SINS Committee Meeting

SUB-COMMITTEE ON THE STUDY OF SPORT IN CANADA OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON CANADIAN HERITAGE

SOUS-COMITÉ SUR L'ÉTUDE DU SPORT AU CANADA DU COMITÉ PERMANENT DU PATRIMOINE CANADIEN

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, October 21, 1998

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[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Dennis J. Mills (Broadview—Greenwood, Lib.)): Order. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen.

We don't have Madame Tremblay here as yet. She's normally the first one to arrive, so I've been purposely holding back a few minutes. She's been faithful from the beginning of this process a year ago.

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Oh, there you go; we can formally begin now that Madame Tremblay is here.

I'd also like to thank the Coaching Association of Canada. They were scheduled as our first witnesses, but they have very generously deferred to Mr. Carefoote and his colleagues from Molson's, who have another engagement in another city. They're on a tight timeline in terms of their scheduling today.

We'll welcome Mr. Carefoote to our committee, where we are linking sport and the economy.

I will turn the floor over to you right away. By the way, if you'd like your colleagues to join you here, you could properly introduce them.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote (Senior Vice-President, Sports and Entertainment, Molson Breweries): That would be a pleasure.

With me is Marilyn McCrae, our vice-president of public affairs, and Judy Davey, in charge of our media and sports properties at Molson Breweries' national office.

Mr. Chairman, committee members, guests, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today and to provide our views on the issues you are discussing. Let me begin by stating why it is that Molson, Canada's oldest and most successful brewery, is appearing before a parliamentary task force dealing with the subject of sport in Canada.

There are several reasons that compelled us to be here. As a company marketing products to millions of people, it's crucial that we understand and support the activities and interests of average Canadians. We're involved as well in the business of sports and sports entertainment through our broadcasting association with all Canadian professional hockey teams as well as through business arrangements for advertising and marketing.

As a corporate citizen of Canada, we believe in the value of sports—the contribution to health, to social well-being, to our culture, to our sense of community, and to our identity as Canadians. We want to underline the messages that others have delivered to you about the serious and growing problems surrounding the economics of hockey in Canada.

In short, Molson is a part of the sports and entertainment industry in Canada through investments, broadcasting, advertising, sponsorship and marketing. But more than anything else, we're here to recognize the importance of sport to the quality of life of our customers. We see ourselves as having a role and a good track record of successes in supporting sports and sports entertainment as an important part of the Canadian economy, and because of our involvement we believe we have a good understanding of how it all works together.

At the same time, we welcome and salute the work of this committee, and hope we have something to contribute to your deliberations. We share many of the concerns that have been expressed by you and by many other witnesses who have appeared here earlier this year. We strongly believe there is a vital role for public policy in the development of all levels of sports and sport as culture in Canada. And we believe we need innovative public policy ideas to help deal with the emerging challenges in the world of sport.

Let me pause here to say that Molson does not believe government solutions are the long-term answer. However, because of the unique circumstances we currently face with currency issues between Canada and the U.S., there's probably some room in the marketplace for government involvement—on a temporary basis. Efforts to provide short-term relief would allow the sports and their business partners and the fans to determine exactly what kind of long-term stability is necessary, because in the long run, these endeavours must work as enterprises. As a company that's been around for 213 years, Molson can attest to that fact.

There's no doubt that Canadians are strongly committed to sports. They participate extensively in recreational sports on a regular basis—almost half of Canadians over the age of 15, and far higher proportions of those between 15 and 24.

Sport in Canada is also a central part of our values system, an integral part of our communities. Canadians report in a wide range of surveys that sports are crucial to promoting values such as character, fair play and teamwork. Fully 90% of Canadians believe sport is an important part of our culture, and that is true of both recreational and professional sports.

Millions of Canadians support as patrons, and follow as fans, professional sports. Canadians of all ages and from all regions are passionate about their favourite sports figures and teams. We're a sporting nation whose international achievements far outstrip our comparative size. We glory in achievement, we set high standards for performance, and occasionally we despair when we fail to meet them.

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We demand the best in a country where the economics of sport are a difficult challenge at the best of times. And those economics are changing rapidly for the worse. The reasons are pretty clear. We compete with nations of larger size with more resources and bigger markets. We share a border with a country in which sport is a commodity like any other, where size usually dictates results.

Let me give you one fact that crystallizes the point. Molson is the proud sponsor of the world-class motorsport called Molson Indy Toronto. The annual rent for the temporary course for Molson Indy Toronto is more than that paid in rent for all of the 17 Indy races combined in the U.S.

Canadians see sport as a part of culture and a unifying force in a country that occasionally needs support that we give freely to other parts of our culture. It also puts us on the world stage, whether that be as the host of the Molson Indy in Toronto or Vancouver—two world-class cities—or as host of the Olympics, such as those hosted by Montreal and Calgary.

Sport is often about competition, so we must take account of the economics. We're increasingly having a difficult time, and the impact is felt by ordinary Canadians as well as by teams. It's important, therefore, to broaden the dialogue on the future of professional sports in Canada, a process this committee is achieving substantially. And because sports is so integral to who we are and who we want to be, problems in sport must be addressed collectively. Industry, government, the voluntary sector and ordinary Canadians must contribute to that discussion and collaborate on the solutions.

Perhaps I might stand back now and review some of the context and Molson's credentials to talk about the role of sport in Canadian society.

There is little doubt that hockey is the cornerstone of Canadian sport; 88% of Canadian men say they follow hockey. It may be the best example in the world of sports as culture, but it's by no means our only popular sport. Golf and motor racing are growing rapidly, football and baseball are firmly established, and basketball is on its way.

The public's interest in professional sports or sports as entertainment correlates with participation in recreational sport. Team and individual sports are growing in popularity, including soccer, slo-pitch softball, snowboarding, swimming, running, jogging and biking.

The reasons for all this? Some are obvious, such as the need for fitness and recreation, entertainment and fun. I primarily like the entertainment and fun part. There are other reasons Canadians cite, and they include the desire for companionship, to develop pride in self, in community and in nation. Canadians want to carry on traditions, instil good values, and build character in young people.

For those of us carrying on the Molson tradition, a commitment to sport is crucial. We believe this is a matter of corporate citizenship, but we believe it for business reasons as well. We don't pretend to be without self-interest. Our involvement in sports allows us to connect with our customers. Beer is the product of choice for fans and participants. It provides great advertising opportunities. It gives us a chance to give something back, to return loyalty. Sport allows us to show our product can be, and is, used in a healthy fashion.

At the recreational level, we sponsor hundreds of local sporting events, many of which contribute to local charities. For instance, we're involved in events ranging from more than 200 local slo-pitch baseball tournaments across the country to the CIAU women's hockey championships. Our Ottawa Molson Canadian Bump and Smash Volleyball Tournament raises thousands of dollars for the Children's Treatment Centre. The Montreal Canadiens softball team raises $250,000 for community charities each summer.

Molson Breweries' two major social responsibility programs link to sport. Our Take Care/Prends soin de toi program on the responsible use of alcohol employs major auto-racing athletes like Greg Moore and Patrick Carpentier.

This summer we rolled out an important new program, called Local Heroes/ÉquipAction, that provided matching funding to local communities and groups for the revitalization of recreation facilities. We wanted to help foster the natural community-mindedness of Canadians as they take action to build safe and healthy communities. The program was met with overwhelming support from Canadians from coast to coast, and we were able to support some 600 projects in this first year.

Finally, we're deeply committed to professional sport in Canada, whether that be teams or events. Canadians want world-class performance from their teams, and they want to have access to world-class events in Canada. We have responded to that desire.

We're an owner or sponsor of motorsports, including the Toronto Molson Indy, the Montreal Grand Prix and the Vancouver Molson Indy. In basketball, it's the Vancouver Grizzlies, the Toronto Raptors and the National Basketball Association. We're the beer sponsors for the Canadian Football League, several of the individual teams, the Canadian Football League playoffs and the Grey Cup.

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Then there is hockey. We are Canada's hockey brewery. We invest in hockey at the grassroots, recreational and junior levels. We sponsor the men's and women's national teams. We have sponsor relationships with the Canadian Hockey League, the Ontario Hockey Association, the Western Hockey Association, and the Quebec Hockey Association. We own the Montreal Canadiens and the Molson Centre, and are a Canadian hockey television institution, most notably through our long partnership with Hockey Night in Canada/La soirée du hockey, and now as we move into a new area of sponsorship, through our “Made in Canada” hockey program, which will see us bringing even more hockey into Canadians' living rooms, through our television broadcast rights with the Canadian teams' games and sponsorship deals with every Canadian franchise of the NHL.

Now to the economics of sports, to the future of hockey, to the role of government. The equation is simple: Sports makes money, and money makes sports happen, and sports is important to the Canadian economy.

Mr. Chairman, your focus on the economic benefits is a very important one. As one example, the NHL provided this committee with a clear picture of its impact: 8,700 direct jobs and 11,750 indirect jobs. On the other hand, events such as the Toronto Molson Indy generate $74 million in economic activity, $14 million in taxes, and 800 jobs for that week period. All of this is crucially important, but far from guaranteed.

Just last week, the Minister of Finance said that we must strive for long-term stability in running the country. Business needs that, too. The hard truth, however, is that it is next to impossible to make a solid business case for investing in sport in Canada. The return on investment is low for even the most successful. Markets are relatively small. The 500-channel universe is bringing competitive professional sports into living rooms at a bewildering rate.

As Canadian professional teams try to survive, the worrisome reality is that we're making professional sports prohibitively expensive for Canadian families, while the majority of the sponsorship rights of things such as Hockey Night in Canada now go south of the border into U.S. pockets.

Surveys show that many sports fans believe that pro sports has become so much about business that it's ruining the game itself. Led by the huge markets south of the border, professional sports in North America are in danger of becoming the exclusive pastime of the rich.

If the trend continues, it will bring with it another, harder look at the economics. For companies that serve the Canadian consumer, it is one thing to have a sports investment that provides weak returns. When that is coupled with diminishing access by average Canadians, the case for continued investment becomes weaker and weaker.

The trend line is discouraging. Canadian teams find themselves at a comparative disadvantage, and their fans certainly notice. Ticket prices are rising steadily and are already out of the reach of many. The dollar is at an historically low value, and the ability to grow revenue is limited by small fan and television markets.

Currently, club revenue is at an all-time high. Ticket prices have never been more. Sponsorships are widely sold. Luxury suites and the broadcast revenue, both in Canada and the U.S., have never been higher. Despite this, the game teeters on insolvency, and taxation is a key issue.

It's an obvious proposition that quality is suffering. Canada's NBA teams are a good example of this. There's lots of fan interest, but the teams are having a hard time making a go of the business. And it was a discouraging year at the Olympics for the men's team, and in the NHL playoffs for Canadian teams.

Hockey is in trouble in Canada. It is in jeopardy at all levels of the game. You've heard it before, but it bears repeating. Canadians worry that teams are pulling up stakes and moving to the U.S. They worry that Canada is becoming a de facto minor-league feeder to the U.S. Our coaching at entry and developmental levels is not being adequately supported. We've allowed the world's strongest bottom-up development system to weaken. We have not reinvested sufficiently.

Frankly, we've allowed some of the fun to be taken out of the game by relentless commoditization of what was once as much a cultural pursuit as a business. Its image has been tarnished by incidents of abuse and violence. Many parents worry about allowing too strong an attachment to hockey, a sea change in attitude that would have been incredible among earlier generations of Canadians.

We believe there is s continuing cultural and social value to hockey. There's a value of shared history and experience, and we continue to believe there's a business value as well. Molson will continue to support hockey at all levels and work to be part of the solution to improving and stabilizing the Canadian game, to rebuilding the spirit of sport in hockey. But we need to be part of a grand partnership that involves the industry, the business sector, voluntary groups and government.

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We have read and listened to the debate about government involvement in supporting professional sports. We know there are competing interests and needs. We know our beer drinkers think they deserve a tax break—maybe even a tax break on the price of beer—before a major league hockey team does. We think they deserve a break too, including a break from the rising ticket costs for sporting events.

It is clear that Canadians participate in sports, feel passionately about them, and expect to be the best and see the best. Canadian sport is no more or less worthy than Canadian arts or cultural institutions. Governments support professional activity and private corporations in those spheres because they believe they are centre to Canada's sense of self. There are a myriad of public policy instruments, some quite innovative and efficient, that are used to nurture them. We believe that with some creative thinking and the will to make a difference, we can collectively find the right tools in sport as well.

We applaud, and have enthusiastically supported, the actions undertaken by Ken Dryden and others to establish the Toronto Symposium on Hockey, a forum for players and key stakeholders to address the state of hockey and enhance the development of the game. We believe it's this kind of collaborative, focused approach that government and industry must encourage and participate in if we are to revitalize the game.

We at Molson are prepared to dedicate our energies towards establishing a broader national dialogue on the problems facing sport, and the potential solutions at our disposal, but we know that solutions can only be achieved if all key players are at the table. The next stage of dialogue on the future of sport must include all levels of government, because the issues at hand cross jurisdictional boundaries. Solutions must be found at national, regional and community levels.

We believe the federal government has a unique opportunity to take a leadership role in this process, to engage provincial and municipal governments, and indeed all Canadians, in discussions about the future of sport, and hockey in particular.

A number of economic challenges face professional sport in Canada.

The first challenge is federal, provincial and municipal taxation for both players and teams. As others have told you, tax is an area where Canadian teams are at a significant disadvantage vis-à-vis American clubs. High taxes place Canadian teams at a comparative disadvantage in attracting talent, and forces teams to charge their fans higher ticket prices.

For teams, some ideas for debate might include tax deductions/deferrals for capital cost investment, or tying tax relief to longer-term payback at varying thresholds of success or varying degrees of reinvestment. For players, deferred income, increased scope for deductions, and other measures would help balance the current disincentive against playing in Canada.

As mentioned earlier, currency exchange issues are top of mind. With a lower dollar, costs rise, tickets become more and more expensive for fans, and it becomes increasingly difficult for Canadian teams to compete. For example, sponsorship restrictions on individual products significantly influence the ability to attract high-level sporting events to Canada.

Broadcast rights: In particular, there are growing concerns about the role and influence of bidding practices and broadcast rights on access to sporting events and revenue allocation to Canadian-based teams. It's very difficult to bid against crown corporations like the CBC.

Entertainment taxes: These taxes, levied on every ticket for every game, significantly increase the price of tickets for the average family.

Molson believes the end result should be that popular sports remain accessible to the average fan, not that franchise owners or players necessarily make more money. We believe all these economic issues have a direct and negative impact on the ability of average fans to enjoy professional sport. That's why we do much more than make and sell beer. Molson has been a Canadian institution for 213 years because of its role in the fabric of the country.

We applaud this initiative by the committee. It's already yielded some important information and dialogue, but we do believe there's more to be done.

We strongly believe that sport, and hockey in particular, is part of our cultural fabric. Canada's future commitment to sports carries important value and cultural considerations, including nation building, community development, healthy living and quality of life.

The current threat to Canadian sports equally threatens Canadian culture. As such, it is vital that major institutions and organizations in Canada take steps to secure and revitalize the future of Canadian sport, from the grassroots to the professional level.

We believe a collaborative effort is essential to success. Joint forums like the Toronto Symposium on Hockey are crucial building blocks for dialogue, and ultimately redress some of the issues facing Canadian sport. In order for this initiative to exceed, however, industry, the not-for-profit sector and all levels of government must take a seat at the table and work together. In particular, we believe the federal government is uniquely capable of taking a lead role.

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A number of important economic issues must be included in the debate about the future of sport. Rising prices for consumers and the rising costs for teams are as much symptoms as causes of the problems facing sport. A broader debate about economic issues related to taxation, employment, sponsorship, broadcasting and economic spin-offs from sport is required to develop innovative, long-term solutions to the economic problems that confront us. We believe this debate must include all levels of government as well as affected industries and organizations.

Molson is committed to Canadian sport, and we're determined to secure its long-term health. We have a responsibility to do our part to ensure that professional hockey remains in Canada. We will continue to have broadcast and sponsorship agreements with every Canadian NHL team. We willingly take on responsibility to foster recreational sport in Canadian communities. It's part of our Molson values, and we will continue to sponsor hundreds of leagues, teams and events at the local level. We will continue to promote community development through programs like Local Heroes.

Because of our heritage, we have a responsibility to promote dialogue on the future of Canadian sport. The challenges facing Canadian professional and recreational sport demand the active participation of the federal government. There is an opportunity for government to take a leadership role in revitalizing sport, and hockey in particular, to work with the many organizations and institutions already dedicated to the task, and to help bring other key players to the table.

We wish you well in your deliberations and hope our input has been useful. If there are any questions, we would be glad to answer them.

We have a brief videotape that captures our involvement.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Carefoote.

How long is your video?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: One minute, I think.

The Chairman: Fair enough.

Afterwards, Madame Tremblay, you will be first out of the gate.

[Editor's Note: Video presentation]

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Madame Tremblay.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay (Rimouski—Mitis, BQ): Thank you, Mr. Carefoote, for your presentation. Would you be so kind as to leave a copy of your text with the committee clerk.

[English]

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Yes.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Frankly, I don't quite know where to begin. You spoke about establishing a dialogue on the problems facing sport and that's important, in my view. We must discuss our concerns in order to understand one another and ultimately, to find solutions to these problems.

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First of all, could you tell me a little bit about the symposium that Mr. Dryden is planning to hold in Toronto? Do you know if in fact this symposium will be held and when and who will be invited to attend?

[English]

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: It is primarily in the planning stages; however, we have made a commitment to work with Mr. Dryden to execute it next summer. It will look at all aspects of the game—coaching, training techniques, medical, as well as strategy and player development.

We would hope, and it's our goal, that it would become the largest, the best, hockey symposium in the world, where the world will travel to Toronto, to Canada, to participate and to learn.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Will the symposium be international in scope?

[English]

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Yes.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Then we'll have to wait until next summer to find out a little more about this initiative.

I've been following developments since the start of the season, and the Montreal Canadians a little more closely.

Some players held out and subsequently signed contracts worth millions. When Mr. Bettman sat in that very seat, he told us that an incident like the one with Alexandre Daigle wouldn't ever happen again. However, there is a new Alexandre Daigle on the scene and his name is Vincent Lecavalier. He signed a three-year contract worth $15 million. And here we were told that this wouldn't happen again.

[English]

The Chairman: Where's he from?

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: He learned the game of hockey in Rimouski. As you can see, we have some very good training facilities in our community.

Million-dollar offers are being made and contracts are being signed with holdouts, with unknowns and with players far less talented then those who played in past years. When there were fewer teams in the league, the cream floated to the top and the game was a showcase for the best players. Today, it's apparent that not all players are highly talented, although admittedly, there are different kinds of talent. However, when I hear teams say that a particular player was hired because they needed an enforcer or someone to keep opponents in line, then I can't deny that this is a far cry from the game we want young people to admire.

I jokingly said the other day that we would soon have to ask the CRTC to televise hockey games at a later hour, instead of at 7 p.m. to suit the Americans. Hockey has become so violent that games shouldn't be broadcast before 9 p.m.. Games should be televised later, rather than earlier.

Given the level of violence in the sport and the fact that there are many empty seats at the Molson Centre, it's clear that the game of hockey is in serious trouble. However, hockey is responsible for creating its own problems and it is up to the organization to look within itself to find solutions before coming to us and saying: "The government has to help us out. We have problems."

I watched the dollar plummet last summer and it occurred to me that Canadian teams would probably lose money. You say that a weak dollar will result in higher ticket prices. Whether the dollar is worth 70 cents, 89 cents, 65 cents or 50 cents, the Chrétien dollar, a $100 ticket will still cost $100 Canadian. The falling dollar doesn't affect Canadian spectators.

I have no idea in which direction hockey is heading, but people are less and less enthusiastic about the game. I seriously doubt if 90 per cent of men follow hockey. What reassuring words do you have for me?

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[English]

The Chairman: Do we have time for a short answer?

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I think Mr. Bettman and certainly the Canadian club owners who have presented before you are addressing many of the issues as only they can. As a sponsor, and as someone who invests in these clubs for a long period of time, what's frightening for us is the fact that they can leave.

You know, in this country, you have tremendous awareness for the sport, you have tremendous participation. It fills the newspapers on a daily basis. To think that a team can't be successful in Canada, can't survive in Canada—and not just have success but survive; witness the Winnipeg Jets and the Québec Nordique—to me seems fundamentally wrong. That a city like Nashville, where they wouldn't know a hockey stick from a drum stick, could automatically take our players and take our game— I worry about it, and I worry about it because I think Canada is so strongly identified with hockey.

I agree with you on many of your points, that the money that's being spent on players of perhaps lower quality is more than we've ever been accustomed to, certainly in this country, and doesn't feel right. I'm assuming that over time, the quality of players, etc., will be sufficient, and that the game and the league will do the right things. But what would be a shame for me is if in this interim period we saw more Canadian teams leave this country. It's just such a big part of our identity, I believe, and of the Canadian culture and fabric, that I think it would be wrong. Anything we can do to try to help that, we would like to participate in.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: It's as if the game is no longer a part of our cultural heritage because it's become a business. Money has become the overriding consideration. It's all that matters. The quality of the game has become secondary. League officials are incapable of changing the rules. There was talk of having two umpires, of removing the blue lines or the red line, but these ideas were all discarded. The hockey powers that be are unwilling to consider any changes to the game.

When Canadian teams are gone, maybe then they will wake up, but it will be too late. That's the problem. What can we do? In my opinion, we can't wait until next summer to hold a symposium. This year is clearly a turning point for several teams. Money isn't the only issue. Even if the government were to pour money into the league, this wouldn't solve all of the problems. When culture is accessible, people are willing to make the effort. Just look at how many people attended the Rodin exhibit in Quebec City. Young people today can't afford to go to a hockey game. Money is the real problem here.

[English]

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: It is a business.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Exactly.

[English]

The Chairman: Thanks, Madame Tremblay. We'll come back.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Fine.

[English]

The Chairman: Mr. Bonwick.

Mr. Paul Bonwick (Simcoe—Grey, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The Chairman: We'll try to make our questions concise and focused so that we can get as many members in as possible. I have a long list here.

Mr. Paul Bonwick: I will.

Just as a brief comment, I think my sons would disagree with Madame Tremblay's analysis of the sport.

The Chairman: Excuse me for one second, Mr. Bonwick.

I am waiting for Madame Tremblay to see Mr. Lecavalier, who comes from her riding, ask him to take not $17 million but maybe $0.5 million and play in Montreal, and see what his response will be.

Mr. Paul Bonwick: Certainly in my opinion, contrary to my colleague's, I believe in fact the league and its officials should be commended for the evolution that has taken place in the sport. I grew up watching hockey, and I think it has truly matured. There's been a focus on trying to achieve the highest levels of professionalism, both on and off the ice. I think the sport is ever-evolving, but certainly has done a very respectable job in that regard.

Dennis, thanks for providing me the opportunity to come here. You certainly should be congratulated for your leadership role in bringing to the forefront just how critical sports is to Canadian society and to Canadian culture.

More specifically, you've touched on the macro problem of our size, Canada versus the U.S., which seems to be the largest inherent problem to encouraging development within our sporting industry in Canada. We've seen dips and dives and increases in the dollar throughout time, but we're always dealing with the fact that they're at least 10 times larger than us, and in fact, in this economy, much more significantly than that. But that same story holds for almost any industry in Canada, so it becomes difficult, even though we recognize the societal importance of sports in Canada.

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I'm just wondering if maybe you have some specific targeted suggestions on how we should be focusing tax relief, or where you see specific areas of funding heading that there's payback for the average Canadian, not just societal payback but actual dollars and cents generated into the economy.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: In reference to your comment that lots of industries face that, you're right, and lots of industries don't exist in Canada because of that. More so from our own experiences, I would argue that some of our endeavours that we're in today— If things don't change substantially, one way or another—either the dollar gets stronger or sponsors have some other way to participate beyond the current ways they do, or whatever—things will go away because they just financially don't make sense.

For instance, our two Indy car races are two of the most successful races on the circuit, and it's very difficult to sustain their financial viability.

Mr. Paul Bonwick: I appreciate that, and again, the same thing is said pretty much across the board. What I'm wondering is, do you actually have some targeted recommendations on how we should be funding, or targeting on tax relief—on where we should be making recommendations, how we should be putting that to paper and making recommendations to our caucus, and in turn cabinet?

As one small supplementary, do you make these same presentations to municipal councils as well? I noticed you were sort of trans-jurisdictional there, when you were talking about the costs of running facilities versus the cost of renting facilities in the United States, whether it's through the City of Toronto or Edmonton or wherever. Do you try to do the same sales pitch there? Because I buy into it, and I see what you're saying, but we can't force the City of Toronto to lessen the price for you to run your Indy.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: If you take Toronto as an example, we deal with really two levels of government, for sure, certainly with the City of Toronto, which owns the initial piece of property, and then the Ontario government, as it relates to the rights surrounding Ontario Place. As I say, they're both quite substantial relative to what other cities and other people pay.

So it seems most of the major events we're involved with certainly involves some level of government.

As it relates to the specifics, I did note a few in the presentation as it related to players, for instance, such as deferral of income, those kinds of things, and also as it related to sponsors or people's support—

The Chairman: Mr. Carefoote, excuse me.

Mr. Bonwick, I don't know if you were here for the full presentation, but in the body of Mr. Carefoote's presentation he had about eight or nine very specific recommendations. So in fairness to him and in fairness to others to get their questions in, maybe we should get you a copy of that, and we could refer to those.

Mr. Paul Bonwick: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Comuzzi.

Mr. Joe Comuzzi (Thunder Bay—Superior North, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me compliment you first.

Dennis, you've worked so hard on this committee, and you've brought it all together. It's through your initiative that we're approaching something that's very important to young people in Canada, and some of us older guys.

To reiterate, I think there's nothing worse that's happening in our economy today, as I've mentioned to you before and at this committee, and we have to do whatever we must do in order to ensure that the value of the Canadian dollar increases so that our competitive sports teams in Canada have at least the opportunity to compete.

I welcome Mr. Carefoote and his colleagues. I was very interested in the presentation.

You said at the outset, Mr. Carefoote, the the government should provide short-term relief. Do you want to expand on that and tell us what your thoughts are in that respect?

• 1615

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: My thoughts are that if we hold up the dollar situation, which for all of the professional leagues, I would say, is probably the most critical situation, and if we assume that is an aberration, I would hate to see short-term actions taken if in fact that problem would be corrected in some period of time. If in fact we are at this relative cost value versus the U.S. dollar, then we do have some probably serious structural problems with our sports industry. I mean, almost all parts of it are conducted in U.S. dollars. When all your expenses are in U.S. and all your income generally is in Canadian, it makes it very difficult.

So what I was getting at there is that if, longer term, we believe the dollar will move back to its earlier levels, to lose a team or lose events in this next two- or three-year period would really be a shame, because they won't come back. I'm fairly confident that there is just so much competition for them, it would be very difficult to get them back—not impossible, but difficult.

Just personally, and on behalf of the company, that is a concern because of what they represent. From a business standpoint, we enter into marketing partnerships with organizations. We look for a long-term investment. It's very difficult for us to tell on an annual basis that we spent x and got back y. It's a very difficult thing to do.

It's like when one looks at the stock market; over a period of time, you think you're doing the right things, you're making the right investments. And that's how we view these sports properties. If you believed for a minute the market was going to continue to decline forever, you would probably take your money out of the stock market.

We don't think that's the case; we hope that's not the case. However, teams are in serious issues. We went through it last year with Edmonton and we were quite active with them in trying to raise money to keep the team in Edmonton. But at some point in time, those things will become more and more difficult to continue to do.

Mr. Joe Comuzzi: I thank you for that answer.

One more question, Mr. Chairman.

In your presentation you talked about nation building, building a country and unity, which is something that I think is very important. One of the means to do that is the interest all Canadians have in sports.

I'm going to make an analogy—and I want you to compare it—that, to me, Molson, and prior to Molson, Imperial Oil, is synonymous with sports in Canada. We were just in the process of going through the World Series, and at the opening game at the World Series they brought Tony Bennett in to sing America the Beautiful, a magnificent presentation. A national hero, Mr. Sosa, threw out the first ball. That wasn't arranged by the Yankees or the Padres; that was arranged by National League Baseball. It was stimulating to the American people inasmuch as when they played the national anthem, they didn't go off-television.

At the next game, they brought in Robert Merrill from the opera, and the Maris family to throw out the first pitch. Merrill sang the national anthem.

In Canada, it seems we have lost our way—and I would appreciate your comments—inasmuch as when we have any national sports spectacles, whether we have the World Series or the National Hockey League or whatever it may be, we seem as sponsors to think this is a waste, the playing of the national anthem, and the symbolism. The event starts after the introduction and the playing of the anthem and so on. That is not really building a nation. That isn't contributing to the unity of the country.

When the Montreal Canadiens used to have this gentleman sing the national anthem at the Montreal Forum, it was absolutely magnificent. We don't do that any more. Tell me why.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Well, we do play the anthem and have it sung, but—

Mr. Joe Comuzzi: I know you play the anthem, but we do play it at little league, too.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I know it's played at all the games. I know it's sung on special occasions, but I don't know that it's sung every game, everywhere.

• 1620

As you say, it was in Montreal, and that is really a decision—

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: À Rimouski, oui.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Right.

I think it is an important part, I agree with you. I guess it's up to the clubs to decide. Certainly at our motorsport events we play it, and usually bring in someone famous to sing it.

So I agree with you.

Mr. John Cannis (Scarborough Centre, Lib.): We forget the words sometimes.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Not too recently I returned to Canada after spending a number of years in the U.S., and you really do notice that. It is quite a cultural difference, and it's a shame. You're right, it's very emotional.

The Chairman: Excuse me for just a short 30 seconds, but following up on Mr. Comuzzi's point, Mr. Carefoote, you are one of the most influential sponsors in our nation. When you go in and put your sponsorship support behind these events, whether they be amateur or professional, whatever, couldn't you use your expertise and maybe have a checklist of some of the things you would want as part and parcel of the packaging, things that promote unity and the heritage of our country? Is that too much interference on your part as a sponsor, or is it something you could consider?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I think we could certainly ask those questions. I will say, though, that the NHL—and I don't know if they do control it—does control what goes on the TV broadcast, what will be broadcast when, and how much time you have.

The Chairman: Okay.

Mr. Joe Comuzzi: I won't belabour that, but I think it's something we've lost sight of, and we should refocus our attention on that in our national sports. It only will come through the sponsorship program, because they'll listen to them.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Comuzzi. Mr. Mark.

Mr. Inky Mark (Dauphin—Swan River, Ref.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First, let me thank you and your delegation for being here. Let me applaud Molson for all the work they've done in certainly supporting amateur sports as well as professional.

We no doubt as Canadians see hockey as a cultural event. The question I have difficulty trying to identify is that with the development of big business in terms of the sport of hockey, has it become really a business event or is it still a cultural event? I'm having a hard time trying to define what hockey is today in the reality of commerce.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: It's my opinion that it is still a cultural event, but it won't be if the business base isn't there to support it. I mean, the NHL would not exist, and professional hockey would not exist, if it didn't meet certain business requirements.

As I said, I don't think there's ever been a time when more Canadians have spent more money on hockey in terms of ticket prices, the amount of games, advertising. Arenas, I'm sure, generate more money than they ever have.

So I think they're doing a lot of the right things, but it just still feels that it's quite a challenge for professional hockey to survive.

Mr. Inky Mark: I personally remember when the Winnipeg Jets left Manitoba. No one has forgotten the demise of the Jets, because they were an attraction to not only the city of Winnipeg but also the province, and the people in the province were very proud of the Winnipeg Jets.

Coming from a municipal government, I know there's still pressure on municipal governments to build rinks, because there's still heavy-duty interest in hockey. I know my own two sons play hockey.

At the same time, when I look at the changing make-up of professional teams in terms of how many Canadians exist, and because of our own system of apprenticeship, and with the global situation, it's just around the corner when we're going to have teams in Europe and other parts of the world.

That's why I raise this question: At the professional level, has it gone beyond the affordability of this country?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: If you mean specifically, certainly tickets have gotten more expensive.

• 1625

As a sponsor, when we look at events like hockey and major sporting events, and all things, we don't look for the same sort of return on investment that we might look for in other elements of our marketing mix. It's part of who we are and what we believe in, and I would say we don't examine this nearly as hard as we do other kinds of promotions and things we do.

But it's like everything; everything has a limit. I would think that, from what I see and from what my colleagues in other industries say, it's reaching a saturation point, and I think it's reaching a saturation point probably with consumers in terms of tickets. When it costs you, to take two children to a hockey game, $400 to $500 after tax, well, I don't know how you'd do it.

From our own selfish perspective, it creates an opportunity for beer drinkers, because we can let them go to a game, but that hard— So that is a big thing for consumers today, and somehow it just doesn't feel right. I don't know if we'll ever get that far, but I would certainly like to think that going to a hockey game is not out of reach for the average Canadian.

Mr. Inky Mark: If I may, Mr. Chairman, I have just one very short question.

The Chairman: A short question, Mr. Mark, and then we have to move to Mr. Proctor, because we still have two other series of witnesses today.

Mr. Inky Mark: Do you know if there's been a comprehensive, in-depth study done on the survivability of hockey in, say, the next millennium for Canada?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I'm not familiar with that.

Mr. Inky Mark: Do you think that needs to take place? It seems as though we're groping in the dark here with only short-term solutions; maybe we need to look at long term as well.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I would agree.

Mr. Inky Mark: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thanks, Mr. Mark.

Mr. Proctor.

Mr. Dick Proctor (Palliser, NDP): Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.

I'll just rattle through some questions that come to mind. Thanks for the presentation.

To follow up on Mr. Comuzzi's initial question, would you care to tell the committee which professional teams you think might be most at risk at the present time in this country?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: No, I don't know. I think the one thing the NHL in Canada has right now is that they all have pretty solid ownership groups that make sense for where they are. So I would hope that—

I mean, I can't think of anything worse, from our perspective, than to have another team leave Canada.

Mr. Dick Proctor: Right.

I thought I picked up a little bit of a dichotomy in something you were saying. At one point, you were talking about the need for more public money for sport, and then at another point, you seemed to be suggesting that the CBC had deeper pockets than other people, and that this was creating a problem.

Could you just explain where you're coming from there?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: The only thing I'd say about the CBC is that the CBC money goes to 28 NHL teams. It doesn't go to the six Canadian teams.

Mr. Dick Proctor: And the suggestion is that more should go to the six NHL teams, or all should go to the six NHL teams?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: No, I'm not suggesting that, per se, but I think it again comes back to this notion that Canadians are spending substantial amounts of money to support hockey in this country. It would be a shame that there isn't hockey that you can go and see and participate in.

Mr. Dick Proctor: Okay.

We all know from our finance minister that we have only limited amounts of money. We're reminded of that regularly. If, for example, we had to fund something like the outdoor hockey league in Regina, Saskatchewan, versus giving more money to make sure that the Edmonton Oilers, say, stayed in business, I would assume, from your presentation, that you'd favour the latter as opposed to the former. I'm just wondering how you would square that circle.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: I don't think I'm saying that, necessarily. I'm not trying to prioritize hockey. I guess what I would say is that I think hockey is absolutely critical to Canada and to Canadians at all levels, and I certainly think it's probably even more value where people can participate, and it's part of the community.

Mr. Dick Proctor: I have one more, Mr. Chair.

I thought I heard you say—or imply, anyway—that there's perhaps more public money for funding of the arts in Canada than there is for Canadian sport. Did I hear you correctly? If I did, can you give us any figures on that?

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: From our perspective, and in particular dealing with the broadcast issue and broadcast production, where substantial grants are made to the production of Canadian drama and whatever—non-sports, I guess—we're in the sports production business. We'll produce almost 800 hours of programming this year. If we were to develop further sports-related programming, we'd be strictly on our own—or I'm not aware of anything in that sense.

• 1630

Mr. Dick Proctor: So you don't have any specific numbers, but it's your belief that there's far more money for the arts than for sports.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: We could certainly get those for you.

Mr. Dick Proctor: Okay.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Proctor, just for your information, research can give you that information from estimates in terms of the amounts that go into the various cultural components.

Mr. Carefoote and colleagues, thank you very much. You have helped us immensely in our deliberations. You have brought very valuable information to us.

Mr. Jeff Carefoote: Thank you very much for the opportunity.

The Chairman: We are running a very tight schedule today, so we'll move right along to the Coaching Association of Canada.

Welcome, Mr. Bales. Maybe you would like to introduce your colleagues. We will turn the floor over to you immediately, and thank you for coming.

Mr. John Bales (President, Coaching Association of Canada): Thank you very much for the opportunity to meet with you today.

[Translation]

We are pleased to appear before you this afternoon. Allow me to introduce my colleagues: Eric King, Vice-President, Operations and Marketing; Carolyne Hudson, Promotions and Communications Coordinator; and Tom Kinsman, Executive Director, Canadian Professional Coaches Association. My name is John Bales and I'm the President of the CAC.

The mission of the Coaching Association of Canada is to enhance, through the quality of coaching, the experience of all Canadian athletes.

[English]

We work with over 60 sports in the development of their coaches, from the community to the high-performance level. Over 80,000 community volunteer coaches take part in national coaching certification program courses each year. Over 650,000 volunteers have been trained since the program began.

Research into the benefits of a strong sport and coaching system are contained in the paper you should have received, entitled “The Contribution of Coaching in Canada”,

[Translation]

"The Contribution of Coaching in Canada".

[English]

This paper documents over 140 research studies on such areas as health, mental health, learning and so on.

In addition to the training of coaches through the national coaching certification program, our membership arm, the Canadian Professional Coaches Association, has three major goals: to enhance the status of the profession of coaching and the professionalization of its members; to strengthen the voice of coaches in the sport system and to provide conscientious self-regulation of the community; and to provide services and help to coaches in a variety of areas identified by the membership.

With that as background, I would like to address the paper entitled “Strengthening the Canadian Sport System”,

[Translation]

"Strengthening the Canadian Sport System".

[English]

Let me briefly highlight the major points.

A major concern in Canadian sport is facility development. At the youth sport level, we experience inadequate practice time and strong demands for more facilities for youth sport.

Most university facilities are at capacity. At the high-performance end, facilities are identified as the number one need. We have situations of Olympic medalists having to run around joggers on a track because their times conflict. It just isn't possible to dedicate time to high-performance athletes in too many cases.

• 1635

In other cases, facilities are just not available to do the amount of training necessary to reach an international standard.

Given that situation, we put forward the recommendation that the federal government look into committing up to $50 million per year, over a five-year period, to a sport infrastructure program for the construction and upgrading of sport facilities. We can't gain the benefits of sport participation or provide Canadian athletes with the opportunity to excel internationally if we don't upgrade our stock of facilities.

The second area addressed in the paper is funding the national sport system. Canada provides the lowest level of funding to the sport system of any developed country. Now, I can't say for sure that this is true of any developed country, but I haven't found one yet that we compare favourably with.

In the case of Australia, with a population of 17.5 million people, their annual sport budget is $155 million compared with the Canadian budget of approximately $60 million. Finland, with a population of 5 million, spends $105 million on sport. Germany—and some details are contained in the paper—with a population of 80 million spends $322 million on sport.

So there's a whole series of examples, as we go down and look at the expenditures on sport development from different countries, that shows Canada just isn't in the ballpark. If we expect to continue to provide opportunities for Canadian athletes to both participate in and achieve international excellence, there just isn't the support available to allow that to happen.

As an example, the overhead shows you the number of different coaches that are supported, comparing Germany with Canada. These are numbers of coaches supported through federal government grants in each country. Germany supports 789 national coaches, and Canada has a target of 99 coaches. So there's an enormous discrepancy there.

One of the areas that I think we're very proud of in Canadian sport is that we have just recently developed a network of national sport centres to help our national high-performance athletes. The map on the overhead shows the distribution of these centres, right from coast to coast, serving all areas of the country.

This is certainly a very important step forward, but these centres still have to be resourced in order to be competitive. Again, if we look at a comparison, in this case to Germany, against whom we modelled the program—we looked at how different countries had developed this aspect of high-performance sport—Germany is able to put in ten times the size of budget, ten times the resources, into this program area. It makes it exceptionally difficult to compete internationally, and as you know, sport is very much an international competition.

In this area, given that the current funding is neither adequate nor competitive with comparable countries, we're recommending that the Sport Canada budget be increased by $40 million from the current $60 million to $100 million annually. This kind of investment would at least put us in the ballpark of being competitive with the other countries in the world.

The third area is that of creating an effective national sport structure. We've proposed the creation of a Canadian sport confederation in order to become more effective and more efficient and to provide proper leadership to Canadian sport; to put forward the tax deductibility of membership fees to encourage all Canadians to participate in sport; and to clarify roles and responsibilities between the government and policy and financial accountability and the sport community in the delivery of programs.

• 1640

Those are the major points from the paper. Before opening it up for questions, I'd like to offer some comments on one of the key issues you've been wrestling with, that of providing support for professional sport franchises.

The first point is that professional sport franchises do not develop the sport system. They in fact need the system to supply them with players, but they do not develop the system itself.

The second point is that a long-term solution is required to the issue of professional sport franchises.

The third point is the lottery funding issue as a potential solution to funding not just the professional sport franchise problem but also the overall funding of sport in this country.

We would propose reopening the question of lottery funding with the provinces. This issue we're talking about is both a federal and provincial issue. The lotteries were given to the provinces in 1979. There was a commitment that 3% of the funds raised at the provincial level would come back to the federal government, with the priority being on sport, but that in fact has not happened. So there's certainly some scope there for discussion.

The other point is that many countries fund their systems through lottery mechanisms. In the paper we make reference to Wembley Stadium in London, which is their major professional sport facility. It's received $300 million in lottery funds. In Italy—their professional leagues in a variety of sport—in Israel and in different countries, lottery funding is helping this issue while at the same time providing the opportunities for amateur sport development.

I'd like to thank you for this opportunity, and bring it open to questions.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Bales.

We will begin with Madame Tremblay.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Go ahead, sir.

[English]

The Chairman: Go ahead, Mr. Mark. Madame Tremblay defers to you.

Mr. Inky Mark: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Bales, thank you for coming before the committee.

I'll start by referencing our former delegation, because hockey has such a huge role to play in our culture. I'd like to hear from you, from a coaching perspective, on whether we are doing the right thing in following the junior hockey system of coaching between amateur to professional. Should we go to a high school-college approach, as they're doing in the States?

Mr. John Bales: The answer is probably a hybrid of the two, but I think there is a lot of improvement and a lot of benefits that come from an educational model.

Generally speaking, our high school and university programs are underdeveloped. Our university programs are suffering. In fact, a significant number of the coaching positions in Canadian universities have either been cut or downgraded from full time to part time. There is a tremendous need to strengthen that element of the system. It is an exceptionally important part of the growing experience for young children. So it is a very important part of the system.

Mr. Inky Mark: You indicated in your report that your perception of Sport Canada is not totally positive. Could you tell us briefly what is wrong with it?

As well, with regard to your recommendation that you should set up a Canadian sport federation, perhaps you could highlight how that organization would work comparable to what is in existence today.

Mr. John Bales: Sport in Canada would not be anywhere close to where it is without the guidance and leadership of Sport Canada. They have provided tremendous development to the system over the last 25 years.

• 1645

What we've proposed in the paper is that it's time to look at the structure, to look at how we can become more efficient and effective, to look at what policy and financial areas should be retained within government and what program areas can be better developed outside of government. I think there are significant coordination and efficiency improvements that can be made by a clearer division of those responsibilities, but I wouldn't like it to reflect that Sport Canada has not provided a tremendous service to Canadian sport over the last 25 years. I think what we're now looking at is how do we improve to the future.

Again, if we take the lead from comparing with other countries and what they've done, most countries have set up an outside-of-government structure in order to run the sport program aspect and left government to set the policy and provide the direction and funding and financial accountability.

Mr. Inky Mark: May I ask one more question?

The Chairman: If it's short, Mr. Mark, because we have to move on to our next witness pretty soon. We have a tight deadline today.

Mr. Inky Mark: Okay. It's a short question.

On the infrastructure recommendation that there should be more funding, I don't think there's any disagreement, but the question I have to ask you is, what are we talking about, facilities for Olympic athletes or amateur sports?

Mr. John Bales: It's really both. I give an example in the paper of the speed-skating oval in Calgary. It's the top facility in the world. If you were to talk to anybody in speed skating, they would tell you that Calgary is the place to go for the best facility in the world. All kinds of international teams train there.

But if you look at the recreational use, the use by the universities, the use by clubs, it's an extremely well-maintained and -managed facility that benefits all elements. When we're talking about facilities, I think that's really what we're talking about, that we have to create facilities that will accommodate high performance but will also accommodate a broad breadth of user.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Mark.

Mr. Volpe, did you have a question?

Mr. Joseph Volpe (Eglinton—Lawrence, Lib.): I just wanted to follow up on that. I'm curious about how you would achieve that balance—

The Chairman: Excuse me one second, Joe. Pardon me, but I did not notice Mr. Cannis had a question. I had him in the last round and I thought it was for Mr. Carefoote. Can we come back to you after Mr. Cannis?

Mr. Joseph Volpe: Sure.

The Chairman: Go ahead, John.

Mr. John Cannis: I don't have a question, Mr. Mills.

The Chairman: Okay, Mr. Volpe.

Mr. Joseph Volpe: My price has gone up.

I feel like I'm negotiating a professional sports franchise deal here.

Mr. Bales, let's say your model is acceptable from an academic point of view. How do you maintain that balance between providing facilities that are capable of maintaining high-level performance participation and at the same time having the commitment of community that wants to use it for recreational and less-professional use? Explain that one to me.

Mr. John Bales: I'm not talking about professional teams here, I'm talking about high-performance athletes, Olympic team athletes that need facilities in which to train. They need those facilities approximately four hours a day. There's another ten hours a day of usable time.

There are some excellent models of that happening but there just aren't enough examples of it happening. There's a strong need for more facilities. We've gone through quite a long period where there has not been very extensive sport facility development, so we need to begin to renew those facilities.

• 1650

Mr. Joseph Volpe: Is that happening because the participation rate has plummeted, or is it because the participation rate in certain sports has shifted, as reflective more of the general public's involvement in, participation in, certain activities that may lead to a higher-performance-level type of activity—for example, in the Olympic sports—or is it because of other factors that we haven't explored?

Mr. John Bales: The facilities are at capacity. I think if you were to talk to people who run facilities, their facilities are being used at capacity. That becomes the problem that high-performance athletes can't get into them frequently enough to train, or at reasonable times.

So I don't see that it's a problem that the facilities are underutilized or that people have shifted out of the facility; the problem is much more that we need more facilities.

Mr. Joseph Volpe: One last short one, Mr. Chairman.

You used a couple of countries as examples in your second-to-last sheet here. I have a very superficial understanding of the way some of the things happen in those countries, but it strikes me that the availability of facilities in those countries pales in comparison with those that are available to us here in Canada—and I'll be very parochial here—or available in my city of Toronto.

Now, either I have a mistaken impression, and people who are from those countries and who tell me about the state of the facilities they have are lying, or the association of facilities to performance and achievement just isn't there. Because those countries outperform us, regrettably, on virtually every single level and in every single sport.

Mr. John Bales: Britain is the example I've used in the paper. There's no question that we have better facilities than Britain, but they have addressed that issue very directly. They're putting $750 million a year into sport facility development, recognizing how far behind they are in that area. They've committed very significant amounts of lottery funds to rebuild their facility base.

Mr. Joseph Volpe: On a per-capita basis, that's about $350 million Canadian.

Mr. John Bales: Yes; you can halve it, roughly.

Mr. Joseph Volpe: Okay.

The Chairman: Mr. Cannis.

Mr. John Cannis: There is a question I wanted to ask, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for the opportunity.

Mr. Bales, you stated, if I may quote you, that, “Professional sports need the system”. I agree with you.

Earlier we heard from Molson. Does the business sector provide any financial support at all to the coaching association?

Finally, you talked about $50 million for the next five years. Were you referring also to the $50 million already committed to Sport Canada, or is this an additional $50 million that you're asking for?

Mr. John Bales: This is additional. I think in order to get into a competitive ballpark with other countries, there's a need for an increase in the support.

But in terms of your question with regard to corporate involvement, I'll ask Eric King to answer that.

Mr. Eric King (Vice-President, Operations and Marketing, Coaching Association of Canada): During the last 13 to 15 years, the association has reduced its dependency on the federal government from approximately 80% to 60% of our total budget. That has been done primarily through corporate sponsorship. We have been fortunate to secure the support of a family of corporate sponsors, primarily 3M Canada.

You will appreciate that we are in the business of education, specifically coach education. We have educated some 700,000 coaches through the 3M National Coaching Certification Program in the last 25 years. We educate an average of 80,000 coaches a year, who take one of our courses. We generate approximately $0.5 million through corporate sponsorship and through corporate and charitable donations.

So we have been, relative to other national amateur sport organizations, most fortunate indeed.

Mr. John Cannis: So when corporate witnesses are here asking for some kind of support, to support our other professional franchises, you're then, I believe, in agreement that we should as a government seriously consider their request in terms of flexibility and support, because there seems to be a reciprocal support on your side. Am I correct there?

• 1655

Mr. Eric King: Well, we do not have a brewery sponsor. Our sponsors are 3M, Investors Group, the Sports Network and Wittnauer International. None of them, I believe, other than TSN, perhaps, are involved in professional sport.

Mr. John Cannis: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Translation]

Mrs. Tremblay.

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: I'd like to thank our witnesses for their presentation.

Could you tell me whether the professional coaches you refer to are certified coaches?

[English]

Mr. Tom Kinsman (Coaching Consultant and Executive Director, Canadian Professional Coaches Association): When we talk about the Canadian Professional Coaches Association, which is an arm of the Coaching Association of Canada, we're talking about setting professional standards where a coach has achieved a certain level of education, has achieved a certain certification level within the education program, and has committed to a professional code of ethics.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Basically, you ask for three things in your document entitled "Strengthening the Canadian Sport System". First of all, you ask that the federal government commit $50 million for the construction and upgrading of sport infrastructures. In what way would this $50 million expenditure improve the lot of coaches?

[English]

Mr. John Bales: We believe that if the overall sport system is strengthened, we will be able to strengthen the coaching aspect. So facility development and a better opportunity to offer sport programs will raise the whole level of Canadian sport, both participation and excellence, which will increase the demand for coaches and the opportunity for coaching.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Have you any idea of the type of infrastructures that should be acquired with this $50 million commitment? What new facilities are needed? Do we need more arenas, more ski slopes or what exactly?

[English]

Mr. John Bales: That's a very interesting question, because in this country, no one nationally is taking the leadership or providing leadership to the facility question. So we don't have a map of facilities, of where the facilities are and where they're needed. In most other countries you could go to the national government or the provincial government and get a very detailed answer to that question.

To a fairly large degree, really, we have left the facility development question to very local initiatives of individual groups determining an ability to create a facility, with no national plan.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: I have one very brief question.

The Chairman: Go ahead.

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: We have heard testimony from many witnesses and groups. Some have told us that it is cheaper to train in the south of France because the facilities they need exist there and the coaches are better than those here in Canada. Others told us that it was extremely difficult to train in these centres of excellence, that they have to get in unseen through the back door and deal with all kinds of complications. Do we lack the necessary infrastructures here in Canada? Would our athletes really benefit from new infrastructures? That's an issue that concerns me.

You claim that a $50 million commitment is needed , that Sport Canada's budget should be increased to $100 million and that a Canadian Sport Confederation should be established. All of these initiatives would improve the situation. However, you represent coaches and I see no direct relation between these recommendations and coaching as such.

[English]

Mr. John Bales: I think the relation with coaching is very much creating a stronger sport system, where the coordination of sport programs between the athlete assistance programs and the sport science and sport medicine programs and the coaching programs all are best coordinated in order to be delivered more effectively to the customer, being the athlete. So in order to show improvement in those areas, I think we really have to come up with a better-coordinated system.

• 1700

In terms of training off-site, and going to the south of France for training camps, in my mind, we have a much bigger responsibility than that—to provide the opportunities for Canadians to be able to practise sport in Canada. We in fact do a lot of sending Canadian athletes elsewhere because they can't get the opportunities here. For instance, there's the number of athletes who go to the United States on scholarship because the university system is so much stronger down there than what we can offer here.

If you were to talk to the coaches of most of our team sports, they would tell you that their top squads are playing outside of the country. There just aren't in Canada the league opportunities in basketball, in volleyball, in field hockey, and a whole variety of different sports. So the athletes have to go elsewhere in order to train.

I don't think that's the solution. I think we should be able to provide opportunities for Canadian athletes to train in Canada.

That doesn't mean you don't still have certain training camps, and obviously competition, outside the country, but we have a lot of work to do to provide the opportunities for Canadian athletes to develop. Only a small—very small—percentage of athletes in fact can go outside the country and take advantage of some of those opportunities. We aren't providing the depth of opportunity that we should be.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Madame Tremblay.

Mr. Coderre, do you have a final question for our witness?

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Coderre (Bourassa, Lib.): I'm a little confused today. We have the Coaching Association of Canada appearing before the committee, but we don't seem to be talking about coaching. There are many different schools of thought, but basically, what we're hearing is that in order to resolve all of the problems, we need to spend more money, to build a new ski centre and so forth.

Two weeks ago, I realized that sport was becoming too macho, that women were relegated to the sidelines and that the real problem was accessibility and the political will, not only on the part of the government, but on the part of all industry stakeholders. You have an important role to play because your association represents coaches. The coach's job is to take an athlete's raw talent, to shape that athlete and to ensure that he not only becomes a good athlete, but also a productive citizen.

The problem, as I see it, is that you are here asking us for money. I have no problem with our finding better ways to spend the money we have. I agree with you that sometimes, judging from the testimony we have heard, we get the impression that Sport Canada operates out of a small, dusty office and is looking for a purpose. In reality, however, the grass is not always greener on the other side. Some of the responsibility rests with you.

I'd like to hear you talk today about coaches and the training they receive. There aren't many things that I won't talk about. Young boys and girls are currently experiencing some significant problems, be its sexual abuse, training problems and so forth. You talk about professional certification. Unfortunately, Mr. Bales, I get the feeling—and correct me if I'm wrong because at my age, I still have a lot to learn—that the basic problem here is that coaches have not received the proper training.

I'll make a deal with you. If it's money you need to improve the quality of coaching, then I'll go along with that. However, not only does your association need to take steps to ensure that sport more accessible to women and young people and that athletes become better role models, it also needs to appoint watchdogs to ensure that coaches do a better job. As things now stand, either young people are left to fend for themselves, or associations are having some problems in terms of appointing watchdogs.

Young people are scared because they don't feel safe or because they have a problem with the kind of coaches we now have.

[English]

Mr. John Bales: We provided quite a bit of information on the coaching program in some of the previous documentation.

We're very proud of the coaching program we've developed. As we've said, large numbers of coaches are going through the system. We have 80,000 coaches each year who take one of the programs. We've also created the Professional Coaches Association to try to set ethical standards as well as qualifications.

• 1705

We have many of the elements of the system in place, but there's still a lot of work to do in follow-up. It's one thing to teach coaches what their behaviour should be; it's quite another element to ensure that that behaviour in fact happens out in the field.

In order to try to address that, we are creating a professional membership structure that would also go down to the volunteer level through the sport organizations and to the provincial level. That is a very big issue for us. It's definitely one of our top priorities. We have just done a major review of the coaching certification program in order to look at how we can ensure it has more impact and more practical value to the user.

So that is our mandate and our responsibility. We don't feel we can be successful in fulfilling that mandate if we're not part of a strong sport system. We've always felt very frustrated that we teach a coach a code of ethics and values and proper material, and then they go into a league environment where those values aren't supported. It's the overall system that the coach is working in as much as the personal development of that individual.

So part of what is very important is that we improve the overall system, and that will help the coaches' effectiveness within their job.

Tom just wanted to add a comment to that.

Mr. Tom Kinsman: All of us here at this table were brought up in sport, and we're in our jobs because of the positive development experience we got from sport. It was a great character-building experience and it provided great insights into life. Other people following us should have that same opportunity.

You ask why we haven't focused just on the development of coaching. The answer is quite simple. We came here to speak to the question of developing sport in the country. Most of the presentation here has been about trying to build a better sport system.

If we build a better sport system, it's clear that there will be more activity at all levels, and when there's more activity at all levels, there will be a need for more coaches. Those coaches have to be working to the correct standards and values and must be educated in such a way that they can do their job competently.

We know sport always has been here and always will be here. It will go on without us. However, if we want our athletes to compete at the highest level internationally, they're going to need coaches with the expertise to be able to develop them to the level of competition that exists, and that takes more support. It takes better-qualified coaches, which takes better training programs.

We look at sport as a great learning opportunity for the development of individuals, but that doesn't inherently reside in the activity of sport. Sport is just something that happens. If we look back in the past, we see various forms of sport, such as bull-baiting and cock-fighting and all these other things, that really didn't promote the values we thought were important.

The sport experience should be a values-based experience, but that won't happen if we don't make the effort to put those values into sport. We can only do that through educating coaches, as well as everybody else, but the coaches are the front line for this kind of education.

There's also another step past the education, and that's setting ethical standards of practice that can be enforced within the system to ensure that, even though coaches are educated to a certain ethical standard, there are checks and balances, disciplinary mechanisms, or watchdog mechanisms in the system to make sure they are practising according to those standards.

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The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Kinsman, Mr. Bales, and all your colleagues. You've been most helpful to us today. Thank you.

Mr. John Bales: Thank you very much.

The Chairman: We've been pushing the clock here today, and we're going to move right on to our last witnesses.

Here's a little bit of backgrounder on our next witness. When we started this exercise of doing an analysis of sport in the economy, some of the best people in sport in our country said we should go back to the report of the Task Force on Sports for Canadians. This was a task force announced in 1969 by then Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Most people who have read this report believe it is the classic document. We're happy today to have with us the executive director of that report, Mr. Chris Lang. He was one of the architects of that report, and here we are 30 years later revisiting some of his work.

We're happy to have you here, Mr. Lang, with your experience in sport sponsorship and the whole realm of sport in this country, not only from a private sector point of view but in developing public policy. We welcome you and your colleagues.

Mr. Chris Lang (Chairman, Lang & Associates): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Ladies and gentlemen, we'd like to take about 15 or 20 minutes to take you through a brief overview of the presentation we gave you. I'd like to preface that by some introductory remarks.

We've been involved in sport for 34 years, starting back in Winnipeg in 1964 with the national hockey team; then through the Pan-American Games in 1967; then, as the chairman mentioned, with the Task Force on Sports in 1968; through the development of the Coaching Association, ParticipACTION, the National Sport and Recreation Centre, Hockey Canada, and the Sport Marketing Council; and working with other provincial-level organizations over the last 34 years.

A couple of conclusions from our involvement are paramount and I'm sure are high on your list.

The first and most important conclusion is that sport is one of our greatest national assets and should be treated the same way as other national assets or national resources. There absolutely is a role for the public sector in protecting, monitoring, and developing national assets. We might sometimes question the role of the federal government in the way those assets—

The overwhelming conclusion I make, having spent 34 years involved in sport in Canada and around the world, is that we have to develop a unique way to do sport in Canada. We're not like the Americans, with the educational system. We're not like the Europeans and Asians, with the club system. We have our own unique way of developing resources.

As you know, we have a tremendous cultural mosaic, but another characteristic of Canadians is that we like to hedge our bets. We can't figure out whether things should be developed publicly or privately. In my personal view, having watched sport develop over the last 34 years, the best way to develop sport is the dynamic tension between the public and private sectors. Both have a role in developing it.

The role that I would suggest belongs to government, which is really the custodian of the public interest, is on the policy side. If you don't, you risk that the private sector will take it over and then sport will become business.

I know there were some questions about that before, with what sport is today in professional hockey. In answering that question, although I wasn't asked it, I would suggest that with hockey, it is both. It is a cultural asset, and there are all kinds of full-length research studies on that to show it's a significant part of the Canadian fabric. If you go back to the Task Force on Sports in 1968, that was suggested particularly with the CFL, the Canadian Football League. That's really where that organization got some profile, which it never really had before.

Also, the private sector is probably the better organization to execute.

So the model we should have in this country is the public doing policy, obviously in concert with the participants in it, and then going to the private sector to execute. I think you got a sense of that from the Coaching Association, in the model they're suggesting now.

• 1715

If you go back and look at sport development in this country, starting in 1964 with the Fitness and Amateur Sport Act, and now coming 34 years later to your study, which is needed, you will find that sport has wavered. At certain times the federal government has been the leader and at other times the private sector has been the leader, and there has been this dynamic tension.

The mistake we've made is that we've never really understood our roles. I don't think the federal government has really staked out the policy area, and I don't think the participants on the other side have necessarily accepted that. There are all kinds of examples of that. If you go back to 1970, I think, Marc Lalonde was the sport minister, and he slapped down John Bassett and the gang who were trying to bring a football league into Toronto, because they said it was going to destroy the Canadian Football League. That was an example of it.

There's no question that today, professional sport in this country is being faced— I've had the opportunity to talk to a number of the people you've talked to. For sport franchises, the issues are serious, such as tax difference and difference in the dollar, the currency.

There are other differences too. Culture is a big difference. I'm not sure if that came out. We don't have the same depth of sport culture as they do in the United States. And we don't have the system, particularly in major sports such as hockey or football. When Notre Dame plays football, they get 100,000 people in the stadium. So there's a fundamental difference there.

This asset has to be developed and maintained, both from a cultural point of view and, probably more important, from an economic point of view. I had an opportunity to read the recent economic study on sport, and it's woefully weak. It comes out that sport is under 2% in terms of GDP and unemployment, and that's absolutely ridiculous. I think those numbers are closer to 8%. If you study any other country, the numbers are a hell of a lot higher. For some reason, we're not tracking it or we're not covering it properly. We don't know the economic impact of the thing you're talking about, and I don't think we've fully explored the social impact. We're going to address that in some of our recommendations.

I'm going to talk about the corporate side, and then Dan Thompson, who was an Olympic athlete, is going to talk about the sports side, because there are two pieces to it. We sent a presentation to you last week, and I'm not going to bore you by taking you through the details.

We've been around sport sponsorship now for 34 years, and in our business we see over $400 million a year of sport sponsorship on a global basis. I don't think any other firm in the world sees that amount. I'm not trying to suggest by any stretch of the imagination that that's the revenue of our company, nor do we influence $400 million, but we see $400 million spent in this area around the world.

If you go to research today, you'll find a couple of things. First and most important, you have to start with the consumer. The consumer is you and I around this table. If we think about ourselves for a moment, we're looking essentially for two things: branded products cheap and experiences.

An example of a branded product is Coca-Cola. There was the whole emergence of the cola wars, when Cott came in and started to sell 24 cans of cola for $4.99, and that forced Coke to come down from $11.99 to about $6.99. The public today wants branded products cheap, and that's the whole growth of what you would call these box stores, the Wal-Marts and the big stores, where people today want something they trust and know cheap.

It's interesting to note that today you can buy Levi's jeans on the Internet in Hong Kong for $26, pay $6 to FedEx, and have them drop in your lap in three days. Well, why, in your right mind, would you go to the store? You know the quality of Levi's. Why would you go out of your way to go to an Eaton's or a Bay or a Zellers? That's something else. That's the second thing consumers are looking for.

Consumers are looking for an experience, and that's the whole example of Starbucks. Why would you go and pay $2.50 for a Starbucks coffee when Dirty Joe's around the corner has exactly the same coffee for $1? You pay $1.50 for the experience. What's the difference between Perrier water and club soda? Not a heck of a lot, although you pay a premium for one and you don't for the other.

The basis of our presentation from a corporate point of view—and Dan will talk about it from a sports point of view—is that we've yet to see sport start from the consumer and work back. If you study industries, there's a number of ways to look at industries today, but generally you can group them into three buckets. They're either product-driven, channel-driven, or consumer-driven.

• 1720

Depending on the speed of technology and the influence of technology in your business, if you get behind the consumer—and, for instance, if you're still product-driven and the consumer has enough information to affect the purchase, and if they're up to the channel or they're up to the Internet—you can find your business in great difficulty.

A very interesting book by a professor at MIT has just come on the market; it's called Clock Speed. The thesis of this book is very simple: probably the animal that's had the greatest effect in the study of human beings is the firefly.

The firefly has three characteristics. First of all, it's small, so you can put a heck of a lot of them in a bottle; secondly, it has a lifespan of two weeks; and thirdly, it has some human characteristics. I'm not sure what the heck those are, but the biologists have been able to study the firefly and see the speed. So the thesis of this book is, what are the firefly industries?

If you want to see the speed of technology, the industry with the shortest lifespan, the one that's the firefly of business, is the film business. You make a film and take it out the first weekend. If you don't make it in the first weekend, you don't make it. That's absolutely proven.

On the other hand, the industry with the longest life cycle is the airplane frame manufacturing business. Boeing is still selling 747s 30 years later. The auto industry retools every six years. Industries that have a fast speed today are technology and communication, and you can see how fast they're moving. So what happens is technology is the big driver of information, and information is really the basis on which you and I, as consumers, make the decision on what we're going to buy.

What we're trying to get across in terms of sponsorship today is that the 25 million-plus Canadian consumers out there who are going to buy products and services are looking for two things: they're looking for branded products cheap and they're looking for experiences. If you study the many vehicles the corporations can use to build their brand or create an experience for consumers, there are many out there: arts, culture, science, charity, and sport. If you go to the research that's available today, only one works overwhelmingly, and that's sport.

Sure, charity is a nice cause. If you have a competing product, and presuming that most of the attributes of your product—quality, price, service, etc.—are equal, then the tie-breaker could be Heart and Stroke, Kids Help Phone, or whatever. But overwhelmingly, sport comes in before that.

The reason for that is 90% of the population are into sport. People are segmented in those other areas. Because of that strong appeal and the strong emotion—and it doesn't take you people very long to figure out the depth of that emotion when you look at the sport pages or the television coverage— Just take a look at the conversations that go on, in big events but on a regular basis, in terms of the Stanley Cup or the World Series. Not very many of us follow baseball, but we're all baseball experts when the World Series is on, or football as you get down to the play-offs, or the Stanley Cup.

What we have here is an asset that has tremendous appeal to the public and tremendous marketing clout. Our sense is that it's underdeveloped, both on the amateur side and on the professional side. The gist of our recommendations is really coming off that side.

The good news is that we have this asset. Sure, there's all kinds of bad news, and you've heard it all from everybody appearing in the last two or three months, giving you the litany of the dollar and the owners' inability to control players' salaries and all those things, and those are issues there. The good news is we have the best asset in the country in sport.

Our concern is that we're not developing it properly. We have to take a look and not do what we've done historically with it. We have to do it differently. That's our thesis today. We have to break the old mould and the old traditions.

Just to presume that some of the big companies are great sport marketers or that some of the big amateur or professional franchises are great marketers is an assumption worth taking a look at. Our sense is that an awful lot of opportunities are out there to use these properties a heck of a lot differently and at the same time not violate sport on the other side.

The simple message I gave—and it's the first part of the document you have—is that the influence of technology and the speed of information are causing corporations to have to build a relationship more and more with their customers. On the other hand, the customers want a brand cheap and an experience. What better vehicle to enhance and reinforce your brand?

• 1725

You had Molson here before, with Jeff Carefoote talking about this. Obviously the reason they wrap Molson around hockey is so that they can sell their brand. They're using it as a medium to get to their consumer and to get the message to the consumer, because of the audience and the obvious inherent interest that the public has in hockey, which goes way beyond their segment or their consumption pattern. They're not people who just drink beer. There's a heck of a lot greater interest in hockey than beer-drinkers, and it transcends a number of ages. They just are particularly tapping into an age segment and a consuming segment that they want.

The message we want to leave you with is that technology is moving very quickly, which is causing information to move, which is then forcing corporations to market differently. They're going to have to communicate, no matter what the price of the dollar and no matter what's happening in the economy.

Dennis, you come from business and you know that when the market is down, you have to fight for market share. The last budget you turn off is your marketing budget. You'd probably cut a hell of a lot of other things, but when the economy is tight and you're fighting for consumers, smart companies jack up their marketing budget to make sure they don't lose the consumer, and then down the line maybe they jack the price. But the last thing you want to do is lose market share.

That's the scenario we're sitting in at the present time, for the short run. We believe it's right for sports sponsorship and we believe there are lots of opportunities. We recommend that you go about it in a very specific way. Government has a role on the policy side of that and the private sector has a role in the execution of that. The good news is that sport is a very viable medium to use to communicate to the public, and corporations are going to use more of it.

Now Dan will talk on the sports side and then we'll get into our specific recommendations.

Mr. Dan Thompson (Principal, Architectus, Lang & Associates): Thanks, Chris.

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, for the purpose of this conversation, I'd like to talk about properties. The sport community fits in as a property. A property is referred to in this context as an event, activity, or facility that relies on corporate sponsorship as a key contributor to its financial success. The sport community certainly fits into this.

You've heard previously from the NHL, Major League Baseball, the NBA, and CFL representatives about the status of professional sport in Canada. I would instead like to focus on the plight of the amateur sport community.

In any given year, Architectus, which is a division of Lang that consults specifically with property owners, talks to over 100 properties about sponsorship. Of those, about half are from the amateur sport community. Our overwhelming impression of the amateur sport community is that they are unprepared to meet the demands of the 21st century marketplace.

Chris has spoken about the need for properties to become more relevant through open dialogue and programs that directly touch consumers in a tangible way. Currently, in the majority of situations—not every situation; there are some sports that do this well—the amateur sport community is viewed as unsophisticated in many respects, in that the brand of the sport is not well articulated. These sports are unaware of their assets and what those assets are worth, and how best to maximize revenue.

There's a lack of integration and a limited ability to build quadrennial programs that tie a series of events and/or programs into a bundled or tiered package. There's limited research and a limited understanding of research on who property consumers are, the attributes of the sport, and the profile of participants, spectators, and buyers and their buying habits. There's a limited understanding.

They are unable to deal with competition. They have limited read-and-react skills. They're unable to change with the marketplace, and we know how fast the marketplace is changing right now.

There's a lack of measurable assets. In other words, they are unable to justify and defend the property's value to a corporation.

Image and awareness versus sales and brand enhancement are the things Chris was talking about, and there's a lack of customization. There's a general inability to create leveraging ideas that talk to the corporation and more importantly to their consumers.

In our view, to properly take advantage of the 21st century marketplace, the sport community must do the following.

Articulate the brand attributes of the property. Why is figure skating important to consumers? What attributes do consumers like about it? Other sports need to do that as well and really understand that.

Provide sponsors with an in-depth spectator-viewer-participant profile.

Control the channels of distribution—in other words, on-site, broadcasting, licensing, communications, etc.

Demonstrate the value of their assets.

Package assets to maximize revenue—in other words, know how to tier the assets, how much the assets are worth, and how to best maximize that potential.

Become marketing-driven versus technical, and enter into collaborative marketing initiatives with other sports and the sport community.

• 1730

What I'd like to do now is just very briefly talk about five primary recommendations, and there are a series of other recommendations I'm sure we would make if we had more time.

The first one deals with tax incentives, and you've talked about tax incentives as part of this hearing. Sufficient incentives do not exist for the amateur sport community. Tax deductions of up to 200% should be extended for sponsorship rights fees. Further, these deductions should be tiered to maximize support of smaller, less established amateur sports. In addition, there should be distinction between not-for-profit, or amateur, and for-profit, or professional, sport organizations.

These incentives would provide opportunities for smaller companies to become involved in amateur sport, especially given the current clutter in pro sport sponsorship and the consumer interest in grassroots community programs.

Tax deductions should also be extended to amateur sport organizations that invest in research, thereby enabling properties to be better prepared when selling to corporations. This is a general trend we see. The sport community has an inability to communicate the value of their properties to the corporations.

The second idea is the concept of a Canadian sponsorship trust. The amateur sport community needs a resource that it can draw upon to raise the level of its sponsorship expertise. A sponsorship trust would be a source of funds that organizations meeting pre-established criteria could access. A series of qualified suppliers would provide services in sponsorship packaging, sales, and sales management. The sport community partners would reimburse the trust when funds were generated from sponsorship sales, so it would be repaid over time. The trust would allow organizations to elevate their level of sophistication and transfer intellectual expertise from agency to in-house people over a number of years. This concept could also apply to other organizations—the arts community, for example.

The third idea is the concept of a Canadian sport corporation. Currently the sport community is like a ship without a rudder. No one organization speaks inclusively for the amateur sport community. On top of this, corporations view the amateur sport community as an extension of government. Corporations are hesitant to give to sport because of its association with a government environment.

The big idea is to move the $50 million or $60 million Sport Canada asset base into a not-for-profit, non-governmental corporation to manage public and private sector interests in the amateur sport community. Hence the concept of a Canadian sport corporation.

A Canadian sport corporation would maximize corporate access to and the revenue potential of the Sport Canada asset base, which is currently under-leveraged. This Canadian sport corporation would facilitate the development of amateur sport as an integral part of Canada's cultural heritage and would spearhead the re-branding of sport as an important social service. A Canadian sport corporation would function as a business and have the ability to leverage existing Sport Canada assets: the Canada Games, the athlete assistance program, national training centres, etc.

A Canadian sport corporation would assist other sport community partners to form collaborative marketing initiatives to generate sponsorship revenue towards a national community-based amateur sport program, which was talked about in the 1992 Sport: The Way Ahead.

The fourth recommendation is in the whole area of preventative legislation. The amateur sport community needs better protection for its domestic rights and from international federations. Legislation is needed that would prohibit activities by an international body without the sanction, approval, and/or involvement of the Canadian sport governing body.

A case in point is the Canadian Figure Skating Association and their relationship with the ISU. At a recent ISU congress, legislation was enacted that permits the ISU to sanction an event in a country, through a third party, without the sanction of that country. While not acted upon to this point, it remains a threat to CFSA revenue potential. It's legislation currently on the books.

The fifth and final one I'd like to touch on today is the concept of a research bank. In our experience, the amateur sport community needs access to up-to-date consumer and corporate research. Clearly sport organizations are having trouble demonstrating the relevance of their sport to corporations and in turn to the end consumer. The research bank would be a fund or a service that would assist in the development of attribute profiles for sport, the accumulation of consumer research on psychographics and attitudinal studies, and testing of new events and sport concepts. The research bank is critical to servicing the 21st century marketplace with products that touch consumers in a tangible way.

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In conclusion, we believe the new millennium will be a turning point for the amateur sport community. The amateur sport community as a whole needs to develop a strong master brand that is viewed as credible and can deliver programs nationally and speak with one voice. Beyond the subcommittee on sport in Canada, and with all due respect to the COA, no group truly speaks with an inclusive voice for the amateur sport community.

Currently the Sports Federation of Canada and the National Sport and Recreation Centre have been functionally dismantled, and the sport community itself has failed to fill the leadership void. Without leadership from within, a master vision for sport will never be realized. It's time the amateur sport community was given the tools to create its own public partnership with government and the corporate community, through concepts such as a Canadian sport corporation.

Failing the above, the amateur sport community needs marketing expertise, specifically the ability to understand the value of its assets, bundle or tier the assets, and develop packages that are relevant and that touch consumers in a tangible way. If you could act upon only one recommendation, it would be our advice to create marketing expertise to complement the amateur sport community's world-class technical abilities. At the very least, that would produce a sport system that is consumer-relevant, thereby meeting the demands of participants, spectators, and viewers.

We thank you for your time and would like to open the floor for questions.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Provenzano, you've been waiting.

Mr. Carmen Provenzano (Sault Ste. Marie, Lib.): Those are some very interesting concepts. Perhaps I'll just play the devil's advocate with my questions.

The Chairman: Absolutely.

Mr. Carmen Provenzano: That's an interesting concept, a Canadian sport corporation with the function of managing and disbursing maybe $100 million. Combine that with the preventive legislation you're talking about, which would, among other things, prohibit activities by international bodies without the sanction, approval, and/or involvement of the Canadian sport governing body.

It could be argued that the aftermath of the legislation and creating this sport corporation would in effect be a monopoly, creating a sport czar that would have a tremendous amount of influence and control in Canadian sport. If you hold the purse strings, that gives you a tremendous amount of power, not only in disbursing funds in any given fiscal period, but in controlling the destiny of certain organizations and maybe where sport goes in Canada.

As for the case study that was provided, involving the International Skating Union—which apparently may be conducting an event here in Canada without the permission of a member federation, which would be the Canadian Figure Skating Association, I presume—that's arguably not a bad thing.

For the sake of argument, similar things are done elsewhere. We've seen it in hockey. With the Canadian Figure Skating Association and the International Skating Union, the line becomes very blurry between amateurs and professionals, and I don't clearly understand the implications, but we just had two National Hockey League teams play an exhibition game in Japan. I certainly would take offence to the notion that you had to obtain the permission of the Japanese Ice Hockey Federation or the Japanese government to go and rent a stadium there and hold an event.

• 1740

Similarly, there's been talk of football, and certainly basketball, moving into Europe. If any Canadian teams wanted to go and rent a stadium, anywhere at all, to have any kind of sporting contest and generate revenue to make it a cost-effective or worthwhile endeavour, I certainly would take offence if they should need anybody's permission.

The kind of legislation you're talking about is going to cut two ways. I'd like to hear your comments on that, and particularly on the potential to create a monopoly and a sports czar.

Mr. Chris Lang: To play the devil's advocate myself, if you were to check out that hockey situation, I would be dumbfounded if the NHL did not have the permission of the IIHF and the Japanese Ice Hockey Federation to play that game in Japan. I'd be dumbfounded if that didn't happen. I'm sure it did.

Mr. Carmen Provenzano: It would be nice to know.

Mr. Chris Lang: We can check it out, but I would bet a lot that that happened, because the NHL and the IIHF are partners in the Olympics, and they're not going to cut across each other's territory.

The issue, using figure skating as an example, is that right now, you don't have a level playing field. Only one organization in Canada has that legislation, and that's the Canadian Olympic Association.

A law was passed here in 1977—and Dick Pound was instrumental in getting it through—that protects the COA's rights and does not allow the IOC to put an Olympic Games in here without the approval of the COA. They're the only sport governing body in Canada that has that right, and it's enshrined in legislation. Everybody else is out in the free market.

There's a similar law down in the United States at the present time that prohibits international federations from coming in on local territory. It has nothing to do with a monopoly; it has everything to do with your own territory. An international federation can decide to put an event on in this country, and what happens if the event in effect kills the Canadian federation? So it's not a monopoly.

Again, with sports, there have to be certain rules. The parallel—and maybe not an absolute parallel—would be to play hockey with no rules. You have to be able to figure out how you can play with each other.

Relative to putting too much power in an organization, there are already two examples of that happening in this country. You have CODA sitting in Calgary with a percentage of the money that was generated from the Olympics; they have a significant fund. You also have the Canadian Olympic Association with the Olympic Trust for the other piece of that profit. So there are already vehicles out there that have assets and are dispensing money.

I agree with you: money, to a large extent, calls the shots. The concern that has been exhibited—certainly it was presented softly by the Coaching Association—is not that Sport Canada is not handing that money out properly, but that maybe collectively it would be better if the people who had a say in spending the money had a say in how that money was handed around, a little more democracy in doing it. Our essential thesis is maybe they should all be put into a pot. That doesn't mean government wouldn't have a piece of that pot. They'd be equal players in that organization, on some kind of basis, the same way as the federations would be, or whatever else.

I know that, by being devil's advocate, you could take apart some of the facts out there. It's difficult sometimes to take a specific example and prove a principle. We're not advocating, by any stretch of the imagination, empowering a czar of sport who has the money and can decide where that money is being spent.

One thing we're very good at in this country is democracy. The example of that right now is the bid in Toronto for 2008. I think the board is now up to 96 and climbing, and the executive committee is up to 16 and climbing, so it's pretty democratic, if you take a look at who are the 96 people and who are the 16 people. And every day another group comes up that feels they're not part of that.

Sport has had a tremendous amount of democracy, and I don't think that would be lost in the process we're talking about.

Mr. Carmen Provenzano: What happens to corporate sponsors who want to operate outside of the aegis of a Canadian sport corporation?

Mr. Chris Lang: They're already doing that. Again, we're not suggesting that that organization would necessarily do the sponsorship. What we're suggesting is that if we pooled resources, research, and marketing effort and brought up everybody's level, then there would be strength.

In terms of putting it together, if you go back to 1968 and look at the fundamental recommendations of the task force, in effect it said that sport was sitting on the kitchen table in this country, and we had to pull it off the kitchen table and put it on the business table. We had to try to centre it at the National Sport and Recreation Centre and get something going in coaching; get something going in attitudes, which was ParticipACTION; and clean up the hockey situation by putting all the constituents around the table with Hockey Canada.

• 1745

The reality is that all those things have been done. Over a period of time, the Coaching Association has stayed; Hockey Canada has done its job and gone; the National Sport and Recreation Centre is sort of drifting off; the federations are getting stronger and some are leaving, like skiing to Calgary and possibly others; and ParticipACTION is still there. It's a constant change.

I don't think it would have any impact—as a matter of fact, I think it would be a positive impact—on sponsorship. Because as Dan suggests, the difficulty we have in sport at the present time, from a corporate point of view, is that far too many sport properties still talk about the features of what they have to offer rather than the benefits to corporations.

Today, corporations are in the business of— It's tougher today, with the dollar and the economy and all the woes we've heard about from corporations. They're spending their dollars much tougher to do that, so they have to see that they're going to get a payback. So any recommendations that would make better vehicles for them to get a payback would help the flow of dollars coming further over.

Mr. Carmen Provenzano: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman: Mr. Coderre, and then we move on to Madame Tremblay.

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Coderre: This study has been under way for several months now.

[English]

The Chairman: A year.

Mr. Denis Coderre: A year? That long?

[Translation]

How time flies! The reason why were here is that in 1969, a task force was set up and today, 30 years later, we have come to the realization that we still haven't resolved a number of issues.

[English]

Let me read you page 5, just the first part of your report:

Canadian sport, in many of its branches, is in serious difficulty.

Sound familiar today?

A mass of evidence, gathered both in this country and abroad, has convinced us that many of the problems facing sport in Canada can only be overcome with the assistance of the federal government.

[Translation]

Every time I hear someone testify, and that's been the case since you began your presentation, three words come to mind:

[English]

partnership, leadership, and accountability. I'm amazed to see all these witnesses who want our money, and then they say, “Let us do the job. We'll take care of it.”

[Translation]

Since Mr. Sponsorship is sitting across from me, I'd like to ask him if, in proposing the establishment of this corporation, what he's really saying is:

[English]

“We know the job. Give us the money, and we'll take care of it.”

[Translation]

The problem I see is that from the outset, we have been talking about taxpayers' money and about corporations that are in business primarily to turn a profit. If we want to create partnerships using corporations and taxpayers' money, why then not create a sport department, or reconsider the idea of a sport ministry where true leadership would come through accountability? This way, we could avoid a repeat of the mistakes of the past thirty years. In looking at the current situation and at the experiences of the 1969 task force, it becomes clear that what we need is tougher policies and greater leadership in order to address the needs of the industry, particularly those of amateur sports. I will get to professional sports later.

[English]

Mr. Chris Lang: Of the 54 recommendations of the task force, 52 were implemented. The only one that wasn't implemented was tax deductibility.

I agree that you can take the same introductory paragraph from the Task Force on Sports and put it in here, but with respect, I suggest that in any other endeavour, 30 years later you could do the same thing. All that tells you is you have something vibrant and changing. What we're suggesting is that we have to now change the mechanism to do it.

I agree with you on the three words you said—partnership, leadership, and accountability—but we're suggesting it may be a better mechanism to put it at arm's length to be able to execute it a little differently.

Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity. When I was flying down today, I sat next to an individual on the plane—

A voice: You'd better watch what you say.

Mr. Chris Lang: Yes, I'd better watch it.

Voices: Oh, oh!

Mr. Chris Lang: I'll tell you what: you've kept us entertained with that, anyway. So let me throw you another one that you can play with too. I won't give the guy's name, but—

Voices: Oh, oh!

• 1750

Mr. Chris Lang: It was very interesting, because he works for a crown corporation, or I think he said a schedule III corporation, that manages government's excess land. I think the federal government is the largest landholder in Canada.

A voice: Canada Lands.

Mr. Chris Lang: Yes, Canada Lands.

I was just talking to him about what he was doing. The government has seen fit to take the 11 million acres that you have— I think they buy the assets from you in a not-for-profit organization. They then go and do whatever they have to do to pick up the assets, they go and sell it, and the profit then comes back, because you own the bottom line in the corporation.

That's not much more than we're talking about. There's a precedent in doing that. Now, I'm not sure sport and land are one in the same thing.

Sport was at its height in 1976, when you had a sport minister; the first minister was Iona Campagnolo, and then we went off that. I guess the last sport minister was Otto Jelinek.

Ms. Suzanne Tremblay: Jean Charest.

Mr. Chris Lang: Jean Charest, sorry, after Otto Jelinek. It's drifted back in terms of significance, and I'm not sure where it is in the structure now.

You had a number of players on the private side and on the public side. What we're suggesting now is that you put them all at the table, including the government, and maybe there are efficiencies in working in one vehicle.

As for how far out you have to push that, whether you entirely privatize it or schedule III or whatever, there are people a heck of a lot smarter than us who can figure that out.

[Translation]

Mr. Denis Coderre: Mr. Lang, if we want some guarantee of accountability and assurances that the government will assume a leadership role by adopting effective policies, in terms of sport ethics, preserving sport and even allowing for tax deductions, I think it's important that—

I have to admit that when mention is made of agencies or crown corporations, I break out in hives. Increasingly, we see that when accountability is lacking, horror stories abound.

I'm not a socialist, but a liberal. If we want to strike a balance between taxpayers' money and the role of the government, in this case the elected representatives of the people, in establishing an effective Canadian policy on amateur sports, there needs to be stronger government ties than can be found in a crown corporation or business that is independent of government. Even if we appoint someone to sit on a board of directors, this is only one vote. You know better than I do how this works. This does not necessarily mean that we will wield any influence.

To guarantee this partnership, this leadership and this accountability, we need projects that bring people together, for instance, the 2008 games in Toronto, the 2010 games in Quebec City and the World Cup of soccer.

The Chairman: Yes, soccer.

Mr. Denis Coderre: Wouldn't this be one way of providing the kind of leadership we need and developing an effective policy for amateur sports and ultimately, for professional sports?

[English]

Mr. Chris Lang: I'll take the first half of the question and Dan will take the second half in terms of the games itself and whether that will have an impact.

We're now on the form rather than the substance. What we gave you were recommendations for the substance, not the form. The simple reality of what we're telling you is that the federal government is not playing a strong enough role in sport. If you want to have a minister of sport and see how effective that will be, that's one way to go.

The way the Americans control sport is through legislation. They scare the hell out of professional and amateur sport. Any time they start straying too far, what do they do? They pull them into Washington and scare the hell out of them and threaten to hit them with anti-trust. They have laws down there that we don't have up here.

• 1755

The reality is you're not playing a strong enough role. What structure do you need to do that? We're not skilled enough to say. We are suggesting that you have to play a greater leadership role, but it has to be played on some kind of partnership basis. The recommendations we gave you were on substance, primarily from the sponsorship side. They were the things we thought were needed to drive more funding into sport.

On the other hand, and following up on what the Coaching Association said in answer to a question that I think you asked on coaching individuals, if you don't have the right form at some point in time, you can work all you want on the substance, but if the right climate isn't there, you've wasted your time. The Coaching Association said they're taught all these things about ethics, morality, skills, and whatever, and then they go to an environment where that's not appreciated.

That's partly what's happened and why amateur sport is not getting the corporate funding. I'm not saying it's a direct correlation, and we're not trying to lay the blame at the government's door. We're not saying that because you don't have a minister of sport or a deputy minister, it's not a high priority. We're saying if you can raise the priority to number one or number two and make sure there is some kind of mechanism on a partnership basis, then you are going to get more funding.

You have the Coaching Association coming in front of you saying they need $40 million and they need facilities and coaching programs. Then we're coming on the other side saying you need money to be put into marketing. You people are going to have to play God here and decide which is the chicken and which is the egg. With respect, we would argue that we're the chicken in this case: you need the money first to be able to do those things second.

The reality is the amateur sport system in this country is not free-standing enough, from a financial point of view, to be able to get its own house in order. Therefore we're sitting here as amateurs in front of you, with cap in hand, saying, “Give us more money.” If I were you, I'd say, “What have you done with the assets you have? Are you squeezing the most commercial value out of what you have?” Then I think we would say, on the other hand, “We need some help to do that.” So again, we're coming back to you.

I agree with you. I too get fed up with the private sector walking to the public sector and asking for support all the time. The structure is something you're more skilled at.

Dan, why don't you talk about the impact of us getting the Olympic Games in 2008 or 2010, or a World Cup or something, in terms of developing the sports structure?

Mr. Dan Thompson: To back up just for a moment, one of the reasons we thought about a Canadian sport corporation was that in this corporate environment, corporations are hesitant to give to anything that's government. We needed a non-governmental vehicle so that this could be facilitated.

Also, when we look at the $50 million to $60 million that the government puts into sport, there are assets that are not being leveraged and can't be leveraged, because they're too close to government. The athlete assistance program is $7 million. A program could be created around the athlete assistance program that could involve corporations, but because of how it's structured, it's not appropriate. The same would hold true for the national training centres.

With an entity such as this, we're not talking about letting accountability go and creating a corporation that would run the show. If you're going to give any corporation or group access to $50 million or $60 million, you're going to have strings attached. We understand that, and that was part of the deal. But by creating an entity that speaks for the sport community more holistically, there will be more continuity when we're pitching for some of these larger programs, such as the Olympics or major facilities that need to be built, etc.

It's also capturing some of the corporate community's goodwill, and for some of the great Canadians we have who want to make a contribution to Canada, this could be a vehicle for them to make a contribution.

Mr. Chris Lang: I think it's kind of ironical that you have the Toronto bid for 2008 trying to raise $40 million to make their bid successful, and I've never seen a more Alphonse and Gaston routine between the private sector and the three groups in the public sector as to who's going to pay for it. Nobody wants to put any money up, and yet it's a $2 billion economic impact.

Maybe they haven't made a good story, maybe they haven't packaged it properly, but boy, a business case could be made. And get the facts. There's too much fluff floating around. Is there an economic impact? Does it affect the country from a cultural point of view? Does it affect it financially? Then make a business case that it's worth a $40 million investment.

• 1800

With all due respect, the three levels of government spend over 40% of the GDP in this country and make all kinds of investment. Why isn't sport a worthy investment? Probably we haven't made the case, but equally, you haven't made us make the case. Whose fault is it? We're both to blame.

We're both the owners of sport. It's incumbent on you people as legislators to come back and say, “Make a better case. Quit coming here asking for a handout.” Equally, it's on our side to rile you people and say, “You're missing the boat here. You spend money on all kinds of things that nowhere have the same social aspect and economic impact.” And hopefully that can be proven.

Quite frankly, we don't have the information to prove that, so we're just talking air here in terms of trying to make the economic case. I know for a fact that with the World Figure Skating Championships going into Vancouver in 2001, the economic impact is a minimum of $10 million. Boy, then you have some leverage against the city and the province to put some money into it, and they've already been able to leverage some of the city money.

We don't do a good job in sport—and I tell you, both professional and amateur sport—in making the business case for what we do. We spend too much time talking about the sport side and who's playing and who's doing this, rather than the business side.

The Chairman: Madame Tremblay.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Following up on what my colleague, the member for Bourassa, said, in terms of establishing a Canadian Sports Corporation, the old adage springs to mind: "once bitten, twice shy". Even within federal organizations, bilingualism is a problem. If we have a fully independent corporation, what assurances do we have that both languages will receive equal consideration? We've already seen the kinds of problems that some athletes have when it comes to training and being selected to teams. Some have to go before judges. I have some serious concerns about the kind of total independence that is being proposed and about the lack accountability, particularly about the lack of accountability.

What justification could there possibly be for this lack of accountability? What are your views on the subject?

[English]

Mr. Chris Lang: We're not suggesting a full accountability, but let me answer the first part of your question.

Quebec is 30% or 35% of the Canadian market. If you're going to look to the private sector to partly fund this and you have corporations that are interested in that market, I don't know how the bilingual aspect will be lost. With respect, I think it's the other way around. Probably it will be even harder, because I think corporations are looking for more opportunities to be able to sell their products in Quebec, and sport is a very significant part of it. So I think it would come the other way.

I suggest, with respect, that maybe we're caught up a little bit too much here in the form of our recommendation rather than the substance. We're not skilled enough to talk about— We've thrown out the concept that sport is a national asset and it's best developed in a partnership. How do you develop that partnership, with what mechanisms? We're not sure, but we need more of a partnership.

You people are much better skilled than we are at figuring out the form. You're very good at it, as legislators. What we're giving is the substance. We had to say something, so we came up with a corporation. We're talking more about the philosophy of a partnership and how it works. I know we have a heck of a time in this country making it work, but I'll tell you what: it works in sport. Sometimes we make mistakes on it, but generally it works in sport. Generally, if you break down the teams, there's usually the percentage of gender on it, there's usually the percentage of language on it—

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Would the proposed Canadian Sport Corporation be the first initiative of this kind or does a similar model exist elsewhere?

[English]

Mr. Chris Lang: We could look at Australia as a model. The U.S. has a different model. We could look at everything else in the world, but again, we have to come up with our own model that fits our own set of circumstances.

The United States has an entirely different model. The federal government does not put money directly into sport. It enables, it cajoles, and it has legislation, but the big funders of sport in the United States are the educational system and the U.S. Olympic Committee, and the sports governing bodies go out and scramble around somewhere in between. They have a different model, and Europe is a different model.

We can go and look at other examples, but we'd better make sure we come up with a made-in-Canada solution. Another typical Canadian thing, other than being a mosaic and always hedging our bets, is that we tend to look outside. We tend to think that to be successful, you have to go outside and come back, for some strange reason. Why can't we make our own solution?

• 1805

We've done very well in sports. In spite of the problems we've talked about, we did awfully well at Nagano. We're doing very well, but we could do a heck of a lot better if somehow we put ourselves together. Sure, let's look at other examples, but then let's put our best minds to it and come up with a Canadian solution.

You as the federal government have a strong hand in that, and with respect, at the present time it's not as strong as it could be or should be.

[Translation]

Mrs. Suzanne Tremblay: Your proposal calling for the creation of a Canadian Sport Corporation is similar to one submitted to us by the Coaching Association of Canada. That's why I asked if a similar model existed elsewhere. I was curious as to whether this was an original idea. Some of the aspects of the CAC proposal give me cause for greater concern, for example, the number of voting members and so forth. I don't wish to get into all of the details at this time, but it's certainly something to think about.

[English]

The Chairman: Our last questioner of the day will be Mr. Mark.

Mr. Inky Mark: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to continue the same line of questioning. In Manitoba we do have a provincial minister responsible for sports. You have recommended that a Canadian sport corporation be established. Would you prefer that over re-establishing a ministry for sports at the federal level?

Mr. Chris Lang: What we were asked to do is come here and look at it from the sponsorship point of view. As Dan suggested, there are limitations in having—

The federal government owns some of the major assets in sport, such as the athlete assistance program, and has a stake in those national training centres. They could attract some commercial sponsorship, but because they're sitting inside government, they can't do it. Therefore you have assets that you're not developing.

That's one argument for taking it out. There may be other arguments on the other side. We're not skilled enough here to be able to look at the options. We were suggesting that it needs to be a partnership and the federal government needs to step up and play a significant role. Whether that's a minister of sport but maybe the marketing is outside, I don't know what the mechanisms are.

The question is, how do we accomplish what we're trying to do? We were asked to come and suggest how we could get more funds into sport, both professional and amateur. We have commented that the current vehicle you have is not conducive to that at the present time, principally in terms of owning the assets you have.

Dan, why don't you—

Mr. Dan Thompson: Second, I don't believe the sport system is capturing the intellectual capital that exists within the Canadian business community. Some very powerful and caring people would like to be involved in the sport system. This could be a great vehicle for them to make a difference in the sport community.

I don't believe we've given them— They have an opportunity to do that through various associations and boards of multi-sport organizations, but on a national basis, for creating a national sport vision and a national sport plan, that vehicle doesn't exist. It could be very powerful.

Mr. Chris Lang: As I suggested to your chairman, what you really should do to get further information on it is bring Dick Pound in front of the committee. He is the single most powerful guy in Canadian sport, and probably one of the top five in the world. He knows all these systems. Get him here and ask him. He was also part of that legislation in 1977. He's a lawyer, so he would come at it from the point of view of accountability and those kinds of things.

Maybe we stuck our nose out too far in recommending structures. We were trying to suggest ways and means of bringing in corporate dollars. In effect, all corporate dollars are a bridge to the ultimate consumer. Whether the public gives it or whether corporations give it, it's for the same reason. So we were coming up with recommendations geared towards that.

We're not technically skilled, we're not well steeped in the sport system, and we're not heavily involved in the sports system. We're on the fringe. We're on the side, looking at it from the marketing point of view. We're suggesting some things, and if they were done, the resources you have in sport could be better developed and better utilized by doing it a little differently from the way you are now.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Lang and your colleague.

• 1810

I want to say to you, Mr. Lang, that you should feel satisfied and proud that we on this committee are trying to build on the work you did in this House of Commons some 30 years ago. We thank you again for that work and we thank you again for your thoughts and insights today. It's been great.

The meeting is adjourned.