House of Commons Hansard #204 of the 37th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was flag.

Topics

Question No. 145Routine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

The Speaker

Is that agreed?

Question No. 145Routine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

Halifax West Nova Scotia

Liberal

Geoff Regan LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons

Mr. Speaker, I ask that all notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

The Speaker

Is that agreed?

Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

The Speaker

The Chair has notice of an application for an emergency debate from the hon. member for St. John's West.

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:25 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

Loyola Hearn Progressive Conservative St. John's West, NL

Mr. Speaker, as you are well aware, the discussions about overfishing on the nose and tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap have drawn a tremendous amount of attention not only in the Atlantic provinces but nationally and, recently, internationally.

When I first raised the issue with the fisheries committee last fall, pretty few were aware of the problem. The committee agreed to have hearings. It came to Newfoundland and was presented with tremendous amounts of information from all sectors of society, everyone involved with the industry and people interested and affected by it.

Mr. Speaker, shortly following that, after we had some examples of what was going on in the area outside the 200 mile limit, you granted us an emergency debate in the House which was supported unanimously by all parties and drew a tremendous amount of attention.

Since then the committee has been finalizing its report and listening to officials, people directly and indirectly affected by the industry, and the public generally. We have discussed the issue with people nationally and internationally. We are now seeing a fair amount of concern and interest expressed by other countries, especially the political arms. This is something we have not seen before.

The committee tabled its report yesterday. It was hard hitting and unanimous. However all it did was present to the House the same arguments people affected by the industry had brought before the committee. Unfortunately, without any consultation with his colleagues or the House, yesterday the minister rejected the report. What kind of signal is that sending?

The concern is that the autumn meeting of the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization, more commonly known as NAFO, will be underway before the resumption of the House of Commons and the next supply cycle. The opportunity allotted for a debate is therefore only available at the present time.

I am aware that a request for debate must be on an issue, it must be an emergency and it must be of national scope. Mr. Speaker, as you ruled before, this issue fits both.

The minister has made statements that indicate he is preparing to abandon efforts to combat overfishing at the NAFO meeting. The NAFO meeting could well determine the fate of our Canadian Atlantic fishery. The cabinet would benefit from hearing the views of members of the House of Commons before determining the policy it will follow.

In his comments the minister said custodial management, which was recommended unanimously--

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:30 p.m.

The Speaker

I am sorry. The hon. member is to be given a brief opportunity to explain the reason for urgency, but this sounds more like a speech to the poor Speaker who is unfamiliar with these things in great detail. I wish he would come to the point. He really has to move rather quickly at this stage and not make a speech. He can save that for later if the emergency debate is granted.

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:30 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

Loyola Hearn Progressive Conservative St. John's West, NL

Mr. Speaker, it is fairly complicated and I wanted make sure that not only you but the other members understood. The request I am making today could or would be made by any member who sits on our committee.

In a response yesterday to the press, not to the House but blatantly and openly to the press without any consultation, the minister stated that custodial management or unilateral expansion of the 200 mile limit were one and the same. They are not one and the same. This is not the way we can go to NAFO--

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:30 p.m.

The Speaker

The hon. member is not taking my advice. I know that he does not share the minister's view. That is clear. However it is irrelevant to the urgency of the matter for debate. He has to stick to that point in these submissions at this point and not make arguments. If he will be making arguments I will not be able to hear him further. I invite him to deal directly and immediately with the issue of urgency.

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:30 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

Loyola Hearn Progressive Conservative St. John's West, NL

Mr. Speaker, I will get right to the point.

I do not think I need to convince you that the issue is important locally and nationally. It is an emergency because before we get a chance to debate it openly and convince the government of the direction to take at NAFO, the NAFO meetings will have taken place. This is our last chance to go to NAFO with arguments supported by everyone in the country and not just the fishing industry. If the minister's opinion is the one we are going to NAFO with, we have lost our case already.

The government must be aware of what the committee presented. There is only place to make it aware: here in the House as members from the committee and others interested in the topic get a chance to make their arguments.

Request for Emergency DebateRoutine Proceedings

3:30 p.m.

The Speaker

I thank the hon. member for St. John's West for his submission.

As he said, I did grant an emergency debate on this very subject a few months ago because I believed there was some urgency to the matter. However I must say that nothing he has said today has convinced me that the matter has become more urgent today than it was when I granted the previous debate.

Accordingly, I am of the view that his request does not meet the exigencies of the standing orders at this time.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

3:30 p.m.

St. John's West Newfoundland & Labrador

Progressive Conservative

Loyola Hearn Progressive Conservativefor the Minister of Justice

moved that Bill S-41, an act to re-enact legislative instruments enacted in only one official language, be read the second time.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

3:30 p.m.

Northumberland Ontario

Liberal

Paul MacKlin LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to begin the second reading debate on Bill S-41, an act to re-enact legislative instruments enacted in only one official language.

The bill is necessary to resolve any uncertainty with respect to the constitutional validity of certain instruments of a legislative nature such as regulations and orders in council that are still in force today but, at another time, may have escaped bilingual enactment and promulgation.

From time to time doubts have been raised about the constitutional validity of some regulations. The bill would dispel any such doubts and ensure compliance with the language guarantees of the constitution. Perhaps just as significantly the bill would demonstrate and strengthen respect for the equality of status of both official languages in all federal legislation.

Parliament has a duty, both legal and constitutional, to ensure compliance with the language provisions, which were written into our constitution in 1867, and later supplemented by the official languages acts of 1969 and of 1988, as well as enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms of 1982.

In its third report tabled in parliament on October 30, 1996, the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations expressed the view that some federal regulations made in the past by the governor in council were unconstitutional and of no force and effect because they had been made only in one official language.

The bill would correct any potential constitutional defect arising from regulations and orders in council made only in one official language but published in the Canada Gazette in French and English. Such legislative instruments would be automatically and retroactively re-enacted in both languages.

In effect the bill would replace by general reference, without amendment, all regulations and other instruments of a legislative nature for which English and French versions have been published in the Canada Gazette by giving the published versions legal authority and retroactive effect.

This legislative technique does not require that reference be made to each instrument or that each by physically re-made by the regulatory authority. It is an efficient, cost effective and legally appropriate solution to the situation identified by the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations.

The bill would be given retroactive effect pursuant to the widely recognized powers of parliament . This is required to ensure that everything done in the past in reliance upon federal legislative instruments is validated. This is only right. Persons who have had notice of the existence of the legislative instruments at issue and have consequently arranged their affairs should be confident in the legal validity of their actions.

The bill makes provision for the possibility that some legislative instruments may also have been made in one official language only and published in that language only or not published at all. The governor in council would be given authority to re-enact such instruments and to give them retroactive effect.

I wish to reassure the House that the bill is required only for greater certainty. The government is confident its legislative instruments are valid. The validity of a proclamation published in English and French but made in English only in 1921 was challenged in the lower courts several years ago. There are currently no court cases in which the validity of such instruments is challenged. However, the risk that such arguments could be raised does exist and the government has the duty to address it.

I commend the bill to the House for consideration and passage. The bill is about respect for the equality of status of English and French. The bill would provide for greater certainty and ensure that all acts of parliament and government regulations respect the constitutional language requirements. The bill would ensure the continued application of the rule of law.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

3:35 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Gurmant Grewal Canadian Alliance Surrey Central, BC

Mr. Speaker, I rise on behalf of the constituents of Surrey Central to participate in the debate on Bill S-41, the legislative instruments re-enactment act, which was introduced in the Senate in March.

For years we did not have an opportunity to debate regulatory reforms or parliamentary scrutiny of legislative instruments in the House, but this week coincidentally we have a second debate on this issue. Yesterday I debated Bill C-202 during private members' business. I was a kind and made non-partisan remarks in the co-operative and collective spirit of the House. However, today I cannot help being critical of the government and I will take my full time.

I point out that Bill S-41 is the result of the hard work of the members and legal counsels of the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations. I have the honour of being a three term co-chair representing the House of Commons.

The purpose of the bill is to re-enact, in both official languages, legislative instruments that were enacted in one language but published in both official languages; and to allow for the re-enactment of legislative instruments that were enacted in one language but not published, or published in one official language.

Section 133 of the Constitution Act, 1867 provides that acts of the Parliament of Canada shall be printed and published in both official languages. The proposed act would ensure the validity of legislative instruments that are made in only one official language although they may or may not have been published in both official languages. The bill would also confer regulation-making powers on the governor in council to retroactively re-enact those legislative instruments in both official languages.

From 1867 to 1969 most regulations and orders in council were made only in one language. Those instruments were then generally printed and published in the Canada Gazette in both official languages. Prior to Blaikie No. 1 and No. 2 the constitution was believed not to require bilingual enactment of delegated legislation.

Beginning in 1969 the Official Languages Act has required that all rules, orders, regulations, by-laws and proclamations that are required to be published by or under the authority of an act of parliament must be made and published in both official languages. A legislative instrument is made in both official languages when both versions are signed by the competent regulatory authority prior to printing and publishing.

The constitutional requirements that the Supreme Court of Canada held to exist in 1979 were specifically included, in clear and unambiguous terms, in the 1988 Official Languages Act.

In all cases that have come to the attention of the committee, regulations that should have been enacted in English and French were enacted in English only. The issue of the constitutional validity of the federal delegated legislation enacted in English only was first raised in 1992 by the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations in relation to the Public Lands Mineral Regulations.

The department argued the constitutional defect was cured by the 1978 Consolidated Regulations of Canada. A consolidation could not serve to validate an otherwise illegal regulation. The department argued that the regulations made in English only in 1969 were valid because the governor in council was in good faith when the regulations were adopted. However, the issue of the good faith of the governor in council in enacting certain instruments is entirely irrelevant to the issue of the constitutional validity of those instruments.

Then the Public Lands Mineral Regulations were revoked and the committee identified four other unconstitutional regulations. There can be no doubt there are others. For example, it was recently ascertained that the income tax regulations were unconstitutional as they were enacted in only one official language. The government dropped the legal argument it had been touting for the preceding four years and returned to the discredited consolidation argument.

The 1978 consolidation is irrelevant from a legal and constitutional point of view. A consolidation, as was pointed out by Senator Gérald Beaudoin in the Senate committee, is at best a housekeeping process that has no impact on the constitutional status of the consolidated legislation.

Then surprisingly the former justice minister acknowledged that the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations had put forward a number of opposing arguments which warrant serious consideration. She requested her officials to further study the issues raised and to suggest ways to remove any uncertainties regarding the validity of federal regulations or other legislative instruments which were still in force.

Law does not lend any support to the peculiar interpretation put forward by the Department of Justice. On the contrary the courts have confirmed that section 133 requires the publication in both languages of all legislation to which it applies; nothing more, nothing less.

The Supreme Court of Canada in the Manitoba language rights reference described the purpose of section 133:

--which was to ensure full and equal access to the legislatures, the laws and the courts for francophones and anglophones alike.

and that:

Section 23 of the Manitoba Act, 1870 entrenches a mandatory requirement to enact, print and publish all Acts of the Legislature in both official languages...

It establishes a constitutional duty on the Manitoba legislature with respect to the manner and form of enactment of its legislation. This duty protects the substantive rights of all Manitobans to equal access to the law in either the French or English languages. Those words are equally applicable to section 133. I note that the court did not refer to some acts of the legislature of Manitoba but all acts.

I note that some 20 years after the Blaikie decision the federal government has yet to take measures to identify the extent of its non-compliance with section 133 of the Constitution Act of 1867. Subordinate legislation enacted prior to section 133 should be identified and re-enacted by the appropriate regulation making authority.

The approach chosen by the government in Bill S-41 would distinguish between two classes of non-complying instruments. The first class of instruments is made up of those legislative instruments that were published in both official languages at the time of enactment but that were not enacted in both official languages. Those instruments would be validated by clause 3 of the bill.

The second class of legislative instruments is made up of those instruments which were not enacted in both official languages and were not published in both official languages at the time of their enactment. With regard to those non-complying instruments the federal government apparently does not intend to take corrective action other than to confer on the governor in council a discretion to retroactively validate the instruments in question.

The Department of Justice claimed that to identify non-complying regulations would involve prohibitive costs. I suggest that if the federal government is aware of the legislation that is being applied at the federal level, as it should be, it is a simple enough matter to verify whether or not that legislation was properly enacted in both official languages.

In reality Bill S-41 would only provide a partial solution to the issue brought forward in the committee's report. Following passage of the proposed legislation there would continue to be a number of unconstitutional regulations in place that would not have been validated.

The proposed clause 4 is premised on the continued application of and enforcement of legislative instruments that the federal government knows to be unconstitutional. The propriety of this approach in constitutional terms is questionable. Because it does not wish to engage in the task of identifying with precision the class of instruments referred to in clause 4, the government is content to allow those legislative instruments to continue to be applied in spite of their unconstitutionality.

In the event a person raises the issue of the unconstitutionality of such a legislative instrument by way, for example, of a defence to a criminal prosecution, the governor in council would intervene to deprive the person of their defence by retroactively deeming the unconstitutional instrument to have been validly made.

The preamble to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms recites that Canada is a society founded on principles that recognize the rule of law. Is it too much to expect that in such a society, a government is under an obligation to take active steps to remedy constitutional defects of which it is aware and has been aware for at least 20 years?

The instruments referred to in clause 4 are not unconstitutional only on the grounds that they were enacted in only one official language. Clause 4, as noted above, applies to instruments that were not enacted in both official languages but that also were not published in both languages.

Any legislative instrument referred to in clause 4 would be unconstitutional even if it had been enacted in both official languages on the grounds that it was not printed and published in both languages.

Clause 4 of the bill does not appear to contemplate the existence of instruments enacted in both official languages but not printed and published in both languages. Of course this is consistent with the hypothesis put forward by the Department of Justice according to which the government may choose not to print and publish a legislative instrument, in which case section 133 would not apply to the instrument. For reasons stated before, I reject that hypothesis.

Clause 3 of the proposed legislation satisfactorily resolves the problem of constitutional non-compliance with regards to all legislative instruments made in only one language but published in both official languages at the time of enactment.

As for all non-complying legislative instruments, it seems to be the view of the federal government that it is acceptable to maintain these laws in place notwithstanding their unconstitutionality.

The federal government is apparently incapable, 20 years after the second Blaikie decision, to identify those instruments made or approved by governor in council or a minister that forms part of the body of the federal delegated legislation.

It could well be argued that there is no justification for delegated legislation which does not comply with section 133 of the Constitution Act, 1867, either because it was not enacted in both official languages or because it was not published in both official languages, to continue to be enforced by public authorities, and that any such legislations are to be formally revoked or expressly validated. This is not what clause 4 of the proposed legislation proposes.

On May 2, 2002, Senator Hervieux-Payette and I appeared before the Senate committee charged with the review of this legislation in our capacity as joint chairmen of the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations. We urged the committee to amend Bill S-41 to ensure that the unconstitutional legislation referred to in clause 4 of the bill would not continue to be applied indefinitely.

In that regard we suggested that an appropriate legislative model was furnished by section 32 of the Statutory Instruments Act which provided the following.

“Where a regulation or an amendment thereto has not been published in the Canada Gazette and is of such a class that, if it were made after the coming into force of this act, it would not be exempted pursuant to paragraph (c) of section 27 from the application of subsection (1) of section 11, it shall be deemed to be revoked on a day 12 months after the day on which the act comes into force unless before that day it is transmitted to the Clerk of the Privy Council in both official languages, in which case the Clerk of the Privy Council shall, notwithstanding subsection (1) of section 7, register the regulation forthwith”.

The alternatives that are consistent with the government's obligation to respect the rule of law are: first, to identify all legislative instruments subject to section 133 of the Constitution Act, 1867 that do not comply with the requirements of that section and to re-enact them in such a way as to cure the constitutional defect; or, two, to formally revoke all noncomplying legislative instruments as unconstitutional legislation that has no place in the corpus of federal law.

A transitional provision patterned on section 32 of the Statutory Instruments Act represents a compromise between these two approaches. I am very happy to see that the Senate has amended the bill in the manner suggested by us and that the new subclause 4(7) provides that: “Upon the expiration of 6 years after this act comes into force, any legislative instrument described in subsection (1) that has not been re-enacted in both official languages is repealed. Any instrument submitted for re-enactment within 6 years could in fact be re-enacted, but at the expiration of that time period all non-complying instruments would be formally revoked”.

While some would argue that the delay of six years, which this clause gives to the government, is excessively long considering that the government has already had 20 years in which to correct the situation. It will nevertheless bring closure to this issue.

While I think that the one year delay we suggested to the Senate committee was entirely sufficient, I will support clause 4(7) as it was added in the legal and constitutional affairs committee of the Senate.

Bill S-41 would provide that the present and previous governments have been ignoring the rule of law, respect for the charter and the importance of linguistic duality in Canada and thereby allowing uncertainty.

It is the government's constitutional obligation to respect the rule of law. Cost cannot be a criterion in order to correct mistakes of abdicating constitutional obligation made in the past. It is respect for the rule of law which is important.

We in the Canadian Alliance believe that constitutional validity must be preserved in order to protect Canada's unique dualistic bilingual structure. By enacting legislation in only one language, the government risks isolating its citizens further. This is a very dangerous domestic policy to support.

I would also like to point out that what is troubling is the government's attitude: its approach to democracy, transparency, accountability and openness; and its arrogance and sometimes even bullying or do not care attitude. The government has taken 20 years in this case and what it has done is pathetic.

First, the government ignores the problem. Then it denies there is an issue. And then it bends over backwards to argue its case, baseless as it may be, against the strong and logical arguments from the general counsel of the Standing Joint Committee on the Scrutiny of Regulations. Once it is convinced it will then drag its heels and not properly correct the mistake or the error it made in the first place. That is the most serious problem the standing joint committee faces.

Some of the files have been in the pipeline for as long as 5, 10 and even 20 years. All this adds up to a huge backlog of instruments whose legality or validity is questionable. As I mentioned earlier,it necessitates the need for regulatory reform.

The following are some of the improvements I would propose to the government.

The federal Liberal government does not govern, but rules Canada. It introduces bills that lack substance, are vague in intent and often written in incomplete and general terms, leaving the door wide open to put through regulations that define our laws without proper checks and balances. By doing so, the Liberal government effectively has gutted the parliamentary process of accountability and transparency in the formulation of its laws representing further erosion of the rights and powers of parliament. Parliament is no longer at the centre of the law-making process. It is the regulations that give form and substance to legislation instead of the government bills.

Only 20% of Canadian law is made in parliament. The remaining 80% is added through the back door by way of regulations which are neither debated nor subject to effective public scrutiny.

The role of parliamentarians to formulate legislation is very limited. Scrutiny of regulations is thus an essential task in protecting democracy, transparency, legitimacy and in controlling bureaucracy. The regulatory burden, also called red tape, faced by Canadian businesses is very high and is a costly impediment to productivity and growth. In addition to restricting people's freedom to make their own choices, rules and regulations dampen innovation, discourage investment, stifle entrepreneurship, weaken competitiveness, curtail job sand lower the standard of living of Canadians.

Canadians spend over $100 billion per year, which is 12% of GDP, to comply with federal, provincial and municipal regulations. If we convert it, that is about $13,700 per household. This spending is second only to shelter. This cost exceeds total personal and corporate income tax collected by the federal government. Red tape is a hidden tax.

Between 1975 and 1999 more than 117,000 new federal and provincial regulations were enacted which would measure 10 stories high when stacked. Each regulatory program is a monument to a past problem.

The only means for parliament to scrutinize its regulations is through the House and Senate Standing Joint Committee of for the Scrutiny of Regulations, which I had the opportunity to co-chair. The committee has been operating without statutory footing for many years, perhaps since 1974. Before the committee uses its ultimate weapon of disallowance, in some cases the process can take 5, 10 or 20 years. This is unacceptable.

The current disallowance procedure was meant only as a temporary measure since 1987 and it has to be on permanent statutory footing. I will not elaborate on this because I spoke on it yesterday. I will move on to some other issues that I would like to bring to members' attention.

I would like to make some recommendations. The delegated regulations and other statutory instruments must be referred to the appropriate committee of the House in addition to the joint committee on regulations. It will provide the House with a check on the enabling clauses in the bills that allow the making of subordinate legislation. They can look to the regulations based on policy and merit because of the committee tenet.

The realistic alternatives to regulations, such as negotiated compliance, should be explored and the focus should be results based and not based on the process. There can be market or tax incentives or disincentives.

Regulations should be written in transparent, simple and easy to understand language. The primary clientele of government regulations is the public and not the legal professionals.

Another recommendation is that a cost benefit analysis should be done and published before making regulations. Estimation of competitive and impact analysis and enforcement cost and risk analysis would also be helpful. Regulators are largely insensitive to the hidden costs of regulations and unaware of alternatives.

Regulatory service standards should be established and a fast track approval process developed for products already found to be safe in other jurisdictions.

The Canadian tradition of promoting social policy objectives through economic regulations is a luxury with a high but hidden price tag. A strong social safety net is only possible if first there is a strong economy.

Regulatory action should be harmonized if possible with the existing provincial, national or international standards and regulations. There should be greater regulatory co-ordination, co-operation and even consolidation among various levels of government. There is a need for greater sensitivity in Canada to the regulatory structures and shifts in the United States and other major trading countries. We have no choice but to adapt to them. It does not mean imitating, but bending to international realities.

An interprovincial standardization commission should be established. Canada contemplates free trade with the United States, yet regulatory barriers to trade inside its own borders must be dismantled. Professional standards and licensing rules, such as the free flow of capital, consumer protection laws, export laws for unprocessed provincial goods, truck safety and measurements should be standardized.

Regulatory proposals must include a sunset clause or performance review to ensure they meet the desired objectives and results. In France, government forms have an automatic sunset review date. Reverse onus should be put on the process. Relevance, effectiveness and timeliness of regulations should be monitored.

The clogged pipeline of files needs to be cleaned. Accumulation leads to strangulation. The total cumulative burden of regulations is the number one regulatory problem. Departments and agencies should be encouraged to do a cleanup of redundant and obsolete regulations by eliminating and preventing non-essential procedures, forms, licences and regulations that do nothing meaningful other than adding to the cost of dealing with the government.

Canada has reached a point where more good regulations are thrown after bad ones which causes a sinkhole effect. In a federal regulatory sedimentation system, over time layer upon layer create an unsystematic bundle of constraints and disincentives. Dormant regulations are like sleeping dogs and take up space, require occasional upkeep and pose a potential threat in the public sector.

Omnibus repeal legislation should be introduced. A reliable regulatory inventory and review of the accumulation should be prepared to identify problem areas and classify regulations as the good, the bad and the ugly. The government should be brought into the 21st century with the use of advanced technology.

The regulatory responsibility is intentionally split between or among various departments and agencies. One department carries on research and forms a judgment about a product yet the responsibility for whether or not that judgment is implemented rests in another department. Splitting responsibility encourages duplication, internal red tape and diffusion of responsibility and accountability.

For example, with the environment and fisheries departments, one department justifies the regulation making and the other department implements it. Other examples would be health, labour, transport and immigration; finance and national revenue; and health, agriculture, the human rights commission and employment insurance. For all of them there is loss of publication.

No internal regulatory commitments should be entered into without a careful regulatory impact analysis to ensure that international proposals are in tune with Canada's interests, for example, the Kyoto commitment.

Canada can learn from American and other international experiments about new approaches to regulations. These should be monitored both for lessons we should emulate and experiments we should avoid.

Many times penalties are too low in relation to the proceeds of violence or crime. Serious offenders get an unfair economic advantage. Serious non-compliance must be made unprofitable. Due to inadequate penalties, the government adds additional regulations to bolster the original regulations, for example in fisheries. Inadequate penalties entirely nullify the effect of the regulations, for example, penalties for smuggling humans or drugs.

Reliance on criminal sanctions can have a similar nullifying effect by virtue of being so heavy that the burden of proof becomes extremely difficult, legal proceedings commensurately too expensive and judges and juries too reluctant to convict.

There is a need to identify all regulatory statutes whose penalties have become inadequate. Omnibus amending legislation should be put before parliament.

Canada should introduce a regulatory flexibility act similar to the one in the United States to provide for tiering of regulations, administrative procedures and federal program delivery to recognize the limited financial and managerial capacities of small businesses. The government should be sensitive to the time pressures of small businesses and their limited resource pools.

Small businesses are the economic engine of Canada. They could be allowed a three to five year regulatory honeymoon period in which new businesses may be exempted from complying with certain tough regulations without compromising safety, health and environmental protection, for example, stringent labour standards. Any voluntary expenditure for occupational health and safety could be allowed as a business tax write-off.

Departments and agencies responsible for financial costs of regulatory litigation should pay their legal costs from their budgets to provide an incentive to regulators to ensure that their regulations are well prepared and enforceable and to prevent shaky prosecution. Departments and agencies should also pay the legal costs of private citizens and small businesses when a prosecution is unsuccessful and was questionable and intimidating.

The House of Commons should give itself, through its joint standing committee, the means, in terms of adequate number of legal counsel, equipment, communication tools and other resources, to make the scrutiny more meaningful. Previous problems concerning employees' salaries and the number of employees should not be allowed to be repeated. This is important for the morale of those working very hard in support of the committee.

When the standing joint committee tables a report in the House of Commons and desires a response from parliament, it simply mentions that it has made a similar request in the report tabled in the Senate. Within 150 days of the presentation of a report, the government shall table a response thereto, but no similar provision exists in the rules of the Senate. That is a problem of compatibility of the procedures in the House of Commons and the Senate with respect to disallowance, reports and so on.

The revocation of an instrument disallowed by the House of Commons is currently dependent on a decision of the governor in council or a minister to obey the order the House.

The current procedure for disallowance is not encoded in law. We need to make amendments to the Statutory Instruments Act so that the standing orders which lay out the procedure for disallowance have a statutory footing and can be implemented successfully. Moreover, it should be applicable to all the instruments, rather than those instruments which are made by the governor in council or a minister.

The disallowance procedure and the scrutiny of legislative instruments should be applicable to those instruments which are made by authority delegated by parliament to various agencies and boards, such as the National Energy Board, the National Transportation Agency, the CRTC and so on. There needs to be a statutory footing by amending the Statutory Instruments Act for the disallowance procedure.

The government should have a mechanism in place to measure the regulatory burden on individuals and businesses.

I will close my remarks by saying that we support Bill S-41 because we need to have all legislative instruments not only made but printed and published in both official languages of Canada.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

4:10 p.m.

Bloc

Benoît Sauvageau Bloc Repentigny, QC

Madam Speaker, to begin with, I would like to say that it is not easy to follow the member for Surrey Central, after such a fine, scholarly speech that covered every aspect of a bill as important as Bill S-41. Nevertheless, I shall attempt to make a modest contribution in an attempt to explain to Canadians and Quebecers how Canadian legislation will be improved once Bill S-41 is passed.

It is a pleasure, but also a disappointment to speak to Bill S-41, which originated in the Senate. The bill is in response to the report of the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations that was tabled in October 1996. The response to a report which was tabled in 1996 and which was studied for many months comes in 2002. Therefore, the public and witnesses have been waiting for this response for six, seven or eight years.

People are disillusioned and disinterested in this government. The scandals, the squandering of public money, everything that has happened with Groupaction, Everest, Lafleur Communication, and so on, and the millions of dollars that have been wasted are examples that have made the public lose interest and confidence in the members who represent them and have led the public to become disaffected.

The six year wait for Bill S-41 is another example, in addition to the scandals at Human Resources Development Canada and those concerning the sponsorship program, which may explain the public's loss of interest in its elected officials.

As regards Bill S-41, I will quote some of the witnesses who appeared before the Senate committee. These are people who are well aware of the importance of this bill. I will begin with the hon. Minister of Justice. He said, on April 24, 2002, and I quote:

I am here today to discuss Bill S-41, the Legislative Instruments Re-enactment Act. This bill arises in the broader context of Parliament's duty to enact, print and publish its laws and other instruments of a legislative nature in both official languages of Canada. Before I present the purposes of this bill, allow me to clearly indicate to the committee that the government considers itself justified in asserting that the vast majority of such instruments comply with the constitutional requirements.

It was a nice admission on the part of the Minister of Justice to tell us that the vast majority of his instruments comply with legal and constitutional requirements. By saying this, he was really telling us that some of these instruments do not comply with the Constitution, but he said it candidly and honestly before a Senate committee. This is to the minister's credit, and I want to emphasize this.

Further on, the Minister of Justice added:

However, from 1867 to 1969—

I am not very good at math, but this means about 102 years.

—the scope of the constitutional duty was not known. Prior to the enactment of the 1969 Official Languages Act, it may fairly be assumed that most federal regulations, orders in council and other such instruments of a legislative nature were made only in one official language.

We are talking about the period from 1867 to 1969. I repeat what the minister said:

—it may fairly be assumed that most federal regulations, orders in council and other such instruments of a legislative nature were made only in one official language.

I will let hon. members guess which official language, but I will say that it is definitely not the one that I am using right now. This means that only one version of these instruments was signed by the governor in council. The minister concluded by saying:

These instruments were then generally printed and published in the Canada Gazette in English and French.

Of course, since then, we learned this through the rulings of the courts.

When we ask whether the rights of minority communities are being respected, the phrase “through court rulings” keeps coming up. When the government is not sure, instead of respecting what they think are people's rights, it turns to the courts, with the resulting expenditure of money, time and energy. The minister goes on to say:

Of course, we now know through the judgment of the courts that such a practice does not meet the constitutional requirements applicable to such legislative instruments.

The Minister of Justice came to tell us that the vast majority of legislative instruments are consistent with the constitution. This therefore means that some are not.

With respect to the constitution, which was patriated in 1982, I wish to point out that we are still waiting for the legislative instruments to be adopted in French. This constitution has not yet been officially translated. Twenty years have passed. We can celebrate the 20th anniversary, but we are still waiting for the provinces to approve the legislative instruments in French. The country's primary law does not respect Bill S-41, as now enacted.

The minister said that because of the federal government's restrictive interpretation, statutes were enacted primarily in English for 102 years in violation of section 133 of the Constitution Act, 1867. He very clearly pointed out to the Senate committee the shortcomings of the federal government with respect to its constitutional obligations since 1867.

The Commissioner of Official Languages, Dr. Adam, appeared before the Senate committee on this topic in May 2002. She said:

Moreover, these are rights that were recognized at Confederation by section 133 of the Constitution Act, 1867 and confirmed and clarified in the Official Languages Acts of 1969 and 1988 and in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

It is somewhat amusing that we find ourselves here in June 2002 discussing a bill, S-41, which sets out, confirms or proves the rights contained in the British North America Act of 1867.

Those who have drafted legislative texts and those who have enacted these texts since 1867 have not understood that section 133 of the constitution required them to do so in both official languages.

For 102 years, section 133 of the constitution was for the most part neglected and violated, as legislative texts were enacted in one official language only. It would seem to me that, having realized the error, it ought to have been remedied. But no, it took supreme court judgments.

As I said, when there is any doubt as far as the defence of the rights of minority francophone communities is concerned, rather than allowing them to exercise their rights, they are told to go to court. Then the cases move from courts of first instance, to second instance, and then to the supreme court. Then after five, ten, fifteen years of debates, the minority francophone communities are informed they were right. Everyone knows that, because it is clearly stated in the law.

But to get to that point, they have to hire lawyers, and spend money and energy they ought to be devoting to the promotion and development of their community. They are required to expend energy on defending rights that are already obvious, since they are in the constitution and in other Canadian statutes.

Here is what Ms. Adam said. “Fortified by these guarantees from 1867, 1969, 1999 and the two Blaikie judgments rendered more than twenty years ago, we now learn, with some astonishment, that there are still a number of pre-1980 regulatory instruments—no one knows exactly how many—that were not re-enacted in both official languages”.

This government does not abide by the Official Languages Act nor the Canadian constitution, but asks people to abide by its laws. That is pretty funny.

Ms. Adam concluded by saying:

The situation must indeed be remedied at the earliest possible opportunity so that the constitutional obligation of legislative bilingualism is respected and the validity of our laws ensured.

It is pretty disturbing and worrying to see the official languages commissioner ask the government to remedy, at the earliest possible opportunity—this is a nice phrase that means absolutely nothing to the government—a situation that is written and enacted in the founding legislation of this country and that goes back to 1867.

Today, the commissioner is saying:

The situation must be remedied at the earliest possible opportunity.

To think that the government wonders why some people do not have confidence in it and why French language minority communities doubt its goodwill.

It is simple, it is clear, it is specific and it is obvious, we have just demonstrated this. When it comes time to assert a right, it has to be fought for. In the case of this right, it has taken more than 130 years.

Also, at the same time as it is introducing Bill S-41, this government is telling us “We are hiring unilingual English employees to fill bilingual positions, but we are asking them to learn French, this country's other official language, within a reasonable timeframe”. No one knows what reasonable means.

So, at the same time that Bill S-41 is being introduced—government members may wonder where I am going with this example—we are also discussing hiring a poet for the House of Commons and the Senate, a very official position. Now, I did have not taken this to the supreme court, but as far as I can see, the Official Languages Act is not being respected.

So a bill has been drafted to clarify a section of the Constitution Act, 1867. The government is swaggering around, saying “This is wonderful, we are fixing a problem that has existed for some one hundred years”. However, at the same time, it continues to violate this country's laws.

I will read an excerpt of the release issued by the House of Commons and the Senate on the hiring of this poet. I want to point out that we opposed the creation of this position. The release reads:

Candidates must have published poetry works. They must also have made a contribution to writing and be accomplished writers who have influenced their peers.

When we hire a poet, it goes without saying that the person should have some experience in this area. It only makes sense. So far, so good.

The release then provides that:

—the candidate—and this is getting interesting—should be able to write in both official language.

I hope that he or she will indeed be able to write in both. A person who can write neither in English nor in French has a problem when applying for this position.

However, if I am reading correctly the job offer for the poet who was just hired, an idea, as I said, that we opposed, a person who only speaks one of the country's two official languages could have applied for the position. I am sure that the President of the Treasury Board will tell us “No problem. The incumbent can take courses to learn the other official language afterwards”.

If the person hired for this position is a unilingual francophone, I am prepared to make a long speech in the House of Commons. I am prepared to meet the challenge.

I know very few people with a command of only one of the two official languages, specifically French, who are hired in so-called “bilingual” positions. But it is a different story for the other linguistic group. Furthermore, I will be providing statistics.

We are told that the poet could speak and write in English only and be hired. It is not easy to translate poetry. I have never tried, but it cannot be easy.

How, in the year 2002, can the government offer an official position in one or the other of the official languages, but not both? The President of the Treasury Board will tell us that the person will take training in the other language. By the way, the language in question will be French. We presume that, after a reasonable period of time, this person would be capable of writing their poems in both official languages.

This is in very bad faith, and it is dishonest. The government is introducing a bill like this and, at the same time, breaking the basic rules for an official position in parliament.

I urge my friends and colleagues living in minority communities throughout the country, and anglophones who respect the law and who are francophiles to ask themselves some questions about the hiring of this poet. If the government hires a unilingual anglophone, what message does this send to anglophones about respect for French-language communities, and to francophones about respect for themselves?

In the job offer, the government says that the poet must have a command of one or the other of the official languages, which I find utterly shocking.

This job offer is indicative of this government's whole approach to the Official Languages Act. Since the Liberal Party took office, the total number of offices designated bilingual in Canada dropped by 25%. This government was so interested in bilingualism that it reduced services in French by 25% in those places where people are entitled to ask for and receive service in their own language. Since 1993, the number of bilingual positions has dropped by 25%

Bill S-41 is all well and good, it is quite nice, but there is still a problem. Another statistic shows that 20% of public service managers who are in bilingual positions today are unable to meet the bilingualism requirements. This means that when a position is created, one of the conditions of this position is that the candidate be bilingual. Then a unilingual anglophone is hired. In 99.9% of the cases, the unilingual person that is hired is anglophone. A unilingual anglophone is hired to fill a bilingual position, and they are told “You must now take language training in the other official language, French”.

Currently, 20% of the management positions in the public service that are designated bilingual are held by people who do not meet the bilingualism criteria. They want to hire a unilingual English poet, and they want to pass Bill S-41.

Furthermore, the number of public servants at every level in the different departments who are responsible for the Official Languages Act, and the ones responsible for francophone minority issues, has dropped by 50% since the Liberals came to office. I am not only referring to deputy ministers, but all levels. The number of public servants assigned to positions directly or indirectly related to the Official Languages Act or to issues affecting official language minorities has plummeted by 50% since 1993.

Even the throne speech contained the following statement:

Canada's linguistic duality is fundamental to our Canadian identity and is a key element of our vibrant society—

It is a matter of saying one thing and doing another. I have proven this with the various statistics I have presented.

Since the Liberals came to power, the budget allocated to the Commissioner of Official Languages has been cut 28%. The person who is in a position to defend minority community rights, Commissioner of Official Languages Dyane Adam, has less money, fewer means, fewer tools, fewer resources to defend these communities.

At the same time as the government is talking in its throne speech about how important these communities are to the government, it has cut the number of employees responsible for their issues, their programs and their rights. There has been a 25% cut in the number of service points available to them, and people who speak only one official language are now being hired for positions with bilingual designation. At that same time, we are faced with the affront of the acceptance of a so-called official poet laureate, who might well speak only one of this country's official languages, and you can guess which one that would be.

We cannot, indeed, have any objection to the adoption of Bill S-41, because it rectifies a situation that is totally unacceptable and has gone on too long. Today, we still do not know how many bills and other instruments have been drafted and introduced in complete contravention of Canada's constitution.

I therefore encourage hon. members to support this bill. I do, however, hope that the ministers of this government and the members of the opposition will not give this matter only occasional consideration. It is an ongoing situation in our minority communities and requires their ongoing attention. I trust that they will always be watchful of what is going on with francophones in minority communities. They must not say to themselves “We have adopted Bill S-41 so we will deal with it two, five or ten years down the road”.

The sole purpose of this bill is to remedy a shortcoming that ought to have been remedied since 1867. As the person supposedly responsible for the Official Languages Act, the president of the privy council, has said—and if he does not agree, let him say so—“If the francophone communities continue to go to court to defend their rights, they will have less money for programs aimed at promoting their communities, helping them develop, and encouraging various events in their communities and regions”.

I do not believe that this is the way to advance the cause of minority official language communities. Their self-actualization will come through openness, an open and flexible interpretation of the various issues and the various pieces of legislation.

In conclusion, the Minister of Justice candidly admitted to the Senate committee that he was not complying with the constitution. He also told the Standing Joint Committee on Official Languages that, in his opinion, the most important section in the Official Languages Act, namely section 42, was a declaration of intent on the part of his government and not an obligation to act.

Again, in order to ensure the respect of an act that enjoys unanimous support—an act that was recognized by everyone in committee and even in the various court rulings—minority French language communities will have to turn to the courts. The minister told us that if minority French language communities want confirmation of the existence of this right, namely the government's obligation to act, as opposed to having made a mere declaration of intent, he is giving them the option of going before the supreme court.

Five or ten years from now, after having spent and wasted a couple of hundred thousand dollars—that they do not have or that they could use to promote and develop their communities—the government will have no choice but to meet its constitutional obligations. It will be obliged to promote and to take action. This is clearly spelled out in the act.

But the minister said “This is a declaration of intent; we do not intend to engage in this promotion, in this development of French language communities”.

We must support Bill S-41, but we must also be much more open. We must always keep in mind the development and promotion of these communities.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

4:35 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for St. John's West, Fisheries; the hon. member for Chambly, Government Contracts; and the hon. member for Davenport, The Environment.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

4:40 p.m.

NDP

Peter Stoffer NDP Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore, NS

Madam Speaker, I wish to first thank my hon. colleague from the Bloc Quebecois as well as his party for raising issues of the French culture and language, not only in the House of Commons but throughout the country.

It always starts the debate going when we talk about Mr. Trudeau, the former Prime Minister, offering official bilingualism throughout the country. We are still struggling in our predominantly English sectors with our educational process, which is a provincial responsibility, of having French language taught from the very beginning, or having French immersion or French lessons or anything of that nature.

I am just as much to blame for this as anyone, but I hope by now that all school aged children are offered official French and English language training when they first start school. By the time they become teenagers and young adults they will be able to flip back and forth between both official languages without any problem. Also people who speak our aboriginal languages such as Cree, Dene, Inuit and Inuktitut in turn would not only be able to speak their native languages but would also have the opportunity at a very early age to speak the other two official languages.

On a more provincial level, a big battle is going on in the city of Halifax about funding for École Beaufort and on whether to shut the school down or move the people enrolled in French lessons. It is really sad that we are going to stop or reduce the opportunity for children to study French because of financial restrictions. That is simply unacceptable.

There should not be one child that does not have the right, from the very beginning, to take courses in both official languages. If we did that, I believe we would see the debate over bilingualism subside. It would be really nice if say in 15 or 20 years the vast majority of Canadians could speak both French and English.

Although I am taking lessons in French, I am by no means bilingual, and I apologize for that. I could probably spend a lot more time in that regard. If only the opportunity had existed when I went was going to school, from kindergarten on up, as it does in Europe. I was born in Holland. Four languages are taught right from the beginning. By the time these kids reach their teenage years they can flip among three or four languages without a problem. I notice a lot of cab drivers here speak Arabic, French, English and other languages as well. If all Canadians had that opportunity, issues like we are discussing now with Bill S-41 would be a thing of the past.

I also want to mention the fact that the bill originated from the Senate. I question why a Liberal dominated government would have to debate a bill that originates from the Senate. Why did it originate from the Senate and not from the front benches of the government? Maybe a member on the Liberal side will answer that when he or she gets up to speak.

I just very briefly want to say that our member for Acadie--Bathurst is very supportive of this legislation. He has encouraged members of our party to support it, which we will. We know there are flaws in the bill but it is better than what we had before. We encourage the government to move quickly on this legislation and to promote and encourage official bilingualism in the country whenever it can.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

4:40 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

John Herron Progressive Conservative Fundy Royal, NB

Madam Speaker, I wish to begin my speech on Bill S-41 by saying that the Progressive Conservative Party intends to support the government on this bill.

When we look at the bill we see that it is only four pages of reading. It is one of the most simple bills we may actually have before the House of Commons. Many individuals may not think that this piece of legislation necessarily requires a lot of debate or that it could be confrontational in any way, shape or form. To be honest, the merit of the bill is that it is a technical bill. It addresses the reality that many of our statutes, principally orders in council or perhaps regulations, were initially instituted in only one of our official languages.

There is a debate among certain individuals that because these acts were in fact translations when they were eventually adopted into law, as opposed to being enshrined in law simultaneously in both of our official languages, they potentially could be subject to some form of legal challenge. There are certain individuals who may say that the bill is merely of a legal nature. I must compliment the government on the approach it has taken. I believe it to be a very efficient approach to ensure that the intent and the spirit of parliament is never contravened by our laws. I think that is the government's intent in giving this a retroactive nature. I do not think there is anything where one could conclude that the actions had an aspect of malice or mis-intent. I think the approach it has taken is completely legitimate.

I believe that the preservation of our laws in both of our official languages quite clearly speaks to the fabric of this nation. The formation of this country in 1867 was indeed a very serious partnership of four founding provinces and two strong linguistic communities. Having a law enshrined, whether or not it is intended to be a defensive mechanism for court challenges, has a positive aspect to it as well. It enshrines into law the necessity to protect and respect both of our official languages. That indeed does speak to the fabric of our nation.

We have had some similar situations arise in our country in the recent past. In the city of Moncton in the province of New Brunswick there was a court challenge because the municipal bylaws were initially tabled only in English. There is a strong bilingual character in the city of Moncton. The constitutional legality of those laws was challenged as to whether they were in fact binding in terms of municipal law.

Courageously, the province of New Brunswick did not challenge the court decision that was made. In fact, it made a clear commitment to actually ensure that in our largest cities and in our most linguistically pluralistic cities we have our municipal bylaws translated to reflect the nature of those communities. I really want to applaud the federal government and the efforts of not only the Minister of Canadian Heritage but in particular the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs for their financial contribution in assisting my provincial cousins in the province of New Brunswick with the costs of the translation for those municipal communities. This reflects a similar initiative taken by the Right Hon. Brian Mulroney in 1984 for the province of Manitoba, after the Blaikie decision, whereby the provincial statutes were written in both official languages.

I think this reflects the common bond that we have as a nation. When it comes to defence of our linguistic communities, this is an issue that transcends most party lines. Sometimes I am a little bit confused about the official position of the leader of Her Majesty's official opposition on embracing that duality, but I suspect he will have a chance to be able to provide more clarity on that aspect down the road as well.

I know that we are never supposed to make reference to the absence of a member in the House, but I would like to make reference to the presence of my friends from the ridings of Madawaska--Restigouche and Saint John. We can applaud a strong, progressive piece of legislation just passed by the province of New Brunswick through premier Bernard Lord. It is our new provincial official languages act, which really reflects the spirit of the first pioneering act that was passed by the then premier, Louis Robichaud. What the provincial government of New Brunswick has done with its new law is ensure that we have a progressive piece of legislation that meets our constitutional obligations, particularly under sections 41 and 42 of the Official Languages Act. I would like to pay tribute to that aspect as well.

I would like to perhaps send up a flare or indicate one particular concern because people are worried about our constitutional obligations under official languages and about the need to respect the constitution, which is a document that, in theory, makes our family whole. These days parliamentarians are reticent to raise the constitutional aspects of our nation from time to time, but the fact is that 25% of our population is still not represented in our constitutional family.

At some point it will be incumbent on the Government of Canada to address that immense inadequacy or deficiency. It is something that concerns me dearly, because it is just a matter of fact that at some point that issue will flare up again. We should do this in a very proactive and progressive way and not let it sit in perpetuity in the hope that it will go away. Not only is it a fact that it could be problematic, but it is also in the spirit of the nation to ensure that all members of our Canadian family participate in the constitutional framework itself.

That was the spirit of Meech when it was embraced by all 10 premiers, not once but twice, initially in 1987 and later in the 1980s. Then one particular individual turned his back on Canada, the then premier of Newfoundland. Make no mistake about it, Meech was about the protection and respect of the linguistic duality of the national identity that we have in the province of Quebec, its language, culture and civil code. It reflects the historical compromise that founded this nation and even steps back to the Quebec act of 1774 itself.

When we talk about the constitution and ensuring that we have laws that meet those obligations, let us ensure that at some point as parliamentarians we have the courage of our convictions to understand that our country has to be whole again and that 25% of the population is not represented in our constitutional framework. We need to find a way to actually accomplish that so we can reflect the nature of what we had attempted to do under the then premier, the late Robert Bourassa.

For a technical bill perhaps I went into some deeper thought for some individuals, but that is why we do this. That founding partnership still reflects the essence of our nation and is one that has to be wholeheartedly addressed. We need to ensure that we have national leadership in that regard.

Legislative Instruments Re-enactment ActGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)

Pursuant to order made earlier today, the bill is deemed to have been referred to a committee of the whole, reported without amendment, concurred in at report stage and read a third time and passed.

(Motion agreed to, bill read the second time, considered in committee of the whole, reported, concurred in, read the third time and passed)

Pest Control Products ActGovernment Orders

4:55 p.m.

Edmonton West Alberta

Liberal

Anne McLellan LiberalMinister of Health

moved that Bill C-53, An Act to protect human health and safety and the environment by regulating products used for the control of pests, be read the third time and passed.

Pest Control Products ActGovernment Orders

4:55 p.m.

Madawaska—Restigouche New Brunswick

Liberal

Jeannot Castonguay LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak at third reading of Bill C-53, the Pest Control Products Act.

The passing of this bill will enhance the government's protection of Canadians' health and their environment by minimizing risks posed by pest control products.

Enshrined in this legislation is the requirement to incorporate modern risk assessment concepts into the scientific assessment of pesticides. This includes additional safety factors to protect children, thereby helping to ensure that Canada's children are given special protection from health risks posed by pesticides.

These additional safety factors recognize that children are affected by pesticides in a way that is different from adults and are applied whenever children might be exposed to pesticides through food or residential uses.

Health protection will also be strengthened through C-53's requirement that aggregate exposure to pesticides and the cumulative effects of pesticides that act in the same way be assessed.

One of the most important amendments that was made to the bill was to ensure that these factors are considered when making registration decisions about all pesticides, not just those used on food. This bill states unequivocally that no pesticide may be used in Canada unless any associated risks to the environment have first been determined to fall within acceptable limits.

The term “environment”, defined broadly to be consistent with the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, includes the components of the earth, all layers of the atmosphere, animals, plants and other living organisms. Environmental risks include the potential capacity of pesticides to do harm to ecosystems, species at risk and biological diversity.

Bill C-53 supports minimizing risks, not just keeping them within acceptable limits. A pesticide will not be registered if its value is determined to be unacceptable—that is, if it does not contribute to pest management in a positive way. The assessment of value, which includes the pesticide's efficacy, enables the lowest effective rate of the pesticide to the determined and it is only that lowest rate that is approved for use.

One of the most important features of this bill is to increase the Canadian public's access to information generated and held by the government.

When enacted, the new Pest Control Products Act will make Canada's pesticide regulatory system among the most transparent and open in the world. A public registry will be established that allows the public to have access to detailed evaluation reports on the risks and the value of registered pesticides. The public will also be allowed to view the confidential test data on which pesticide evaluations are based.

Bill C-53 will make it easier for Health Canada to share scientific studies on pesticides with other federal, provincial, territorial and international regulators and with health professionals.

Sharing studies with its international regulatory counterparts enhances the process for international harmonization, including joint reviews of pesticides. Joint reviews give Canadian growers equal access to newer, safer pesticides so they can be competitive in the marketplace, while helping to ensure that Canadians have a safe and abundant food supply.

International harmonization also contributes to risk reduction by speeding up the withdrawal of older, frequently more hazardous pesticides and expediting their replacement with pesticides that are safer and more compatible with the goals of sustainable pest management.

Bill C-53 will also strengthen the government's post-registration control of pesticides. This control is being enhanced, first, by requiring mandatory reporting of adverse effects.

A company that is applying to register a pesticide or one that has a registered pesticide will be obliged to report to the government any adverse effects produced by its product.

Failure to report adverse effects will be an offence under the legislation. When the government receives an adverse effects report, it will review the information and decide whether it should initiate a special review in order to determine if registration of the pesticide needs to be amended or cancelled so that health and environmental risks remain acceptable. Action can be taken right away to protect human health or the environment, if necessary.

The government's capacity to re-evaluate pesticides systematically is being strengthened, notably by requiring re-evaluations of pesticides to be done 15 years after they are registered.

It is also providing the minister with the authority to take action against registrants who fail to provide the data needed to conduct re-evaluations. Strengthened capacity to conduct re-evaluations will translate into better environmental protection. It will also translate into better health protection, notably for vulnerable populations such as children and seniors. The re-evaluation process will be similar to the processes used in the United States and Europe.

Finally, Bill C-53 brings federal pesticide legislation into line with contemporary standards regarding compliance. It provides clear rules and increased powers for Health Canada's inspectors. The bill also allows higher maximum penalties to be set when pesticides are not marketed or used in accordance with the law--up to $1 million or three years in jail for the most serious offences.

Having touched on the main thrusts of Bill C-53, I will now review the changes accepted by the Standing Committee on Health which have been reported back to the House. Under these amendments, the major elements of the bill are substantially unchanged. But in order to improve and refine these elements, significant amendments have been accepted. They reflect comments made by committee members, the debates in the House, and take into account comments made by numerous other Canadians in submissions before the committee.

To respond to concerns that the term “acceptable risk” was too vague, an interpretation of this term has been added to the legislation, “Acceptable risk” means that there is a reasonable certainty that no harm to human health or the environment will result from exposure to or use of a pesticide.

This level of precaution is the most stringent way to protect Canadians and their environment from the potential risks associated with pesticides.

By adding a definition of “formulant” and including this term in the definition of “pest control product”, the requirement to ensure that all ingredients of a pesticide are assessed has been clarified. As well, as I have already mentioned, consideration of aggregate exposure and cumulative effects that was already in the section on maximum residue limits has been added into the registration and re-evaluation sections of the bill. The committee also accepted the suggested amendment that information about adverse effects be included in the material available for Canadians to examine in the public registry.

An important objective of the bill is to minimize risks associated with pesticides, not just ensure that risks are acceptable. One way of doing this is to facilitate access to pesticides that pose lower risks that those already registered. To this end, an important amendment made to the bill was to add a provision to require the minister to expedite the evaluations of reduced risk pesticides. The new provision in the bill will ensure that this is given priority. Another amendment also clarified that the annual report to Parliament on administration of the act will include the status of registrations of lower risk pesticides.

Access to minor use pesticides by farmers and other users was another key area of discussion during the committee deliberations. A specific authority to make regulations respecting minor uses has now been incorporated in the bill.

Finally, a provision has been added to have the act reviewed by a parliamentary committee after seven years.

There are two areas that have received considerable attention: restricting the so-called “cosmetic use” of pesticides, and extending the precautionary principle to the registration of new pesticides. I would like to explain why amendments have not been made in these areas.

Some witnesses before the standing committee stated that the cosmetic use of pesticides should just be banned by the federal government. The fact is that all pesticides and their uses must be treated in the same way under federal law. They must all be subjected to rigorous scientific testing and the results must be critically evaluated using the latest risk assessment methods. The results of these risk assessments will be different for each pesticide and use. An outright ban on “cosmetic uses” of pesticides presupposes that they all cause unacceptable risks.

That is not the case. Since the PCPA is based primarily on the criminal law power, it would not be appropriate to make that use a crime if the risks posed by that use have been determined to be acceptable.

The preamble to Bill C-53 recognizes the interdependence of federal, provincial and territorial pest management regulatory systems and encourages respect for the responsibilities of each order of government.

Should provinces and municipalities, whose legislation is not based on the criminal power, want to further restrict the use of any pesticide, they may.

For example, provinces may have sensitive wetlands that need to be protected and they would restrict the pesticide from being used in that area. Or, citizens of a particular municipality may decide that they do not want to have a pesticide used in their community no matter how small the risks and they may persuade the municipal government to enact a by-law to that effect, if their municipality has been given such authority by the province.

In any case, access to new, safer pesticides and an active re-evaluation program for older pesticides will ensure that any pesticides registered at the federal level do not pose unacceptable risks, bearing in mind the very stringent interpretation of “acceptable risk” that has now been added to the bill. Priority has been given to re-evaluating all lawn pesticides.

Suggestions have been made to have broader incorporation of the precautionary principle in Bill C-53. It is already included in the section of the Bill that pertains to pesticides that are already registered and in use. The principle is stated there so that if threats of serious or irreversible harm are detected for a pesticide that is already registered, the government will not have to wait for full scientific certainty before taking cost-effective measures to prevent adverse health impact or environmental degradation.

Use of the precautionary principle under these circumstances will enhance the government's capacity to act quickly when threats are detected.

The situation regarding the approval of new pesticides, that is those that are not already in use, is different. The Pest Control Products Act has as its fundamental approach the extremely rigorous assessments of pesticides before they are registered for sale or use in Canada.

As explained earlier, “acceptable risk” means that there is reasonable certainty that no harm to human health or the environment will result from use of the pesticide. Applying the precautionary principle based on a threat of serious or irreversible harm to the registration of new pesticides would actually weaken the standard set for safety, not strengthen it.

Registration decisions are based on whether or not exposure would be 100-1000 times lower than the level at which no adverse effects are shown. This is a more stringent test of safety than whether or not there are “threats of serious or irreversible damage”, which is the wording contained in the Canadian Environmental Protection Act's version of the precautionary principle and the one in this bill.

Pre-market assessment of pesticides means that Health Canada does not simply allow a pesticide to be used and then wait for evidence of harm, it exercises its authority to reduce risks before a pesticide ever reaches the market.

I would just like to note that the current Pest Control Products Act is 33 years old and Canadians are expecting the government to act to help protect their health and environment and ensure a safe and abundant food supply.

I ask everyone in the House who wishes to see an effective, modern and open pesticide regulatory system in Canada to support Bill C-53.

In closing, I would like to thank the Standing Committee on Health for its careful assessment of this bill and for the amendment that have been made to further strengthen it. I believe that this bill represents a critically important step forward in our capacity to protect Canadians and their environment.

Pest Control Products ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Gurmant Grewal Canadian Alliance Surrey Central, BC

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the constituents of Surrey Central I am pleased to rise to participate in the debate on Bill C-53, an act to protect human health and safety and the environment by regulating products used for the control of pests.

Before I begin I want to acknowledge the hard work done by our senior health critic on the file, the hon. member for Yellowhead with whom I will be splitting my time.

Bill C-53 would replace the 33 year old Pest Control Products Act which is long past due. This primary legislation intends to control the import, manufacture, sale and use of all pesticides in Canada.

Pest Control Products ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)

Order, please. I must advise the hon. member that the first three speakers cannot split their time unless they ask for unanimous consent to do so.

Pest Control Products ActGovernment Orders

5:10 p.m.

Canadian Alliance

Gurmant Grewal Canadian Alliance Surrey Central, BC

Mr. Speaker, I would ask the House to give me unanimous consent to split my time.