Bill C-33

Strengthening the Port System and Railway Safety in Canada Act

An Act to amend the Customs Act, the Railway Safety Act, the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act, 1992, the Marine Transportation Security Act, the Canada Transportation Act and the Canada Marine Act and to make a consequential amendment to another Act

This enactment amends several Acts in order to strengthen the port system and railway safety in Canada.
The enactment amends the Customs Act to require that, on request, any person in possession or control of imported goods make those goods available for examination in accordance with regulations and deliver those goods, or cause them to be delivered, to a secure area that meets the requirements set out in regulation.
The enactment also amends the Railway Safety Act to, among other things,
(a) add a definition of “safety” that includes the concept of security;
(b) prohibit interference with any railway work, railway equipment or railway operation, or damage or destruction of any railway work or railway equipment, without lawful excuse, in a manner that threatens the safety of railway operations;
(c) prohibit behaviour that endangers or risks endangering the safety of a station, railway equipment or individuals who are at the station or on board the railway equipment and unruly behaviour toward employees, agents or mandataries of a company;
(d) authorize the Minister to order a company to take necessary corrective measures if the Minister believes that
(i) a measure taken by the company in relation to a requirement of a regulation made under subsection 18(2.1) has deficiencies that risk compromising the security of railway transportation,
(ii) the security management system developed by the company has deficiencies that risk compromising railway security, or
(iii) the implementation of the company’s security management system has deficiencies that risk compromising railway security;
(e) authorize the Minister to grant, refuse to grant, suspend or cancel a transportation security clearance;
(f) strengthen the administrative monetary penalty regime; and
(g) require a review of the operation of the Act every five years.
The enactment also amends the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act, 1992 to, among other things,
(a) require persons who import, offer for transport, handle or transport dangerous goods to register with the Minister;
(b) provide to the Minister powers relating to the management of safety risks; and
(c) establish an administrative monetary penalty regime.
The enactment also amends the Marine Transportation Security Act to, among other things,
(a) set out the Act’s purpose and allow the Minister of Transport to enter into agreements with organizations in respect of the administration and enforcement of the Act;
(b) set out regulation-making powers that include powers respecting threats and risks to the health of persons involved in the marine transportation system, the sharing of information and the establishment of vessel exclusion zones;
(c) authorize the Minister to make interim orders and give emergency directions and modify the Minister’s power to give directions to vessels; and
(d) create new offences, increase certain penalties and extend the application of certain offences and the administrative monetary penalty regime to vessels.
The enactment also amends the Canada Transportation Act to, among other things,
(a) specify that the Minister may use electronic systems in making decisions or determinations under an Act of Parliament that the Minister administers or enforces and provide that a power of entry into a place under such an Act may be exercised remotely by means of telecommunications; and
(b) reduce the threshold above which the Minister and the Commissioner of Competition must receive notice of proposed transactions relating to a port.
The enactment also amends the Canada Marine Act to, among other things,
(a) set out that port authorities are responsible for management of traffic and create regulatory authorities respecting fees and information and data sharing in respect of that management;
(b) provide the minister with the power to require, by order, the taking of measures to prevent imminent harm to national security, national economic security, or competition; and
(c) require port authorities to establish advisory committees, which must include representatives from local Indigenous communities, require periodic assessments of port authorities’ governance practices and set out new requirements respecting plans and reports relating to climate change.
Finally, it makes a consequential amendment to the Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada Act .

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

In fact, I had the chance earlier to raise the fact that my colleague was not talking about Bill C‑33, he was talking about Bill C‑26. He told us that he intended to get around to explaining the connection between the two, but I see that he is still telling us about Bill C‑26, not Bill C‑33 or the clause we are now considering.

I don't know whether you have the authority to intervene, Mr. Chair, for him to get around to making a connection with the bill now being considered.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

What our colleague is talking about is very interesting, but I am unfortunately having trouble following it, because I do not have any document to which I can refer so that I can better understand what he is saying. Personally, I prepared for a discussion this evening on Bill C‑33. What he is talking about is a different bill.

If the member wishes to talk about a different bill, I will perhaps ask him to provide committee members with a few details and the relevant documents, so we are able to follow what he is saying properly. I want to feel useful this evening at the committee. I do not want to be here just to listen to someone else talk. If someone is referring to something else, it would be nice to have the documents in question. That would give us the same information about the subject as the member has so we could follow his comments better, and would give us some guidance for our own thinking.

So I am feeling a bit lost, because I have no document to refer to. I do not know all the details of the bill to which the member is referring.

I will leave it in your hands. We need a little more guidance. When we are speaking in a vacuum, we will get equally empty results.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Chair, can you explain this for me, but I am wondering whether Mr. Strahl's speech and comments really relate to the content of Bill C‑33.

In my opinion, everything he has referred to since he started speaking concerns Bill C‑26. If I am not mistaken, that bill is at a later stage. It may even have been enacted.

I would therefore like some reassurance and I would like to know whether the member's comments are in order, according to your interpretation.

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

That bill is clearly still before the industry committee, I would assume. With cybersecurity, perhaps it could be with public safety.

I know that we had some serious concerns with that piece of legislation. I think we want to ensure that the rights of Canadians are always protected. When we're considering Bill C-26, which deals with cybersecurity, we know that this is an evolving field and there's an evolving threat level that comes with that. We know that the government, quite frankly, has failed to protect the rights of Canadians when it comes to their security—both personal security and in our communities. When it comes to the online environment, they've been lax. They've turned a blind eye, quite frankly, to threats to cybersecurity. I think we've seen that again and again.

We saw it when this government refused to ban Huawei from the 5G network for years in spite of overwhelming evidence that the communist regime in Beijing was using that technology in the Huawei network as a way to gain access to personal information. That was a security vulnerability.

We saw that our Five Eyes partners in the security establishment—our international partnerships with Australia, New Zealand and the United States—all took action to protect their citizens and their networks from cybersecurity threats. That's something this government did not do. It took them years and they fought it and fought it before they took the decision—much too late—to exclude Huawei from our cybersecurity networks. That resulted, quite frankly, in embarrassing situations where Canada was excluded from high-level meetings of the Five Eyes.

We saw it very recently, when Australia had its deal with the United States to purchase submarines, for instance. There was an exclusion of Canada because Canada's networks were not deemed to be secure enough to allow us to participate in those very important, high-level meetings. These are examples where the government has failed to take cybersecurity seriously.

As I said, we have grave concerns with Bill C-26. It's troubling to see that this bill would cede power to another piece of legislation or have this coordinating amendment, so there would be two pieces of legislation that we believe are flawed coordinating with one another. I think this is the sort of thing where we should be considering what is in Bill C-26 as we discuss this. We can't simply agree holus-bolus to something in another act if we haven't considered that fully, here at this committee.

I think that this particular clause is one where, perhaps as the evening goes on, we will find a way to bring about an amendment or to look at ways we can make sure that the concerns we had with Bill C-26 are addressed.

The summary of Bill C-26 states:

Part 1 amends the Telecommunications Act to add the promotion of the security of the Canadian telecommunications system as an objective of the Canadian telecommunications policy and to authorize the Governor in Council and the Minister of Industry to direct telecommunications service providers to do anything, or refrain from doing anything, that is necessary to secure the Canadian telecommunications system. It also establishes an administrative monetary penalty scheme to promote compliance with orders and regulations made by the Governor in Council and the Minister of Industry to secure the Canadian telecommunications system as well as rules for judicial review of those orders and regulations.

It continues:

Part 2 enacts the Critical Cyber Systems Protection Act to provide a framework for the protection of the critical cyber systems of services and systems that are vital to national security or public safety and that are delivered or operated as part of a work, undertaking or business that is within the legislative authority of Parliament. It also, among other things,

(a) authorizes the Governor in Council to designate any service or system as a vital service or vital system;

(b) authorizes the Governor in Council to establish classes of operators in respect of a vital service or vital system;

(c) requires designated operators to, among other things, establish and implement cyber security programs, mitigate supply-chain and third-party risks, report cyber security incidents and comply with cyber security directions;

(d) provides for the exchange of information between relevant parties; and

(e) authorizes the enforcement of the obligations under the Act and imposes consequences for non-compliance.

Cybersecurity, as I've said, is a growing concern for Canadians. It remains a national security concern. It remains an economic security concern. We know we lose when things like patents, trademarked information and secrets are lost because of a failure to ensure we have adequate cybersecurity in place. We know the government doesn't have a legal mechanism to compel industry action to address cyber-threats or vulnerabilities in the telecommunications sector.

Bill C-26 is another example of the Minister of Industry being given sweeping powers, as we heard with Bill C-33, where the minister is given sweeping powers to enact orders that, in his opinion, are necessary to protect port infrastructure, port operations, etc. We just dealt with that in a previous clause. I think this is another example where we need to ensure that the powers given in Bill C-26 are proportional—that there are checks and balances, and that the rights of Canadians are always protected when the minister is exercising the rights and powers given to him or her in the legislation. It's another example of giving the minister broad powers to enact the legislation.

Now, cybersecurity is something that Conservatives have been raising the alarm about for a long time. We did it when we first created, under a conservative motion, the Canada–China special committee. That was an issue that was raised there. In the context of Huawei, it is something we raised time and time again: our concerns that our 5G network was not being protected.

There are opportunities to strengthen our cybersecurity protocols. We need to ensure that not only are the privacy rights of Canadians respected, but that there's also no attempt at censorship for Canadian citizens when they are operating in the cyber-environment. We've seen the government go down that road as well, with Bill C-18 and with Bill C-10. They want to control what Canadians see, and control the algorithms of what will show up in their social media, for instance.

We have a hard time trusting the government when it comes to anything to do with cybersecurity or Internet regulations. They've proven time and time again that they're willing to sacrifice the rights of Canadians in order to promote their own narrow agenda.

Bill C-26, unfortunately, increases regulation and red tape, often, we believe, without adequate oversight and without votes in Parliament.

We've seen, even here today, that the rights of members or parliamentarians, the supremacy of Parliament, are things that this government does not put as the highest priority. If Parliament gets in the way, they simply try to bypass it.

I think Bill C-26 is another example of where that has happened. We have grave concerns with that, as I outlined briefly. There is also—

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In this bill, there is a coordinating amendment—if the copy of the legislation I have is correct—that states:

If Bill C-26, introduced in the 1st session of the 44th Parliament and entitled An Act respecting cyber security, amending the Telecommunications Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts, receives royal assent, then, on the first day on which both section 18 of that Act and section 123 of this Act are in force, subsection 2(3) of the Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada Act is replaced by the following:

Jurisdiction in respect of other Acts

(3) The Tribunal also has jurisdiction in respect of reviews and appeals in connection with administrative monetary penalties provided for under sections 177 to 181 of the Canada Transportation Act, sections 127 to 133 of the Critical Cyber Systems Protection Act, sections 43 to 55 of the International Bridges and Tunnels Act, sections 129.‍01 to 129.‍17 of the Canada Marine Act, sections 16.‍1 to 16.‍25 of the Motor Vehicle Safety Act, sections 39.‍1 to 39.‍26 of the Canadian Navigable Waters Act, sections 130.‍01 to 130.‍19 of the Marine Liability Act and sections 32.‍1 to 32.‍28 of the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act, 1992.

I'm hoping that either the legislative clerk or perhaps some of the witnesses can indicate for me what the status is of Bill C-26. Has it received royal assent? If not, where is it in the process? This is just so we know how likely it is that this coordinating amendment will be utilized with Bill C-33.

Perhaps they could just tell me what the status of that bill is.

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

Mr. Chair, I believe that my privileges were actually violated by your not giving me a chance to speak to a clause of a piece of legislation that we are debating by simply calling a vote on it and saying there's no speakers list. By not even calling for debate and simply moving to a question.... How are we to know that we were going to go back into the legislation, when Mr. Kurek was in the middle of debating a motion?

By failing to allow for a debate on a clause of a piece of legislation, you have violated the privileges of all members of this committee. I would like to move a motion that we debate whether or not my privileges were violated by the chair when he refused to call for debate on the previous clause before calling for a vote.

That is the motion that I would move. It's that you have violated my privileges by not allowing us to discuss a clause of this bill by simply slamming the door and moving to a vote.

That is not how we have operated for the entirety of this debate. That is not how we operated for the entirety of our consideration of Bill C-33. To get rammy now and start to push this through in a way that we have not operated in.... I recognize that the chair and the government don't like when members of Parliament in the opposition exercise our rights, use the tools at our disposal to hold the government to account, and move duly accepted and duly moved motions at the time of our choosing, as is our right as members of Parliament. They want to simply end that discussion and move on to something that they would rather talk about.

That is not what the rules allow for. The rules call for members of Parliament to have the opportunity to discuss, debate, consider, amend, propose changes from all sides and then make decisions. It is not for the chair to suddenly say “I call the vote” the very second that Mr. Badawey gets his way and a motion gets shut down.

Mr. Chair, I've always respected your commitment to fairness. I've always respected how you have been neutral in that position, but I can't quite believe what is happening here tonight, where there is a departure and a decision to simply ram these motions through without giving us an opportunity to debate.

You've ruled Mr. Kurek's motion out of order. There is another motion that deals specifically with the transport component of Bill C-26. That motion is in order and does specifically deal with this issue.

It is very clear that the rights and privileges of members of Parliament are protected by our Standing Orders. They are protected, quite frankly, by the Constitution. They are to be limited only in very extreme circumstances.

A privilege motion actually takes precedence. We know this in the House. A privilege motion takes precedence over all other matters. When a privilege motion is moved, all other legislation—anything else before the House—is set aside because the rights and privileges of members of Parliament are to supersede the rights and privileges of the government, which might not want them to be exercised. They are sacrosanct. They are, quite frankly, something that we should be very concerned about when any member, not just those who wear our team colours, is impacted by it.

This is the sort of thing, you can bet, that Liberal members of Parliament, when they were in opposition, would have raised hell about. They would never have accepted this sort of thing, clauses being rammed down our throats without the ability to even discuss them for a minute, or to have a single word brought forward before it was voted on. That supersedes, quite frankly, whether or not the chair is sustained by a vote. This is something that is bigger than that. It is something that touches the very core of what we do in this place.

I know the government is frustrated that there have been concerns raised with Bill C-33. We've heard it in the numerous meetings that we've had with testimonies, none of which spoke about the benefits of the legislation. They were all very critical of the legislation. I know the Liberals didn't like that. They didn't like that we were going clause by clause through the bill. They didn't like that a member of Parliament might want to speak about issues related to the cost of living and the cost of transporting goods. That's the sort of thing that Mr. Badawey shut down with the assistance of the chair.

Standing Order 116(1) states:

In a standing, special or legislative committee, the Standing Orders shall apply so far as may be applicable, except the standing orders as to the election of a Speaker, seconding of motions, limiting the number of times of speaking and the length of speeches.

It specifically talks about the end of debate. Standing Order 116(2) states:

(a) Unless a time limit has been adopted by the committee or by the House, the Chair of a standing, special or legislative committee may not bring a debate to an end while there are members present who still wish to participate. A decision of the Chair in this regard may not be subject to an appeal to the committee.

(b) A violation of paragraph (a) of this section may be brought to the attention of the Speaker by any member and the Speaker shall have the power to rule on the matter. If, in the opinion of the Speaker, such violation has occurred, the Speaker may order that all subsequent proceedings in relation to the said violation be nullified.

Mr. Chair, this is a very serious section. It says very clearly, “while there are members present who still wish to participate”, not who are on a list that didn't exist before debate was closed, before it was shut down. This is a very serious issue, and one that we will take very seriously, because, in attempting to get a bill passed by an artificial deadline, there is now clearly a violation of the rights of the members of this committee.

All of the members on the Conservative side of this table were prepared and willing to speak to the clause upon which debate ended artificially. Again, it says, “A decision of the Chair in this regard may not be subject to an appeal to the committee.” Quite frankly, it doesn't matter that once I stop talking there's an attempt to have the chair's ruling sustained, because, again, this is not a matter for a majority vote of the committee. Members' privileges are not subject to the tyranny of the majority. Members' privileges are protected by our Standing Orders, and they are protected by our role to represent the people who sent us here.

It would be quite something if we could, instead of having our rights protected, have our rights dictated to us by the majority of committee members, who find them to be inconvenient tonight. That is, quite frankly, something that we can't tolerate. This is something that should supersede any of the other things that we were going to talk about here tonight.

We have seen time and time again how there has been an attempt to shut down debate. We know that shutting down debate has been done in the House of Commons a record number of times.

There is a process in place for shutting down debate. In their election campaign in 2015, the Liberals promised they would never use the rules of the House to shut down debate. We've seen them break that promise time and time again, both in a majority and with the help of the NDP in a minority government. They've done that on numerous occasions. Hundreds of times they've shut down debate, but that is by a motion. That is using a process that is in place. The Speaker doesn't simply get up and say, “Debate is over. We're having a vote right now.” That is all—

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Mr. Chair, I was giving the member the benefit of the doubt in terms of where he was going to go with this, but as I listen to his intervention and look at the motion—I've done it three or four times now—I can't see how this motion is relevant to this committee.

I know that another committee brought this up sometime this week, whereby the same attempt was brought forward by the Conservatives to bring this motion. I believe it was at the international trade committee, and there they ruled it as not being relevant to the committee. Now that I see it being brought here, I have the same concern that this is not, in fact, relevant to this committee.

Therefore, I'm asking, Mr. Chair, that we rule it not relevant, move forward and get back to Bill C-33.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

Thank you for your testimony.

I'm trying to determine, from what I heard in your testimony.... I mean, we had a strike at the Port of Vancouver, and we had a strike at the St. Lawrence Seaway recently, both of which had a significant impact on our economy and our supply chains, which are of course what Bill C-33 is purported to help address—although, I would argue, insufficiently. I think what you're saying is that this provision would not actually apply in those two recent examples.

[Heather Moriarty]

That is another great question.

What I would say is that the time to advance the ports elements is now. The review concluded that ports were working well but more was needed to strengthen the governance of ports to make sure we had what we needed to prepare them for the future.

We don't know what other measures will be needed as part of the supply chain office or the report. These are a step in the right direction, and I'm sure that anything else will not only complement this but build on what we have here.

Bill C-33 obviously is more port-specific, whereas the supply chain office is very much multimodal, and I understand that there will be other elements coming from that as well.

[Heather Moriarty]

That's a good question.

I believe we've already tabled some information in terms of how Bill C-33 seeks to address some of the measures contained in the supply chain report.

I like to say that Bill C-33 is a bit of a down payment on what's to come from the supply chain office and from that report. This helps to protect supply chains and ensure fluidity, but we're not sure where the supply chain office is going. It's on its feet. There may be more coming from a ports perspective, but it may be more integration.

This will certainly help our colleagues in the supply chain office as they seek to move forward with their work, because it will give them a lot of what they need to advance and to ensure ports are those intermodal hubs that connect all other modes of transportation, to make sure they can do what they need to do.

[Rachel Heft]

The language in the proposed amendment would not be consistent with other Transport Canada acts. The ministerial order power proposed in Bill C-33 is generally consistent with other ministerial order powers found in other legislation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 96 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.

Pursuant to the order of reference of Tuesday, September 26, 2023, the committee is meeting to resume consideration of clause-by-clause on Bill C-33, an act to amend the Customs Act, the Railway Safety Act, the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act, 1992, the Marine Transportation Security Act, the Canada Transportation Act and the Canada Marine Act and to make a consequential amendment to another act.

Today’s meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

We left off at clause 122 of Bill C-33.

To help us with clause-by-clause consideration, we have joining us, once again, representatives from the Department of Transport, as well as our legislative clerks.

(On clause 122)

To address clause 122, I will open the floor.

Mr. Muys.

[Dan Muys, Conservative, Flamborough—Glanbrook, ON]

I would like to speak on BQ-6.

I think the points Mr. Barsalou-Duval raised with this amendment are worth some scrutiny. One of the concerns overall is with the broad and vague ministerial authority that Bill C-33 gives the minister. It's an “Ottawa knows bests”, one-size-fits-all approach. This amendment hopes to provide a bit more clarity to that. I think he articulates a few different areas where that needs to be applied, all of which makes some sense.

Taken individually, national security is clearly a very significant issue. Economic security is obviously important, particularly when the whole objective of Bill C-33 is to look at national supply chains, which have been tattered and stretched. The bill clearly doesn't address that. This is an attempt to put some limitation on the minister when it comes to this.

I think that's worthy of discussion. I think we should continue to discuss this.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Amendment BQ‑6 proposes that Bill C‑33, in clause 122, be amended, in item (a), by replacing line 6 on page 78 with the following:

107.1(1) If there is a

Amendment BQ 6 also proposes that Bill C‑33 be amended in section 122, in item (b), by adding after line 28, on page 78, the following:

(6) For greater certainty, for the judicial review of an order made under subsection (1), the correctness standard applies to determine whether there was a risk of imminent harm to national security, national economic security or competition that constitutes a significant threat to the safety and security of persons, goods, ships or port facilities or the security of supply chains.

On page 78 of the bill, in section 107.1, it says that the minister has the power to make ministerial orders in certain specific cases. The specific cases are quite broad, and include national security, economic security, competition, and the security of persons, goods, ships, port facilities and supply chains. The scope for the use of ministerial orders is therefore very broad. What's more, in the bill, the article begins simply with “If the Minister is of the opinion that there is a risk of imminent harm [...].”

First, the amendment aims to remove the words “is of the opinion.” Second, we wish to add a sixth paragraph, according to which the use of such orders is expected to be made in an organized context and according to a standard. This ensures that the minister does not have unlimited discretionary power. I think that the use of such a power requires a tighter framework than what is proposed in Bill C‑33.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, we've been here for the last couple of weeks to discuss Bill C-33. We're continuing to do that today. We're hoping to get that done prior to rising from the House on Wednesday.

With that, Mr. Chair, I would like to get back to work. I move that the debate now be adjourned.