[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Thursday, November 30, 1995
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[English]
The Chair: Colleagues, I want to bring this meeting to order.
Today we're going to be receiving a presentation from the Canadian Museum of Nature. It is represented today by Dr. Allan Emery, the president; Robert Leblanc, the chief operating officer; and Dr. Patrick Colgan, the executive vice-president.
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Those of you who follow the fortunes, good or bad, of the museum, will know that the museum in recent months has been in the news. It's been the subject of a number of newspaper articles as a result of certain things that have been happening - we'll get into that - and certain plans the museum has. I know at the beginning Dr. Emery will give us an overview of what's been going on there, and then we'll take some questions.
We're also going to take advantage of Dr. Emery's presence to have him give us any possible ideas he might have respecting national unity.
So without further ado, we're going to invite you to speak to us for perhaps 10 minutes,Dr. Emery, and then we'll open it up to questions. Thank you for coming.
Dr. Allan Emery (President, Canadian Museum of Nature): Thank you very much for inviting me. It's always a pleasure to appear before this committee. I know some of the questions we've had in the past have been searching, and I presume they will be today.
Perhaps the way to start off is to remind everybody that in 1990 we became a crown corporation, and with that, a new board of trustees was put into place. In very quick order the board suggested there were four different areas where the museum needed to improve its activities and also to change its way of operating. The four major directives were that we needed to be much more accountable to society, that we needed to be truly national in our outlook and to have a modern, dynamic and interactive means of communicating with people, and also to become entrepreneurial.
The museum is indeed a museum of nature - it's about natural things. We're dedicated to the improvement of people's attitudes and behaviour towards nature. We currently preserve a collection of some 8 million specimens and artifacts for research and posterity. We carry out fundamental research on ways to ensure - believe it or not - the long-term survival of humankind.
We guide a conversation with Canadians about nature and our place in it. Last year this conversation included some 3 million people across Canada and internationally. Our prime audience in this last year, and also in years previously, has been families with children. We have discovered, and so has other research, that if you target families with children you also exclude nobody else.
We operate at a grass-roots and community level and have a solid phalanx of dedicated volunteers. We are currently forming partnerships with private sector organizations nationally and internationally.
In the last almost two years now we've been working to improve our collection's activities considerably, with the attention to the poor building locations we currently find ourselves in - the collections are at risk, as was noted in the Auditor General's report - and our attempt to create a new consolidated facility in Aylmer is one of the ways we can do this. The advantage of this building is that it's to be built to our specifications by a private sector corporation at no extra cost to the Government of Canada. We're simply consolidating the leases we have with all the many other buildings to make that a possibility.
The site is an excellent one for the museum. It's one that has a relict wetland on it, and the plans for amelioration we've got going are completely capable of rendering that wetland available for interpretation, and also to preserve it for the future.
Some of you probably also know we've been making some major changes in our approaches to how we become accountable to society, and there are a number of areas in which we've made, I think, some major advances on that. One is in the research area. We're now operating our research activities on a multidisciplinary base, and these projects are intended to create models of how to solve nature-based societal problems from a scientific perspective.
This is a very important kind of change, and it's one that has engendered a fair amount of controversy around the world. What it does is assume that the museum has a mission and that the scientists within it are also embarked on that same mission, whereas traditionally, in academic organizations like ours, the scientists have had free rein and basically follow their own lead.
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In public programming we've also made some major additions this year. One of the most spectacular pieces of direct evidence of our having had an effect is that Canada and Mexico have now signed a joint agreement in which each of our countries is prepared to safeguard areas of land that are used by the unique migratory butterfly, the monarch. Both countries have agreed to put aside three areas off Lake Erie and the high mountain ranges in Mexico.
We understand from Mexico that it was a travelling exhibit we did on a three-partner basis that made that possible. This was an exhibit about the monarch butterfly that spent some time in Mexico City. Because of that, the opinions of Mexicans were swayed enough that we were able to form that joint agreement.
As well this year we've been active in establishing new kinds of techniques and technologies for communicating with people. One of the projects now being built is a means of communicating on a kind of electronic round-table that will be held in Montreal in 1996. This project will join aboriginal people with the IUCN World Conservation congress and will have a potential audience of some35 million people. That's an intriguing new means of reaching out in a very big way.
If I might, Mr. Chairman, I'd like now to turn to what we in our museum think is our mandate, but also to how we're perhaps uniquely capable as a museum of helping bring Canadians together.
When people are asked to describe their image of Canada, almost all people start with nature. Our history is based on natural resources. Much of our art, such as the Group of Seven and our cultural expression, for example with the aboriginal people, is based on nature.
Nature is close to all Canadians. The climate is severe enough that we all talk about it - including today. If you look at a map, you'll see Canada is actually mostly uninhabited. That is to say, it's still in a more or less natural state.
Our use of nature is a constant topic of conversation. Canada's nature draws tourists, and the popularity is increasing rapidly. So nature is a common, binding thread for all Canadians.
The Canadian Museum of Nature, since it became a crown corporation, has been making a massive effort to become a major instrument to assist in developing a strong sense of unity across the nation. Most of the changes we've been implementing are directly associated with the concept that nature is a common thread binding all Canadians together.
So you already have an institution devoting much of its effort to capitalizing on the idea that nature is a binding force for Canadians. Our major recommendation is that you work with us to ensure we have the capacity to deliver on that aspect.
This morning Patrick made the suggestion that the best way to do this would be to triple our appropriations. While I'm sure that's not possible at this point, it is interesting to note that we have a very high level of fixed costs, so marginal increases to our working capital make vast increases in our capacity to produce.
I'd like to highlight a couple of things.
First of all, the museum is working to create a means to talk about our common interests in nature. We are creating what are called communication centres. These are distant locations from here, spread across country, in which people could participate with other people across Canada in literally real-time conversations about the natural world. These conversations would be guided by the museum, and the museum in turn would be influenced by the conversation, adding to its own store of knowledge and expertise.
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We have already several centre concepts in play, one of three in our research area, called centres of knowledge. We have a Canadian Centre for Biodiversity. In many ways, once this dialogue with Canadians has been operating for some time, we'll be able to pass on our accumulated wisdom to everybody from the ordinary citizen to government decision-makers. I've already mentioned one of the agreements that has happened as a result of some of those guided dialogues.
The Canadian Museum of Nature, then, has a very real role to play in creating this dialogue with Canadians. Some of the things we talk about are critically important to Canadians and also to the world.
I'll diverge momentarily to remind you that the number of animal and plant species currently in the world is fundamentally unknown, but it's probably around 15 million to 30 million. They're now dropping off, becoming extinct, at a rate that is the equivalent of or even faster than the rate at which species disappeared during the time the dinosaurs became extinct on the face of the earth.
One of the things we're working on is to try to create a predictive model that would give us the ways and means to prevent humankind from going the way of the dinosaurs. The uncontrolled loss of diversity of animals and plants at the present time is a major danger to the world and of course to Canada.
In our collections area, we are creating centres of expertise across Canada by establishing national and international networks of natural history collections with regional centres of excellence.
In business, one of the things we have found we can do is to encourage private sector businesses to be interested in the realities of environmental protection and use that as a way to build a better future based on concepts of sustainability.
Currently we have three programs focused on Canada's critically important societal and nature-based concerns. They include: the Arctic, and that's concerned with promoting sustainability in the north; biodiversity, which is to understand natural diversity so we can meet society's needs sustainably; and a program called Origins, in which the notion is that the past holds the key to the future.
From our perspective, then, the museum is engaged in talking to all Canadians. We are here to try to change and improve the attitudes and behaviour towards nature. We measure these changes in knowledge, attitude, skills and behaviour, and we do this by carrying on this guided conversation with Canadians. It creates a complete loop in which the museum and the people of Canada work together to find their common future, in which nature is the common theme that binds us together.
That is the notion on which we are currently operating in the Canadian Museum of Nature to assist directly and concertedly in enhancing the unity of Canada.
Thank you very much.
The Chair: Thank you. I appreciate those comments, and I say that on behalf of my colleagues. I'm sure they all appreciate that.
Before we go to Mr. Hanrahan of the Reform Party, I'll use the privilege of the chairman to ask you three or four questions relating to some of the controversy the museum has found itself in in recent months.
First of all, you have on your hands at least five condemned buildings that Labour Canada wants you to get out of. You have a plan to have a consolidated facility at an Aylmer site, but that has run into problems as well. So I guess in a way you're caught between a rock and a hard place - or you're caught between wetlands and condemned buildings.
So my first question, Dr. Emery, has to do with the buildings themselves. Given what Labour Canada has told you - and I thought perhaps your deadline was coming up about this week - are you going to close those buildings?
Dr. Emery: Yes, we are. In fact, had you been with us in my office today, you would have been surrounded by boxes and binding tape. We're moving people from the buildings that have been condemned into temporary locations, both inside the main building, where exhibits are held, and also in some of the other buildings that have not been condemned. We've also had to rent new quarters at extra cost, but we are indeed moving people out and maintaining as best we can an active program.
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There are some significant problems, however, not the least of which is the increased cost, which is very significant. It also means the collections are now in worse danger than they were before. We have been allowed access to the buildings to maintain the collections, but it means we only get to them on an interim basis and only at periodic intervals.
The Chair: That's going to exacerbate an existing problem that was cited by the Auditor General in his last report. He pointed out that you weren't properly handling your core function, which is managing your collections. In that regard, are things getting perhaps even worse for you?
Dr. Emery: They are indeed. However, I think the characterization that we are not managing correctly is perhaps inappropriate. The landlord of the buildings in which we have been housed for years is Public Works. We were not at liberty to decide or define the nature of the buildings in which we were housed. When we received custody of these buildings in October 1994, we moved immediately to attempt to correct that situation.
For all the kinds of deficiencies in those buildings that we are able to correct - that is, that are not the responsibility of the landlord - we have done so. It is those latter deficiencies that caused Labour Canada to close the buildings, and we have no control over those.
The solution we have in place - or thought we had in place - is to invite the private sector to create a building for us that would satisfy all our needs, which these other buildings do not.
The Chair: You're talking about the new headquarters in Aylmer.
Dr. Emery: Yes, that's correct.
The Chair: Before we go to that, Dr. Emery, I just have one more question on the existing buildings.
I'm sorry, Mr. Hanrahan, if I am preventing you from starting.
You're moving the staff out of there. Would I presume correctly that if you are moving staff out of five condemned buildings you will be moving the staff, at least temporarily, into what you might call crowded conditions? If that is the case, what does that do to the morale of the staff? We've been told, rightly or wrongly, that the morale of the staff over recent months has not been up to snuff.
Dr. Emery: I think any move like this, whether it's one you want to make or not, creates some kinds of problems for the staff. I know moving into crowded quarters has a depressing effect on morale on the one hand, but on the other hand, it does something we've been looking forward to for some time. Because we have traditionally been in as many as thirteen or fourteen buildings, our staff has been scattered all over the place, not able to easily communicate with each other. Believe it or not, this will improve that to some extent. Of course, it is that intention of getting people together so that there's a critical mass that is the basis for our looking for a consolidated facility.
The Chair: I think I should turn it over to Mr. Hanrahan. I have a number of questions about the Aylmer site, but I think I should let my colleagues begin.
Mr. Hanrahan, you have eight minutes.
Mr. Hanrahan (Edmonton - Strathcona): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you for your presentation. Probably the last thing you need right now is to make a presentation in front of a committee while you're in the midst of your move, so we'll try to be as sensitive as possible to your situation.
We got your annual report last night and a number of things caught my eye as I went through it. The directive set by the board of trustees increasing the accountability to society is the first. You mentioned you're already operating in three regional areas. Did you say you plan to up that to seven?
Dr. Emery: No. What I said was we have three centres of knowledge currently, but the concept here of becoming more accountable to society is far more broad-sweeping than that. The presumption of accountability is based on the notion that society in some way is able both to know and also to measure the contribution the institution makes to the community at large and that their money is spent to their benefit. So what we have done basically in all the areas is we have moved to create a means of making that happen.
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I'll give you a couple of examples. One is that we have instituted advisory committees that include people from outside the museum to look at all the core functions we're doing inside the institution. These people offer advice on making sure the kinds of approaches we're taking in the museum are suitable and have the right kinds of themes that deal with society.
In our public programming area, the concept of communication centres I think is a critically important one. Essentially it offers to all of Canada the opportunity not to come to this great temple of science on bended knee but rather to participate and actually to have a significant role in making decisions about not just the future of the museum but their own futures, because they will be brought into contact with many different facets of the concerns and issues they might have.
Mr. Hanrahan: Knowing the evaluation role of the museum...do you evaluate?
Dr. Emery: We certainly do, yes. We have a number of ways of doing that. There's the normal way, where you assess the results you've had against your expectations. But there are broader issues as well.
Mr. Hanrahan: Who sets the expectations?
Dr. Emery: Expectations are set in our corporate plan, which is approved by government ministers.
Mr. Hanrahan: Interactive communications: I can see how that will develop. Becoming a truly national institution is basically along the same lines as you describe. The average guy on the street will become more aware of the role. What jumps out at me here is ``becoming entrepreneurial''. How are you doing that, and what success have you had?
Dr. Emery: The legislation in 1990 changed the basic financial status of the institution. Previously we were what's called a departmental corporation. In that instance we were both unable to solicit donations and unable to have unimpeded access to business opportunities.
The new legislation, the Museums Act proclaimed in 1990, changed that, and we are now expected to bring in some of our revenue from external sources through essentially two different kinds of operations. One is fund-raising. We have been quite successful in that. Our first major campaign was to get money to bring in a major collection of minerals called the Pinch collection, and to build a gallery. We successfully brought in something like $8 million or $9 million to do that. That was our first major campaign.
We've also been establishing and developing a business capacity in the museum. We moved from essentially zero to about 12% or 13% of our income from external sources, at a time I think everybody would agree was probably one of the more difficult in Canadian history to establish businesses.
Mr. Hanrahan: Do you see that process continuing in the sense that you've gone from zero to 12% or 13% - ultimately your future plans would see that area growing and the reliance on government decreasing?
Dr. Emery: Correct.
Mr. Hanrahan: That's excellent.
Could you quickly run through an example of these entrepreneurial activities that have been so successful?
Dr. Emery: Yes. We have quite a number, actually. I'll just pick one off the top of my head.
One of the things we've been doing on an international base is establishing ourselves - and I think correctly - as one of the world leaders in the subject of biodiversity. As you know, Canada was a leading proponent of the Convention on Biological Diversity in Rio in 1991. With that convention, and with all the signatories who were party to it, the countries have agreed to do a number of things, including creating a national strategy for biodiversity, creating a national inventory, and establishing ways and means to preserve and sustain biodiversity in these countries. We now have written accords with a number of countries around the world and we've now undertaken a number of studies at the expense of either these other countries or world aid agencies to carry out that work.
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Another one that's kind of intriguing is a project we did with Placer Dome. Placer Dome is a major mining corporation. They were competing for a licence to operate a gold mine in a place called Kazakhstan, an interesting country just bordering on what was Siberia and China. They were invited by that country to do something special for the country. The chairman of the board and I happened to know each other because we had been successful in raising money before from Placer Dome. They invited us, at the expense of Placer Dome, to go over to Kazakhstan and give them advice on how to create a new national museum. That was paid for by Placer Dome.
So these are examples of the kinds of entrepreneurial efforts we're making.
Mr. Hanrahan: I have one final question, if I may. You are establishing your new facilities in Aylmer, and I would assume some discussion of this topic has come up at some point. Had the referendum of a few weeks ago gone the other way and Quebec had declared its independence, what would happen to that building in Aylmer and to the whole operation of the museum?
Dr. Emery: That's a question that I think only the Government of Canada can answer. As far as we are concerned, and in my opinion, that referendum will never go the other way.
Mr. Hanrahan: That is, hopefully, correct, but the numbers on the last one may not have supported that hope in the manner we would like.
Have you taken it under consideration at all? You must have discussed this at some point.
Dr. Emery: Actually, no. We have been directed by our board of trustees not to have such a discussion. I know the board has probably discussed it in camera, but we have followed the directives of the Treasury Board of Canada, which in their decision that gave us custody transfer directed us to the Pink Road site in Aylmer.
Mr. Hanrahan: So for you people it's simply not an issue.
Dr. Emery: It's probably an issue, but it's not something over which we have any control.
Mr. Hanrahan: Thank you very much.
Mr. Peric (Cambridge): Dr. Emery, thank you for appearing today.
Could you brief us a little bit more about the site in Aylmer? Could you explain to us why you would even consider a wetland site for headquarters?
Dr. Emery: There's quite a long and involved history to this. Public Works was the landlord for all of our buildings and accommodations up until 1994, at which time we gained custody of our properties.
In 1988, quite a few years before 1994, Public Works purchased without our participation but on our behalf the site in Aylmer. It was actually a bigger site than the one we're currently considered to have access to. It was 180 acres. At the time it was zoned industrial. It was held in private sector hands by Northern Telecom.
In acquiring the land, we were invited by Public Works to suggest the kinds of needs we had for our accommodations. In creating that architectural program, as it's called, that is, the definition of building needs, the Department of Public Works did an examination of the property. They examined it for contamination and environmental issues of that type. At the time they discovered that Northern Telecom had had a minor spill of highly volatile material, so they embarked on a clean-up program for that activity. At the same time it was estimated - this took, I guess, two or three years - that the cost of producing a building according to the specifications we had would require approximately $100 million of extra cost to the Government of Canada, and we would be able to have access to the building sometime between the years 2004 and 2008.
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Just at about the time the Museums Act was being passed, it was considered the policy of government to give special-purpose buildings to the agency that was responsible for handling them. That custody transfer did not come to us until, as I said, October 1994. Until that time we had no jurisdiction over the choice and really no input into the choice of where that building would be sited. In the original corporate plan, when we knew that we were going to get custody but before we'd actually received it, we put a request for offer out to the world to build us a building and to provide a site. We were directed by Treasury Board to revise our corporate plan and to put down the Aylmer site as the site to which we would be taken. A Treasury Board directive that came to us in custody transfer directed this to that Pink Road site.
Immediately that we had custody of the buildings we began to investigate the property. Our scientists, and others we had hired through AXOR, began an investigation of the environmental sensitivity of that property. During this time, our investigations - and not those of Public Work - made it apparent this is what is called a relict wetland. That is to say, it's a wetland that used to be fully functional and is left over from a previous, more extensive wetland area.
As for the property itself, on the one side, the western section is bounded by a quarry. To the south there is a major road, Pink Road. To the north, on the little piece of property we were to acquire, there is a dry hemlock forest. To the east, there is about a 500-metre corridor that leads to a larger wetland, but even that is bounded on all sides by road. While it is a wetland and while it is important and those kinds of aspects are real, it is nonetheless not a wetland that has a broad importance in the Canadian perspective.
On the other hand, it is a wonderful potential site for the museum. First of all, having been zoned industrial, were we not to take it, the land would have been developed industrially and thus would be lost forever anyway. Were we to take it, we can demonstrate - and have demonstrated through our environmental assessment and mitigation plans - that we can preserve the wetland and its functions, with some minor changes, and we can also use it for interpreting to the public the kinds of importances of wetland areas.
In the final analysis, however, the decision is really not ours. This is again a decision in which the Government of Canada really needs to ask itself....
I should make one other comment before I say that. During the period between 1988 and now there was a new wetland policy passed by the Government of Canada. This wetland policy was not in place at the time when the property was originally acquired. There are new requirements put on government ownership of property that were not there when this property was actually first acquired.
In any case, the decision is not really ours to make. The Department of Public Works is still the responsible agent for this land. The Department of the Environment has commented on the environmental assessment in the form of a screening report we prepared for them. They have made those comments available to the Department of Public Works. It is now up to those two departments to decide whether or not it is appropriate to hand the property to the museum.
Mr. Peric: You're telling us that Public Works purchased the property without any input from your side and without any specifications from your side, that after that there was actually no environmental study done on the property, and that now we're stuck with the property.
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Dr. Emery: You've characterized it maybe a little bit too strongly, but Public Works had from us a knowledge of the kind of building we needed to have. They also knew the distance from the Victoria Memorial Museum building we could withstand having all of our staff so that we could actually work with that building. They also knew we would be interested in a natural-looking environment. When they took over the property they did an environmental assessment, but it was of contamination, not of environmental sensitivities. It was not until we took over the custody of the buildings in 1994 that we did an environmental sensitivity assessment of the property.
The Chair: Dr. Emery, you were supposed to have gotten a report from the Department of Public Works - once delayed, I believe - on November 15. Have you gotten it yet?
Dr. Emery: I'm not quite sure to which report you're referring.
The Chair: Their assessment report.
Dr. Emery: Actually, the Department of the Environment is the one that does the assessment, and they did indeed deliver the assessment. Public Works is then required to respond to that assessment.
The Chair: Have they responded?
Dr. Emery: They are in the process of doing so.
The Chair: My understanding was that they were supposed to make the response by the end of October. It didn't happen. Then it was delayed until November 15. It didn't happen. And you're saying it's still delayed.
Dr. Emery: That is correct.
The Chair: You don't know when it's coming.
Dr. Emery: No, we don't know for sure.
The Chair: Mr. Serré.
[Translation]
Mr. Serré (Timiskaming - French River): Thank you for your presentation.
I don't quite understand what is going on with all these buildings that are condemned and those facilities that should be built but haven't been built. I would like you to explain briefly what is going to happen over the next few months concerning the museums. Will they still be open to the public? What about the activities during the transaction period? What about the staff? In a word, what will happen in the next few months?
[English]
Dr. Emery: I have to admit that it is indeed a confusing time. I'm sure that without being intimately involved, as we are all the time, it would remain confusing to an outside observer. Briefly, as I just mentioned to the chairman, we're not positive of when the decision will be made about the new facility in Aylmer.
Now, remember, there are several options here. One is that we would be asked to accept the property and to build on that property. Another would be that the decision of Public Works and Environment would be that this is not appropriate to transfer to the museum, in which case we would then be looking at purchasing a piece of property on which to do that. As soon as Public Works comes to its decision, we can make the move quite quickly, within a matter of weeks or days, and start to move on that.
In terms of what we are going to do with the people in the next couple of days, they are already moving. Everybody will be moved into their temporary quarters by December 5. So that's now handled.
The difficulty, as I mentioned, is that some of our activities will be compromised, particularly our research and our collections activities, because these buildings primarily house the science activities of the museum.
There is also some impact on public programming. There will be some deadlines that will probably slip and some that we just won't be able to make, but in general, the public programming activities of the museum have, for the most part anyway, been covered off. The main area where we will run into difficulty is that we no longer have access to our facilities to build exhibits and to do specialized kinds of work in those areas. So we will have to hire that out on a contractual basis, which will double the cost of that kind of thing. So we'll have to hold back on some of those activities.
[Translation]
Mr. Serré: Will your exhibitions be open to the public during the next two weeks?
[English]
Dr. Emery: Yes, absolutely.
[Translation]
Mr. Serré: Only until the end of the week.
[English]
Dr. Emery: You'd have a lot of fun there.
[Translation]
Mr. Serré: My children went to the museum and loved what they saw.
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As the Chairman said, there have been several negative pieces in the media over the last few months, and we must recognize that the public does not have a very positive opinion of the museum because of the recent events.
What do you intend to do? Whether this negative impression is justified or not, it certainly doesn't help the museum to meet its goals. What are you going to do to improve your general image?
[English]
Dr. Emery: Yes, indeed we do, and we have been. I think it's important to recognize, though - and I do stress that this is an important aspect of understanding what's happening here - that there are traditional modes of dealing with particularly professionals in academic institutions, and we are contravening those traditions. We are doing it on a scale that has raised the ire of certain, what shall we call them, ``reactionary'' scientists from around the world. There's an important reason for that, and it is that we consider the Canadian Museum of Nature to be directed by the Government of Canada to carry out certain kinds of activities.
If we had tonnes of money, which we do not, it would be quite possible to allow scientists to have a completely free rein, to be completely curiosity-driven in their research. We feel, however, it's much more important for the Canadian Museum of Nature to direct - not to specify, but to direct - the activities of our professionals in ways that keep them directly associated with the mandate of the institution. That, as I say, has engendered considerable controversy.
As you also know, because of our prediction of what actually happened in the program review, we began by laying off 20% of our staff, or about 50 people. Of those 50 people, 7 were scientists. Several of those scientists have maintained throughout the period from then - and ``then'' means 1993 - a campaign to discredit the institution. Much of their position is based on a traditional approach rather than a modern approach to dealing with these kinds of issues.
The Chair: Dr. Emery, your critics have said if you were to build on the Aylmer site this would impair the wetland functions, which is in contravention of federal wetlands policy. Is that true or false?
Dr. Emery: That is false according to the Department of the Environment's analysis of our mitigation plans.
The Chair: So you're saying building there would be consistent with federal wetlands policy. As you know, this government would like to think of itself as one of the world leaders when it comes to the preservation of wetlands.
Dr. Emery: It would indeed. In fact, if I can just elaborate very briefly, the mitigation plans we have not only preserve the basic function of the wetlands, but because we have convinced Public Works to add to that what's called a ``compensation package'', that is, we would have access to manage the property that is not assigned to us but is contiguous to our property as a wetland, it would actually more than make up for any small amount of damage we might do to that property.
The Chair: So you can assure this committee and the public that the wetland function will not be compromised or can be maintained after the development.
Dr. Emery: Absolutely.
The Chair: You can give that kind of assurance?
Dr. Emery: I can indeed. In fact, I can go one step further. In several aspects of that wetlands we can enhance what's currently there. One of the animals that was of interest to the environmental groups was the chorus frog; the design of the building and the landscaping would enhance the chorus frog's environment.
It's important to recognize that when you apply the wetlands policy, it is not a policy that is intended to prevent any development of wetlands. What it's intended to do is to preserve the functionality of that wetlands. According to the analysis of the Department of the Environment, including the members of federal departments responsible for the wetlands policy, the mitigation plans we have, completely and to the letter and spirit of the law and the policies, acknowledge all those variables.
The Chair: You mentioned the chorus frog. I could also mention Clinton's Fern. Are you satisfied...do you really know what it takes to preserve that site as a habitat for those rare species and others? Do you really know? You can stand here with certainty and say you really know what it takes to preserve that as a habitat?
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Dr. Emery: I can say with absolute certainty that we know what it takes to preserve that habitat.
I have a caveat, and it is the following. The quarry is outside of the control of the federal government. It is a private sector organization. Currently there is a 30-inch pipe that feeds water into the wetlands. If that quarry reduces or cuts off that flow of water, it will be outside of our control, and some of that functionality of the property of the wetlands will, in fact, be lost. If Aylmer increases the size of the road, then that will also decrease the capacity of the wetlands. Those are outside of our control, however. But whatever is within our control we can actually manage.
The Chair: But the development would have impacts on the ground-water budget. Have you really identified and quantified those impacts?
Dr. Emery: We have indeed.
The Chair: Again you're certain?
Dr. Emery: Yes, sir.
The Chair: Well, there's nothing like hearing from a certain man.
Mr. Assadourian.
Mr. Assadourian (Don Valley North): I was really interested to hear your report. I'm fond of nature, and I watch the TV shows about nature as much as I can - besides Question Period, of course.
What kinds of relationships do you have with other similar institutions throughout the world, specifically in South America, where hectare after hectare of land is being destroyed, developed by mining companies and what have you, especially in Brazil? What kind of impact does that have on the environment, and what kinds of cooperation do you have with those countries? You mentioned Kazakhstan, but you never really mentioned those people who damage the environment and nature.
Dr. Emery: I'm intrigued that you ask about South America. One of the areas we have been developing very strongly is a kind of north-south accord. We already have agreements written with Chile and Colombia and in Central America with Mexico and Costa Rica. In all of these areas we are trying to work in a partnership arrangement to help them understand the kinds of variables that are important in the preservation of habitat.
It's also important to recognize that you need to be able to use nature. We can't think of living in a world in which nature is somehow divorced from us. We are a part of nature.
Our relationship with countries in South and Central America is based on that concept. For instance, we helped Costa Rica write their country study. We are currently carrying out a conference on biodiversity in Chile. We're working on an accord with Cuba actually on biodiversity there, and with Colombia as well.
Ms Guarnieri (Mississauga East): I can appreciate that you feel as if you're contravening ``traditions'', as I believe you referred to it. Given the current fiscal climate, we're asking agencies to seek new efficiencies, but I'm wondering how you'd address the serious concern raised by the Auditor General that the museum is failing dismally in its core function, which is managing its unique and irreplaceable collection of 8 million specimens of plants, animals, and minerals.
The Auditor General also makes the observation that it goes far beyond addressing the lack of information about the collection and far beyond simply having a new building and a new facility to house your specimens.
What are you doing to address this problem in the short term?
Dr. Emery: The most significant part of the shortfall, as far as we are concerned, is indeed the housing of the specimens. That has been a major problem for us for a very long period of time and it's one that we absolutely must address.
The second element the Auditor General dealt with was the information that surrounds the collection and how you get access to the collection and how you make use of the information about the collection. Here's another area in which our museum is leading the world. I would hasten to say that many of the museums around the world are following our lead. However, it does not fit with some of the traditional views of how collections should be managed. We were judged by the Auditor General on traditional views of how collections should be managed.
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Let me give you an example. The Auditor General suggested we had a very large backlog. ``Backlog'' is not a very good word, but in the parlance in which the Auditor General was considering it, it is to say we have not taken materials that came in from the field, broken them out into separate jars or specimens or whatever, given them names, and inventoried them.
In modern collection management it is a colossal waste of money to do that kind of thing. You lose a lot of information associated with field collection material if you break it apart. You often compromise the capacity to do chemical tests on these things. In the modern way of handling this kind of material it is better to leave them in field condition until you need them than it is to break them apart and inventory them all separately at the time. It is also very expensive to do that, and we don't have a lot of money.
There is absolutely no danger to the collections under these conditions. In fact, they're often in better shape if you don't do that to them than if you do.
Another consideration the Auditor General had was access to information. He is correct that our ability to access information in electronic format - that is, on computers - is not as good as it should be. However, we are at about the norm, or even better, of all institutions in the world that hold collections; and currently we are developing, in partnership with the Digital corporation, a means of creating what we call a ``scientific information system'' that will probably be a world leader and that will certainly be followed by many institutions around the world. We anticipate it will be completed within about a year.
Ms Guarnieri: May I just seek clarification? Forgive my ignorance, since I'm not an expert in how you catalogue these specimens, but did I understand you to say it's more expensive to leave them in bulk than to itemize them?
Dr. Emery: No, it's more expensive to itemize them; a lot more.
Ms Guarnieri: I misunderstood you.
The Chair: Mr. Hanrahan.
Mr. Hanrahan: I want to get away from the actual day-to-day running and the complications you are facing and so on and get back to the original purpose of your coming here today, relative to our committee and our mandate, which is to develop a fuller understanding and awareness of each other, our values, our aspirations, and pride, which binds us together, common values and celebrating those, geography.... Museums have a large part to play in that. It has a little to do with the questions that were asked earlier about communications.
I'm looking at the national aspect of this. If I'm a biology teacher in Edmonton - Strathcona, or anywhere in Canada, and I want to access the materials you have available in order to bring the students into the varied environment we have, the common environment we have, and the work you people are doing to preserve that, have you specific programs that allow that to happen?
Dr. Emery: We don't actually have them fully implemented yet. We are working in three different areas to make that a reality.
The first one is that we have a national strategy that would create an electronic network of museum and other collections across the country. We've already begun on that. It is now two years into the making. We have partnership agreements with a number of other museums across Canada.
The second thing we're doing is to establish what I call ``regional collection centres'', which would bring areas of expertise to different parts of Canada so all the collections of Canada would be rationalized. That is, the effectiveness of the collections in Canada, which are now held in disparate organizations and not connected together, would actually be made far more powerful and a potent force in Canada.
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The final one we're almost ready to go with is a project that puts us on the World Wide Web and gives access to people anywhere in the world to the kind of information we have.
We're doing this in a very special way. Most World Wide Web home pages are essentially electronic brochures. Ours, however, will have a high degree of interactivity so people will actually learn from their contact with the home page. It will provide direct access to the kind of information people will need to have about the collection and what's in it. If specialists want to get even deeper into our information base, we will have the means to make that available as well.
In an entrepreneurial spirit, one of the things we hope to be able to develop is a means of giving private sector corporations, in particular, access on a cost per basis, where we would be able to add value to the information that is there in electronic format.
Mr. Hanrahan: Excellent.
I recognize the fiscal restraints you're under and the interim conflict you're going through, but I would like to ask - as I did with the Canada Council when it was here last Tuesday - if it would be possible for you to submit to this committee three or four well-developed concrete proposals that would assist us in fulfilling our mandate of Canadian unity.
I would pay particular attention to the biological and climatic conditions when you drive through Quebec, as opposed to Ontario, the Maritimes or the West. There are so many similarities that unless you looked at a map, you wouldn't know you were actually in Quebec as opposed to Ontario.
Geographically, so much binds us together, and I would like to see that exhibited. If I have to live in the same climate, the same biological environment as my fellow citizens in Quebec, developing from that there has to be a Canadian personality with a certain commonness to it. That's what we're searching for here.
Dr. Emery: Indeed.
Mr. Hanrahan: Perhaps you could see your way to developing that. Again, I don't expect miracles because of the turmoil you're under, but that is our purpose here. It's not really to investigate wetlands or whatever, although that is significant.
Dr. Emery: I think it is important for us to understand that the museum currently has quite a number of such projects ongoing.
Who is your audience here? When you have this thing finished, who will you be talking to?
Mr. Hanrahan: I think that's a question we would probably want to answer collectively, but I would defer to the chairman on that.
The Chair: I'm sorry, I didn't hear the question.
Dr. Emery: I was asked if I could submit some ideas on projects that might be used to help bind Canada together, and also recognize specifically the similarity of biological and geological areas. I wondered, when I was listening to the question, who the audience is.
The Chair: It's the entire country.
Dr. Emery: How would you get to the entire country?
The Chair: We are going to prepare a report that we will share with the entire country.
Dr. Emery: So would the nature of my suggestions be put in the language of the common man?
The Chair: Yes, of course. What we want to do doesn't have to be financially viable tomorrow or the next day. I think when it comes to national unity we should be sharing ideas with each other for what we can do to further the identity of the country, help celebrate the successes of the country, and learn more about each other.
Dr. Emery: It occurs to me that instead of just a report it might be more fun and perhaps even more useful to use some of the modern techniques that are available to communicate with people. So I would invite some sort of cooperative spirit here to figure out how we might do that.
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I can certainly give you some ideas on what we are doing and what we could do, all of that based either on what we have in our work plans or on what we could do if we had more money. But if there was a way of getting at this so that it gets out further and more broadly, it seems to me that would be far more useful.
The Chair: I think that in itself is one of the ideas. If we have, say, the 50 best ideas on how to celebrate Canada's greatness and 50 ideas on how we can learn more about each other, maybe one of the ideas is how to communicate that.
I think Canadians do have a vast reservoir of ideas, but how do we share them so that the good idea that springs up in Halifax gets to Cranbrook, B.C., or to Lethbridge, Alberta, so that we can share the ideas and implement the ideas together? After all, we are all one country. That's one of our challenges, Dr. Emery.
Dr. Emery: That sounds really helpful. I know ideas are all over the place. There are thousands of them.
The Chair: I'll tell you what; if you could submit to us even three or four real good ones that would knock the socks off us, we would feel enriched by that.
Dr. Emery: Okay.
The Chair: I gather you have finished, Mr. Hanrahan?
Mr. Hanrahan: Along those terms, I recall a National Film Board presentation about 25 years ago called Helicopter Canada, which was extensively used in schools across this country. I think it was a very positive contribution to Canadian unity. That form of communication is somewhat dated now, but we have to find a vehicle similar to that, that is easily accessible, that can be used in community and educational facilities, that will bring these ideas together.
Dr. Emery: Indeed. Actually, you should be interested to know that the National Film Board is doing Helicopter II.
Mr. Hanrahan: Really?
Dr. Emery: Yes, but indeed, I think using some of the more modern techniques rather than just film, for instance, is the way to approach that. We'd be happy to make that sort of presentation.
Could I come back very briefly to the debate that seemed to be still swirling around and maybe was unsatisfied about the Aylmer site? I think it's important for us all to recognize that we have done in the museum everything possible to preserve that in the sense of what we can do now that we are directed to the site. That is done. The question remains here as to whether or not the Government of Canada should actually transfer that land to us. Given the variables that are there, we can control it, but we cannot do anything with the variables that are outside of our control.
To come back maybe in a more general sense to the question, to maybe the spirit of the question you were asking, Mr. Chairman, while the wetlands policy will be completely satisfied, and it really will be, because this has attracted so much attention, it might be important to consider whether even that ability to maintain the policy of the wetlands is sufficient reason to stay there.
The Chair: On that, I think some of your critics have suggested that there are suitable alternative sites right around Aylmer, sites that wouldn't get their dander up so much. What's your reply to that?
Dr. Emery: We have investigated those sites, and if we are directed not to use the site in Aylmer, we have immediate means to move to those other sites.
The Chair: In your opinion, can you be as effective there?
Dr. Emery: Oh, indeed, we can, very much so. The problem, of course, with all these kinds of changes is that there is an increased cost, and the increased cost would be in the order of about$2 million.
The Chair: With respect to the particular Aylmer site that is in question right now, do you concede that certain mitigation measures would have to be taken -
Dr. Emery: Absolutely.
The Chair: - and are you confident that the mitigation procedures you would follow would be effective? Are you confident about those measures?
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Dr. Emery: We are confident about those measures, yes. I do think it's important to recognize that this is not just - not now, anyway; not any more - a question about meeting the letter and even the spirit of the law. There is an appearance, or a presence, that is perhaps even transcended by those...than just using those policies.
The Chair: On the question of national unity, it's good to hear that you're taking to the information highway, if I can use that term, and that you'll be doing that even more so in the future.
What about when it comes to some of the more recognizable things that have been done to share product, if I can put it that way, with others far away? Are you involved in loans to other museums?
Dr. Emery: Oh, yes.
The Chair: Do you also have travelling exhibits?
Dr. Emery: There are many traditional ways in which the museum has taken that load. We have travelling exhibits. Each travelling exhibit has about a five-year period during which it stays on the road in Canada or internationally, and then they come back for refurbishment and go out for another five years. So they have a lifespan of between 10 and 15 years. We currently have about 20 to25 travelling exhibits that move around the country.
We're shifting, though, from venues that are traditionally inside museums to those that are in more high-attendance locations. We currently have travelling exhibits in airports and in shopping centres. It seems to me that's one of the ways in which we can attract attention to nature as a binding force for Canada and also reach people who are not already committed to being museum-goers. But we do have all those standard things.
We publish books - in fact, some of our books are just amazingly successful - in partnership with some of the publishing houses. For instance, there is one series of books with Somerville that, in sum, has now reached about 2.5 million people. So they're very successful.
We deal with toys and puzzles. We are in the process of publishing CD-ROMs. The whole spectrum of traditional museum approaches to reaching out beyond the walls are there, but we're taking that even further now.
The Chair: Thank you.
To take you back to the Aylmer site for one more question - it simply has to do with schedule - what time line are you on? Presuming that you do get approval - much to the chagrin of some environmental critics - when would you expect that approval? When could you build, and when would you move there?
Dr. Emery: I'll give you a very brief answer and then maybe I'll turn to my chief operating officer.
Currently we have been told that Public Works will respond within anywhere from three days to three weeks to the report they've received from Environment Canada. We would be able to move within about two weeks on that.
Bob, did you want to add to that?
The Chair: How long would it take to build?
Mr. Robert Leblanc (Chief Operating Officer, Canadian Museum of Nature): The majority of our staff and collections would be in the new building about 14 months after shovelling the ground, so to speak.
The Chair: In 14 months.
Mr. Leblanc: Something like that.
The Chair: Thank you.
We look forward to your ideas with respect to national unity. Just let your imagination run wild. Whatever you have will be most welcome.
Dr. Emery: Thank you very much.
The Chair: Thank you, and thank you, colleagues.
This meeting is adjourned.