Mr. Speaker, as I said previously, I would like to thank the member for South Shore—St. Margarets for bringing forward this motion.
I am pleased to rise today as the official opposition critic for fisheries, oceans, and the Canadian Coast Guard to speak in favour of Motion No. 40. I will be voting in favour of it, and I will be encouraging my colleagues in the official opposition to do the same.
Motion No. 40 proposes that the government explore legislative options prohibiting the abandonment of a vessel, suggests an educational component on responsible vessel ownership, recommends improving vessel registration, and calls upon the government to assist in the removal of abandoned vessels where its presence creates an economic burden for a community.
I know that my colleague, the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap and the deputy critic for fisheries, oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard for the official opposition, will be sharing some compelling examples of that in his speech later on in this debate.
Vessels that are abandoned by their owners pose a serious challenge to Canada's coastal communities. Abandoned vessels can pose an imminent risk of environmental damage and can interfere in navigation. Ships left to drift or rot can cause long-term environmental damage, endanger other craft on the water, and create a general eyesore.
We know that derelict vessels are a major irritant and concern for municipalities and port authorities across the country, as they do not fall under local bylaws and local authorities often lack the financial means to deal with these abandoned vessels. That is certainly true for smaller communities.
Currently, vessels are removed by the Canadian Coast Guard or Transport Canada only if there is an imminent risk of environmental damage or if they are obstructing navigation.
Back in 2012, a Transport Canada study on the issue of abandoned and derelict vessels in Canada drew a number of conclusions. It was estimated that there were 397 abandoned and derelict vessels in Canada. The removal of these vessels could range from $1,500 to $3,000 for small vessels to hundreds of thousands of dollars for large vessels. We certainly heard from the member for South Shore—St. Margarets that some stretch into the millions.
Abandoned and derelict vessels are an issue being addressed by a growing number of municipalities and private shoreline property owners, and their removal is costly and requires significant technical resources. It is challenging or impossible to identify owners of such vessels, and consequently municipal governments or property owners may have to deal with the issue and pay for the removal themselves. There is also a lack of co-ordination of the type of information that is collected across the country, and it is not possible to do a cost estimate for the removal of all known abandoned and derelict vessels.
The report recommended that an interjurisdictional working group be formed to address the issue and to provide recommendations on identified issues, including creating definitions of the terms “abandoned vessel” and “derelict vessel”; developing relevant legislative and regulatory tools and a gap analysis to identify all responsible federal, provincial, and municipal authorities; highlighting methods used to identify owners; identifying potential sources of funding to remove abandoned and derelict vessels, including short-term and long-term options; creating a central inventory; developing training, communication, and awareness material; and facilitating the sharing of information in relation to the removal of abandoned and derelict vessels.
For these reasons, the former member of Parliament for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, John Weston, introduced a private members bill in the last parliament to address a number of the issues related to derelict and abandoned vessel. Bill C-695, An Act to amend the Canada Shipping Act, 2001 (prohibition against abandonment of vessel), would have amended provisions in part 2 of the Canada Shipping Act in order to prohibit the abandonment of a vessel. Clause 1 would have added the definition of “deemed abandoned” in section 210, describing when a vessel is considered abandoned. Clause 3 would have added the offence of abandonment of a vessel, liable on summary conviction to a fine of not more than $100,000 or imprisonment for a term of not more than one year, or both.
Bill C-695 recognized that boat owners needed to be held accountable for their own vessels, just as this motion “recognizes the requirement for the prohibition against the abandonment of a vessel”.
In the last election, as part of our platform, the Conservative Party promised to support the provisions of Bill C-695. We also proposed to set aside $1 million per year, beginning in 2016-17, to cover one-third of the cost of removing priority derelict vessels.
Over the years, a number of proposals were brought before the House that would take a different path. Two nearly identical bills, Bill C-231 and Bill C-638, would have shifted the burden from vessel owners to Canadian taxpayers.
Clause 1 of Bill C-638 would have designated the Canadian Coast Guard as the receiver of wreck. Clause 2 proposed to change the discretionary power found in section 155(3) of the Canada Shipping Act into an obligation for the receiver of wreck to take measures in order to remove, dispose or destroy a wreck.
Clause 3 of the bill would have given the minister of transport and the minister of fisheries and oceans regulatory powers respecting appropriate measures the receivers of wreck must take or direct to be taken to remove, dispose of or destroy a wreck, as well as exemptions from the obligation to do so.
Clause 4 would have required the minister of transport to file a report every five years before each House of Parliament regarding the operation of part 7 of the act.
There are a number of concerns with an approach that would designate the Canadian Coast Guard the receiver of wreck. The Coast Guard is considered to be part of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. It is not a separate legal entity and simply cannot be designated as a permanent receiver of wreck.
However, there is a larger issue here. Automatically making the Canadian Coast Guard the receiver of all wrecks regardless of the level of threat the wreck poses to the environment or navigation would divert the limit of resources of the Canadian Coast Guard from the current important work that it is doing. Scientific work, work to manage our fisheries, life-saving search and rescue work would all be compromised if we were to shift the responsibility of addressing abandoned vessels from shipowners to the Canadian Coast Guard.
Washington State has a program for derelict ship removal, a program that Transport Canada has studied. What was learned from that experience was that any remediation program that did not improve shipowner responsibility and accountability merely encouraged vessel owners to abandon unwanted vessels, relying on taxpayers to pay for the cost of disposal.
We must not shift the financial burden of derelict and abandoned vessels on to taxpayers. We must do more to ensure that vessel owners are held responsible for their property. We do need to take action, and this is a major issue in many communities in British Columbia and right across the country. The motion should be passed by the House so the work can continue on making our laws and regulations on derelict vessels more comprehensive and more stringent.
I look forward to the debate on this and encourage all members of the House to support the motion.