or certificate stage. So you’re asking for that same support just to be extended into the post-grad stage.

Karla Olsen: Correct.

about advanced education.

Karla Olson: Yes.

Jennifer Blatherwick: You’re asking for grants to help people, very, very similar to the grants that exist for people at the bachelor stage or the diploma or certificate stage. So you’re asking for that same support just to be extended into the post-grad stage.

Karla Olson: Correct. Like I said, I looked, and I couldn’t find anything.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I think unless someone has been in care, I think there’s no….

Karla Olson: So again, a different system if you are a person with disabilities.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Exactly.

That was really helpful. Thank you.

Karla Olson: Thank you.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): I won’t ask a question. I’ll just say that I really appreciate that you came. Particularly knowing, witnessing, that maybe it was challenging for you. It’s very meaningful that you would take this active role in citizenship and give us this input for the province.

The Minister of Finance actually presented to us yesterday to talk about just how democratic this process really is and how this is our democracy in action. I really appreciated that you came and that you presented. Thank you very much.

Karla Olson: Well, and thank you. I’m in a room with so many MLAs. I mean, how often do I get that opportunity? It’s really, truly wonderful. So thank you so much.

Steve Morissette: Just clarifying the PWD rates. You’re asking for $100 — up from $500 to $600 to make it…. That seems so little.

Karla Olson: It does. It’s a minimum. I ask for a minimum. Not a maximum. A minimum. And my rationale…. I think it’s reasonable.

Like I said, please don’t think of this as a deficit. It’s going to be an investment in that housing for those people in social housing. And yes, people who are low income will be spending that money. They’re not going to be taking big trips abroad and spending elsewhere. They will be spending it at their local restaurants, at their grocery stores, getting a haircut. So, an injection of funds. Please view it that way. Thank you.

Steve Morissette: Thank you so much.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. Thank you.

Okay, we’ll move on to the next presenter, Lauren Casey from Association of Administrative and Professional Staff at UBC.

Welcome and good morning still. Thanks for coming to present to us. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions and you can begin whenever you’re ready. Thank you.

Association of Administrative
and Professional Staff at UBC

Lauren Casey: Thank you. I’d like to start by thanking the committee for your time today. I’d also like to acknowledge that we’re gathered on the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the q̓ic̓əy̓, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓ and SEMYOME First Nations.

My name is Lauren Casey, and I’m the president of the Association of Administrative and Professional Staff at the University of British Columbia, or APPS for short. APPS is the professional association for the management and professional staff group at UBC, and our more than 6,500 members play critical roles in every function of the university. They provide leadership and professional expertise in the university’s research and learning missions.

I’m here today to call the government to address our members’ top concerns, namely the ongoing housing crisis in B.C., challenges to public transportation and the backlog at the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal.

Our members work for one of the top universities in Canada, and many are professionals with advanced degrees and competitive salaries, yet many of our members are still priced out of the city they work in. Our members face lengthy commutes from the suburbs to UBC Point Grey and UBC Okanagan. They express that home ownership is completely unattainable, and some are considering leaving Vancouver or B.C. altogether.

In May 2024, Vancouver renters using the site Live.Rent were found to be spending 52.75 percent of their income on rent, on average. When more than 50 percent of the income goes to housing, workers are left struggling to afford food, transportation, child care, and other necessities. This forces them to make difficult trade-offs just to keep a roof above their heads.

When even workers employed by one of B.C.’s top-rated employers are priced out, it’s evident that the system is failing the majority of British Columbians. More action and resources need to continue to be put towards building truly affordable housing.

Our second recommendation is to fund and expand the availability of public transit through service improvements, further push for the Broadway extension of the Millennium Line to UBC and ensure the Kelowna Regional Transit System and B.C. Transit improve public transportation in Kelowna.

[11:00 a.m.]

Public transportation is not just a convenience. For many of our members, it is a lifeline. It is our way to get to work, shop for groceries, attend medical appointments and access the different supports they need to live with dignity. With service cuts having already been floated in the last year, it is evident that TransLink needs to be reliably funded so riders aren’t left worrying about reduced service.

In Kelowna, increased service and expanded transit routes would ensure that

a lifeline. It is their way to get to work, shop for groceries, attend medical appointments and access the different supports they need to live with dignity.

With service cuts having already been floated in the last year, it is evident that TransLink needs to be reliably funded so riders aren’t left worrying about reduced service. In Kelowna, increased service and expanded transit routes would ensure that anyone commuting to and from UBC Okanagan could safely and efficiently get to where they need to go.

Improvements to public transportation will not only address the needs of British Columbians. It will also help meet the province’s goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In its CleanBC Roadmap to 2030, the province promised to make it easier to get around safely without the use of a car. Without improvements to public transportation, it would be very difficult for the province to meet its climate change targets.

Our third and final recommendation is to allocate additional funding for the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal to improve wait times and quickly eliminate the unacceptably long backlog of cases. Eliminating the backlog and reducing wait times at the tribunal is a matter of justice and public trust. The tribunal is meant to be an accessible alternative to the courts, yet its long wait times and growing backlog undermine this purpose. As Martin Luther King Jr. once said: “Justice too long delayed is justice denied.”

Our members have experienced firsthand the long wait times. From the time a complaint is submitted to the time when the tribunal serves the respondent, this process can take anywhere between 18 to 24 months. For the complaint to be fully resolved, it can take an additional year or two. Imagine having to continue working with the person who harassed or bullied you for that long of a period.

When complaints take years to be addressed, it harms workers’ mental health and discourages witnesses from speaking up. Long delays exacerbate trauma and can leave workers without the support or legal protection they need most. Increased funding would allow the tribunal to bring on more staff to clear this backlog and ensure that trust is restored in a system meant to protect British Columbians from human rights violations.

Thank you for the opportunity to present as part of this budget consultation. We hope the information I’ve shared today offers meaningful insights into the needs of our members — needs that reflect those of many working British Columbians.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation. We will now turn to questions by members. Any questions?

No? Okay. All right, I think we’re good. Thank you so much for your presentation.

Next I will call up Jasleen Sidhu from Sikh Heritage B.C. Welcome. Thank you for coming to present to us. You will have five minutes to present and five minutes for questions after. You may begin when you’re ready.

Sikh Heritage B.C.

Jasleen Sidhu: Good morning, everyone. My name is Jasleen Kaur Sidhu, and I’m here on behalf of Sikh Heritage B.C.

For the past eight years, Sikh Heritage B.C. has helped preserve and celebrate Sikh culture, heritage and history throughout British Columbia. As a Punjabi Sikh woman born and raised in this province, I have witnessed firsthand how our community’s traditions and values enrich the social and economic fabric of B.C. Today I want to share three key areas where Budget 2026 can make a meaningful difference in the lives of Sikh British Columbians.

First, we see a clear and growing demand for culturally specific funding to support Sikh artists, historians and storytellers. Last August, the B.C. Ministry of Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport released a report on its Canadian South Asian museum consultations. Of the individuals who provided feedback, 60 percent identified as Sikh.

This overwhelming response tells us two things. One, the Sikh community wants to see its stories and achievements highlighted on a provincial level. And two, we need financial support to make those stories come to life, whether through museum exhibits, oral history projects or educational resources and professional development opportunities.

Educators also need resources so they can facilitate teaching the histories of B.C.’s visible minority communities within classrooms. By investing in grant programs that specifically fund Sikh art, music and historical preservation projects, Budget 2026 would ensure Sikh voices are heard.

Second, we cannot ignore the alarming rise of anti-Sikh hate. Statistics released in 2023 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation south of the border indicated that anti-Sikh incidents ranked among the highest reported hate crimes. Over the past two years, the Canadian Anti-Hate Network has documented similar upward trends here in Canada.

In Ontario last year, a Sikh man’s turban was spat on, and another individual was threatened with violence simply because of their Sikh articles of faith. Online harassment targeting Sikhs has also seen a massive spike in recent years.

[11:05 a.m.]

In response to this, national Sikh organizations such as the World Sikh Organization of Canada launched an anti-Sikh hate project where they have been listening to the experiences of Sikhs with anti-Sikh hate and collecting data on anti-Sikh hate across the country. A report on this is expected to be released sometime this year.

Anti-Sikh hate in B.C., home to one of the largest Sikh populations in Canada, is not an abstract problem. It’s happening to our friends, our families and our neighbours.

And finally, I wish to address the serious threat posed by transnational

on anti-Sikh hate across the country. A report on this is expected to be released sometime this year. Anti-Sikh hate in B.C., home to one of the largest Sikh populations in Canada, is not an abstract problem. It’s happening to our friends, our families and our neighbours.

Finally, I wish to address the serious threat posed by transnational repression and extortion. In late 2023, Prime Minister Trudeau confirmed that agents of the Indian government were involved in the assassination of B.C. resident Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Canadian citizen and B.C. resident.

In the months since, Sikh business owners and community leaders have faced organized crime–style extortion attempts linked to foreign actors. Since then, Sikh members of the community have had to avoid public gatherings and even to minimally operate businesses, out of fear.

To protect our community’s safety and freedoms enshrined by the Canadian Charter, we must ensure that those threatened by foreign interference have the resources they need to report and resist intimidation. Our recommendations are as follows.

Our first is that we would like the B.C. budget to allocate additional grant funding for Sikh organizations that preserve and showcase Sikh heritage across B.C. and to increase monetary and resource support for B.C. educators to implement the history of Sikhs in British Columbia into classrooms.

Our second recommendation is that the government establish an anti-Sikh hate task force with a dedicated anti-Sikh hate help line or online system. There is currently no government-level tracking of anti-Sikh hate as separate and distinct from South Asian hate, which masks the issue and continues to extend harm suffered by Sikhs in B.C.

There also needs to be a formal review or survey into anti-Sikh hate, and a strategic plan to implement solutions, once these results are available.

Our last recommendation is that we recommend that the government allocate funding and resources to existing agencies and bodies within the province to ensure they have the ability to protect British Columbians. There needs to be more transparency, with the Sikh community, into what the provincial government is doing to take threats of foreign interference seriously and to protect Sikhs in B.C.

By investing in Sikh culture, anti-Sikh hate prevention, and protection from foreign interference, Budget 2026 can help build a B.C. where every Sikh individual, whether they are a newcomer, a small business owner or a student, knows that they belong, that they matter and that their heritage is valued.

Thank you for your time and consideration, and I welcome any questions that you may have.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for that presentation. I will turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: In some ways, this problem is a little opaque to me, because I’m not inside the community, and the discussion of foreign interference has been enormous across provincial and federal sectors. It’s not something within the Sikh community, I think, that a lot of people are aware of outside the Sikh community.

When you’re asking for us to allocate provincial resources to the problem, which specific bodies are you thinking that we would fund?

Jasleen Kaur Sidhu: I think something related to education about the issue itself. Like you’ve already mentioned, it’s not something that a lot of people outside of the community are aware of.

The second thing is also just providing supports to those that are facing, or have, threats against them, when it comes to foreign interference. We would see this as something related to law enforcement, some sort of protection, anything like that.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No other questions.

Thank you so much for your presentation.

We will take a brief recess for ten minutes.

The committee recessed from 11:08 a.m. to 11:23 a.m.

The committee recessed from 11:08 a.m. to 11:23 a.m.

[Paul Choi in the chair.]

Paul Choi (Chair): We will call the committee back to order.

We’ll hear from the next presenter. I’d like to call Dr. Jabeen Jussa to the front, from B.C. Chiropractic Association.

Thank you for coming to present to us today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready. Thank you.

Dr. Jabeen Jussa: Good morning, and thank you for the opportunity to present to you today. I’m Dr. Jabeen Jussa, the chair of the British Columbia Chiropractic Association, representing 1,200 chiropractors in the province.

Chiropractic doctors are trained and qualified to diagnose and treat musculoskeletal, or MSK, conditions. These are issues that affect the spine, the joints, the muscles and the nervous system. Chiropractors treat patients in nearly every community in B.C., including rural and remote areas where access to care can sometimes be limited. Each day we treat neck and back pain, arthritis-related pain and some types of headaches.

I am here today to present three practical opportunities to better serve patients and reduce pressure on our health care system. First, we are asking the Ministry of Health to allow chiropractors to directly refer patients to the publicly funded radiologists for X-ray tests.

[11:25 a.m.]

Chiropractors are trained and currently qualified to order and interpret X-rays. In chiropractic school I received 400 hours of education in diagnostic imaging, and to maintain licensure, we must take six hours of continuing education in radiology every two years ongoingly. Yet, we still are required to refer our patients back to their family doctors for a referral.

of education in diagnostic imaging. And to maintain licensure, we must take six hours

of continuing education in radiology every two years, ongoingly, yet we still are required to refer our patients back to their family doctors for a referral.

MSK conditions account for approximately 30 percent of visits to family physicians. If chiropractors were allowed to directly refer, it would save the health care system approximately $4 million annually, eliminate over 100,000 unnecessary physician visits and reduce treatment delays by one month. Let’s have a streamlined health care system.

Second, we recommend a two-year pilot project to embed chiropractors into the primary care networks. Let me tell you about Jason. Jason is a 22-year-old university student with back pain. He does not have a family doctor, so he went to his local walk-in clinic, where he was prescribed muscle relaxers and anti-inflammatories. His pain got worse, so he went to an urgent care clinic, and he was prescribed some opiates.

Sadly, this is not uncommon. In B.C., 87 percent of those who died of a toxic drug overdose visited their health care provider in the previous year, and 56 percent of those for pain-related issues. Untreated chronic pain can lead to depression, substance abuse and withdrawal from life.

What if, when Jason went to urgent care, there was a chiropractor who was able to treat him with rehab, manual therapy and give him some self-care tools? This model already exists in the collaboration between the Ministry of Health, the Fraser Health Authority and the Maxxine Wright clinic in Surrey, where a chiropractor was embedded into that health care team.

Over six chiropractic visits, these patients noticed a reduction in pain, they were better-engaged parents, and they had better sleep. Those involved with substance — some of them actually reduced their use, and none of them had a relax. And nurse practitioner visits went down by 87 percent, opening more slots for non-MSK conditions. Building on the success of Maxxine Wright, we are proposing a $2 million, two-year, team-based care pilot project across ten primary care networks.

Third, we are requesting scope recognition to include needle stimulation, also known as dry needling. In every province except British Columbia and Quebec, chiropractors are regulated to perform needle stimulation. It is a safe, evidence-based pain reduction tool, and it is already included in our training. This is a modern example of how to increase services without increasing costs to the system by removing barriers so that professionals can practise to the full extent of their education.

In summary, these three requests are practical and align with the government’s goals for accessible, team-based, patient-centric care. Allow chiropractors to directly refer patients to the publicly funded X-rays, and streamline the referral process; fund a two-year pilot project for chiropractors embedded in primary care networks to support patients suffering from MSK conditions; and recognize scope to include needle stimulation to increase services without increasing costs to the system.

Thank you for your time and your consideration. I am here to answer any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for that presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you so much. I have two questions about your recommendations. Dry needling — is it the same as acupuncture, or would that be different from acupuncture?

Jabeen Jussa: It’s a bit similar to acupuncture. So it’s more medical acupuncture, yes. Our new regulatory college already regulates it for others in the profession, so that would be a very seamless thing for this new college to be able to do.

Sunita Dhir: My second question. You recommended a two-year pilot project to include this in the primary health care system.

Jabeen Jussa: Chiropractors, yes.

Sunita Dhir: Are there any provinces in Canada who already have this?

Jabeen Jussa: Yes. In Ontario, they have these rapid access clinics. Chiropractors are embedded into those clinics, and they help specifically with MSK conditions. And I believe Brunswick is currently or will be starting a new pilot project in that arena as well.

Sunita Dhir: But those are also pilot projects?

[11:30 a.m.]

Jabeen Jussa: Yes. But in B.C., the here one that we had at the Maxxine Wright clinic was part of the innovation pathway. So that was funded by the Ministry of Health, where the chiropractor was embedded in that. That was done over the past year, and very successfully. They will continue to have that chiropractor in that clinic.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you so much. Thanks for the presentation.

Bryan Tepper: I just want to clear up dry needling — IMS?

Jabeen Jussa: No, different. Dry

that was done over the past year, and very successfully, that they will continue to have that chiropractor in that clinic.

Sunita Dhir: Well, thank you so much. Thanks for the presentation.

Thank you.

Bryan Tepper: I just want to clear up. Dry needling IMS?

Jabeen Jussa: No, different. Dry needling is a bit more surface. IMS is quite deeper into the muscle belly.

Bryan Tepper: Okay, that’s all. I’m good.

Steve Morissette: Thank you for the presentation. So you’re asking for diagnostic imaging or you’re just asking for X-ray?

Jabeen Jussa: Right now we are just asking for X-ray to directly refer our patients to the publicly funded.

Steve Morissette: No other imaging at this point.

Jabeen Jussa: At this point. We would love to be able to do that — obviously, CTs, MRI, blood tests — but we would like to start with X-rays. Currently, we’re not even able to access the X-ray reports. As chiropractors, we’re not able to go onto the CareConnect system and actually extrapolate those reports. So if a patient comes in, and had a fall, for example, and I wanted to access the report to see if they fractured their ankle before performing treatment, I’d have to contact the family doctor or ask my patient to get that report from their family doctor. I have no other way of accessing it.

Steve Morissette: So, as follow-up, why are you not asking for that?

Jabeen Jussa: We have asked for that. We did ask for that, four years ago and just recently. We did receive a response that patients now can access it through the health gateway system, which is great, but if you’re not tech savvy, it’s very difficult to access it, right?

Steve Morissette: Right. Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? Nope. Okay, thank you so much for your presentation.

Jabeen Jussa: Thank you. Thank you for your time.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you.

Okay, next I will go to the next presenter. I’d like to call up Denise Praill from Canuck Place Children’s Hospice Society to come to the front please.

Thanks so much for joining us today. As a reminder, five minutes for the presentation, five minutes for questions by members, and you may begin whenever you’re ready. Thank you.

Canuck Place Children’s Hospice

Denise Praill: Thank you. My name is Denise Praill, I’m the chief executive officer of Canuck Place Children’s Hospice. Thank you so much for inviting us again to present to the committee. Before I begin, I’d like to respectfully acknowledge that I’m speaking to you today on the traditional and unceded territories of the SEMYOME, q̓ic̓əy̓, kʷikʷəƛ̓əm, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓, qiqéyt and Tsawwassen Nations.

Canuck Place is B.C.’s specialist pediatric palliative care provider offering critical services to our province’s most vulnerable children and youth. We operate 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, providing specialized care for children from birth to age 19 with serious illness. We operate two provincial hospice locations, one in Vancouver and one in Abbotsford. With our inpatient and in-community and in-home care, virtual care and 24-hour phone line, families receive care no matter where they reside in the province right when they need it. We provide longitudinal care for children and families, caring for children from the time of diagnosis until the time of death and continuing our support to their families with comprehensive grief and bereavement support for up to five years.

Today I’d like to address the opportunity to improve grief and bereavement support for parents and siblings grieving the death of a child in British Columbia and addressing the disparities and significant gaps in understanding Indigenous, racialized and marginalized families’ access to bereavement care. Families begin grieving at the moment their child is diagnosed with a life-limiting illness and continues after their child dies. We know that providing comprehensive bereavement care helps families, including parents, siblings and extended family members to live better, healthier and more productive lives. Addressing these needs will support families to integrate their grief in meaningful ways so that they can continue to live fully even in loss.

Unaddressed grief can have significant impact on one’s mental and physical health, functional living, relationships, etc. Grief and loss are universal experiences and yet the loss of a child and sibling is uniquely profound and complex. There are approximately 300 child deaths each year in B.C. from all causes. Of those, two-thirds are from natural causes and one-third from accidents or trauma. Currently, bereavement care for families in B.C. who experience child loss varies widely, influenced by factors such as Canuck Place involvement, cause of death, location, local resources, staffing demands, clinician competencies and the unique needs of families who have lost a child.

[11:35 a.m.]

As a society, there continues to be discomfort with death and dying, and even more so when faced with the reality that children die. There are gaps in specialized support for neonatal and infant loss, traumatic deaths and sibling and family support. And there are limited options for prolonged grief interventions and for informal support during later years of bereavement. There are also limited cohesive grief literacy resources for education, guidance and reassurance in the province.

Grief, loss and bereavement support has been a core part of the Canuck Place

loss, traumatic deaths and sibling and family support. There are limited options for prolonged grief interventions and for informal support during later years of bereavement. There are also limited cohesive grief literacy resources for education, guidance and reassurance in the province.

Grief loss and bereavement support has been a core part of Canuck Place care and services since its inception. We are the only family-centred child loss specialist in B.C. offering support through a specialized interdisciplinary team. We know that the majority of families connected to our service benefit from ongoing touchpoints and specialized counselling support.

The demand for this support is rapidly growing. We’ve seen a 60 percent increase in the number of families supported over the past five years, and virtual care is enabling us to reach across the province. Based on our analysis and expertise, we are building a new care model that is effective, efficient, sustainable and scalable. It will enable us to address the disparities that exist in specialized bereavement care for families and make sure the unique needs of siblings continue to be addressed.

Canuck Place will be a beacon of specialized services for child loss in B.C., and we have expanded our population for bereavement to include all families in British Columbia who experience child death, regardless of whether or not their child received pediatric palliative care services. By focusing on direct care, enhancing community capacity and contributing to knowledge and education, we can build a bereavement care system that meets the growing needs. We can lead this work.

Canuck Place is encouraging the committee to recommend the increased investment in resources to ensure adequate specialized grief and bereavement care for caregivers and siblings experiencing the death of a child in B.C. Grief and bereavement care has a long-term, positive impact on families, and it’s time to invest in it.

With our expertise, leadership and extensive partnerships in the children’s health care system, Canuck Place is uniquely positioned to support the province in shaping this support in such a way that it will meet the unique needs of families in B.C. who are in need of care. Working in collaboration and partnership with other service providers and organizations will be required.

We have those existing partnerships, and we focus on providing education and training to clinicians across the province in order to increase their knowledge and competencies in caring for seriously ill children and their families. We also collaborate with Canada’s Paediatric Palliative Care Alliance, the Canadian Alliance for Children’s Grief, the Centre for Palliative Care, and B.C. Hospice Palliative Care Association to advance knowledge and engage in quality improvement.

In closing, on behalf of the entire staff and volunteer team at Canuck Place, I look forward to our continued partnership in working with the government of British Columbia. Thank you all for your time today and for your consideration of our recommendation to increase investment in resources to ensure adequate specialized grief and bereavement care for parents and siblings experiencing the death of a child in B.C.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation. We’ll turn to the questions by members. Any questions?

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for the work that you do and the families you support.

Increasing bereavement counselling is an important topic. I was hoping that you could give us a little bit more detail around numbers. So what kind of cost, what sort of…? It’s awful to have to talk about it like this, but what sort of FTEs do you maintain now, and what is your hope for an increase?

Denise Praill: Great. Thank you. I would first say that we’re working in partnership with others. At Canuck Place…. I can certainly talk to you about our numbers. We have a team of approximately eight counsellors, and we have a contingent of social workers and others, so lots of complementary skills in there.

Our annual operating budget for the grief and bereavement services right now is about $800,000. We’ve done a scaled-up model, we’ve done literature research, we’ve worked with partners and community to define the model of care that we’re working towards when we’re entirely scaled up three to five years from now. It’s about a $1.5 million investment from the Canuck Place side.

But we recognize that we’re going to need others. We’re going to need counselling and partnerships with adult hospice across the province because, again, those mechanisms vary depending on the community. We’re looking at from $800,000 investment to about $1.5 million, so almost double our current investment.

Jennifer Blatherwick: So you work with community partners across, like, say, Charlene Reaveley or any of the other grief support…?

Denise Praill: Absolutely.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Your virtual service…. I saw that you mentioned a 60 percent increase. Is that a result of having more tools to reach out to more families across the province?

[11:40 a.m.]

Denise Praill: I think it is. I think that’s a result of certainly more tools. We’ve invested in our technology.

And I think…. It’s odd to say, but it’s a gift of the pandemic, when we had to really be critical about how we deliver our care and services and that families enjoy the comfort of their home, the privacy of their home as supposed to coming to a physical space, perhaps where they lost their child. It has its benefits and, certainly, it has allowed us to deliver more care without having that physical barrier of being one-on-one or in a group setting. We still continue to offer one-on-one, both at Canuck

and that families enjoy the comfort of their home, the privacy of their home as opposed to coming to a physical space, perhaps where they lost their child. It has its benefits, and certainly, it has allowed us to deliver more care without having that physical barrier of being one-on-one or in a group setting. We still continue to offer one-on-one, both at Canuck Place and in-home and group bereavement services, but we’re seeing that growth in a virtual care.

Jennifer Blatherwick: So you’re seeing that growth not just in like rural, remote, northern areas where, you know, perhaps this service was physically inaccessible, but you’re seeing it in urban areas.

Denise Praill: Absolutely. I don’t have to commute from Surrey to Vancouver or Surrey to Abbotsford to physically be at a Canuck Place location.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Denise Praill: You’re welcome.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions?

Okay. That is it. Thank you so much for your time in presenting to us.

Denise Praill: Thank you very much. Very nice to meet you too.

Paul Choi (Chair): Very nice to meet you. Thank you.

Okay. We’ll call up the next presenter. If I can have Mr. Robert Boscocci from HME Home Health come to the front, please. Thank you so much for coming to present to us today. As a reminder, five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions after. You will see, if you have one minute left, the yellow light go on, and red if you’re out of time.

Robert Boscocci: Perfect.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay. Whenever you’re ready, you’re good to go. Thank you.

HME Home Health

Robert Boscocci: Thank you, first of all, thank you for having me. So I’m Robert — you got my last name, perfect; it’s catchy, Italian and a hard last name — CEO of HME Home Health. Quickly: we’re a B.C.-based company with 130 staff. I founded the company in 2012, and I work in mostly communities across B.C. Really, we’re in the business of providing class 1, class 2 medical equipment, so anything from wheelchairs, hospital beds, over-head patient lifts, anything kind of durable that we see.

In terms of today, I’m here today to talk about ceiling lifts. This conversation, essentially, very quickly, ceiling lifts are anything that we use for patient handling. It’s how we get patients in and out of hospital beds’ It’s how we transfer them. It’s kind of, in terms of what we do, our most critical piece of equipment.

Across the various health care authorities, funders, we sell the lifts across B.C., so we have fairly continuous funding in place for that. One area where we’re having difficulties right now is just with one of the ministries. It’s the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction. Essentially, in that ministry, they have an old regulation from 14 years ago for ceiling lifts, and they have a cap of $4,200 in place.

The issue we’re having as a company — but really it’s broad across our associations and all the companies in B.C. — is you actually can’t access the lifts without funding. So with the other ministries like WorkSafeBC, ICBC, Ministry of Children, the limit is $8,000. In that department, it’s $4,200. Unfortunately, we’re having a tough time getting ceiling lifts into group homes, people with disabilities, obviously, low income.

The issue, and I kind of want to raise it, is fundamentally when you don’t have a lift, you really can’t get a person in or out of bed. You can’t feed them. We do about eight or nine lifts a day, so a lift is the most essential component of the hospital room.

We’ve been here, last year in front of the standing committee, a different company, and we asked for the limit to be reviewed. It was on the standing committee recommendations, but unfortunately, in the last contract that just came out, the limit is still in place, and it’s in the regulations. So, kind of, I’m here today, just to respectfully ask this to be reviewed.

It’s actually a very small amount of lifts. Across B.C., we would do tens of thousands of lifts. In the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction, it’s probably around, I think, 150, 200 lifts a year. But for whatever reason, the limit’s been in place, and it’s essentially limiting our ability as a company — but really it’s across our industry — to provide these lifts. So that’s why I’m here today.

I’ll leave with two minutes, because I think I’m the last person before lunch, so I don’t want to tie you up. They always put me, I think, the last person before lunch. Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation.

We’ll go to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Hello. I just want to make sure that we’re all understanding. The lifts that you’re applying to have paid for through SDPR are exactly the same lifts that are getting paid for through ministry of children and family services, are getting paid for through ICBC, through WorkSafe, but they have a cost limit at those other places of $8,000. SDPR’s limit cap is $4,200, which does not cover the cost of the lift.

Robert Boscocci: No. Correct.

[11:45 a.m.]

Jennifer Blatherwick: So if you’re a family that is being supported by SDPR, you have very limited means, and so you’re not able to get that lift because the cost, the caps are not harmonized.

Robert Boscocci: You’ve got it. Correct.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay.

Steve Morissette: So this is for people that are

not able to get that lift because the caps are not harmonized.

Robert Boscacci: You got it. Correct.

Paul Choi (Chair): Did you have your answer? Nope, okay. Recognizing MLA Morrissette.

Steve Morissette: So this is for people that are at home. So this could potentially put them in a care home, if they can’t afford a lift?

Robert Boscacci: It’s a good question. If you can’t modify the home for the person with a lift, usually, then, you’d be looking into going into an institution or facility. Obviously, funding and stats-wise, we all know it’s better for the patient outcome. But, also even from a budgetary purpose, it would be far cheaper to keep the person in their own home, but also from a clinical perspective as well — a better patient outcome. But that would be correct.

Really what it is, is a huge WorkSafe issue. Just so we all know, OTs, doctors, nurses — you can’t put the patient on to the bed. So you have to use a lift. In the event you don’t have an overhead lift, your only other option is a floor lift. The problem with floor lifts is that they have a certain tendency on thick pile carpet…. You think about your house. If you have any uneven ground, it makes hoisting the person almost impossible.

Typically, you always want to do an overhead lift to kind of work around that issue.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? Seeing none, that is it. Thank you so much for your time and your presentation. The committee will now take a recess for lunch.

The committee recessed from 11:46 a.m. to 12:54 p.m.

The committee recessed from 11:46 a.m. to 12:54 p.m.

[Paul Choi in the chair.]

Paul Choi: Welcome back. Thank you so much. We will call the committee back to order.

We’ll start with the next presenter. We have Andrew Longhurst from the Health Sciences Association of B.C.

[12:55 p.m.]

Thanks for joining us today. As a reminder, you have five minutes for presentation and five minutes for questions after. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

Health Sciences Association of B.C.

Andrew Longhurst: Thank you so much. Good afternoon.

My name’s Andrew Longhurst. I am a researcher and policy analyst at the Health Sciences Association of B.C. It’s a union that represents

As a reminder, you have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions after. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

Health Sciences Association of B.C.

Andrew Longhurst: Thank you so much. Good afternoon.

My name is Andrew Longhurst. I am a researcher and policy analyst at the Health Sciences Association of B.C. It’s a union that represents 22,000 specialized health care and social service professionals working across the province. Our members work in hospitals, child development centres, community health care and social service agencies and many more settings. On behalf of HSA president Sarah Kooner and our 22,000 members, it’s a real privilege to be here and make some recommendations for Budget 2026.

Our union, HSA, represents over 70 distinct professions in health care and social services. The professions we represent are called the allied health professions or health science professions. HSA is part of the B.C. Federation of Labour and the National Union of Public and General Employees.

The work of our members is critical to a functioning health care system that provides timely, comprehensive care, but shortages of our members mean that British Columbians wait longer for surgery, cancer care and early childhood intervention or sometimes go without necessary treatments or therapies altogether.

We appreciate government’s commitment to public health care, but shortages and underinvestment in our professions translate into bottlenecks and longer wait times for patients, families and children.

Our first recommendation is to urge the provincial government to make continued and deeper investments to address shortages and recruitment and retention challenges that are widespread in health care and social services. Lab technologists, imaging technologists, mental health clinicians, respiratory therapists, pediatric therapists and many more are burning out.

The numbers of current and expected vacancies are sobering. In 2024, there were over 14,500 vacancies in the health care and social services sectors in B.C., according to Statistics Canada. Over the ten-year period from 2015 to 2024, the number of vacancies increased 137 percent. Again, this is Statistics Canada.

According to the B.C. government’s labour market outlook, many of our professions are designated high opportunity occupations, and we expect to see over 25,000 job openings in these professions by 2034. For example, we’ll need nearly 1,700 medical laboratory technologists by 2034. But unfortunately, B.C. graduates fewer than 130 medical laboratory technologists annually.

In many professions, we rely on out-of-province training and migration to fill vacancies. Much more can be done to train our workforce in-province, while also improving pay, staffing levels and working conditions that support recruitment and retention.

Our second recommendation is to address the serious funding and access challenges in the non-profit child development sector. There are over 30 non-profit child development centres in the province serving families and children with a wide range of physical, neurological and developmental disabilities, as well as mental health and behavioural issues.

In December 2024, HSA published an extensive research report with 14 recommendations to address underfunding and long wait times at publicly funded child development centres. This work builds on research and analysis conducted by the B.C. Association for Child Development and Intervention and the Representative for Children and Youth, as well as other academic researchers.

Front-line pediatric therapists and child development professionals that HSA represents are deeply concerned about the state of services for children and youth with support needs and their families. The Representative for Children and Youth estimates that fewer than one-third of children and youth in B.C. who have support needs are being served by the current system, leaving about 80,000 children with disabilities and their families without the services they need.

The publicly funded service landscape has historically been underfunded, understaffed and fragmented. In 2008, there was a freeze to base funding for CDCs, child development centres, and while there have been occasional increases to child development centre funding since that time, these vital non-profit centres have been left with fewer resources amidst rapidly growing wait lists. Many centres have had to change their service delivery model, limiting access only to children with the most complex needs, effectively leaving other children and their families out, without services.

[1:00 p.m.]

The proposed restructuring of services for children and youth with support needs through the request for proposals and creation of family connections centres has resulted in the potential closure of a non-profit centre in Kelowna called Starbright.

It’s still at risk of permanent closure. They’re looking for certainty about their future. This unfortunately sent a lot of shock waves through the child development sector. We deeply appreciate government’s decision to

or has resulted in the potential closure of a non-profit centre in Kelowna, called Starbright. It’s still at risk of permanent closure. They’re looking for certainty about their future, and this, unfortunately, has sent a lot of shockwaves through the child development sector.

We deeply appreciate government’s decision to pause the process, but there are concerns about the potential for an already fragile service landscape to experience greater fragmentation, privatization and staffing shortages as well. With that, we would recommend that the provincial government immediately increase funding by 50 percent. That would help to increase staffing levels, allow them to expand programs and service offerings, as well as really help stabilize the workforce.

I don’t have the exact figures in front of me, but I think that a 50 percent increase would really go a long way towards increasing access. I think we’d probably see that in the range of $20 million to $30 million in additional base funding would be needed, keeping in mind that these are vital services for many children and youth with support needs, and their families.

I’ll conclude there. Thank you very much. I’m happy to answer any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: In graduating 130, did you say they were lab techs? Was it medical health technologists?

Andrew Longhurst: Yes, med lab technologists — folks who are analyzing tissue samples and blood, and helping with diagnosis.

Jennifer Blatherwick: What institution do they graduate out of?

Andrew Longhurst: It’s BCIT and CNC for MLTs, med lab techs. It’s similar across many of the health science professions, where many of those professions are trained in one place. It’s often BCIT; sometimes there are programs in Prince George or scattered through the province. Those programs tend to be limited to one or two institutions.

For many of them — physiotherapy, occupational therapy and other great examples — there have been very welcome investments in improving training capacity. But we still rely to, I think, too large an extent on that out-of-province migration, without the in-province training capacity that’s needed. There has been some really good work on the supply side, but addressing some of the recruitment and retention pieces is needed as well.

Jennifer Blatherwick: You’re thinking of an expansion in the current institutions capacity — so that BCIT and CNC would increase their numbers of seats — but of an expansion to other post-secondary institutions as well. So there’d be more training in more different places?

Andrew Longhurst: I think it’s fair to say that it will vary between different professions. Keeping in mind the health science professionals, allied health professionals encompass about 70 distinct, different disciplines.

I think it will vary, but what we have seen is that there hasn’t necessarily been the longer-term planning to increase that seat capacity. In the last few years, there has been a boost in many different training seats, and that has been fantastic. But we need to see that, I think, in a more consistent way moving forward.

We’re not in a position where we have such serious workforce shortages: we’re planning longer term, rather than being more reactive. Many provinces are grappling with the same issues, but a lot of the programs have remained quite small, considering the demand on those professions and the workload challenges.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? Okay, thanks for your presentation.

We’ll move on to the next presenter. Could I ask Ms. Heather Scott, from Langley Community Health and Hospital Foundation, to come forward?

Thanks for coming today and presenting to us. As you’ve probably heard, five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions after. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

[1:05 p.m.]

Langley Community Health
and Hospital Foundation

Heather Scott: Thank you so much for the opportunity to present today. My name is Heather Scott. I’m the executive director of Langley Community Health and Hospital Foundation.

I want to start with some gratitude. We’re so grateful for the province’s leadership and investment in Langley’s health care system. That includes the new MRIs, the new ER and the new hospice. Just last week we opened an urgent and primary care centre

My name is Heather Scott. I’m the executive director of Langley Community Health and Hospital Foundation.

I want to start with some gratitude. We’re so grateful for the province’s leadership and investment in Langley’s health care system. That includes the new MRIs, the new ER, the new hospice — just last week we opened an urgent primary care centre. These are all incredible investments that are going to impact the access to care for thousands of patients in our community, but more urgent investment is required.

I’m here today to respectfully urge government of British Columbia to move two critical investments forward at Langley Memorial Hospital in Budget 2026. The first, please prioritize the construction of a new long-term-care home. And second, please commit to the construction of a new patient care tower, including a renovation and expansion of our current ambulatory day care and surgical theatres.

Langley Memorial Hospital was built 60 years ago, in 1965, to serve a population of 20,000 people. Today, Langley is the fastest-growing population in Metro Vancouver with 200,000 people, ten times the number of people, but our hospital has not kept up with the demand, the pace, and it’s causing incredible pressure on our staff, on our patients and the Fraser Health system broadly.

Right now, Langley has 1.1 beds per 1000 people. That compares to the national average of 2.5. And we’re significantly lower than Vancouver Coastal at 3 beds per 1000 population, just to give you an example of the inequity. If Langley continues to grow, and it is expected to continue to grow at the same rate, in just five years, we will be less than one bed per 1000 people in that community.

Two key community investments are required, and with your recommendation and urgent government action, they will improve patient safety and help recruit and retain health care workers.

Our first request is, please, the construction of the new long-term-care home. This was actually announced prior to the most recent election by former Minister of Health Adrian Dix. It’s a new, 300-bed, long-term-care home. The residence will provide high-quality, dignified care for seniors and other vulnerable residents while meeting current infection control standards. And it can’t come fast enough: 37 percent of Langley’s population is made up of people 65 and over. That’s almost 20 percent higher than the provincial average.

To understand the urgency of this news, let me tell you about Dorothy, one of our patients. While at home, and despite four visits a day, fall alerts and family involvement, Dorothy, who is elderly and has advanced dementia, wandered out of the house one night. She fell, and she was brought into hospital.

Dorothy has been in our hospital in an acute care bed for months, even though she does not require hospital care. What she requires is 24-7 supervision in a safe environment. But there are no long-term-care beds available in Langley. Now she’s confused, she’s declining, and she’s exposed to hospital-acquired infections.

Dorothy and the 30 to 50 other seniors like her in our hospital are not who hospitals are meant for. She and our seniors…. They deserve better. Langley urgently needs more long-term-care beds to ensure safety, dignity and true care for our most vulnerable.

Our second request for recommendation to Budget 2026 is a commitment that was made by the B.C. NDP during the 2024 provincial election. And that is the construction of a new patient care tower and the renovation and expansion of our ambulatory care and surgical theatres. Why? Because at any given time, our hospital is 26 to 50 percent over capacity.

When Dorothy first arrived she was in a hallway on a stretcher and in restraints. She was in restraints because being in a hallway with advanced dementia creates confusion that just deepens the confusion. And now she suffers from hospital-acquired delirium.

Hallways are not designed for patient care.

This project would increase our hospital’s capacity to address the region’s growing demand for acute care. These projects will help when we recruit and retain health care workers, fill gaps in the system, provide equitable access to care and improve patient safety.

[1:10 p.m.]

And I know our community will be behind me. Our community gave $17 million to the ER expansion, and because of that we were able to bring in an MRI. We pay for it, but the government operates it. Which is extraordinary. They will come to this part of these projects again. I know this to be true because

Our community gave $17 million to the ER expansion. Because of that, we were able to bring in an MRI. We pay for it, but the government operates it, which is extraordinary. They will come to this part of these projects again. I know this to be true because we have a significant donation that I’d be pleased to tell you about. I have four seconds left.

Let me just conclude by saying that we would be most grateful if you would recommend both projects for the 2026 budget. It’s Langley’s time. Let’s get them done. Let’s do it together. Thank you for your time. I’m happy to take any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much. We really appreciate your passion and advocacy to the health care and Langley community overall. We’ll turn now to questions by members. Turning to the Deputy Chair.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Hello. It’s good to see you. You know, I can understand your emotion. It’s emotional for us to hear a story like Dorothy’s, very disturbing and sad and unacceptable.

My questions are…. So the long-term care home promise and the new tower promise. Were those both election ‘24 promises?

Heather Scott: That’s a great question. The long-term-care project was announced pre-election. So now it’s just a matter, I think…. The process is a bit unclear for me, but I’m hopeful that it will be announced within budget. I was hopeful it would be announced in the 2025 budget.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): We just had budget estimates for the ‘25-26 budget. So there were no funding parcels for either of those projects despite announcements. Is that correct?

Heather Scott: That’s my understanding. The new patient tower, the ambulatory expansion and renovation and surgical expansion and renovation were commitments made during the election, different from the promise made pre-election.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): You mentioned there are between 30 and 50 seniors currently blocking, if you will, acute care beds, because they are in them and could be discharged to long-term care but there is no space available for them.

Heather Scott: That’s my understanding.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): On average, is that your average that is happening on a monthly basis, where there are anywhere between 30 and 50 people who could be discharged if other arrangements could be made, whether it’s seniors or other people who are waiting for housing or alternative care to hospitals sitting in acute care beds? Is that correct?

Heather Scott: That’s my understanding. My numbers would be anecdotal. I would invite the committee to…. They’re difficult numbers to access, so I would invite the committee to refer to the Ministry of Health, which would have those numbers and be more accurate. But my understanding is that on a regular basis, there are between 30 and 50 patients that don’t require acute care, but have nowhere else to go in our hospital.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Okay, thank you. Just to get it on Hansard, it’s not inconsistent with what we hear from Surrey Memorial Hospital as well. So it wouldn’t surprise me if those were accurate numbers.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No, okay.

Heather Scott: Can I make one comment?

Paul Choi (Chair): Yes.

Heather Scott: We have a donor who came to us with a gift towards ambulatory care expansion in 2023. That donor is now saying that they would be willing to give $2 million for that project if the government were to make progress on this project by the end of 2025.

So my request for this recommendation would be, I think, a good example of the government making progress on that. I have to say that we haven’t started fundraising for these projects because they haven’t been in-house. But if that’s helpful, I want to make sure we’re aware of that.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, thank you so much for your presentation and your time. Okay, we’ll go to the next presenter. If I can call Mr. Ajit Johal from immunize.io to come to the front please, thank you.

Hello, thanks for coming and presenting to us. You have five minutes for a presentation, five minutes for questions after, and you may begin whenever you’re ready to go.

[1:15 p.m.]

immunize.io

Ajit Johal: Perfect. First of all, thank you so much for the opportunity to present in front of the committee. My name is Ajit Johal from immunize.io. I’m a B.C. resident, and I’ve been a pharmacist for almost 15 years. Currently I work in the area of academic and vaccine education. So today I’m here to talk to you about

Ajit Johal: First and foremost, thank you so much for the opportunity to present in front of the committee. My name is Ajit Johal from Immunize.io. I’m a B.C. resident, and I’ve been a pharmacist for almost 15 years. Currently I work in the area of academic and vaccine education.

Today I’m here to talk to you about shingles. Shingles is a devastating condition that causes significant strain on the health care system. It’s estimated that between direct medical costs and productivity costs, the average case of shingles costs about $1,500.

Fortunately, there is a very safe and effective vaccination. The two-dose Shingrix vaccination provides over 90 percent efficacy in preventing shingles and its complications, and it has durability for at least 11 years — probably more. Recent Markov modelling shows that the number needed to vaccinate…. You would need to vaccinate less than 10 people to prevent one case of shingles.

Other provinces like Ontario currently have a public program. At this time, B.C. does not. I presented to this committee in 2023 on proposing a publicly funded shingles program for the province for residents 65 and older using the B.C. get vaccinated program, which has been very successful in getting high vaccine uptake for COVID-19 and influenza through community pharmacies.

Here I am two years later, and we don’t have a shingles program. But after the last speaker, you know, we have to be mindful that if the province had money to fund everything that would help, then they would. But it’s finite, and health care spending is in a deficit. So my three recommendations today are: how can we do an innovative program that is cost effective? And is that something that people here might be interested in hearing?

My first recommendation is that the National Advisory Committee on Immunization strongly recommends shingles vaccination for all adults 50 years of age and older. In British Columbia, if you look at census statistics, you’re looking at a population between 50 to 64 of just over a million people, with an estimated 800,000 currently in the workforce.

We should be leveraging employer-sponsored and -promoted shingles vaccination programs. Crown corporations, government corporations should be including this vaccine in their extended benefits program and promoting it to staff to either go to their pharmacy or have onsite vaccination clinics. Employers will bear the brunt if one of their staff gets shingles, with presenteeism and absenteeism. With a private payer coverage model, you are alleviating direct strain on the system by not having to pay out of public purse for a single dose, so we should be throwing that forward.

Just to give you an example of the disparity of this, nurses are not covered for a shingles vaccine. In the school districts, BCTF recently, in their union bargaining agreement, got the shingles vaccine covered in the summer of 2024. But that’s only half of the individuals that work in the school district. You have maintenance staff, teaching assistants, administrative staff under the CUPE union that do not have this coverage.

Even if you include the vaccine in your benefits plan, people are not aware that it exists. They don’t know what their risk is. Currently the Richmond school district has the highest utilization of teachers getting the shingles vaccine because they offer onsite clinics. So there’s certainly an opportunity to reduce the impact on the system while not having to pay out of pocket, out of public purse.

My second recommendation is to restrict. Instead of a 65 plus program, do what Ontario does: 65 to 69. You get the highest risk peak of shingles, the highest cost. According to their modelling, they’ve reduced over 110,000 physician visits and $27 million in direct medical costs.

My third recommendation is: what do we do about equity? What do we do with individuals with lower socioeconomic status who should suffer disproportionately from these vaccine-preventable diseases? Well, why don’t we include the two-dose shingles vaccine as a Fair PharmaCare benefit? If they’re not employed, it goes towards a deductible, and eventually it will be a benefit. If they’re over 70 and on a fixed income, medication costs…. We’ll lower that deductible, and this vaccine can be rolled into that.

[1:20 p.m.]

Those are just three different arms of the government. You’ve got unions, the Crown corporations, public health, and then you’ve got the ministry, Fair Pharmacare, all of which can kind of chew off a piece of this, with the goal of having a high uptake rate of shingles vaccination in this province to reduce costs.

Happy to take any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation.

We’ll turn to questions by members.

chew off a piece of this, with the goal of having a high uptake rate of shingles vaccination in this province to reduce costs.

Happy to take any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation.

We’ll turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for bringing this forward. It’s something that so many older adults suffer with every day. The Shingrix vaccine has been safe and effective for years, so it has a very strong proven track record.

When you’re talking about employer-sponsored and -promoted programs, are you saying that this would be a thing that we could, as a province, promote because it saves money on absenteeism? We’re looking at it as an investment, but one that will result in a cost saving.

Ajit Johal: Correct, yeah. Basically, you have a demographic of individuals who are eligible for this. If they get shingles, they are going to consume direct medical costs. There will, potentially, be a family doctor visit. There’ll be medication — Valacyclovir. There might be a specialist visit. There might be hospitalization if they get herpes zoster ophthalmicus in the eye.

But they will miss work, right? So I think what we need to think about is how we leverage private payer models through extended plans to limit health care expenditures. I think that’s kind of what I was mentioning about that.

I think it’s very underutilized. It’s a simple intervention to reduce long-term downstream costs. If you have ten, 11 years of effectiveness, that is a lot of time for someone to get shingles, and that will carry a lot of benefit as an intervention.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Absolutely. Now you’re saying that there was some of this in action, on-site clinics in Richmond school district?

Ajit Johal: Yeah.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Do we have any preliminary data coming out? That must be quite new.

Ajit Johal: Yeah. The Richmond district runs a program. They have higher utilization, through their claims data, but again, the payer is Blue Cross, right? It’s not the ministry. That’s something that we’re looking into, to see, because you’re looking at different payers for things, and I think that’s where we have to be strategic. We need to deliver better health care, but we don’t have a lot of budget. So if someone’s paying for something, then let them pay for it.

But it’s also beneficial to them too, because they’re going to see the impact of losing a teacher, losing a transit staff, losing a….

Jennifer Blatherwick: Two doses of Shingrix are $400. A single day of lost labour is in the neighbourhood of $600 to $700 for teachers. So, economically, the investment makes sense.

In terms of restricting…. Now, for the 50-plus programs, we have a really significant number of people that are still in the workforce that are 50 to retirement age.

Ajit Johal: Correct.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Looking at restricting the target from 65 to 69 is an interesting choice because, of course, that’s kind of…. So you’re thinking that we would focus on employer-sponsored models for people who are still in the workforce, and then if we’re looking at public pay model, we would, as a public system, focus on 65 to 69?

Ajit Johal: Yeah, that’s just the…. Ontario’s already done the work there in terms of modelling. And given the, I guess, health literacy of our population, we would probably get higher uptake, just like we saw with COVID and influenza and other vaccines. So that’s a strategic cohort to match the highest burden of shingles with the least amount of doses you have to buy.

Jennifer Blatherwick: And then, making sure that we would be accessing…. For the Fair PharmaCare benefit, that is another population that really struggles with health effects and then access to medication — reactive medication — and care afterwards.

Ajit Johal: Totally.

Jennifer Blatherwick: So you’re thinking…. Would the age cohort of the people who would be covered, that we would age that down, though?

Ajit Johal: Yeah, that would be…. I mean, these are just ideas I’ve thrown out there. My thought was that. It’s just my experience. I used to work as a psychiatric pharmacist. I had a lot of patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia who would be interested in the vaccine who were not in that 65 cohort. They were in that sort of 50 cohort. But it’s $400, so they don’t have the funds. But all of their medications are covered under plan G and stuff like that.

It’s just looking at how we get the most people vaccinated without having to buy doses and actually get them through public health, get them through pharmacies. How do we use what we already have and kind of grow it? You got to think outside the box.

[1:25 p.m.]

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. We will move on to the next presenter.

I will call the next presenter

got to think outside the box.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. We will move on to the next presenter.

I will call the next presenter, Miss Jennifer Newby from Autism Support Network of B.C., to come forward.

Thanks for coming and presenting to us today. Hello. We have five minutes for your presentation and five minutes for questions after. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

Jennifer Newby: Hello, everybody. My name is Jennifer Newby, and I have been a B.C. resident for the past ten years. I am the parent to two amazing children diagnosed with autism. They’re here behind me. I am also the executive director of the Autism Support Network Society, and I am one of the original two creators of the school exclusion tracker, which has led to the Ombudsperson investigation that is currently underway. And I am one of the co-authors of the Parents and Professionals Plan to transform CYSN services on behalf of disabled children and youth.

I grew into my role specifically because of my advocacy on behalf of my own family first, and then that expanded into community. The number one thing I want to emphasize as my priority for this engagement is to adopt the Parents and Professionals Plan. You can read it on the MCFD consultation portal.

We do need to expand the direct funding model that currently exists only for children diagnosed with autism to other disability diagnosis groups. There is a report from 2007 called the Pay Now or Pay Later report. This report was written about autistic families, but I think it can be applied to the broader community. The title itself is pretty self-explanatory, but to give you the very, very short version, when you invest in a child’s access to evidence-based early interventions, it pays massive dividends. For example, a child with autism who can self-regulate, self-advocate their needs and desires and even do some of their own personal care around hygiene is much less likely to require costly one-on-one staffing in a care home someday.

Our birth year prevalence of children diagnosed with autism has just recently gone up again to one in every 31 children who are currently eight years old. About one in four of them meet the criteria for profound or severe autism. You are going to want to get ahead of the curve on teaching this very large cohort of children these skills before the next decade is over.

There are also children with Down syndrome, medical complexity or fetal alcohol syndrome who can present very similarly but are denied funding based on their diagnosis alone. This is wrong. We need to look at the functional needs as rated by a doctor, not a social worker. Many of these children are already identified in the system at various or even multiple points, such as the At Home program or voluntary care agreements or even just frequent flyers at B.C. Children’s Hospital. These families need the most wraparound care, and $6,000 per year for a child over the age of six is barely a drop in the bucket.

Speaking of voluntary care agreements, the most recent RCY report detailed the excruciating decision by some families to put their children in government care just to access services. It would be substantially cheaper to provide services to families without also having to pay for the fostering caregivers.

On the less visibly disabled side of the equation, a child with learning disabilities who gets targeted intervention and keeps up at grade level is less likely to internalize shame or bullying. They say trauma is the actual gateway to drug use or crime. Early interventions can reduce the likelihood of someone winding up on the path of jail or becoming homeless and doing whatever they need to do to survive at that point. This cascade is a domino effect. I’m sure we’d all love to gradually reduce the costs of policing and naloxone to places like the Downtown Eastside, but that can only happen if we go upstream and stop people from falling in.

My second request of this consultation pertains to school funding. I’m sure you’re probably being inundated with requests for blank cheques. While I do agree that more money is needed in the school system, I would like to request this government commit to an independent financial audit of the school districts, specifically Surrey school district, before opening the province’s purse strings.

In just this current school year alone, the Surrey mayor has stepped in to donate paper, the third of five learning centres is closing, StrongStart classrooms are reducing their hours, bus services for disabled children have been cut, and 50 EAs this year will not be replaced if they’re injured or retired. Kids are being excluded from educational opportunities to such an undeniable degree that it has triggered the Ombudsperson investigation. And our district is talking about having to cancel between 40 or 60 international field trips related to band or athletic competitions, exclusively due to trade concerns with the United States. Priorities, right?

[1:30 p.m.]

We’re paying our current superintendent slightly more than the Prime Minister of Canada and still somehow paying $166,000 last year to our former superintendent on consulting fees. And why did we spend $66,000 on a rugby league? It is not just a question of dollars but also price.

Priorities, right? We’re paying our current superintendent slightly more than the Prime Minister of Canada and still somehow paying $166,000 last year to our former superintendent on consulting fees. And why did we spend $66,000 on a rugby league?

It is not just a question of dollars but also priorities. I’d love to see more legislation protecting disabled children’s right to access education, such as the IDEA act from the United States, but I recognize that is not the purview of this committee. Front-line staff, both teachers and EAs, are unable to ask for this accountability without critiquing their employers. But I can assure you this is an incredibly common sentiment.

So to reiterate, expand the individualized funding and audit the districts, please. Pay now or pay later.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. I will now go to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I have five kids myself, and four that are neurodivergent. So thank you for coming, and thank you for bringing your boys here so they can see you do this advocacy.

Jennifer Newby: Yeah, I think bringing my children here is kind of an important point because we have been doing evidence-based interventions since we were very young. And to see the disruption in our routine to come here, to break from our normal schedule, to tolerate, for them, a relatively boring experience and sit quietly without being disruptive, kind of speaks to the importance of such intervention.

And I think just throwing money at the school districts is not going to get us there. And ignoring disabilities based on just what designation code they fall under is not going to help a lot of these kids.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Sorry, so I was just going to ask…. I know that pre-entry into school — children receive supportive funding, I think of like $6,000 a year? Is that correct?

Jennifer Newby: For the children that are diagnosed with autism under the age of six, they can receive up to $22,000 per year. But that money is prorated based on what month of the year they were diagnosed, and that paperwork goes to the social worker, and the average age of diagnosis is five and a half. So you get six months, maybe, of intervention before a child is thrown into kindergarten with no other early interventions.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Especially if you’re a parent who doesn’t have experience in the field, and so you perhaps don’t recognize the signs early enough to get….

Jennifer Newby: Well, even if you do, the waitlist for Sunny Hill is, I believe, 92 weeks the last I heard. But the BCAAN waitlist website has not actually been updated since the end of 2023, I believe it is. So it says on there 80.6 weeks, but I’ve heard through the grapevine that it’s actually in the realm of 90-odd weeks now to be assessed with autism.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Hi, nice to see you again.

Jennifer Newby: It’s nice to see you.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): I don’t really have a question so much as a comment, and I’ll give you my card.

I’m concerned by some of the things that… I’ve have done a lot of advocacy about the operational shortfall for sd36. And I’d be curious to have a meeting specifically with you address the concerns that you raised here today.

Jennifer Newby: Sure. Absolutely.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Okay, great.

Jennifer Newby: Is there anything specific here that I might be the answer in shortform?

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): No, I think that just because the cuts, particularly to the bus service…. It started more than a year ago with the cuts in service for the intensive literacy program, which my daughter, who also has autism, had participated in.

It’s such a helpful program, and the fact that there was no longer bus service provided wasn’t a barrier for us. But for a lot of families, that’s a huge problem.

And so I wouldn’t mind having another meeting just to begin on some of those other issues and see if there’s some things we can work through with the district.

Jennifer Newby: Absolutely. And if I can add just one final point I probably should have mentioned in my speech, but time constraints. A lot of this early intervention and stuff…. If a child is very dysregulated at school and acting out, lashing out, showing with their behaviour that they are not safe or their accommodations are not being met, that actually triggers these school exclusions, I mentioned, but that actually jeopardizes parents’ ability to work, especially for the mothers.

But, really, either parent could be called away from their job, which is a loss of economic productivity for the families, and jeopardizes that family’s income. I mean, my family alone…. Up until last year, I was able to do some contract work periodically, but it was very inconsistent, which means my husband was the sole income for our family for a very long time. And you can imagine, in the cost of living that we are in, how much of an impact that has on so many families.

[1:35 p.m.]

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation and your comments.

We’ll move on to the next presenter. If we can get Mr. Bill Barrable from Praxis Spinal Cord Institute to come forward, please.

Thank you so much for your presentation and your comments.

We’ll move on to the next presenter. If we can get Mr. Bill Barrable from Praxis Spinal Cord Institute to come forward, please.

Thank you so much for joining us and presenting to us. For a reminder, five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready.

Praxis Spinal Cord Institute

Bill Barrable: Thank you for having me. I’m Bill Barrable, CEO of the Praxis Spinal Cord Institute in Vancouver. I want to begin by acknowledging that we’re gathered on the traditional territories of the Kwantlen people.

“Praxis” is a Greek word which means moving knowledge into action. That’s what we do. We’re proud to be part of B.C.’s dynamic life sciences sector. Our work helps advance technologies and treatments for people living with spinal cord injuries in B.C. and globally.

Spinal cord injuries, which we refer to with the acronym SCI, affect more than 12,000 British Columbians. The impacts are profound: shorter life expectancy, social isolation, job loss and frequent hospitalizations. New traumatic injuries and chronic complications cost B.C. more than $440 million a year. The average cost of a hospital readmission for somebody with a spinal cord injury is around $30,000. It’s extraordinary. There are almost three dozen secondary complications that come from a spinal cord injury as well.

Praxis works to change the personal and financial impacts of SCI through scaling proven clinical initiatives, expanding person-centered care, and advancing research into promising new therapies like spinal cord stimulation, biomarkers, and data-driven approaches powered by AI. We have an AI team, a machine learning group that is publishing and producing innovation in this area that is being used right across the world.

We’re helping move the dial on SCI care and innovation for British Columbians, for Canadians, and for people around the planet. We’re making real progress thanks to the province of B.C. and the Ministry of Health who have provided us ongoing support for our work since 2010. We will be seeking funding renewal in this budget so we can continue to advance SCI research and innovation here in B.C. and worldwide.

We use the acronym “PLEX” — people with lived experience — to represent those who live with SCI. These people are the foundation of everything that we do. Our work is driven by their priorities, and we monitor our work with them to ensure that we’re driving results that improve lives. I’ve had personal experience presenting our work in the United States, where the model that we have developed has received a great deal of acclaim. And the refrain was: “We need a Praxis in the United States.”

We also have one of the largest databases in the world for spinal cord injury. The only one larger is in the Veterans Administration. It’s very difficult to get data out of the VA, even if you’re the CDC. Ours is in fact more accessible internationally than any registry out there.

We facilitate an international network of people with SCI and world-class experts who are identifying, prioritizing and solving the most urgent challenges. We take the most promising ideas and technologies and ensure that they’re put into use to improve the lives of those living with the condition. Here in B.C., we’re seeing a real impact with improved SCI patient outcomes. Part of this is because of the work we do on best practices.

We bring together people living with SCI and medical and rehab experts so doctors can learn about best practices and be supported as they use this new knowledge. We have facilitated more than 40-plus workshops across B.C. with health care providers working in the health authorities from multidisciplinary environments who have come. These have been, in some cases, literally standing-room-only events, and very well attended and very well evaluated. So this is part of how we’re getting knowledge into use.

The research that we do as is not basic science; it’s translational research. It’s clinical trials in humans, moving the basic science knowledge into an environment where those trials can be done safely and effectively. We can learn quickly from them and get the best practices in the world.

[1:40 p.m.]

We’ve also supported the creation of an Indigenous-led SCI network, and we support research projects addressing SCI issues facing Indigenous communities throughout our province.

We’ve opened a path to improved grasp, autonomic function, and bladder and sexual health through research on spinal cord stimulation therapy. This is important because these functions are often severely

network. We support research projects addressing SCI issues facing Indigenous communities throughout our province.

We’ve opened a path to improved grasp, autonomic function and bladder and sexual health through research on spinal cord stimulation therapy. This is important because these functions are often severely impacted by spinal cord injuries, affecting quality of life. This initiative helps to improve mental and physical well-being and reduce secondary health complications by restoring even partial control over these areas.

When I say “we,” I mean it truly. Thanks to the support we receive from the provincial government, you are part of this very important work.

Our recommendations today are simple. We would like the province to continue to make strategic investments in support of B.C.’s life sciences sector and to continue to fund our work. These investments not only improve the lives of people living with spinal cord injury, but they also make our health system more effective and contribute to B.C.’s economy through the growth of our life sciences sector.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Any questions? No?

Steve Morissette: You do research as well as work with health care professionals on how best to work with people with SCI?

Bill Barrable: Correct.

Steve Morissette: And that’s ongoing — meetings throughout the province, different areas?

Bill Barrable: We have workshops where we are, effectively, circulating the province and all the regions and convening people — physiotherapists, occupational therapists, physiatrists, nurses, a long list of health professionals that play a role in the health of people with SCI and rehabilitation for other forms of trauma as well — bringing them together.

There is some overlap sometimes with traumatic brain injury because the injuries can occur at the same time. That’s quite a large swath of the population. They have some common needs, and we work together with our partners to make sure that we get the most contemporary knowledge that’s been developed into the hands of people who can use it, including not only the professionals but people with spinal cord injury as well.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I really appreciate the role of data tracking and healthy longitudinal data, deep data. Can you talk a little bit about what kinds of parameters you’re measuring? What is the kind of data that you’re collecting?

Bill Barrable: The registry that we have — we call it a registry, which was really envisioned almost 20 years ago and became operational in 2010 — currently has over 14,000 people, and it covers 31 sites across Canada. All of your major trauma facilities and rehab facilities across Canada would be participating, and the clinician researchers in those centres would be co-PIs, co-principal-investigators.

The idea is that we bring this data together so that the new treatments can be assessed and so that these smart people who see the patients have access to that data so that they can inform their own practice as we go. We also have to write accreditation standards for hospitals across Canada for acute and rehab.

At the time of an injury, there would be certain aspects of that data that would be already automatically inputted into the system and collected to go into the registry. Then there would be a secondary level of detail that would be subject to consent. Of course there’s data captured by the hospital system when someone is admitted to a hospital, which is expected to be collected and required to be collected, and then there would be a different level of that. So it would be data from the time of entry all the way through to the community.

One of the biggest challenges, of course, is that after someone has been treated in the acute setting, then they go to rehabilitation. After that, of course, they’re discharged to home, and oftentimes there are some very significant accommodations that have to be made in order to go back to the community. This is one of the big challenges in B.C. because of the rural nature of our province outside of the Lower Mainland, very significant challenges in those transitions to care.

[1:45 p.m.]

It’s really important for us to collect data all the way through the experience of that individual and what we could call the patient continuum.

Steve Morissette: Just one last one. Do you do any work around sharing your data or working with clinical trials for treatments?

Bill Barrable: Yes, we do. In fact, the registry network

call the patient continually.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you.

Steve Morissette: Just one last one. Do you do any work around sharing your data or working with clinical trials for treatments?

Bill Barrable: Yes, we do. In fact, the registry network that we call, with the 31 sites, really a big part of the rationale for it was to be able to conduct clinical trials.

Enrolment is a challenge because each injury is very different. If you’re trying to do a clinical trial effectively, you’re trying to establish very comparable controlled study groups. So you need a lot of patients to choose from to try and establish that. That’s a really important part of why it exists.

We’ve tried to borrow from successes from other conditions like cancer. Where various cancers have been cured, there’s a heavy use of registries, international trials. You have to partner up to be able to enrol sufficient numbers. Because it’s not as ubiquitous as cancer is, or heart disease or diabetes, we have to find ways to optimize the enrolment for those clinical trials. One of the key success factors in developing innovation and getting it implemented is those, and to have a registry is really a significant platform.

Steve Morissette: Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

Bill Barrable: Thank you.

As an aside, I had an opportunity to listen to a couple of your previous presenters. I just want to thank you all for the work that you’re doing, because those, they’re all really significant.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much. Thank you.

We’ll move on to the next presenter. If I can get Dr. Serena Verma from B.C. College of Family Physicians to come forward, please. Thank you. Hello. Good afternoon. Thanks for coming to present to us.

B.C. College of Family Physicians

Serena Verma: Good afternoon, members of the committee. Lovely to see many familiar faces from our visit to Victoria about a month ago. Thank you for having me today. My name is Dr. Serena Verma, and I’m a practicing family physician here in the Lower Mainland.

I’m also a member of the board of the B.C. College of Family Physicians. We are the largest member-driven, member-led family physician organization, with over 8,000 members. These members are comprised of practicing family physicians, resident doctors, as well as medical students.

The B.C. College of Family Physicians is a passionate and independent champion for family medicine. We bolster the unique and irreplaceable role of family physicians in B.C.’s health care system with a strong position of advocacy, data-informed practice and a focus on community building. We support family physician–led primary care and work towards a future where every individual in British Columbia has access to comprehensive, compassionate and culturally safe health care from a trusted family physician.

Today I’m here to advocate on behalf of family physicians and our patients by encouraging this committee to work with the B.C. College of Family Physicians and the Ministry of Finance by allocating resources in Budget 2026 to: (1) reducing administrative burdens for family physicians, (2) investing in family physician–led team-based care, and (3), addressing the shortage of vital rural family physicians.

Reducing administrative burdens. Family physicians provide high-quality, comprehensive primary care to people across all of British Columbia. However, the burdens of administrative work take away from the valuable time that we could spend on direct patient care. The current system forces us to spend about 30 percent of our time on unnecessary paperwork and forms.

By using Budget 2026 to cut red tape and reduce administrative burdens, the provincial government would support family physicians in seeing more patients and potentially taking on more patients, as well, particularly in a time when one out of four British Columbians does not have a family doctor.

Supporting rural family physicians. As a family physician myself, I often interact with my colleagues who work in rural and remote communities. In rural and remote communities, family physicians are the cornerstone of care, delivering not only primary care but also emergency services, anesthesiology, surgical and maternity services to meet the full spectrum of needs of their community.

[1:50 p.m.]

Chronic under-staffing in rural communities is leading to a high level of burnout and early retirement amongst family physicians, resulting in the closure of essential health services, including emergency rooms.

In rural and remote communities, it has been shown that a higher retention of family physicians decreases hospital rates by 20 percent. During a time of frequent

burnout and early retirement amongst family physicians, resulting in the closure of essential health services, including emergency rooms.

In rural and remote communities, it has been shown that a higher retention of family physicians decreases hospital rates by 20 percent. During a time of frequent emergency department service interruptions and closures, utilizing Budget 2026 to expand initiatives and incentives for rural-based family physicians is necessary to improve health care access for rural and remote communities. These investments would already ease an overburdened health care system and provide quality care our rural and remote communities deserve.

Family-physician-led teams. Family physicians are uniquely trained to provide a whole person continuous care across a patient’s life cycle. Our 10 to 12 years of education and training in that and our ability to diagnose, manage and coordinate treatment for a wide complex range of medical needs ensures that patient care remains patient-centred but also relationship-based rather than fragmented across specialties and providers.

We are advocating for Budget 2026 to include investments in physician-led teams that provide high-quality patient-centred care that work in collaboration with allied health professions to meet community needs. The evidence we have does suggest that family-physician-led models reduces unnecessary referrals, reduces unnecessary diagnostic testing and reduces hospital visits, which ultimately leads to a lower overall health cost. For example, every $1 spent in primary care saves the health system $4 to $6 by reducing hospital admissions and unnecessary specialist referrals.

Thank you once again. We appreciate being invited to this committee. I’m happy to spend the rest of our allocated time to answer any questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for the presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Great presentation. I appreciate your focus on patient-centred care. And thank you for your work as a family physician. We need you and we appreciate you.

Can we talk a little bit about the first request, which is the administrative burden? Recently removing the requirement for sick notes from calling into work…. Is this the kind of initiative that you’re talking about: taking pieces of your job that don’t directly relate to medical care and seeing where we can streamline while maintaining that same quality?

Serena Verma: Absolutely, absolutely. I can go on and on about this. As I recall, my clinic, this last week even…. Sick notes is one of them. And we want to acknowledge what is already being done with sick notes, so thank you very much. We acknowledge that we are working and continuing to work with the provincial government on legislation to eliminate sick notes. That’s a great example.

Another example of special authority forms are forms that patients need filling out to get access to medications at a lower cost. I used to be a pharmacist in my past life. So this kind of…. Just knowing who might be the best person to fill out forms would be a good initial step.

Other examples include things like insurance forms, disability forms and even specific workplace forms. So basically it’s more about: family physicians should not be the default gatekeepers for all non-medical forms. Often these forms can be handled by other qualified health professions, like for example, occupational therapists for return to work planning or pharmacists for certain medication indications. It can be handled by patients themselves sometimes or maybe even automated through technology.

When we’ve asked this question to our membership, 70 percent of them say that the administrative workload that is non-medically necessary is too high. Again, honestly, it’s time that we would much rather spend seeing patients. Thank you for that question.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you. Actually, if I can just follow up with a second one. Speaking of retaining rural physicians, this is extremely important. The rural, remote and northern care networks are just as important as the ones here. One of the things that’s happened in the last little while is loan forgiveness for people who are working in high-demand professions in areas where they’ve been struggling to maintain staffing levels. Are you seeing an effect there? Is that a useful technique for retaining people in those professions in those areas?

[1:55 p.m.]

Serena Verma: I think it’s multifaceted. I’m really glad you asked the question. We’ve gotten many suggestions from our network of family physicians on this topic. I also work with a training program at UBC, and I’ve been working with them for about over 15 years, where we train residents across all of British Columbia — so many are rural as well, IMGs, Canadian medical students. And that is one thing they really appreciate for sure because there’s a huge loan that they have to take out. Other suggestions include things like

with a training program at UBC. I’ve been working with them for over 15 years, where we train all residents across all of British Columbia. So many are rural as well — IMGs, Canadian medical students. So that is one thing they really appreciate for sure, because there’s a huge loan that they have to take out.

Other suggestions include things like guaranteed family practice residency placements for medical students who commit to practising in rural and remote areas. But with that, we also need support for training and supporting them, too. You know, if people enter those communities early, they raise families there. They have partners there. They really become a fabric of the community and the society and the network. It’s this beautiful symbiotic relationship that forms.

Funding initiatives to help with overhead costs of running a medical clinic in rural and remote communities. Family physicians want to do medicine. They do not really want to run a business very often. But the point is, regardless of where anyone lives in British Columbia, we are advocating for everyone to have comparable access to primary care, to wait times, to services, as well as for specialist care.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions by members? Okay, recognizing MLA Dhir.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you, Dr. Verma, for taking the time to come here. Could you explain about your team-based, patient-centred model a little bit? I’m not very clear how that would work.

Dr. Serena Verma: Great question. I did mention I used to be a pharmacist before too. In the clinic I work with, we do have other allied health professionals that work too.

So family physicians are kind of best positioned to lead team-based care, because we understand the unique needs of patients, but also the unique needs of the communities we serve. So this one-size-fits-all solution isn’t going to work for every diverse community need.

As I said, as part of my training hat with the UBC program, we train family physicians. Liaising with and coordinating care with allied health professionals as well as identifying community needs is actually a cornerstone of our curriculum and our assessment processes as well. So that might be us.

It can work in different ways. People can be housed in the same clinic, different allied health professions, with the family physician knowing which patient needs what and what community needs, what kinds of allied health professions. We could also do it in a way where doctors might be in a clinic, but what we do right now is refer for other services in kind of what we call a primary health care network. Then we get those referrals back, and we can actually set up consultations and discussions with allied health professions and have conversations on what’s going well for this patient and what’s not. But working together in teams is so essential and needed.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your time and presentation. Okay, we’ll go to our next presenter. If I can get Sara Sunderji from Access B.C. to come forward, please, thank you.

Sara Sunderji: I can wait for the MLA to come back.

Paul Choi (Chair): You’re good to go. Thanks for coming and presenting to us today. You have five minutes for a presentation, five minutes for questions, and you can begin whenever you’re ready.

Sara Sunderji: Thank you for having me. Good afternoon. My name is Sara Sunderji. I’m here on behalf of Access B.C., which is a coalition committed to advancing reproductive health equity across British Columbia.

I’m here today to discuss improving access to intrauterine devices, commonly known as IUDs, through effective pain management, something which we believe is a fiscally responsible approach to health equity.

IUDs are a highly effective, long-acting, reversible contraception, known as LARCs. They last up to ten years and have success rates above 99 percent. Beyond contraception, they serve as valuable tools in managing hormonal conditions. However, for many patients — most — the insertion process is extremely painful.

The procedure involves a tenaculum, which is a sharp metal clamp, piercing and holding the cervix in place, and then allowing for a rigid metal rod to be inserted through the cervical canal and into the uterus. Imagine this happening to your most sensitive tissue. As you can imagine, it’s incredibly painful.

Most Canadian patients undergo this procedure without anesthesia and are expected to recover within minutes. This suffering is unnecessary because multiple pain management options exist. These include local anesthetics like lidocaine, which cost mere dollars per dose.

[2:00 p.m.]

In 2023, B.C. became the first province to make prescription contraception free and generated over 300,000 claims in its first year and was estimated to have saved the health system $27 million annually by preventing unplanned pregnancies. While free contraception did address cost barriers, pain during insertion still remains.

to make prescription contraception free and generated over 300,000 claims in its first year and was estimated to have saved the health system $27 million annually by preventing unplanned pregnancies.

While free contraception did address cost barriers, pain during insertion still remains. Over 40 percent of patients describe their pain as unacceptable and cite it as the primary reason for avoiding or discontinuing its use, both of which cost our health care system tremendously. By improving pain management, we can increase IUD adoption and reduce unintended pregnancies, abortions and related complications.

Unlike the United States and the United Kingdom, British Columbia has no requirements or standards for pain management during IUD insertion. To address this gap, we propose three steps.

First, B.C. must establish dedicated MSP billing codes for IUD insertion pain management that cover all methods. Currently, clinicians receive no compensation for providing pain control, actively discouraging its use. Evidence from the United Kingdom and the U.S. demonstrates that financial incentives through billing codes and reimbursement policies significantly increase LARC adoption. These billing codes would not only promote equitable access but also enable data collection to track service quality across populations.

Second, B.C. must fund and mandate standardized provider education in IUD insertion and pain management. Most Canadian medical students, residents and practicing physicians lack thorough training in these areas. Taking this step would align B.C. with our counterparts, such as the U.K., whose training programs have improved both provider confidence and patient outcomes. Both the U.K. and Ontario programs demonstrate how increased provider capacity enhances access and lowers costs from contraceptive failure.

Third, B.C. must create a provincial infrastructure fund to ensure all clinics, especially in underserved areas, have the tools for safe, dignified IUD care. This includes local anesthetics, anti-anxiety medications, sterile equipment and trained staff.

Currently, access varies widely, with rural and marginalized communities experiencing the most significant gaps. Research shows that when clinics have reliable access to pain management tools and trained providers, IUD adoption increases, patient satisfaction improves and costly premature removals decrease.

Through implementing our proposed steps of billing code reform, standardized training and infrastructure investment, B.C. can ensure that IUD access across the province is not merely free but truly safe, consistent and equitable for all those who need it. Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for that presentation.

We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you. Great presentation. You did a wonderful job. And thank you for highlighting this issue. It’s a concern across practising medicine globally and one that has been underdiscussed for a long time.

When we’re talking about cost-effectiveness of IUDs versus other methods of birth control…. Do you have any statistics on that?

Sara Sunderji: Well, IUDs are above 99 percent effective, meaning that their failure rate is less than 1 percent, whereas other birth control methods have a higher failure rate. What that ends up doing is it requires the removal of those birth control methods, and it requires insertion of newer birth control methods.

Ideally, the gold standard — and this is based on my discussions that I’ve had with physicians who comprise our team at Access B.C. — is IUD insertion because of its effectiveness and because it lasts the longest, up to 10 years, as I said.

But a lot of individuals are deterred from using this method simply because the pain, the thought of the pain or the experience of the pain is too traumatic or too unbearable for them.

[2:05 p.m.]

Jennifer Blatherwick: And so when you mentioned looking at doing education, you were thinking — did I hear? — both medical school, so graduates coming out would be coming into the medical field with that knowledge already in their pocket but also going back and educating people who are currently in practice to make sure that they had best standards knowledge available to them?

Sara Sunderji: Thank you so much for asking that, because actually I did want to elaborate a little bit more on that.

Based on our studies…. We just did a data analysis based on the literature in Canada and B.C. One of the main findings was that family physicians are burdened with performing the most IUD insertions

I did want to elaborate a little bit more on that.

So based on our studies…. We just did data analysis based on the literature in Canada and B.C. One of the main findings was that family physicians are burdened with performing the most IUD insertions, and a lot of them don’t have access to standardized training.

There’s no certification program that’s completely mandated in order to practise IUD insertions. There are a lot of discrepancies. Also, at the medical school level, a lot of medical students will report not having training. Some individuals don’t have any training from their supervisor, and others do have training.

But the biggest theme is that it’s not standardized. There’s no consistency, and it makes it very difficult for us to track outcomes and to identify what the best pain management approach would be when there’s a lack of training.

As well as family physicians who are in the workforce and are practicing, a lot of their patients do want, as the previous presenter said, to have a one-stop hub for all their services. But a lot of these family providers don’t know where to get the education to even be able to provide IUD insertion. There’s no continuing professional education framework as well.

So we were hoping to advocate for the development of a centralized IUD training hub at the University of British Columbia medical school and with the upcoming SFU medical school so that we can have one stop where standardized education can be provided.

Sunita Dhir: Great presentation.

Seems like when you’re saying IUD here, we are talking about hormonal IUDs like Mirena, not the older-style copper IUDs.

Sara Sunderji: Yeah, so there is a shift — based on our discussions, again, with family physicians and nurse practitioners within our organization — to increased demand for hormonal IUDs. Non-hormonal IUDs are still used in certain cases, but hormonal IUDs are definitely the most prevalent.

Regardless, the insertion process tends to be the same between the two, and pain reported tends to be similar as well. So the issue of pain experienced during IUD insertion, regardless of the type of IUD, still stands.

Sunita Dhir: I have a follow-up question.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I was under the impression that hormonal IUDs like Mirena can only be inserted by a specialist. A family physician can also insert those?

Sara Sunderji: Well, based on my understanding in my discussion with Dr. Ruth Habte, who is also a family physician working with AccessBC…. She does not have specialized training in IUD insertion. She advocates for that. She did receive some at, I believe, the family physician continuing professional education level, not formally but through one of her supervisors. And she does provide that without having the specialized education.

So my understanding, my answer to that question is yeah, you don’t need specialized education in order to provide it, which is one of the issues.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, thank you so much for your presentation and your time today.

We will take a recess. If I can ask the members…. We’re going to take a bit of a shorter recess, and we’ll have us come back by 2:21 sharp.

The committee recessed from 2:08 p.m. to 2:24 p.m.

The committee recessed from 2:08 p.m. to 2:24 p.m.

[Paul Choi in the chair.]

Paul Choi (Chair): We would like to call the committee back in order, and we’ll go with our next presenter, Ms. Colette Trudeau, from Métis Nation B.C., presenting to us.

Thanks for coming today. You have five minutes for your presentation, five minutes for questions. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

Métis Nation B.C.

Colette Trudeau: Taanishi, Members of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia. My name is Colette Trudeau, and it’s my privilege to address all of you today as the CEO of Métis Nation British Columbia. As the government for Métis in B.C., we represent almost 30,000 registered citizens, and we advocate on behalf of more than 98,000 self-identified Métis people in the province.

Our budget recommendations for the 2026-27 fiscal year focus on key initiatives that build on the momentum we have created with B.C. We are asking for a total of $19.3 million to prioritize three key areas: children and families, education, and economic development and infrastructure.

[2:25 p.m.]

We are eager to continue our work, collaboratively with the province, towards MNBC’s authority over child welfare for Métis children and families in B.C. In

three key areas: children and families, education, and economic development and infrastructure. We are eager to continue our work collaboratively with the province towards MNBC’s authority over child welfare for Métis children and families in B.C.

In 2023, MNBC citizens declared that Métis Nation B.C. has inherent jurisdiction over Métis children and family services in B.C. and authorized MNBC to exercise this jurisdiction. Our proposed $10.5 million investment in children and families will support the development of child welfare laws and the provision of services to Métis children, youth and families.

We are also calling for investments in Métis-specific educational content and culturally-grounded programs in education to prevent ongoing marginalization. We recognize that true education success for Métis learners requires that they see themselves reflected in the education system. This can’t be achieved through a pan-Indigenous approach, which overlooks the distinct culture, language and heritage of Métis people. Too often, this model contributes to the ongoing marginalization of Métis students by failing to address their unique needs.

Our proposed $3.8 million investment reflects a three-year strategic plan to build a strong Métis-specific foundation within the K-to-12 education system. This strategic plan includes high-level cooperation with the B.C. Ministry of Education and Child Care, data collection and information-sharing that is evidence-based in policy and programming, Métis chartered community capacity funding, the development of and the implementation of Métis education agreements and Métis-specific cultural resources and curriculum development, and teacher professional development that integrates Métis ways of knowing and being.

This investment supports systemic, community-led change and addresses the long-standing gap in culturally appropriate supports for Métis learners across B.C.

Affordable housing is fundamental to the well-being of our nation. We are seeking $5 million in provincial support to develop a 20-storey mixed-use building. This signature project will not only address critical housing needs with 90 residential units; it will also foster economic growth with five floors of commercial space, all while preserving Métis culture and language.

This initiative aligns with the province’s Homes for People plan and advances Indigenous-led housing solutions with a distinctions-based approach. This investment from the province would reflect its ongoing commitment to reconciliation, ensuring Métis families and individuals have access to secure, sustainable housing solutions and fosters community well-being as well as economic stability. Investing in this project will support social infrastructure development while addressing socioeconomic gaps.

I would like to thank you all for your time today. MNBC is committed to ensuring the socioeconomic rights of Métis people are recognized, that Métis children are brought home to our nation, that Métis students have wraparound supports anchored in their culture, that Métis people have a safe and affordable place to live, and that Métis entrepreneurs can innovate and thrive. We continue to be grateful for your collaboration and partnership on the shared road to reconciliation. Maarsii.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, well, thank you so much for your presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you so much. That was a wonderful presentation.

I really want to talk about the development of Métis-specific resources for use in the education system. What I’m hearing from you is that you want to develop resources that we would be able to use across the province to support teachers in different grade levels who are integrating Indigenous ways of knowing and being into their curriculum but need help in terms of Métis-specific knowledge, protocol and help, right?

[2:30 p.m.]

One of the struggles that education has, especially in areas where there are land-based nations who are contiguous with the school district, is it’s a real struggle to find Elders who can come in and give meaningful interaction and pass knowledge to children. I was hoping maybe you could speak a little bit to how that could work with the Métis Nation.

Colette Trudeau: Absolutely. We have

to land-based nations who are contiguous with the school district, it’s a real struggle to find Elders who can come in and give meaningful interaction and past knowledge to children. I was hoping maybe you could speak a little bit to how that could work with the Métis Nation.

Colette Trudeau: Absolutely. We have 39 chartered communities across the province. They play a very critical role within MNBC. They are there as part of our governance structure. They are where culture thrives and our community thrives.

And so through that, we have Métis Elders, Knowledge Keepers, folks who are very culturally connected. What we have tried to do with the implementation of the IECs is make that clear connection to our Métis charter communities, because that is the way that we can connect folks to that cultural knowledge, to our Knowledge Keepers and our Elders so they can go into schools and teach our teachers as well as our students.

That has been something that we have been advocating for with the Ministry of Education and Child Care— ensuring that it is very clear who the Métis partner is in those communities and with those school districts to ensure that we can do that work.

We know that it takes time to build up curriculum, to provide that professional development. But I will tell you that Métis Nation B.C. is 100 percent here and ready to partner with the province to ensure that we’re doing that work so our Métis kids can see not only themselves but their community and their schools.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Certainly one of the things I appreciate…. So my home community is Coquitlam-Maillardville. And Festival du Bois— Métis Nation B.C. is always a significant partner there, participating, and is doing some of that experiential, hands-on learning.

Kids interact with it and are deeply affected and changed. And you can see, especially children who have Métis heritage, how meaningful it is to them to have that connection and representation. So I thank you for embarking on this work.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you so much. Thanks for the presentation. It was really nice.

You talked about a mixed-use 20-story building. Does Métis Nation B.C. have a specific location in mind? Is it a proposed location?

Colette Trudeau: We do — Surrey. We’re looking at Surrey Centre. We have a property identified, and we’re working with a partner to secure that property, but we do need the investment. As we all know, B.C. is incredibly expensive to purchase land, especially when we’re looking at areas where folks can access it by transit.

A significant amount of work is being done in this area. We have a huge population of Métis people in Surrey, and so having our head office located here to be able to have a storefront area for our Amelia Douglas Institute, which brings in artwork from different Métis artisans from across the province, is a really great way to showcase Métis culture in a community that has a significant population.

So here in Surrey, not too far away, is where we’re proposing that property, and we really do see it as an opportunity to have Métis culture on display in a city that is as diverse as Surrey is.

Sunita Dhir: Beautiful. Thank you.

Steve Morissette: Yeah, you’ve got a $5-million ask for that, so you must have other partners, because that’s a portion.

Colette Trudeau: We are working really hard. The great thing about Métis Nation British Columbia is we also work very closely with the federal government. So as we advocate with the province, we are also advocating federally for additional funds. This is just an opportunity for us to secure the property. And of course, we are going to go down the avenues to make sure that it is developed.

Steve Morissette: Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation and your time.

Colette Trudeau: Thank you so much.

Paul Choi (Chair): We’ll go to the next presenter. If I can have Mr. Scott Ellis from the Guide Outfitters Association of B.C. come forward, please.

Thank you very much for joining us today. Good afternoon. You have five minutes for presentation and five minutes for questions after. You may begin whenever you’re ready.

Guide Outfitters
Association of B.C.

Scott Ellis: Thank you, and good afternoon. And start off by saying just hosting these in-person meetings is really important. It’s a great format. So thank you very much for your time and commitment.

[2:35 p.m.]

My name is Scott Ellis, I am here representing the Guide Outfitters Association of British Columbia. We’re a non-profit association that was established in 1966, so next year is our 60th birthday. We represent outfitters across the province — approximately 2,500 people work in our industry — generating about

My name is Scott Ellis. I am here representing the Guide Outfitters Association of British Columbia. We’re a non-profit association that was established in 1966, so next year is our 60th birthday. We represent outfitters across the province. Approximately 2,500 people work in our industry, generating about $191 million annually to the economy.

Our history started with the Callbreath family in Telegraph Creek in the mid-1800s, and we’re proud to have descendants of that Tāłtān family on our board today. We believe that gives us a balanced perspective to talk about reconciliation.

Today, I do not have a specific budget ask for you, just things to think about, specifically reconciliation, land use and fair compensation, if there’s a taking. Reconciliation is hard. It pushes us to think differently about many things, including land use. Reconciliation with First Nations is something we must do, and to do it right, the outcome should heal communities, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous. It should be durable and help with prosperity.

To be clear, reconciliation is not a line item in a budget. It is a long-term investment to repairing relationships, building trust, creating a foundation for shared prosperity. But this investment needs a structure. Right now, there’s no clear path for Indigenous communities, for businesses, for the public service or for British Columbians trying to understand how reconciliation will impact their future. We need clarity, transparency and fairness.

So recommendation 1 is a reconciliation framework. B.C. needs a provincial reconciliation framework that’s clear, robust, that outlines who’s leading the process, what the timelines are, how the communities and the stakeholders are consulted and how the decisions will ultimately be made. This framework should be publicly available, regularly updated and transparent in its goals and how it measures success. Reconciliation will not be durable if it is happening behind closed doors. The northwest strategy that the Premier announced today on land use specifically could be a model or a framework that we could use for reconciliation.

Recommendation 2 is an AT branch with a supporting regulatory environment. Businesses, especially those that operate on Crown land, need transparency and certainty during these times, specifically for those that operate in the adventure tourism space.

Adventure tourism is the foundation of the “Super, natural British Columbia” brand, and British Columbia has the potential to be a true world-class adventure tourism destination. For it to grow to its full potential, an AT branch and supportive legislation is needed. Like the mountain resorts branch, an AT branch would have a dedicated team to champion adventure tourism. This, combined with an updated AT policy, would drive investment and open up economic opportunities throughout British Columbia.

Understandably, with uncertainty around land use and litigation or lawsuits, the public service takes longer to make decisions and often grants tenures for shorter terms than they should. And often, First Nations are blamed for this. This environment neither grows the economy nor helps with prosperity. Adventure tourism is a major driver, but land use uncertainty is holding it back. A dedicated AT branch and an updated AT policy would boost investor confidence, streamline decision-making and help with prosperity.

Recommendation 3: fair compensation when impacts occur. When reconciliation impacts land-based businesses, fair compensation must be part of the process. It is integral to reconciliation. It is not a barrier to reconciliation. It is a necessary part of building trust and healing, and we believe that when people are treated fairly, they are willing to move forward together. It is about honouring everyone’s right to ensure no community is left behind — Indigenous or non-Indigenous.

In closing, reconciliation is not easy, but it is possible if we have a reconciliation framework, transparent process for land use, and a commitment to fairness for all British Columbians. This government has the opportunity to lead reconciliation in a way that brings people together instead of dividing them, and that’s what healing looks like. Thank you.

[2:40 p.m.]

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members. Any questions?

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for your presentation. I am hoping that for your point 3, when you were talking about fair compensation

Any questions?

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you for your presentation.

I am hoping that for your point 3, when you were talking about fair compensation, you could provide us with an example of what you’re thinking.

Scott Ellis: Yeah, so when a land-back decision happens to aid or advance reconciliation with a particular nation and in that process, land is given or tenures are impacted by businesses that are on that land today or licenses that are operating on that land today. And by no wrongdoing of their own, they are made not viable or the impacts are measurable. In the public interest and to help with economic development for that nation, there should be a mechanism where that tenure holder, that business, has their social economic assessment done, and then they can be made whole again, and they can move on to do something somewhere else.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay.

Thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

We will call up our next presenter. If I can get Miss Tammy Murphy to come forward from CUPE Local 728, please.

Hello. Thanks for coming and presenting to us today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready.

CUPE Local 728, Surrey
School District Support Staff

Tammy Murphy: Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Tammy Murphy. I’m the president of CUPE Local 728, the union that represents 5,000 support staff in the Surrey school district. Our membership includes community support workers, bus drivers, clerical, maintenance trades, education assistants and other student support workers. Our members serve B.C.’s largest and fastest growing school district and work on the traditional unceded territories of the Coast Salish people, specifically the Katzie, Kwantlen, and the Semiahmoo First Nations.

I’d like to talk about inflation and it being so high, which emphasizes how broken our K-12 funding model is. We need a new approach. The existing funding model is based on student numbers and therefore fails to properly account for fixed costs. Costs like infrastructure deficits, unstable economic, and inflationary environments. Our current funding model does not address things like portables, their moves. And it does not support or maintain our aging schools. The Surrey school district has grown, and we have not been funded for the increase of our buildings in our maintenance departments, so we haven’t increased anything. We have the same amount that we had before.

It also fails to address our additional funding needs that the district has to support students with complex and diverse needs. Our district now has an approach that unless there’s an obvious behavioural or medical need, the child does not get support from education assistance.

Lack of adequate public funding stresses all aspects of the system including staffing structures. Increased workloads cause unfilled vacancies, and absences add to a new level of working challenges. Funding shortfalls lead the district to expanding precarious work. Rather than creating full-time family-sustainable jobs, it leads to recruitment and retention challenges.

I presented to this committee in the past and have had similar recommendations, and I am here today because the problem is only getting worse. This government needs to invest in public education in the way that meets the complex needs of all districts.

Our first recommendation is to include block funding to help school districts address their structural shortfalls and to improve the per student formula to better address inflationary and other cost pressures facing school districts.

I also want to speak today about the child care crisis faced by B.C. families. The public education system struggles to recruit and retain qualified education workers due to the part-time aspect of the work.

[2:45 p.m.]

This government is eight years into a 10-year child care plan and B.C. families still struggle to find child care spaces. It shouldn’t be this way, especially when the solution is easy. I’m talking about publicly delivered before and after school care in B.C. public schools.

In BC, the current child care plan

this government is eight years into a ten-year child care plan and B.C. families still struggle to find child care spaces.

It shouldn’t be this way, especially when the solution is easy. I’m talking about publicly delivered before and after school in B.C. public schools. In B.C., the current child care model is nearly…. All child cares are run by non-profit and for-profit groups, even the ones on school district property. There is no public option of operating alongside these private systems, which is operated greatly by precarious workers who are not paid a living wage and have few benefits and no access to pension.

What British Columbia needs is a public option for school-aged children, one that provides reliable, stable and accessible child care to everyone in the community. Public child care in schools means fewer transitions and better care for kids, better jobs for workers and better access to reliable and affordable spaces that parents need. We literally have a readily accessible child care system in every community. The government needs to fund the startup phases for these programs. Budget 2026 can do that.

Examples of this: Campbell River, Nanaimo, Cowichan Valley and Fort St. John have expanded these successfully and they have great programs running before and after school. Families are getting the care that they need and district employees are claiming that the full-time work has changed their lives.

Our second recommendation is that Budget 2026 invest provincially wide expansions on before- and after-school care programs operated in-house by school districts, which will create thousands of new spaces for public schools across the province.

Thank you. And I’m happy to answer your questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you for your presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thanks for coming. So the communities that you mentioned that had publicly funded before- and after-school care through the school district Fort St. John, I think, and I know you mentioned a few other ones…. Are they the ones that were the part of the pilot? There had been a pilot that had been started. Just wondering if you knew more information about that.

Tammy Murphy: The government originally put a pilot through to all districts. Surrey has one as well, but they only have one program operating for seamless day and one operating for before and after because they say that the government is not funding them enough to put in four or more programs. So they’re looking for more money to be able to invest further.

I know that the other groups started the same way we did and they found a way to keep it going and successfully. We’ve actually used them as pilot projects for other districts. Unfortunately, other districts aren’t always willing to listen to what they have going. We’ve tried to present to our district, have people come in from Campbell River to talk about it. People have to be willing to listen. But there is a successful way of doing it, and we’re hoping that the government will help to push the implementation of that.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Okay, great, thank you.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I’m hoping we can talk a little bit about the differentiation between seamless day care and the expansion of before- and after-school programs. Seamless day is usually for kids like K to 5, and you’re thinking before- and after-school care more like recreational care, so it would be for school-aged kids like grade 6 and above?

Tammy Murphy: Yeah.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Do you have any…? You were mentioning that is working in some districts. Is there a district that it’s already implemented?

Tammy Murphy: Yeah, seamless day is implemented in many districts, but the before and after school is successful. It is, I know for…. I talked to the other presidents. I know it’s working really well on the Island. The Island has really put in forward for going with the programs. They literally have the education assistance floating throughout the day. They have the StrongStart. You would have your ECEs coming in and doing those parts. They really implemented a successful system, and they actually have a write-up on how to get it, which CUPE has, which we would be very happy to share with everybody.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Because my one…. I guess it’s not a concern. It’s just I was wondering how it worked with the staffing, if it was easy for them that the union members are ready to take up those positions and it wasn’t then becoming a challenge with saying that they would provide these spaces and then nobody takes it up.

[2:50 p.m.]

Tammy Murphy: It’s part of the discussion we’ve actually had in the past. I know I’ve had this discussion with our district, because our district will sometimes say: “Oh, well, people don’t want full-time work.” It’s true, there are a few people that don’t want full-time work, but there are more people that want full-time work. There are people working two and three jobs to be able to support their families, and these are the people…. In all honesty, you need to post a position. You post it for starting at 6 a.m., that’s when your school sites open, and running for the time that it ends, and vice versa for the other.

They don’t want full-time work, but there are more people that want full-time work. There are people working two and three jobs to be able to support their families. These are the people….

In all honesty, you need to post a position. You post it starting at 6 a.m. — that’s when your school sites open — and running to the time that it ends and vice versa for the other. There are so many people that want work, and I think that it’s an excuse because there are definitely people.

I started this job — I’m an education assistant as well — 27 years ago. I started it because I had little kids. It was easy. Then, as my kids got a little bit older, and I had daycare, I couldn’t afford to be able to support my kids. Even though I was the second…. I’m lucky. I have two incomes in our household.

It’s not easy. I did it. I worked two and three jobs to be able to make up for the lost hours once my kids got a little bit older. People are now in the system. Younger people aren’t coming in anymore due to the violence and the short hours, so we have less people coming in. We have people in retirement ages working. I’m 50, now working at my age. I need more hours. I need a second job.

These kind of things…. You will never, ever be short on people that will want full-time work. Never.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): It’s great to hear.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay. Thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

Okay, moving on to the next presenter, if I can get Dorothy Tompkins from CUPE Local 1260 to come forward please. Thank you for joining us today. You have five minutes for a presentation, five minutes for questions. You can begin when you’re ready.

CUPE Local 1260, Langley
School District Support Staff

Dorothy Tompkins: My name is Dot Tompkins, and I’m the president of CUPE Local 1260. I respectfully acknowledge that in Langley, we work on the unceded traditional territory of the Máthexwi, q̓ic̓əy̓, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓ and SEMYOME First Nations.

I’m here today on behalf of CUPE Local 1260, representing around 1,300 staff in the Langley school district. We are education assistants, bus drivers, youth care workers, Indigenous support workers, clerical staff, library techs and so many others who help keep our schools running.

I’m here to talk about the urgent need for increased investment in B.C.’s public education system, both core funding and targeted resources to support inclusive education and safe working conditions. Despite recent increases, funding has not kept pace with the complex and growing needs in our schools. Years of underfunding have left our school buildings aging, support staff stretched thin and classrooms under-resourced.

Districts like ours are facing budget deficits and making cuts, not because of declining enrolment, but because we’re being asked to do more with less. We are already understaffing the needs that exist. Staff layoffs announced this spring will directly impact students, not because demand has dropped, but because there simply isn’t enough funding to support the current level of service. We need core funding that meets the moment and maintains public school infrastructure.

I also want to bring attention to the increasingly dangerous working conditions faced by education support staff, especially those working with students with complex needs. Let me share some real experiences from the front line.

A highly experienced education assistant now wears Kevlar sleeves and a heavy motorcycle-style jacket to protect herself from the biting, scratching and hitting by a non-verbal Grade 1 student. That student now reaches under the jacket and also targets her private areas. She is burned out and repeatedly told that this is just part of the job.

Another EA was attacked by a student at dismissal after a field trip. While waiting for the bus, he punched her in the head, got her to the ground, slammed her head into the concrete and attempted to strangle her. She nearly lost consciousness and is now off work with a concussion and PTSD.

One EA was assaulted by a student who ripped out chunks of her hair and threatened to kill her with horrifying detail. The only consequence for the student was missing one recess. That EA now works in fear.

A new EA was repeatedly punched in the head by a Grade 5 student after he had already tried to push her down a flight of stairs. She continues to support him daily but with growing fear and stress.

These are not isolated incidents. They are becoming far too common, and for an average salary of around $37,000 a year, barely above the poverty line. Many EAs work multiple jobs just to survive. Burnout is rampant. Recruitment is becoming nearly impossible. People are not leaving because they don’t care. They’re leaving because the system doesn’t support them or the students they work with.

[2:55 p.m.]

This is why our second recommendation is to ensure that Budget 2025 provides targeted resources for inclusive education. That means one support worker in every primary classroom, timely assessments for students and enough staffing to ensure a safe

They’re leaving because the system doesn’t support them or the students they work with. This is why our second recommendation is to ensure that Budget 2025 provides targeted resources for inclusive education. That means one support worker in every primary classroom, timely assessments for students and enough staffing to ensure safe, effective support.

We also need to address structural challenges that are forcing qualified workers out of public education. Skilled trades in K-12 earn 9 percent to12 percent less than those in the municipal sector, making recruitment almost impossible. And most education assistants aren’t given full-time hours, if any, even when the demand clearly exists.

Just last week our district reported 176 unfilled absences in one week; 102 were sick days, 17 of which were unpaid. That’s 50 schools with major staffing gaps. My question is: how do we relieve this stress? The answer is properly supporting the sector with the workforce it needs.

Our third recommendation is that Budget 2026 fund real solutions, wage fairness for trades and full-time hours for support staff. This will stabilize the workforce, provide better support for vulnerable students, strengthen families and help expand child care in schools, affordable child care.

We believe in public education. We believe in inclusion. But belief just isn’t enough. It has to be backed by action and resources.

Thank you for your time today.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you for the presentation. We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thanks for your presentation. I’m always concerned to hear about safety issues, particularly in schools.

Apart from increasing the number of staff available to help with interventions and support for kids, are there any other initiatives you think we need to press for in terms of supporting the needs of students that may have behavioural issues, that could be violent? Or any way else that we can press the government for mitigating the risk that workers are facing at school?

Dorothy Tompkins: That’s a tough one. I think part of it…. Of course, having full-time hours means that a worker is not stressed out and that they’re able to work to the best of their capabilities.

I think that a lot of students aren’t getting assessed soon enough, and also, there aren’t enough resources. For example, if you have a counsellor in a school, they aren’t able to see all the students, because they don’t have enough time. Sometimes they are in two or three different schools. and so they might be able to see a certain number of students but not all of them. I mean, there are so many things. But I think that getting students assessed early and having support for the workers would be great. Some kids do need two people to work with them.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? Okay.

Well, thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

We’ll go to Miss Nikki Kenyon from SelfDesign Learning Foundation.

Thank you so much for joining us today. You have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go.

Nikki Kenyon: Excellent. Thank you.

Good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to speak today. My name is Nikki Kenyon, and I’m the interim president and CEO of the SelfDesign Learning Foundation. We represent learners across the province and contractors across the province. So I’m speaking today from the traditional ancestral and unceded territory of the SEMYOME, q̓ic̓əy̓, kʷikʷəƛ̓əm, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓, qiqéyt and Tsawwassen First Nations. It’s quite a hub.

SelfDesign is a not-for-profit organization with over 40 years of experience developing and delivering personalized online and lifelong learning programs. We serve as the school authority for the SelfDesign Learning Community, which is one of the largest independent provincial online learning schools in British Columbia. We currently enrol approximately 2,000 learners in our K-12 program across the province and, additionally, have learners registered as home-schoolers. Our approach is deeply aligned with the ministry’s priorities of inclusion and diversity and Indigenous priorities, our principals and learner-centred education.

Our holistic model supports academic, social and emotional growth. This is reflected in our metrics for success. For example, over 95 percent of the courses started by learners in grades 10 to 12 are completed within one semester. This far exceeds the average among online schools and speaks to the strength of the mentorship we provide and the personalized support.

[3:00 p.m.]

I’d just like to share briefly two stories of two learners to illustrate the impact of our model. Sheira joins self-design in grade 3. She uses a wheelchair and requires full-time support for every daily activity. With determination and grit and flexible, personalized learning, Sheira graduated with a Dogwood diploma last year, and she gave a powerful keynote at our

two stories of two learners to illustrate the impact of our model.

Shira joined SelfDesign in grade 3. She uses a wheelchair and requires full-time support for every daily activity. With determination, grit and flexible, personalized learning, Shira graduated with a Dogwood diploma last year, and she gave a powerful keynote at our commencement ceremony. Her journey highlights how government funding and inclusive online education can create equitable paths for success.

I just want to thank you for that, actually. It makes a huge difference.

Alex, another graduate, lives with diagnosed learning disabilities, ADHD and mental health challenges. Traditional learning environments failed to meet their needs. With support from a B.C. certified educator and our learning support services team, and with a lot of struggle, Alex stayed engaged and graduated. Their story underscores how flexible education and properly funded supports transform outcomes for students with complex needs.

SelfDesign is the largest school of record in British Columbia for children with disabilities and diversabilities. At our school, we support about 750 designated learners, who receive ministry supplementary funding, including approximately 450 with autism in our school. We also support another 250 learners with emerging and high-incidence needs like Alex, who did not qualify for funding, despite having documented challenges like learning disabilities and ADHD.

These students require access to assessments, mental health resources and individualized plans, supports that we strive to provide using the basic per-student funding, which is just 40 percent of what public brick-and-mortar schools receive. This funding gap limits our ability to meet all of their needs.

I have two recommendations. The first is to increase the funding rate for independent online schools.

Public online schools receive 80 percent of the funding given to brick-and-mortar schools. Independent online schools like SelfDesign receive only 50 percent of that 80, yet we are expected to meet the same educational standards, support vulnerable learners and maintain secure digital infrastructure with fewer resources. Increasing the funding rate for independent online schools would help us sustain and strengthen high-quality, inclusive learning for thousands across the province.

The second recommendation is to expand eligibility for supplementary funding to include high-incidence needs.

We commend the ministry for increasing the supplementary funding, the inclusive education grant for learners with designated needs such as Shira. However, learners with high-incidence needs such as Alex often fall outside the current funding criteria, despite their needs for significant support. Expanding supplementary funding to include high-incidence categories would ensure that equitable access to the resources these learners need to succeed.

In closing, I just want to thank you again for this opportunity. We are pleased to work alongside the ministry to support learners across the province, and we remain committed to sharing our experience and insights to help shape a more inclusive and learner-centred education system in British Columbia.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you very much for your presentation.

We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you for your presentation.

I have a question. How many of your students graduate from SelfDesign with the Dogwood?

Nikki Kenyon: I just was at commencement last week. We had 130 participating. About 108 of those graduated with the Dogwood, and the others were school completion certificates for learners with complex needs. But Shira was one of the ones last year who graduated, even though she has pretty complex needs.

Sunita Dhir: Thank you. Thanks for your work.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? Nope? Okay, we’re good.

Thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

I will call up next Ms. Alicia Rempel from B.C. Confederation of Parent Advisory Councils. Thank you for joining us today. You have five minutes for the presentation, five minutes for the questions. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go.

B.C. Confederation of
Parent Advisory Councils

Alicia Rempel: Great, thank you.

Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

I’d like to acknowledge with respect and gratitude that we gather on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territories of the Semiahmoo, qʼʷan̓ƛʼən̓ and q̓ic̓əy̓ First Nations, who have stewarded these lands for generations. We honour their enduring connection to the land, water and community and recognize the ongoing contributions of all Indigenous peoples who continue to live and care for this territory.

I’d also like to acknowledge our Métis partners and friends living in these territories.

[3:05 p.m.]

My name is Alicia Rempel, and I’m speaking on behalf of the B.C. Confederation of Parent Advisory Councils, representing parents of over half a million public school children across B.C.

Each year we hear from PACs and DPACs and families, and the message is clear. Our public education system is

speaking on behalf of the B.C. Confederation of Parent Advisory Councils, representing parents of over half a million public school children across B.C.

Each year we hear from PACs, DPACs and families, and the message is clear: our public education system is at a breaking point. Despite rising enrolment, districts are cutting vital services like inclusive education, counselling, extracurriculars and maintenance. Schools are aging, understaffed and under pressure. Parents are worried, educators are exhausted, and students are bearing the brunt.

These are not isolated issues; they’re the result of long-term, systemic underfunding. We urge this committee to recognize that chronic underfunding is now a barrier to both equity and excellence. So today we offer three urgent recommendations for Budget 2026.

One, increase core operational funding to districts. We call for immediate and sustained increases to core operating budgets. Districts must not be forced to cut support staff or enlarge classrooms just to balance the books. In Surrey, over 40 education assistant positions are being cut, and specialized learning centres are closing. In Kamloops-Thompson, nearly 80 staff positions are being eliminated.

These decisions are not isolated. They’re systemic symptoms of chronic underfunding that erodes academic achievement. It strains mental health services and disproportionately affects vulnerable students. A commitment to operational funding that reflects real inflation and real needs is essential.

Two, commitment to literacy equity, through structured and science-based reading. BCCPAC calls for the implementation of structured literacy across B.C., supported by policy and curriculum changes and targeted investments. We need literacy centres in every district. We need them to be offering tier 3 reading interventions and evidence-based screeners, beginning in kindergarten. We know that reading is foundational to student success, and we cannot delay closing the literacy gap any longer.

Thirdly, provide targeted capital funding for growth, safety and accessibility. We urge the province to fully fund modular classrooms and commit to building permanent schools in fast-growing districts. In places like Surrey, reliance on hundreds of portables reflects years of underinvestment. Even modular additions often require capital approval and alignment with long-term plans. Deferred maintenance must be addressed now and not later.

Updated area standards are essential to support inclusive, accessible spaces with non-enrolling areas — child care and modern playgrounds. Without this type of targeted capital investment, equity and safety will continue to decline. So we urge you to invest in the long-term health of our public education system, because the future of B.C. depends on how we support our children today.

Thank you very much.

Paul Choi (Chair): We will now turn to questions by members. Do we have any questions? No questions.

Well, thank you so much for your presentation.

Next we will turn to Ms. Nicole Ford, from Tourism Industry Association of B.C.

Nicole Ford: Good afternoon. You’re running ahead of time. That’s fantastic.

Paul Choi (Chair): Yes, thanks for coming today. You have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions after. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go.

Tourism Industry Association of B.C.

Nicole Ford: Wonderful. Thank you again for the opportunity to speak today on behalf of the Tourism Industry Association of B.C. I’m Nicole; I serve on the board of the association. I also work for Rocky Mountaineer, where I’m the vice-president of communications and stakeholder relations.

I have two recommendations I’ll be sharing with you today on behalf of TIABC. The first is around an increased funding request for Destination British Columbia. The second one is funding to support emergency management in the province.

First, regarding Destination B.C., they are a provincial Crown corp. and are absolutely critical to the success of tourism here in the province. They’re responsible for marketing B.C. to the world but also for marketing British Columbia to Canadians and B.C. residents, to encourage them to come explore the incredible things that this province has to offer.

[3:10 p.m.]

They also provide leadership for expanding B.C. tourism products — investing in our experiences to make us more competitive on the world stage. One thing I want to bring up is that in 2023 tourism contributed $9.7 billion in provincial GDP, 4 percent of the overall economy.

They also provide leadership for expanding B.C. tourism products, investing in our experiences to make us more competitive on the world stage.

One thing I want to bring up is that in 2023, tourism contributed $9.7 billion to the provincial GDP — 4 percent of the overall economy. That’s actually more than mining. It’s more than agriculture. It’s more than forestry. That impact can continue to grow with an investment in Destination British Columbia.

As I mentioned, DBC, Destination B.C., is critical to the success of the tourism industry, yet its budget has been stagnant for ten years. If you consider inflation, they’ve actually decreased their budget by about 20 percent since 2019. What that does is reduce their buying power.

It also reduces our ability to effectively compete for tourist dollars on the world stage. Global competition for travellers is fierce, and Destination British Columbia will need more in order to do more. Additionally, Canadians are showing a strong interest in travelling domestically right now, so we really want to be able to leverage on that.

The request is that Destination British Columbia see an immediate funding boost of a minimum increase of 10 percent. What that will do is help DBC continue to market, develop and support the tourism industry as the economic driver it is for B.C. communities.

The second request is, as I mentioned, around emergency management and funding for that. Each year — we all know this — B.C. communities are forced to navigate a range of crises, whether that is wildfires, drought, flooding and so much more. More often than not, these communities are tourism dependent communities, and we consistently see the tourism industry stepping up — tourism businesses providing shelter, housing, food and other services for evacuees, first responders and tourists in their area. They’re doing this all while they are facing impacts to their business due to the same crisis.

What we are requesting is ongoing and secured funding to ensure that the tourism industry can prepare for, mitigate against, respond to and recover from disasters and emergencies that they face. Within this are two specific funding recommendations. One is $500,000 annually to fund permanent emergency management personnel in each of the five tourism regions.

The second is a commitment of up to a million dollars annually to restart and expand a reservation platform that will connect evacuees with hotels and accommodations during a major crisis. There was an important project that was recently discontinued by the government, and it was a long overdue pilot for a digital platform. What it did was show where available rooms were during a crisis.

Unfortunately, without that operational, there’s no backup plan other than a very manual process, which is not effective when hundreds or thousands of people are looking for a safe place to stay in an emergency. So what we’re requesting with this funding is that it would actually restart the project, and it would allow it to be expanded to more areas of the province.

Then with this active reservation platform, it’ll ensure that people have somewhere safe to stay in a major crisis. It’s a smart tool like this that will help tourism continue to support visitors and community members that are evacuated, as well as first responders during the crisis events.

Those are my two recommendations. To recap, it’s a minimum of a 10 percent increase for DBC so it can continue to support our visitor economy. The second is increased funding for emergency management: $500,000 annually to support emergency management personnel and up to a million annually to restart this reservation platform to ensure that when communities are evacuated, people have a safe place to stay and our tourism industry can continue to support and operate in those communities.

Thank you, and I’ll happily take questions.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you very much for your presentation. We’ll turn to questions by members.

Elenore Sturko: Thank you for the presentation. What year was the reservation platform cancelled?

Nicole Ford: It was just within these past couple of months. The Tourism Industry Association, together with the B.C. Hotel Association, actually published a letter in recognition of the fact that it was discontinued. So it was just recently. It was within the last two years. It was built and tested and rolled out, and then the project was discontinued.

On behalf of the industry, they would say that it wasn’t perfect, but it was a start. It was a good foundation, from which more can build, and much more effective than a manual process of trying to search for rooms when you’re dealing with an active crisis.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Can we just talk a little bit more about the idea of having permanent staff, responsive staff, for crisis?

[3:15 p.m.]

You’re thinking that it would be staff that normally work in the tourism, outdoor outfitting industry that also work in emergency response? Is that what you’re thinking? Or are you thinking different staff?

Nicole Ford: Great question. It’s the concept of having someone in each of those tourism

So you’re thinking that it would be staff that normally work in the tourism, outdoor outfitting industry that also work in emergency response? Is that what you’re thinking? Or you’re thinking different staff?

Nicole Ford: Great question. It’s the concept of having someone in each of those tourism regions that is leading emergency management and liaising within the provincial emergency management system on behalf of the tourism. So really connecting the two.

There’s been a lot of great work of getting the tourism industry integrated within the provincial emergency management system. There’s still more work to do, and these roles would play a crucial connection in each of those regions for the tourism industry.

Jennifer Blatherwick: So not necessarily overlapping staffing but someone who has industry knowledge and understanding, deep connection, and can liaise between industry and government?

Nicole Ford: Yes.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay. What was the name of the program?

Nicole Ford: I don’t know that it had an official name. I can search that up and find that out for you, but it was within the Ministry of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness, and it was a hotel reservation platform.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay.

Thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

Nicole Ford: Thank you. Good luck staying on time and ahead of schedule.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you.

We will go to our next presenter, Mr. Donald Grant from Emergency Communication Professionals of B.C.

Thank you so much for joining us today. As always, you have five minutes for presentation, five minutes for questions after. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go. Thank you.

Emergency Communications
Professionals of B.C.

Donald Grant: Great. Thank you. Hello, everyone. My name is Don Grant. I’m the president of CUPE Local 8911, the Emergency Communications Professionals of B.C. We represent over 700 emergency communications professionals that work out E-comm 911.

I’m honoured to be speaking to you today on the unceded and ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the SEMYOME, q̓ic̓əy̓ , kʷikʷəƛ̓əm, qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓, K’k’ai, and Tsawwassen First Nations.

E-comm is the first point of contact for over two million 911 calls each year from 25 regional districts across B.C. We also dispatch for 34 police and 40 fire departments out of emergency communication centres located in Vancouver, Burnaby and Saanich. Our members are the calm voice in the moment of crisis, responding to these calls and making sure that when disaster strikes, help is on the way fast. Our members are the calm voice on the line during a crisis. They are the unseen first, first responders.

Today I’m here with three key recommendations to improve emergency communication services for all British Columbians.

First, we call on the provincial government to establish dedicated and reliable provincial funding for emergency communications. Right now, funding is fragmented and unsustainable, based on dozens of contracts between municipal and regional governments, causing the province’s emergency communication system to be short-staffed and ill-equipped to respond to disasters.

What that means is that property taxes and a landline-based 911 levy are used to fund the 911 system. Property taxes are ill-equipped to address the inflationary realities of emergency communication services that necessitate proactive funding and the ability to respond to the most serious emergencies imaginable as well as higher-than-typical call volumes.

Additionally, landlines are no longer how callers interact with the 911 system. In 2023, landlines accounted for only 17 percent of the calls made to 911. This issue is further complicated by the fact that in any one incident — take an accident on the Trans-Canada Highway, for example — many of the callers driving by won’t live in the municipality where that incident is occurring.

These cost pressures mean that the province’s emergency response system has struggled for years. In 2024, approximately 40,000 calls to 911 were not answered within the necessary response time of five seconds or less. Of greater concern, information is not publicly available about how long those calls have waited, because there’s a marked difference between a call waiting six seconds and six minutes.

In the last couple of months, we have seen the system under immense pressure, with emergency communications professionals going long periods without being able to take a break or even step away from their desk to use the washroom. Over the last two weeks, one of our members worked an 18-hour shift.

We’ve also seen wait times on emergency lines reach more than five minutes. We know that when an emergency happens, seconds count. Fire doubles every 30 seconds. The chance of surviving a heart attack decreases rapidly, and criminal offenders become harder to locate and apprehend.

[3:20 p.m.]

We believe that a 911 system where no call waits on hold is not just a dream but an achievable reality, but only if there is strong commitment from the provincial government and sustained investment. Dedicated and reliable funding is essential not to just respond to everyday emergencies but also large-scale events like floods, heat waves and earthquakes, events that don’t respect any municipal boundary. They demand a coordinated, fully funded and integrated

strong commitment from the provincial government and sustained investment.

Dedicated and reliable funding is essential not to just respond to everyday emergencies but also large-scale events like floods, heatwaves and earthquakes, events that don’t respect any municipal boundary. They demand a coordinated, fully funded and integrated provincial system with backup locations and the necessary staff who respond to these calls for help.

It’s also essential for the upcoming transition to next generation 911, which is going to enable new ways of connecting to the 911 service, including text messages, photos, videos. And while this new system will enhance the service that we’re able to provide to British Columbians, it will also increase complexity and cost. Without new funding, we risk falling behind before the new system even launches.

Second, we recommend stronger provincial oversight of E-Comm with mandatory standards and clear public accountability. A 2024 report by Deloitte confirmed what we’ve long known: the current model struggles to provide effective oversight, approve critical investments or hold management accountable.

Finally, we have one recommendation to have our members play a larger, more integrated role in supporting the mental health of callers. Approximately one in five British Columbians experience a mental health challenge each year. The 2022 report from the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act highlighted that properly funding a continuum of mental health responses, including integrating mental health support into 911 systems, will substantially improve the emergency response that callers can have.

We believe that these three recommendations will substantially improve the service that British Columbians deserve: a strong, responsive, always-ready — no matter the time, place or emergency — emergency response system. Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for the presentation. We will now turn to questions, starting with MLA Rattée.

Claire Rattée: I met with E-Comm 911 not too long ago. And we spoke about a number of these options, like integrating the mental health option into 911 services and things like that. But I’m just wondering…. There were a few things that we’ve discussed at that meeting that you didn’t mention. I just kind of wanted to see if those were still priorities.

One thing was a cell phone levy rather than the landline levy. So kind of getting away from that model of generating revenues off of landlines, because obviously they’re pretty outdated now.

Another one was looking at geolocating to allow better delivery of service. So when people call in, they can be geolocated.

And another thing that we had spoken about was actually expanding service options, because I represent a riding where in a good portion of my riding, we don’t have 911 service. And so that’s a really big concern to me, obviously, for safety purposes for my constituents.

So I was wondering if you could touch on any of those.

Donald Grant: Yeah, so I’ll respond in reverse order. Closing the gaps in the 911 system is absolutely essential. Working with the telcos to make sure that there are wireless services that are available like on the Highway of Tears and things like that are absolutely essential. And it needs provincial government push to make sure that becomes a reality.

About geolocation. Next generation 911 will be much more specific on where callers are located. That’s going to enhance emergency response to be able to even see like how high up a caller may be within a building or things like that.

We don’t charge by the call that comes in. That has never been something that has been talked about. But we aren’t experts on taxation or how that stuff may go. But the UBCM has put forward a resolution to look at things like putting a monthly levy on cell phone bills to replace or to compliment the landline option.

Claire Rattée: Sorry, just to clarify. That is what I was talking about — not per use but having like an extra cost on cell phone bills on a monthly bill that would help to offset some of those costs.

When you’re mentioning things like the Highway of Tears, there are certain aspects of that that are actually a separate issue because it’s actually got to do with connectivity and having cell phone service, which a large portion of my riding doesn’t have, and the Highway of Tears goes through my riding.

That’s a significant issue, but we’ve also got issues around…. If you look at the Nass Valley, for example, they just don’t have 911 service. They have cell phone service; they don’t have 911 service. And so I think that that is an issue that I’m surprised hasn’t been dealt with yet.

I just kind of wanted to see the thoughts on that. So thank you. I appreciate it.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thank you for the presentation. Thanks for the work that the members do at E-Comm. Really essential service for B.C.

[3:25 p.m.]

It’s my understanding that other provinces already collect a levy on cell phones. And it’s just a matter of implementing that here in British Columbia. Is that your understanding as well?

Donald Grant: That is my understanding. That’s correct.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? None? Okay.

It’s my understanding that other provinces already collect a levy on cell phones, and it’s just a matter of implementing that here in British Columbia. Is that your understanding as well?

Donald Grant: That is my understanding. That’s correct.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? None?

Okay, thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

We’re going to move on to Mr. John Leech from Technology Professionals of B.C. to come forward. Good afternoon. Thanks for coming early. You have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions after. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go. Thank you.

John Leech: Superb. Well, first of all, thank you for the opportunity. I’m going to be speaking about technology professionals and engineering and applied science, technology, education and careers.

As you indicated, my name is John Leech. I’m CEO with this advocacy body. TPBC, for short, is advancing education and careers, serving as an advocate for engineering and applied science technology. Let me give you a couple of examples where we’re starting some work.

One of them is, as you might imagine, promoting STEM — science, technology, engineering, math — careers in K to 12. We are developing programs for women in technology to advance and increase the numbers. We’re working with people with disabilities. In fact, one of our board members is a lead on that program. And we’re working with people, Indigenous folks across the province — just speaking a few minutes ago with Dawn McGrath who’s doing a marvelous job, a real firecracker for us.

I thought it might be helpful just to identify, very quickly, three key issues with this, then walk into a little bit of background in terms of who we are, what our members do, etc., and then leave you with three recommendations.

The first is that in a very general way, the well-paid, wealth-producing career options in technology are not well understood in British Columbia, arguably across the country. Secondly, there’s a need to report on the current contribution to the B.C. economy of these technology professionals. And thirdly, the technology-specific standards that are used for the accreditation of technology programs throughout the province of B.C. are now ten years old and, in our view, in serious need of being updated.

In terms of our members, they’re technology professionals who generally function between the trades, on the one hand, and university educated professionals, on the other — engineers, architects, foresters, biologists, agrologists, etc. As you might expect, there’s a little bit of overlap in both areas. They offer services in engineering and applied science technology that fall within this range.

I thought it might be helpful to connect with the health sciences to give you a perspective. People know a lot about the health science professions but maybe don’t quite understand where we fit in in terms of the engineering and applied science technology.

Our members run the gamut from nurse’s aides, from the licensed practical nurse, the registered nurse, the nurse practitioner, X-ray techs, lab techs, etc. One of the specialty areas in which our members are found is as biomedical engineering technologists and technicians. It’s fair to say there are a lot of people in our community that wouldn’t know about the biomed tech.

As far as education is concerned, typically our members are graduates with a two-year diploma of technology for the technologist, a technician’s certificate or a micro-credential, and in some cases, a mix of all of those. Members work in the professional, technical and scientific sector, manufacturing, construction, public administration, mining, oil and gas, and high tech. They run and own their own businesses and hold various technical, management and leadership positions in medium and large-sized firms.

[3:30 p.m.]

In terms of the contribution to the economy, I was involved, when I was CEO with the Applied Science Technologists and Technicians for many years, when we contracted through the national body, with the Conference Board of Canada study. In that study in 2016, it reported that the 400,000 engineering technicians and technologists contributed $54.7 billion to the Canadian economy. In British Columbia, we estimate that today to be about $80 billion for Canada and about $12 billion in B.C. terms. Now, that’s a 2024 number, and it’s our guesstimate, given that there is a bit of a dearth of information since that 2016 report.

Looking specifically at high tech, I saw an article by Jill Tipping, CEO of B.C. Tech Association, who wrote in the Vancouver Sun

Now, that’s a 2024 number, and it’s our guesstimate, given that there is a bit of a dearth of information since that 2016 report.

Looking specifically at high tech, I saw an article by Jill Tipping, CEO of B.C. Tech Association, who wrote in the Vancouver Sun on May 20: “We need governments to invest in human capital by funding an additional 10,000 spaces in tech-relevant public post-secondary programs.”

The other thing that we’ve noticed, and I’m sure you have as well, is the considerable increase in knowledge about trades education and careers. I point to that because we are quite impressed with what SkilledTradesBC has done to manage and develop a greater awareness of trades credentials in the province of B.C. and across the country. We at TPBC would like to see a similar kind of program.

This leads us to the three recommendations:

That the B.C. government partner with Technology Professionals B.C. to develop a tech talent B.C. program to bring to the public a greater attention to technology education and careers and the contribution made by highly skilled technology practitioners.

Secondly, that the B.C. government invest in a project to gather and report on the current contribution to the economy by technology practitioners, including the metrics needed to support planning of technology human resources.

Thirdly, that the B.C. government take a lead in Canada to fund an update of the national technology standards for engineering and applied science and technology.

Thanks for your attention, and if you’ve got any questions, we’d be glad to take them.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for your presentation. We’ll turn to questions by members. Recognizing MLA Blatherwick.

Jennifer Blatherwick: As the Parliamentary Secretary for Gender Equity, I’m absolutely delighted to hear you talk about the opportunities for women and other underrepresented groups in this highly paid and professionalized sector that is going to be anticipating job growth, sustained contributions to the economy and highlighting how important it is to go recruit.

One of the things that we find after recruitment is retention. Workplace culture is an enormous piece of making those people who come into the sector sustain their involvement in the sector. When you’re looking at partnering with the government and the tech talent, recruitment is great. Do you have any thoughts or plans around retention or work culture improvements in order to make sure that you hold on to those gains?

John Leech: Well, I think one of the good pieces of news is that the number of women in technology careers has increased and is working that way. You probably know that the engineers in Geoscience B.C. have a goal of setting certain targets. I believe they’re 30 percent by 2030, 2035. I know other organizations are setting similar targets.

I was just on the phone today on a related, but a bit different, topic with our lead person, Dawn McGrath with Indigenous relations. She’s up in the Kamloops area. When she graduated, there were three Indigenous graduates in grade 12. This year, there are 250 Indigenous graduates in grade 12. So she was super excited with me on the telephone today to report this. I think that using that as a way of example…. It’s largely one of getting that message out, which goes back to my first recommendation.

SkilledTradesBC has done a marvelous job, like a superb job. You know the health science professions that are between the nurse’s aide and the nurse practitioner — the x-ray lab, the x-ray tech, etc. But how many people in society, in your communities, really know about the engineering technician and technologist in this middle ground?

The engineers are well established. The foresters are well established. the agrologists, biologists, architects, etc. On the other hand, trades are doing superbly well. In the middle ground is this largely unknown and unattended career potential.

These individuals — as you’ve indicated, Jennifer — are very well paid. I can’t cite the number, but the Conference Board of Canada indicated that the rise in terms of their salaries, year over year, was significantly greater than what you might find in other fields.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Absolutely. I think it’s a reflection of the quality of the work, but also the demand and the complexity. British Columbia is such a leader in engineering technology.

[3:35 p.m.]

One of the things I was really hoping that you could also touch on…. This is clearly an area in which you have a huge depth of

British Columbia is such a leader in engineering technology. Sorry, I have another question, but I saw that you had your hand up.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): No, I don’t want to interrupt your flow.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay, then great.

One of the things I was really hoping that you could also touch on, this is clearly an area in which you have a huge depth of knowledge, and that is…. So rarely do kids get to hear about these kinds of professions before they leave K to 12, and part of the success of SkilledTradesBC and the trade sector has been those partnerships with the K-to-12 system in order to get that knowledge and education down into, like, middle school. Is that something that you’re thinking would be part of this partnership?

John Leech: Most definitely. In fact, one of the staff resources we have is Dr. Steve Cardwell. Steve has a background as superintendent of a couple of school districts. He retired as vice president at KPU, and he talks a lot about dual credit.

Certainly in the trades area, the ACE IT program is well-established, and we like to see something similar evolve in the technology fields. Different in terms of length of education and training — there are a few other constraints and obstacles — but with a determination and a passion, and a “let’s get up and roll our sleeves.” The prime minister’s on it. Premier Eby’s on it. Let’s roll. Sorry, that….

Paul Choi (Chair): Amazing.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Yeah, you partly covered it. Thanks for your presentation.

Just had been wondering…. I know in SD 36 here in Surrey, there have been some organizations that work with the district to bring in things like robotics — which my kid loves, by the way; very cool. Just if your organization had done some independent work to do collaborations with any of the districts across, like outside of a government direct partnership, but working independently with school districts to bring in some initiatives that would help kids understand the opportunities in the tech sector.

John Leech: What a great question. I’m going to change hats if I can. I serve as president of a group called Technology Festival Association of B.C. I live on the Sunshine Coast. About five years ago, we took over the Popsicle Stick Bridge Building contest. Students build bridges of a certain length, and we test it against test rigs.

When we started, we had 50 bridges, that was in 2018, 2019. Well, in 2023, we had managed to increase it over the years to 189. And then in 2024, the number of bridges — this is in a community of 30,000 people, Sunshine Coast, right? School district 46 — we had 366 bridges, almost doubling.

We just finished doing an egg drop. No cost, very little. We had the fire departments lined up, bring up a fire truck, take up structures that students built — K to typically grades 4 to 7 — up to the top of a ladder truck and drop it and see whether or not the egg survives or not. We got great videos and great photographs. Hundreds. We had eight schools this year — hundreds and hundreds, I don’t know the number, in the 600 or 700 students participating in that. We also supported a Skills Canada B.C. public speaking contest hosted on the Sunshine Coast and with participation from Metro Vancouver schools.

So the answer is there are those kinds of solutions out there. We are “roll it up, let’s make it happen” kind of folk. What we need from you folk is some funding to help us build a tech talent…. In fact, we invested a couple of dollars. If you don’t mind me taking a second here, since I was given just a few moments notice.

Jennifer Blatherwick: You can’t start a project without a good logo.

John Leech: Yes, so we’ve come up with a logo. All we need now is just a little support from your end of things. We have costed it out a bit. It’s 30 days and we estimated that something in the order of $250,000 to review the current state of affairs, to put together a report and ideally within that, build a business plan that will help us build something like SkilledTradesBC.

Paul Choi (Chair): Sorry, because you’re running out of time, if you can wrap it up. Just last remarks, and then we’ll have to go.

[3:40 p.m.]

John Leech: Well, first of all, thank you for those questions. We’re on the same track. I think the key here is just to take away that there’s this middle ground of engineering and applied science technologists and technicians that provide incredible support to the economy — $12 billion, estimated, on our part, and $400,000, we figure, is about 55,000 or 60,000 in British Columbia contributing to economic growth and development. You hear what Jill Tipping says, who’s with the B.C. Tech Association, and there are a myriad of others.

What I will be doing, just so you know, beyond today, is taking this to other organizations and getting their feedback and, hopefully, getting their support, because when you look at the kind of fields which our members are involved, it transcends most areas of industry.

Jill Tipping says, who’s with the B.C. Tech Association, and there are a myriad of others.

What I will be doing, just so you know, beyond today, is taking this to other organizations and getting their feedback and, hopefully, getting their support, because when you look at the kind of fields in which our members are involved, it transcends most areas of the industry.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much.

John Leech: I think I have gone over my time.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much. We really appreciate your passion and enthusiasm.

John Leech: Thanks very much. Appreciate your time.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, we will go to our next presenter, Mr. Wayne Arondus from Manufacturing Safety Alliance of B.C. Up to the front. Thank you very much for coming and presenting to us. You have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for the questions, and you may begin whenever you’re ready to go. Thank you.

Wayne Arondus: Great, thank you for having me. So Wayne Arondus, I’m the CEO for the Manufacturing Safety Alliance of B.C. We are one of 13 HSAs, health and safety associations here in the province that support the manufacturing sector. We do all the OHS training programs, resources, as well as many safety professionals on site supporting manufacturing.

The three things that I have today go back to some work that we’ve already done with the provincial government around the sector labour market project, which was around working with the Advanced Education Ministry on trying to look at the credentialing, the proper credentialing, for safety professionals in the province. One of the things that we find as we serve members across the province is that there is a real lack of credentialing, proper credentialing, for safety professionals, given the amount of risk that there is in many different workplaces in the province. So we’ve been working over the last six years with the provincial government and other SMEs, educational institutions, as well as industry partners.

Now we’re at the final stage where we’ve got some great work that’s been completed, but we need to actually get it out there and implement it and actually do something with the research that’s been completed. So we would love to see that that would be back on the table as something we could complete and take to post-secondary education institutes and look at how we can get a proper credentialing program for safety professionals in the province.

The second one is around mental health. We support a large group of member companies, so of course employers across the province. As we look at the post-pandemic side of things, we’ve seen an absolute increase in the challenges of the five generations in the workforce, if that’s a good way to put it, where we’ve got different ways of managing people and they’re having different challenges with mental health as it relates to the external side of their work, bringing it into the workplace or just dealing with the workplace stresses within it.

One of the things that we’re looking to partner with is both industry and the government around providing better mental health support for employers. Certainly, in the public sector, we see that there is a lot more support provided, but in the private sector, there is no support. Employers are kind of left on their own to find the support. There isn’t a lot of support.

And it’s where to start. Where do we start providing employers with access to proper training, proper resources around coaching, mentorship and even just the ability to have the proper benefits. If we look at a lot of the employee benefit programs, they are inadequate. They have maybe four, one or two mental health sessions, and then they’ve exhausted it. So we’ve effectively just described the water while the employee is drowning.

So we would like to see that there’s a little bit more support for employers around mental health, being able to provide more benefits for their employees, because they’re expensive and they’re necessary. I sit as the president of the board for Canadian Mental Health Association, and we see the statistics every day around mental health and how it affects the population. There’s a disproportionate number of men that sit in this population of struggles within mental health. If we look at the manufacturing sector, it’s predominantly still male. So again, we put the two together, it’s not a lot of research to figure out that we need more support for employers.

The last thing I would say is just around…. I think the work that we do at Manufacturing Safety Alliance is really around partnerships. We work with other HSAs, we work with WorkSafeBC, we work with industry, and we certainly want to make sure that we are able to work with government on providing the best support possible for employers across B.C.

[3:45 p.m.]

As we know, through the pandemic, many manufacturers didn’t actually get to go home. They actually went from one shift to two shifts to three shifts in order to provide food for British Columbians during the pandemic. During that time, our team worked double, triple time in order to provide safe spaces for employers. So we think it’s a really important investment for the government to spend.

manufacturers didn’t actually get to go home. They actually went from one shift to two shifts to three shifts in order to provide food for British Columbians during the pandemic. During that time, our team worked double-, triple-time in order to provide safe spaces for employers.

We think it’s a really important investment for the government to spend time and money to help support the manufacturing sector here in B.C.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your presentation. We will now turn to questions from members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Safety professional encompasses a big range of professions. I’m hoping just for the benefit of us understanding possible budget implications, if you could talk a little bit about some of the scope of work that your members do.

Wayne Arondus: We do everything from, obviously, ensuring that employers are regulatory compliant. And so there are a lot of things. You practically need a law degree to read the website WorkSafe. So we’re the interpreter for those regulations, ensuring that they’ve got all the documentation in place around workplace hazard identification. There’s a whole pile of things that we need to do.

The other part, of course, is the training. There’s required mandatory training every year for employees. And so we have curriculum developers as well as trainers that go out in the field all over the province delivering training in actually three different ways. We do it virtually, we do it on site, and we also do it through an LMS, so a self-based learning system.

But the big part is, of course, our safety professionals we have that go to site. These are people that are industrial hygienists, that do everything from air quality to noise. We’ve got ergonomists. The highest number of the injuries right now outside of mental health is MSIs, musculoskeletal injuries. We have an aging workforce, so of course we’ve got backs, we’ve got shoulders. All these things get worse with age not better. So we’re seeing an increase in MSIs as well as combustible dust, confined spaces, you name it.

Because we really see a lot of the high-risk sectors like the food and beverage, these professionals are really required and they’re not easy to find. Industrial hygienists, we only graduate a very small amount of these through UBC. So when we go to find them, they’re typically very expensive. And they’re hard to find because we’re competing against everybody to find them. Again, we want to encourage more people to go into this profession. It pays very well, but it does require a certain amount of education, and it certainly requires a certain amount of on-site experience.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you. That was very helpful.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thanks for the presentation. That was really great.

Just a question about the mental health supports. Your description was very good: describing the water while the patient’s still drowning and they’re out of time. Are you finding for the people that you represent that they would be able to access someone to speak to, but they don’t have enough benefits? Or is it that they have benefits there, but there’s nobody to talk to?

Wayne Arondus: It’s both. They don’t have enough benefits, and there’s no one to talk to.

I will tell you, being on the CMHA side of things, it is incredible the amount of uptick we’ve had in the demand for resources since the end of the pandemic. It really is quite staggering how many British Columbians are struggling with mental health and mental health type…. Violence in the home…. All types of different things. Mental health is not just what we think of as stereotypical mental health; it’s a lot of different things.

What we’re finding is it’s one thing if you do have the benefits but try to find a practitioner. In a lot of cases, you’re talking to someone across Canada that may not be the same person you’re going to talk to again. So what we find is, again, the health care sector, specifically to mental health support, is really not adequately…. We don’t have enough professionals in that area.

So it’s both.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay.

Thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

We will take a quick five-minute recess.

The committee recessed from 3:49 p.m. to 3:55 p.m.

The committee recessed from 3:49 p.m. to 3:55 p.m.

[Paul Choi in the chair.]

Paul Choi (Chair): We are going to get started. We will reconvene and call the committee back to order. If I can have the next presenter, Mr. Rod Santiago from Archway Community Services, come to the front, please.

Good afternoon. Thanks so much for coming and taking the time to present to us. You have five minutes for the presentation and five minutes for questions following. You can begin whenever you’re ready to go.

Archway Community Services

Rod Santiago: Thank you for your time this afternoon. I respectfully acknowledge that we are on the traditional, unceded ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples, specifically the SEMYOME, the q̓ic̓əy̓ and the qʼʷa:n̓ƛʼən̓ Nations.

Archway Community Services is a multiservice non-profit organization whose purpose is helping people to help people. We assume an active role in addressing poverty, discrimination, inadequate housing and employment, mental health challenges and the fallout when disasters hit.

My message to you this afternoon is the value of and need for collective impact. Collective impact provides a framework for addressing complex social issues through coordinated efforts and shared goals. It involves collaboration across sectors, organizations, governing bodies and communities to achieve meaningful and sustainable change.

Archway Community Services actively participates in collective impact initiatives, such as Foundry Abbotsford, flood relief efforts and multidisciplinary supports to women experiencing intimate partner violence, as well as to the offenders, demonstrating the increased effectiveness of working together to address pressing challenges and improve outcomes for individuals and families.

Foundry Abbotsford is a prime example of collective impact in action. Foundry, a network of integrated health and social services for youth age 12 to 24 throughout B.C., provides support for mental health, substance use, primary care, employment and social services through a partnership of 14 other local non-profits, Indigenous bodies and provincial ministries.

Last year alone, Foundry Abbotsford’s integrated health model offered 8,185 mental health and substance use walk-in counselling sessions and primary care visits to 1,104 unique youth who accessed one or more of its integrated services.

Archway Community Services has also played a key role in disaster relief efforts in response to the devastating floods that impacted Abbotsford and the valley. In November of ’21, Archway became a significant part of mobilizing local, provincial and national resources towards delivering emergency assistance, supplies and support to affected individuals and families.

A concerted strategy means municipal efforts were enhanced by community and business collaborations. EMCR and financial institutions were introduced to local First Nations. To this day, the primary group that led service provision after the flood continues to work collaboratively to prepare plausible emergency management scenarios.

The advantage of planning, working and evaluating together is the fulfilment of broader, deeper impacts that cannot be achieved by any one group on its own. A challenge with a collective impact approach is that no one agency can take full credit for all the results.

Nevertheless, a collective balance scorecard can be created together as a valuable tool for measuring and tracking the progress of shared initiatives. By tracking key performance indicators and outcomes, we can identify areas for improvement and celebrate successes. The use of collective balance scorecards promotes transparency, accountability and sustainable change.

Archway and our community partners support collective impact initiatives in a time when finite resources amidst ever-growing volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity…. We recommend that the province support and participate in locally established and delivered collective impact approaches to address some of our society’s most wicked problems.

[4:00 p.m.]

Food insecurity — allocate resources to partnerships and shared approaches to promote food security, including the creation of local food charters, regional food hubs and bulk-buy collectives.

Disaster management — enhance funding to local, collaborative disaster preparedness and response efforts for emergency

resources to partnerships and shared approaches to promote food security, including the creation of local food charters, regional food hubs and bulk-buy collectives.

Disaster management. Enhanced funding to local collaborative disaster preparedness and response efforts for emergency planning, infrastructure improvements and support to vulnerable populations.

Youth gang prevention. Invest in a network of collaborating programs between community-based organizations, schools and law enforcement to support youth and their families and to address the underlying efforts that contribute to gang involvement.

The collective impact approach enables us to leverage more impactful and cost-efficient community solutions. By funding collaborations across sectors, the province of B.C. would be leveraging collective assets to achieve meaningful and ongoing impacts.

Thank you.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for the presentation.

We’ll now turn to questions by members.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I am so delighted to finally meet you. When the floods happened in Abbotsford, shortly after that, we had the B.C. School Trustees Association meeting. I was a school trustee at that time and the Abbotsford school district spoke so highly of your efforts to help families and, of course, the students that were affected by the flood. So you didn’t realize at the time, but the good work you were doing was spreading the reputation of your organization.

Also, I have certainly heard you discussed as an excellent example of how to successfully integrate and operate a Foundry. That’s been a really effective model across the province, and I’m really happy to hear how well it is working here. You know, this is a budget meeting, and what I am hoping is that you could talk a little bit about how you’ve seen the Foundry services play out in your community and if this integrated model has helped reduce pressures in other areas.

Rod Santiago: From the perspective of budget, the idea of having services for youth, but not just services where you go to one place and then you’re bounced to the next, and then they say, “Ah, but you’re 16, so you go to this age….” And then you’re female, and you go to this one. To actually have it all in one place: where a youth with one visit can have access to, perhaps, get back into school, because they haven’t been able to graduate for mental health issues, because we’ve got a school right there, or immediate primary care services and/or free counselling right on the spot.

The comments that we hear from youth are about: “Had this not been around, I would not be alive today.” So in terms of the costs to our system of not having the services of a Foundry where it’s 15 organizations working together, that’s the kind of additional burden to our society that we’re looking at of not being able to immediately and appropriately address the services that are needed.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Thank you. I can’t highlight enough the good work that’s happening in those organizations, and especially because it’s the expertise of local organizations that makes them so effective, right? As everyone working, it’s a collective impact.

Rod Santiago: Thank you.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Now I’m wondering about food insecurity. You mentioned that you’re interested in ensuring that there’s like a collective and organized approach to food insecurity in your communities.

I see that you highlight food hubs. Now, that’s a project that United Way has been working on for quite some time, and they have food hubs in all the regions now. Are you thinking that this would be a project that was in concert or like an additional project?

Rod Santiago: United Way has been a fantastic partner in our community and a great backbone type of organization to pull other parts of the community together.

In concert with that is the recognition that we run the food bank, and we have about 6,000 individuals a month who access the services. If we’re ever going to be moving away from a food bank being the only option, we do need to look at things like that Abbotsford is developing our very first food charter together, 50 different businesses, community partners coming together saying: “How do we make sure that food is healthy, safe, nutritious and that culturally appropriate food is available to everyone in our community?”

[4:05 p.m.]

It is in that collaborative kind of approach, which is supported by United Way and supported by a lot of other groups in community, where we can actually do a tackling that’s a much bigger way.

I’ll just point out, just received this today, Stanford Social Innovation. Their cover today is “The Future of Innovation is Collective.” So I would encourage just a read through

a lot of other groups in community, where we can actually do a tackling that’s a much bigger way.

I’ll just point out…. I just received this today — Stanford Social Innovation. Their cover today is “The Future of Innovation is Collective.” So I would encourage just to read through how we can actually move forward on some of these solutions in the future.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions? No? Okay.

Claire Rattée: I don’t really have a question. I just have a comment. I’m actually coming to tour your organization in two weeks. Not quite — it was two weeks yesterday. I’m really looking forward to it, and I appreciate you coming to present today.

I’ve been dealing with Maria — help with writing some support letters when some funding was a little bit precarious. I’m really looking forward to it. It sounds like you guys are doing great work, so thank you.

Rod Santiago: Thank you so much. On behalf of a community that works together, thank you for the work that you do to move us in a healthy direction.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your time and your presentation.

Okay, I’d like to call our next presenter, Ms. Leslie Gaudette from Council of Senior Citizens Organizations of B.C.

Thank you for coming and joining us today. You have five minutes for a presentation and five minutes for questions. You may begin whenever you feel you’re ready.

Council of Senior Citizens
Organizations of B.C.

Leslie Gaudette: Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Leslie Gaudette, and I’m president of the Council of Senior Citizens Organizations of B.C., or COSCO without the “t.” Thank you for this opportunity to meet with you today.

COSCO represents over 80,000 members of its 65 affiliated organizations located all over B.C. We promote healthy aging in older adults and keep our members informed of programs, including those from your government, to ensure B.C. seniors remain active. This week is Seniors Week, a time for all older adults in B.C. to celebrate the contributions we make for the well-being of our families and communities.

Our first recommendation is to fund and develop a seniors strategy to coordinate programs and policies affecting older adults and eliminate ageism. We ask that the strategy be developed with input from seniors, incorporate social determinants of health and provide sustained core funding to support seniors programs in community.

You’ve just heard about Foundry. We need the same approach for older adults. Having a plan will ensure limited government funding can be used most effectively.

B.C. seniors are living longer, and many on very limited incomes. Baby boomers are now in their 70s. A strategy is important to address the insidious ageism in our society, which is why we strongly support the work of the UN Human Rights Council to draft a UN convention on the rights of older persons.

A seniors strategy aligned with age-friendly communities will plan for and fund affordable, accessible housing integrated with public transportation both within and between communities. HandyDART funding must be increased and its management be made part of a public system in all communities. Core sustainable funding is needed for seniors programs often managed by seniors centres. These programs combat social isolation, help older adults navigate myriad programs and services, and keep seniors out of hospital.

Our second recommendation is that Budget 2026 fund programs to improve the economic security of low-income seniors.

Of the estimated 1.2 million seniors in B.C., half live on $35,000 a year or less. That is under $3,000 per month, with 300,000 seniors living on under $2,000 per month. The B.C. seniors supplement, currently at $99.30 per month, is amongst the lowest in Canada. We ask Budget 2026 to fund increases to bring the supplement up to among the top three in Canada, to index it to the rate of inflation and extend, without clawback at the top rate, a wider income band.

The recent increases to the Shelter Aid For Elderly Renters, or SAFER, program remain below market rents. We ask that there be an increase to the rent ceilings to reflect actual market rents and adjust rents and income ceilings each year for inflation.

[4:10 p.m.]

Budget 2026 needs to fund senior subsidized housing units to increase the supply of not-for-profit and co-op housing with seniors, based on 30 percent of income. We also need temporary modular housing to keep seniors from becoming homeless. By working to house more seniors safely, these programs will reduce those who are homeless and reduce costs to the justice and health care systems.

Our third recommendation is to fund improvements to publicly funded community health care

temporary modular housing to keep seniors from becoming homeless. By working to house more seniors safely, these programs will reduce those who are homeless and reduce costs to the justice and health care systems.

Our third recommendation is to fund improvements to publicly funded community health care that enables seniors to live independently. We ask for increased funding for community health centres, and we ask for extended health benefits to be available to all seniors. Seniors who can’t hear, can’t see, can’t move well and can’t afford medications, treatment or equipment are again at high risk of becoming socially isolated, which leads to poor health outcomes. Funding is needed to provide this care.

We ask for increased funding for home support, to eliminate the daily rate for publicly funded home support services. One hour of home support per day costs $9,000 per year. For incomes above $28,000 per year, this cost must be borne by the senior, leaving little choice but to opt for subsidized long-term care, which is more expensive for the province.

Budget 2026 needs to fund long-term-care services, operated publicly or by non-profits, and to plan with the federal government to implement the 2023 long-term-care standards. Seniors need a comprehensive plan for holistic, systemic reform of long-term care, where we receive quality care and enjoy our quality and dignified life.

Thank you for considering these proposals.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thanks so much for your presentation. We’ll now go to questions by members.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Thanks for the presentation.

Leslie Gaudette: Hi, Elenore, it’s very nice to see you again. It’s been a while.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Yeah, nice to see you. You mentioned that we’re the lowest for the seniors supplement.

Leslie Gaudette: We’re among the lowest, yes.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): So you want us to come up to the highest, but what is the average for the highest?

Leslie Gaudette: The higher ones are in the $200- to $300-a-month range, which the province did achieve during COVID, but then it came down.

Elenore Sturko (Deputy Chair): Okay, great, thank you for that.

Paul Choi (Chair): Any other questions?

Jennifer Blatherwick: Hi. Thank you for your presentation.

Leslie Gaudette: Thank you, Jennifer. I’m over here.

Jennifer Blatherwick: The SAFER rental supplement was just recently increased — which was good, good progress; also, the income band was expanded to include more.

Leslie Gaudette: Yes, it was. It was one of the few positive things in the budget, and we realize how hard you worked not to cut services.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Yes, and thank you. I think your advocacy is extremely important, because you’re right: one of the things that I see in my community is seniors who come from communities that are not necessarily English as a first language. Their home language isn’t.... As they get older, receiving services in their original language, their home language, becomes more important to them. I am wondering if you’ve heard any reflection on that, by your members, on figuring out how to provide those services.

Leslie Gaudette: Yes. We have a program, an arm’s-length program from COSCO, Seniors Health and Wellness Institute, which offers free workshops across the province. They have worked on getting some of those programs translated into other languages. We certainly support the need for translation into the major languages in B.C., because we know there are ethnic communities, newcomer communities and other communities where English is not their first language.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I think also of culturally appropriate food....

Leslie Gaudette: Yes. We’ve advocated for that over the years. We did something about health care around ten years ago, and we incorporated that into the strategy for health care for Canada, at the time that the 2014 health accord was being negotiated.

Jennifer Blatherwick: I don’t want to just keep taking up all the questions. Now, are there any jurisdictions that you feel, especially on the seniors strategy, are considering the social determinants of health? Are there any jurisdictions that you feel are doing a really good job of measuring things?

Leslie Gaudette: We think this is an unmet need across the board. Some provinces sometimes have wonderful documents out, and it’s something we also advocate to the federal government for, because right now a lot of the programs for health care — I mentioned health care, income security, housing, transportation, social isolation — are all social determinants of health, and they are often dealt with piecemeal.

[4:15 p.m.]

Even the seniors advocate is also calling for a interdepartmental committee — as I would call it, being the federal government myself — to bring together the different programs, so that people talk, discuss. If something has changed in one place, there’s an effect somewhere else. If you raise the SAFER levels, then there’s an effect.

for an interdepartmental committee, I would call it, being from the federal government myself, to bring together the different programs so that people talk, discuss. If something has changed in one place, there’s an effect somewhere else. So if you raise the SAFER levels, then there’s an effect somewhere else. And then the programs are not always…. Sometimes you end up losing more than you gain.

And so we have talked to Minister Malcolmson about this a couple of years ago. So I know that the government is trying to deal with it. But still we need….

Jennifer Blatherwick: One more question. I’ll do one more.

Leslie Gaudette: I don’t mind answering questions.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Okay, good. That’s great.

Looking at funding medication and devices that would be…. Just recently, funding came through for HRT medication as well as diabetic medication and devices. So what are your top priorities in terms of funding medication and devices?

Leslie Gaudette: Well, diabetes is so huge because diabetes has — I’m an epidemiologist — a huge impact on people’s health. It shortens their life expectancy, causes all kinds of other…. So getting diabetes controlled should have a major impact on health care costs generally. And getting all the devices and accessories that you need to manage to cover it is a real plus as well. So we would like to see PharmaCare expanded.

I think heart disease and cancer drugs are very important, and we get a lot of input from that, from our chronic disease aid non-profit charities, I guess. And because a cancer drug that might be covered in the hospital is not necessarily covered in communities — I know this personally from being involved with cancer control at the federal level — there might be pain-control or nausea-control or other symptom-control drugs that can add up. And there are people out there that have $30,000 worth of drugs a year to deal with a number of different conditions.

And they, in some cases, are covered by private health and private insurance programs through their pension plan or whatever. But there are a lot of limitations on those, and we hear a lot from members about lifetime limits of $25,000, or the plans themselves are at risk of becoming unsustainable with the ever-higher cost of drugs.

So we do advocate to the Patented Medicine Prices Review Board to work to get the cost of drugs down. And anything that can be done to get the same cost of drugs to people in the community as is available to people in hospitals would be very welcomed.

Paul Choi (Chair): Thank you so much for your time and your presentation today.

Leslie Gaudette: Okay, thank you very much. It’s a pleasure to see you all. Congratulations, all, on your elections. And good luck with your deliberations.

Paul Choi (Chair): Okay, that concludes our presentations for today.

Members, is there any other business? Seeing none, I would like to look for a motion for adjournment.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 4:19 p.m.