moved:
That this House call upon the government to take the necessary measures, including the drafting of legislation, to prevent medical conditions and illnesses caused by exposure to identifiable environmental contaminants.
Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise in the House today to put forth my first motion to be debated and eventually advance to a vote. It is my hope and trust in this institution that my motion will be supported by enough members who are concerned about the future of this country, the current state of the environment and health as well as the legacy we leave for our children and our children's children.
I would like to acknowledge also that I have some relatives in the audience who are joining me today: Diana and Don Learn, my aunt and uncle from Ontario as well as my aunt, Carol Dembek, from Michigan.
My motion states:
That this House call upon the government to take the necessary measures, including the drafting of legislation, to prevent medical conditions and illnesses caused by exposure to identifiable environmental contaminants.
The motion is an environmental and health trigger for action. It promotes a concept that when identifiable environmental contaminants are linked to people's health, a process should start that will review and debate the matter. It will draw out the circumstances, the benefits, drawbacks and repercussions of taking action. Citizens will have a federal body that will ensure disclosure, an opportunity to institute corrective action and a debate throughout the parliamentary system of members elected in a democracy. They will in the end decide what course of action to take. It is about a body, it is about ability and it is about public confidence, and that is to what the motion speaks.
To put the motion in context of why it has been brought forth, I wish to break my comments into three segments. The first will relate to generalities of the content with specific attention to health, medical conditions and illnesses caused by exposure to environmental contaminants. The second will detail the genesis of the motion to particular circumstances from the community I represent, Windsor, Ontario and the Great Lakes region. In the third part I wish to emphasize a number of examples of citizens and groups who are taking the environment back. They are part of a new wave of public pressure which is advancing environmental and community interests with and without government assistance. They act as an example of how the motion can be of value for this country and beyond.
Identifiable environmental contaminants are more than a simple health issue. This is clear when institutions such as the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development start to analyze and contribute to the discussion on this issue. In fact it has produced a 327 page report entitled “OECD Environmental Outlook” which describes the current environmental trends in the OECD's 30 member nations. This document was first prepared to investigate the potential state of affairs for OECD members related to evaluating the damage being done to the environment and what actions could be taken to ensure a clean, healthy and productive environment for future generations.
Interestingly cross-sectoral issues are examined, including human health and the environment. In its analysis the OECD estimates that environmental degradation causes somewhere between 2% and 6% of all human diseases in OECD countries and 8% to 13% in non-OECD countries. These percentages translate into approximately $50 billion and $130 billion per year. It is clear that we need to start to address this problem from the standpoint of quality of life and for the economics that it costs us in our general economies.
The genesis of this motion comes from a community movement in Windsor that equally applies across other parts of Canada. Specifically, Windsor was recently involved in a Canadian drama that included government deception of its population, investigative reports, whistleblowers, heroes, community outrage and galvanization of community resolve to build a better future.
In the mid-1990s Health Canada, as part of the Canadian government's responsibility for implementing the Great Lakes water quality agreement, collected data and statistics for 17 areas of concern in the Canadian side of the Great Lakes. Health Canada's data included information related to the cases of mortality, morbidity and hospitalization for selected health outcomes, including cancers that might be related to pollution. Despite the results of this information being published in November 1998, it took a CBC investigative report to flesh out the issue, and the report was released to the public in November 1999.
The withholding of the data and report is significant in a number of ways. First, the public paid for a report with their tax paying dollars. Second, it undermined the confidence in a democracy and a bond of trust between citizens and the institutions they built and funded to serve them, not political interests of the day. The sheltering was based on the concern of community groups, environmentalists, health officials and the general public call for action, and would cost too much in funds.
That action is the responsibility of the government to work toward cleanup and improved health goals and let people decide what they want to do with their resources. The study and analysis of the situation was best articulated in the document “Community Health Profile of Windsor, Ontario, Canada: Anatomy of a Great Lakes Area of Concern”, authored by Michael Gilbertson and James Brophy in the periodical “Environmental Health Perspectives”. Both of these individuals are considered hometown heroes for exposing this dilemma and articulating it in a way that has been very beneficial for all of us.
This was an historically significant document for the community. It summarized the Health Canada study in relevance to Windsor, including reference to the social and historical context of the area. There was also a comparison of Windsor and Hamilton, as the areas had similar socio-economic, geographical and populations, to provide a comparison which was relevant.
Among the findings identified, and there is a series of summarizations, was that in seven years deaths for males were 8% higher than the provincial average. Deaths for females were 5% higher than the provincial average. As well, the hospitalization rate for males was 21% higher than the provincial average.
The mortality rate for cancer, for example, of lip and oral cavity capacity was 74% to 75% higher than the provincial average. The mortality rate for cancer of digestive organs was 10% higher than the average for males. For thyroid conditions, overall morbidity rate was 24% higher than the provincial average. Diabetes morbidity rate was 44% higher for males and 41% for females than the provincial average.
Sadly enough, there are issues of diseases of the blood, forming organs, the circulatory systems as well as congenital anomalies and infant mortality. I want to touch a little on those because we are talking about the future.
One thing we discovered was that females after they were born had some anomaly diagnosed within the first year, which was 25% higher than provincial average, and the votefemales who were born without brains was 300% higher than the rest of Ontario. Heart defects among females were 56% higher and 93 females died within the first year; that was 24% higher.
I can go on about these different statistics, and there is more in detail but it is imperative that I move on in my discussions. I would like to point out that the information withheld, evaluated and then released created an outrage for our community. However like any strong community, we began to seek solutions. This is one of the reasons I believe my motion is valid and needs to be advanced by all members of the House. It is about repercussions and it is about taking responsibility.
The mere fact that the report has been withheld from our community and the delay for us to respond to it and to build on it are things for which this government needs to take responsibility. It needs to move forward more quickly with the tools so we can address this issue. That is the only way people can be recognized for the loss they have incurred. Any moment in time means deaths or illnesses. Corrective action needs to be taken. The year lost by the lack of information provided to the public by this deception needs to be corrected. The House can help do that.
However, like it is in any strong community, it was not about the negatives because we began to seek solutions. Hence, after an emotionally charged public meeting, a generous contribution was made by CAW local 444; $100,000 to resolve and create a centre for environmental health. An exploratory committee was formed with stakeholders from diverse backgrounds. Included in the group were: CAW Regional Environmental Council; University of Windsor; district health councils; international joint commission; Windsor-Essex County Health Unit; Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers; Windsor District Labour Council, Sandwich Community Health Centre; Essex Region Conservation Authority; Great Lakes Institute; and some elected officials.
The exploratory committee was mandated to examine the feasibility of creating a centre to address the problems of environment and human health. It retained a consulting company that investigated four examples of environmental health institute centres. From this it developed the concept of an independent not for profit organization.
This new organization is starting to take shape. The University of Windsor has donated space in its faculty and a staffing announcement from other parties is expected shortly. The recommended mission statement for the centre for environmental health is, “To enhance community capacity to provide solutions for the prevention of environmental and occupational illnesses”. It has also set out a series of objectives I wish to articulate because it is relevant to the culmination of why my motion is before the House.
First, it is to receive and analyze information from members of the community on suspected increases in the rates of diseases and other health conditions possibly related to exposure of environmental contaminants. It will actually create that database. It will collate and distribute this information to the public. It will communicate to industry, all levels of government and the community at large what it is finding and how this information is being assembled. It will commission broad research on health effects of specific environmental workplace and non-workplace contaminants. That can be of assistance. Lastly, it will influence, using evidence-based information, all levels of governments to make regulatory and legislative changes designed to prevent medical conditions and illnesses believed to be caused by exposure to identifiable environmental contaminants.
This motion is a specific request from my community which is hurting. That is where it was born. However the community is equally determined to face the reality and make decisions given the opportunity of due process. It is not alone in the struggle to produce real tangible improvements to our health and environment.
With that we can look to our own health care model, a health care model which is something Canada needs to be proud about and needs to continue to improve. It is also starting to recognize that there are peripheral health issues, such as environmental contaminants, that are affecting the way we deliver our health care model and also the expense of it.
We need to realize that prevention is an issue in itself and that expansion is something that will be imperative and supportable, I believe, by all members of the community and by all provinces. In fact in August 2000 the province and the federal government confirmed a commitment to promote programs and policies that extended beyond care and treatment and that made a critical contribution to the health and wellness of our citizens.
We know there are number of organizations in our community that work on general wellness and the principle of prevention. Once again this will provide some type of recourse and a dedication to move that issue forward for those organizations once they develop the linkages. It is important that it is scientifically based and it also evolves, and they will develop that.
A good example of the failing of our current system and why this motion would protect citizens, comes even from today's paper. The headline reads, “Data Shows Ontario Polluters unchecked”. The province of Ontario data showed that 216 facilities were involved in 1,946 violations of Ontario's water and waste water laws in 2001, which is the latest year the information was available. While the number of detected violations showed a significant increase from the previous year, the province moved to prosecute only nine of the facilities, although many of the offenders in 2001 were not the same as those in 2000.
The Province of Ontario is not doing its job to protect its citizens. Despite the tragedy we witnessed at Walkerton and despite the healing process that community has gone through, there is no public confidence and resolve here. Of the worst of our four polluters, only Falconbridge actually faced prosecution. The province continues to allow companies like Chinook and Stepan to violate the law more than 300 times each year without repercussions, said one expert in today's paper.
This is the problem. Without the support from the federal government, we do not provide the tools and resources for people to identify and work toward the problem solving we know is affecting them with environmental contaminants and diseases.
While pollution causes environmental degradation and health costs, it is an immediate expense and a future liability. The delay in taking corrective action means we live with the liability for a greater period of time and pay the consequences of compounding the problem, extending the duration of time for victims caught in the negligence of neglect.
Quite frankly, we are not only passing the problem on to our children, we are killing their hopes and dreams by our selfish actions. We are simply taking out a mortgage for a very expensive home and passing it on to our future generations. We live beyond our means in this house, in the greatest of comfort, and destroy and contaminate the property. Long after we are gone, we force someone else to pay the cost to clean it up and the mortgage for a dilapidated home. This is not the way to go about our planet. This is not the way that we should be living ourselves right now. We need to invest the resources and, more important, the ability, the empowerment for groups and organizations to make the decisions about where they want their dollars to go.
Many people in the world are starting to question the political will and resolve to make the necessary changes before we lose the planet. In fact many citizens of the earth are starting to question why we are even fighting to save it for others. They are starting to realize that we have so much more to gain if we live on it with sustainability, as it affects our quality and longevity of life. If not just for egalitarian reasons, it is for selfish reasons that we need to rethink shortsighted gratification that leads to a reduction in our own lives and in the lives of other family members. Many of these groups are fuelled by practical strategies that include conservation, public awareness, scientific research and the use of litigation for the objective of improving our environmental health.
All these factors lead to the bodies necessary to provide meaning to my motion and the ability for it to take specific direction once correlations are determined between identifiable environmental contaminants and health itself.
There are groups, like the Waterkeeper Alliance. It has used litigation and public involvement, including a world action movement where 10 countries are involved in the actual process of protecting waterways and tributary systems. It is a good example of a group and an organization that uses litigation.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is actually the steward of this and the president of Waterkeeper. I had a recent opportunity to talk with him and hear him speak about the fact that many polluters are using the environment to subsidize their products. This is a practice we need to stop.
With that, I thank the House for hearing my first motion. I look forward to debate and also expansion of it. It is a motion that I hope will gain support and, more important, have some good input from other members.
