Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today at third reading stage of Bill C-11, the purpose of which is to amend the legislation governing transportation in the Canada Transportation Act.
When the bill was debated at second reading in September 2006, I said that the Bloc Québécois supported the principle of the bill, but that we would try to improve it when it was examined in committee. Well, that is what we did. The standing committee heard 37 witnesses and then did a scrupulous examination of the bill, clause by clause.
Of the 11 amendments moved by the Bloc Québécois, plus the amendments from the other parties, the result was that 21 amendments were adopted in the House at the report stage.
First, and in reply to my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville, I would like to point out that, for the first time, the bill sets out the objective of protecting the environment in its declaration of principle. That is still a principle. I think that we are going to have to watch the present government closely when it comes to the actual application of that principle. In any event, it is in the declaration of principle.
With respect to the environment, I would like to refer to the issue of replacing old locomotives. Only about 30% of locomotives in current use meet environmental standards. I think that if the government is really serious about its bill, it will have to set up a program for replacing locomotives. That is only one example. My colleague was talking about the environment in areas around railway lines where there is contaminated land. Now that we have this declaration of principle, we will be able to force railway companies to decontaminate all of the rail lines that crisscross the country, from sea to sea, as you know.
My primary concern with this bill, as a member who represents a riding, was the whole section supporting the development of commuter trains.
Railed mass transit does offer a number of benefits. It is fast, reliable and comfortable and has little impact on the environment. It can be used to reduce our dependence on highway infrastructures that, in my opinion, disproportionately encourage the use of private vehicles, an ineffective solution for our transportation problems in major urban centres, in addition to having a negative impact on the environment. In that respect, the bill is consistent with its declaration of principle.
Under Bill C-11, big railway companies would be obligated to offer urban transit authorities unused railway lines that could be used for public transit. This is a first in the country—that urban transit authorities will be recognized, and recognized in an order of priority. The federal government will be offered those rail lines first, and the offer will then be made to provincial governments, and then to urban transit authorities, even before municipalities. That will all be done precisely to encourage the expansion of public transit in our large urban centres.
The bill will correct the existing situation, in which urban transit authorities are not on a level playing field in negotiations with the big railway companies. The plans they wanted to implement were either delayed, because of tough negotiations, or implemented at inflated operating costs because of the power imbalance.
In one of those amendments, we added that this obligation extends to the entire territory served by an urban transit authority, in addition to the metropolitan region that it already serves.
I want to mention the example of the Agence métropolitaine de transport de Montréal; the territory it serves now extends to Saint-Jérôme, which is outside the Montreal urban area but which is part of a large metropolitan area to be served by public transit.
This line was inaugurated just last month and has been a great success, reducing traffic on our beautiful highways, which are constantly blocked during rush hour.
I firmly believe that Bill C-11 will lead to more commuter trains, which many of our constituents badly need. I am thinking specifically of the people in my riding in the eastern part of Laval, who still do not have access to this efficient mode of transportation.
I hope that this bill will make it easier for the municipality to decide to introduce a commuter rail line in the eastern part of Laval, joining the municipalities of Terrebonne and Mascouche directly to the Concorde intermodal station of the Laval metro, which will be inaugurated soon. The Canadian Pacific rail line is available. This is an innovative solution, because the commuter rail line would stop at an intermodal station instead of going right downtown, making the decision to invest even easier. The commuter rail line will be the crowning touch to the city transportation authority's project to expand the Laval metro system.
The disturbances caused by current railway operations are another major concern for the Bloc Québécois and were debated passionately and at length during our discussions in committee and with witnesses.
Our constituents who live near marshalling yards are seeing their quality of life deteriorate unacceptably. Their pleas to the railway companies to solve the problem have fallen on deaf ears.
Several citizen groups came to tell us how distressed they were that there was no mechanism for negotiating with the railway companies.
Clause 95.1 of the bill, which seeks to correct this situation, originally read as follows:
When constructing or operating a railway, a railway company must not cause unreasonable noise—
The witnesses, as well as the opposition members on the committee, including the Bloc Québécois members, felt that “unreasonable noise” was vague and open to interpretation, which could prevent disputes between operators and the public from being resolved. We felt that the Conservative government was giving the railways too much latitude, at the public's expense.
The Bloc Québécois decided instead to talk about “disturbances” resulting from the operation of a railway. Disturbances include noise, vibrations, emissions and anything else that can affect populations and individuals.
Further to our recommendations and with the support of the other parties, the amendment passed now reads:
When constructing or operating a railway, a railway company must cause as little noise and or vibration as possible,—
This wording is more explicit and closes the door on any interpretation to which a company, having better lawyers than the citizens, might resort, since “as little noise and or vibration as possible” is an appeal to all the latest technologies that can be used to reduce such noise. This problem exists mainly in the marshalling yards. There are different engines on the market now that can lessen the noise of the coupling of rail cars with the engines. The agency can now propose all these solutions and impose them on companies to ensure there is as little noise and vibration as possible.
It is all very nice to have requirements in a bill, but they have to be enforced. To ensure this, a section provides that the Transportation Agency can issue and publish guidelines. To ensure the issuance of such guidelines, the Bloc Québécois proposed amending the section as follows:
The Agency shall issue and publish, in any manner that it considers appropriate, guidelines—
This amendment was then passed in committee.
Now, instead of the section saying that the Transportation Agency “can issue”, it says that the agency has an obligation to do so. All this is in response to the various representations made to us by citizens’ groups who asked us to establish specific guidelines or specific criteria respecting noise in particular. As you know, some municipalities have decibel criteria for the proximity of residences. The Transportation Agency now has to issue guidelines that can be imposed on the railway companies.
This bill also amends the Transportation Act in order to make air transportation advertising more transparent. This is another subject dealt with in the bill and it is important as well. The agency can now, on the minister’s recommendation, make regulations respecting advertising in all media, including on the Internet, of prices for air services. These measures will regulate the marketing of airplane tickets by giving the agency jurisdiction to make regulations respecting advertising surrounding such sales.
This is to deal with the exaggerations found in the media: they give a price but fail to say clearly that it is just one way and does not include all the airport and security taxes over and above the transportation costs themselves.
These changes reflect the demand of consumer groups that travellers should be adequately protected. These groups came to see us in committee and told us their concerns.
Bill C-11 replaces the old position of air travel complaints commissioner with increased powers for the Transportation Agency, which will deal now with air travellers' complaints.
We felt, though, that the complaint-resolution role that the bill conferred on the agency was not very clear. Bill C-11 states that if a person has made a complaint under any provision of this part, the agency, or a person authorized to act on the agency’s behalf, may review and attempt to resolve the complaint and may, if appropriate, mediate or arrange for mediation of the complaint.
In order to reassure us in this regard, the words “may review” were eliminated and replaced by “shall review”, in an amendment introduced at the report stage that has now passed.
In addition, consumers felt reassured by the complaints commissioner’s report because of the complete list it provided of the complaints filed. Although these complaints had not necessarily all been resolved, consumers felt reassured to know that at least the complaints had been publicly disclosed. We therefore added an amendment to the bill to ensure that the agency’s annual report will include the number and nature of the complaints filed, the name of the airline involved, how the complaints were dealt with, and the general trends that emerge. In response to consumer requests, the role previously played by the complaints commissioner was therefore transferred to the Transportation Agency.
In conclusion, I would like to say that the various political parties, both in the opposition and in the government, worked very well together on studying the bill and especially during our work in committee. We thought it obvious that the bill was providing solutions to problems that everyone in Canada has noticed.
The Bloc Québécois is therefore very much in favour of this bill and hopes that it passes as quickly as possible, especially as I can recall two previous versions introduced since February 2003 that never managed to be officially passed. We hope that this time, with everyone’s help including the Senate and the entire government, the bill will finally pass.
Both the constituents we consulted and the various commuter authorities urgently need this bill in order to fix the glaring problems that have gone on for far too long.
