A special subcommittee of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology (Twitter hashtag: #CINDU) spend the last several weeks hearing from witnesses in forestry, aerospace, mining, manufacturing, and other ailing industrial sectors in the Canadian economy. The subcommittee's report, just out last week, provides a good, conventional and relatively brief summary of how we got here, separating out factors that we can chalk up to the recession and factors that we can chalk up to ongoing structural change some of these sectors.
The recommendations, however, were not unanimous among the parties. Here's some of the things that stood out for me:
- The three opposition parties agreed that one way to help the forestry industry would be to insist that lumber be used to construct federal government buildings. I'm not sure the federal government constructs enough new buildings in any one year to single-handedly save the lumber industry but, as Conservative MP Mike Lake writes in his dissenting opinion to the committee's report: “Canada’s steel producers, or indeed other producers of products for the construction industry, would reasonably object to a policy that favoured another industry over theirs.”
- The Liberal Party has a dissenting report in which it calls for a separate credit facility that would help the forestry business.
- The Liberal Party earlier this month won some praise with its call for net neutrality but many of the folks who had been fighting for net neutrality will be surprised (and perhaps a little angry) that the Liberals, in their dissenting opinion, call for the adoption of the World Intellectural Property Organization Copyright Treaty, a treaty seen in many quarters as one that tips the copyright balance too much towards multinational music and film companies. And, in any event, the question for the Liberals might be: Why didn't you ratify this treaty — first negotiated in 1996 — while you were in power? Here's what the Libs recommend to the government:
In relation to a recommendation on copy rights and antipiracy of intellectual property, the Liberal Party of Canada supports the recommendation as follows: “That the Government of Canada immediately introduce legislation to amend the Copyright Act, ratify the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty (WCT) and the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT), amend related acts and ensure appropriate enforcement resources are allocated to combat the scourge and considerable economic and competitive damage to Canada’s manufacturing and services sectors and to Canada’s international reputation by the proliferation of counterfeiting and piracy of intellectual property
- The Bloc Québecois has a dissenting opinion: “The government must immediately adopt an industrial policy that meets Quebec's needs.” Really? Quel surprise!
- The NDP wants more mining centres of excellent like the one in Sudbury, writes NDP MP Glenn Thibeault who is from — Sudbury! The NDP and the Bloc would both like the federal government to get behind loan guarantees to the forestry sector.
You can read the whole report here. The committee has asked the government to respond, which it will likely do sometime in the fall.
The Cons may have a nice wedge issue on this, as the Libs adopt a tack not so much right or left but one dogmatically in line with industry – and out of sync with voters.
Did a child write point 3? “copy rights” and not copyright? Also counterfeiting, although occasionally conflated with copyright infringement, or insinuated as the same as infringement, is a “scourge” of a different kind.
I wonder if counterfeit even came up at the hearing stage or if the Libs added it by mistake not knowing what it means.
Well, given the listed personal prejudices and desires listed in those points you provided, it's no wonder that there's no consensus. Every Dick and Jane who has a need is going to have a differing perspective on what should (or shouldn't) be done.
Add onto that, in an age where increasing technological services are reducing the demand for wood products, that industry must adapt and change it's business model if it intends to survive. We are slowly, but surely moving toward a paperless society and the forestry industry is simply going to have to accept that fact and not expect some sort of “make paper” project to be created by the governments.
Ironically, paper products (i.e.: books, stationary, etc) are once again in line to becoming luxury items that only the wealthy or interested will commit the resources to owning. The difference this time around, is that the same material will become freely (well, relatively) available to the general public through technological means. Which isn't really that bad of a thing.
You've spoken about this subject before I believe David.