Transport Committee on Oct. 28th, 2014

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Lewis-Manning, You mentioned the fact that safety management systems are currently being applied.

They are actually currently being applied by shipowners but they're not mandatory. You do say they're useful. I'm wondering if you can tell us why, on the ground, some of them are applying SMS. As well, can you tell us whether or not Transport Canada is actually looking at auditing the SMS and how that's going?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

I'll start by saying that companies choose to voluntarily develop, implement, and maintain a safety management system because their customers demand it, quite frankly. It is a competitive advantage in our subsector of the industry. Market forces drive some of that, which is positive. It's good for the environment, it's good for shipping, and it's good for the customers and potentially the customers downstream.

Is Transport Canada auditing the voluntary SMS? I don't have an answer for you in term of frequency. I know that the dialogue has been there since Transport Canada was considering making it mandatory, so they're looking at models that already exist. But I don't have the exact number to give you, or the frequency of that auditing. That is something I'd have to follow up on for the committee.

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Yes.

You say that SMS has been in place for a long time. Was it after it became mandatory for bigger ships? When did the industry or the people you represent actually start applying or putting in place the SMS?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

It's been well over a decade. It's a mature system within our subsector of the Canadian marine industry. Some of our members do operate globally, so they are required by international regulations to have ISM compliance. It's a natural transition to take that international requirement into a domestic marketplace as well. In fact it would be difficult to separate them for some of our membership, because it's just simpler to keep it in all your trades, not to divide it. It made smart sense, and we make it a requirement for membership in our association.

[Hoang Mai, NDP, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Maybe I can ask a question of our two witnesses. By the way, it's not that I didn't want you to be here today when I referred earlier to your organization.

What is your position with respect to the mandatory SMS? If you think it's a good tool and it's important, should it be mandatory? That's to both of you.

[Capt John Chomniak]

It's hard to make something mandatory. However, I will say that even before the SMS came into the whole framework of the industry, we as operators already had various aspects of the SMS in place. It just wasn't called an SMS at the time. So to make it mandatory....

[Capt Dan Duhamel, President, Paul's Boat Lines, Canadian Passenger Vessel Association]

I have an SMS on board my vessels.

We were made aware of a template that was being used in Australia, so we basically looked at that template and worked on it to apply it to our own operation on our vessels here in Ottawa. But prior to an SMS or even hearing about an SMS, we had something called “standing orders”, and it was very, very similar. Each and every operator had their own standing orders for their vessel, for their crew.

We comply with the regulation. We are required to run drills biweekly: fire drills, man overboard drills, evacuations. This all has to be recorded and entered in logbooks.

I found that the SMS that we had adopted from Australia, which was an accepted SMS for smaller domestic fleet operators like us, was pretty good, but it was basically putting everything we had already been doing into yet another package, another folder. There was a lot of duplication.

I represent the oldest family owned and operated tour boat company in Canada. We've been at it for a long time. We've evolved as we've had to in the different markets, and it's yet another piece of paperwork, another requirement, that was already in place and just given a different name. We still have our standing orders.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

I'm going to have to cut it there and maybe we can get a little more into that.

Mr. McGuinty, seven minutes.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Good morning, everyone. Thanks for coming.

I want to pick up on the questions from my colleague.

Mr. Chomniak, I think I hear you saying that you're not in favour—

[Capt John Chomniak]

You are incorrect.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Okay, well, maybe you can help Canadians understand.

Let me just get the question out, and, Mr. Lewis-Manning, I'd like to hear from you as well.

Here's my short preamble. Canadians don't understand all of this complexity around SMS. They want to know that your vessels are safe, and they want to know that their government is playing a role in keeping those vessels safe, just as they want to make sure that rail is safe and trucking is safe and transport generally is safe. They feel that governments have an obligation to get the big things right, and one of the big things is transportation safety.

With that being said, help us to understand where we should go with SMS. You don't have mandatory SMS. You don't have any auditing of any significance in place, unless you're international in nature. You're telling us that none of the five recognized organizations....

Mr. Chomniak, I want to deal with your fleet or vessels particularly, because you're either too small, you're not in an urban setting, and so on and so forth. I understand all of that.

So what do we do about this? We're all legislators here. We're trying to improve things. What do we do?

[Capt John Chomniak]

Well, first off, if the Transport Canada inspectors who are already present and on board were capable of auditing the SMS, that would go a long way to start.

As it is, even if the vessels are not allowed to enter into one of the five classification societies, they have to go back to that classification society to have the SMS audited because Transport Canada does not have any personnel who can audit it.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Are you telling me that the SMS for each and every one of your vessels is audited every year?

[Capt John Chomniak]

At this time, it is not.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

How often is it audited?

You said the vessels were inspected.

[Capt John Chomniak]

The vessels are inspected every year by Transport Canada.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Every year, or every four years?

[Capt John Chomniak]

It's every year, and then every four years the entire ship is put into dry dock and inspected.

With regard to the SMS, Transport Canada does not have the ability to audit an SMS.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Because they're not qualified.

[Capt John Chomniak]

Because they are not qualified.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

What about capacity? Do they have capacity to do it?

[Capt John Chomniak]

I would say no and I would also say yes.

The personnel are already there on board the vessel. It wouldn't take much to continue the length of the audit to fulfill the SMS side of it.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Is it your view that SMS should be made mandatory?

[Capt John Chomniak]

I believe fully in the process of the SMS, and I fully believe that every vessel should have one. We all work within the realms of the SMS. In response to your question about making it mandatory, I have no qualms in saying every vessel should have one.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mandatory.