Evidence of meeting #14 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was minor.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:45 a.m.
Conservative
11:45 a.m.
David Osbaldeston Manager, Navigable Waters Protection Program, Department of Transport
No.
11:45 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Merv Tweed
I just have one question before I'll go to the committee. On page 3, when you were talking about amending the definition of work to explicitly include minor works, the written word says “would”, and the interpretation says “could”.
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
All of this is subject to what the committee will be recommending. You asked us for low-hanging fruit. There is no such thing as low-hanging fruit. However, according to the experts in the department, if you want to significantly improve the actual legislation, you look at the seven areas, you consult on those, you come back to us with recommendations, and then we could follow the normal process and go to cabinet and come back with legislative amendments.
11:45 a.m.
Liberal
John Maloney Liberal Welland, ON
I'll start off with following up on the questions of our chair. We're still wrestling with words and definitions of words. You suggested that the definition of navigable water would exclude minor waters. What would a minor water be?
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
We explained that at our last appearance. That's why we were suggesting that one way to get out of this discussion is to rename the act and not talk about navigable waters. But if we're only going to look at this actual act and if we're only looking at amending this act, the idea would be to define navigable water. Today it includes everything as defined in the act and by jurisprudence. So over the years the courts have made a number of decisions, and as David explained last time, it came out to virtually, if you have four inches of water or if you can float a canoe or a kayak on a piece of water of whatever length, this room for instance, it's navigable water according to the act. If you could come out with a recommendation to define it, to restrict it, in order to exclude waters like.... David also explained that if you want to navigate on the water you're going to have to portage every five minutes; you won't be able to navigate anywhere unless you spend your time on portage. Why not exclude this whole secondary piece of water?
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
No, we have no suggestion.
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
We're just suggesting that if you consult on this, and if you're able to come up with a consensus on a definition that is far more restrictive than the one we have now, it would be extremely helpful.
11:45 a.m.
Liberal
John Maloney Liberal Welland, ON
So hopefully our stakeholders will be able to provide some comprehensive suggestions on what these definitions could be.
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
It wouldn't necessarily be easy. Again, as we explained last time, you're going to have basically two camps of people here. You're going to have a camp of stakeholders who will want this definition to be extremely restrictive, and then you're going to have another camp of people who will want the contrary. You will have the environmentalists, who most probably would want it to be more restrictive than it is now, and you will have the proponents of projects, who would want to exclude as many waters as possible.
11:45 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Merv Tweed
I think the simple definition, if I understood correctly from the last meeting, was that if you can float a canoe on it, it's navigable water.
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
That's the decision we have now, imposed by courts. But we think it's too restrictive.
11:45 a.m.
Liberal
John Maloney Liberal Welland, ON
Okay.
The same line of...or your response when you're dealing with the definition of “works” and “minor works” would be similar. There's nothing really to suggest, but leave it up to the stakeholders to suggest to us and we'll try to sort it out.
In your pamphlet—I'm just looking at the one on docks and boathouses—you do attempt to define what is a minor work. Is that in anticipation of this legislation passing?
11:45 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
No. Except for the four works I have named, the act allows for some very limited flexibility through exemptions.
We're actually using, if you want, the exemption power specified in subsection 5(2) of the act to exclude some of the minor works. That's what we explain through all the pamphlets there.
The pamphlets are starting to be known now. We're already starting to see a small decrease in the number of requests, as you can see in the table. Hopefully in 2008 we will have a further reduction.
So this is done by exemption. It would be useful here to define minor works in the act and get rid of the four names. Today, if you have a golf course and there's a little creek on which you can navigate a canoe, and you want to build a bridge to cross between two fairways, you need a Navigable Waters Protection Act application. It's a bridge, and we can't exclude those four named works because the act gives no exemption power for those four.
If you could get rid of those four, that would be another excellent step toward improving the situation.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
John Maloney Liberal Welland, ON
But a bridge, a boom, a dam, and a causeway are obviously significant works that would—
11:50 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
Well, no, a bridge is not always a significant work. A bridge could be just a little bridge in the woods that you can just walk across or bike across.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
11:50 a.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Safety and Security, Department of Transport
A causeway, I presume, yes, but....
11:50 a.m.
Manager, Navigable Waters Protection Program, Department of Transport
If I may, there are varying degrees of bridges, booms, dams, or causeways. I think that's the concern among the clients.
Let's say I am building a temporary lumber bridge that I need to put in for a period of three months. It's located south of 60 in northern Saskatchewan or northern Alberta, and it's for clear-cut or to get into a mining site or a diamond site. We're the only ones there. The bridge is only five feet wide, and it's going over a creek three feet wide that runs seasonally for a period of three months, the same three months I'm going to be there.
Does that really need to undergo the same route as the Confederation Bridge? Because right now it does.
That would be the type of concern presented by stakeholders.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
John Maloney Liberal Welland, ON
I would assume that there are a lot of waterways that are in fact navigable and that have many recreational properties along them. People have their docks, or perhaps a raft--let's say a ten-by-ten or twenty-by-twenty structure--that they swim to or jump off. Would that be considered an impairment? Would they need a permit to have that raft out there?
11:50 a.m.
Manager, Navigable Waters Protection Program, Department of Transport
That answer is correct, and right now they need a permit to put it in.
If you can envision something that's two feet high in the water on a twilight evening, and a water skier coming through into a bay, and this thing is not marked, but stained in a nice dark colour with preservative oil, it is probably one of the most dangerous pieces of equipment that could be put in the water. Indeed, these things do require a permit.
It's not something we would be looking at towards minor work at this point in time, I would suggest.