Bill C-6 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Aeronautics Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment deals with integrated management systems and authorizes the establishment of voluntary reporting programs under which information relating to aviation safety and security may be reported. It also authorizes the designation of industry bodies to certify persons undertaking certain aeronautical activities. Other powers are enhanced or added to improve the proper administration of the Act, in particular powers granted to certain members of the Canadian Forces to investigate aviation accidents involving both civilians and a military aircraft or aeronautical facility.

Motions in Amendment

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I and I think all Canadians appreciate the presentation by the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, and all the other members who have spoken here today, the members for London—Fanshawe, Trinity—Spadina and Sault Ste. Marie.

NDP members are standing in this House, and it is curious, but important to note, that the Conservatives are not speaking to this because they are embarrassed themselves about where the government is going on this.

The member from Hamilton referenced an excellent article in The Hamilton Spectator entitled “Dangerous Skies”. Judge Virgil Moshansky, the original justice who conducted the Dryden, Ontario investigation that became an inquiry into aviation safety, said the following:

What stands out is that the current deterioration in the state of aviation safety in Canada, as chronicled by these investigative reporters, is coincidental with Transport Canada's progressive reduction in the number of its aviation inspectors since Dryden and its ongoing withdrawal from regulatory enforcement.

This is an ominous sign for the future of air safety in Canada, particularly if Bill C-6 is allowed to proceed in its present form.

Would the member tell me who Canadians should believe: the Conservative government or Justice Virgil Moshansky?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is such an easy question. This judge was the person who thoroughly investigated a very serious accident case, and in doing so, enlightened himself to a great degree on the issues in the airline industry, particularly the issues and challenges faced at the level of safety. I certainly, without equivocation, would stand with the opinions of that particular judge.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is with mixed feelings that I rise today to speak to this bill. I say that because we should not have to deal with this kind of inferior legislation, particularly when we are looking at the safety of our citizens, our constituents.

We are entrusted with the responsibility to make public policy and to make legislation that takes into account many different aspects and facets when we look at the bills that have been in front of us recently, be it on trade bills or on voting bills. One of the most important facets in the area of transportation is safety. Protecting the safety of Canadians is one of the key issues that we are here to deal with in this bill.

The reason the NDP has put forward so many amendments and the reason we are standing today to speak to the bill is that if the bill were to go ahead without any changes or amendments it would be a colossal disaster.

It is incumbent upon all of us to foresee, and perhaps it is the unintended consequences of the government, but we need to foresee the consequences of any legislation that passes in this place. On Bill C-6, we need to look at the consequences for air safety.

An issue that has been important in my riding is the integrity of being able to support those men and women who work in our public service to come forward and be protected when they see wrongdoing happening. We know it in the popular term as whistleblowing.

I was proud to work with my colleague from Winnipeg Centre and other colleagues in this place on the committee dealing with the accountability act, Bill C-2, to strengthen whistleblower legislation. We believed it should have gone further but we made some important and positive changes.

When I see this bill, one of the things that stands out that will shock and should appall many Canadians is what the bill does. It takes away that whistleblower protection. We are not talking about maintenance of bicycles, as important as that is. We are talking here about aviation safety. We are talking about very complex mechanisms that most of us would not have the slightest idea of how to get around, whereas with bicycle repair we might.

We need to ensure that those men and women who see wrongdoing are protected. That is a value and a principle that I thought the government believed in. If we listen to the rhetoric, it suggests that it does but then we look at this legislation and we see that it does not seem to be the case.

It was already mentioned by my friend from Hamilton that many people have spoken out. They are not lay people. They are experts in the field. They are telling us that Bill C-6 does not get the job done. They are saying that Bill C-6 opens up, not only the safety of Canadians but the reputation that our country has on the world stage.

My understanding of the bill is that not even our friends to the south, who perhaps have more of a laissez-faire view of things like air safety, would contemplate going this far. It really begs the question as to why we would believe that, in the area of air safety and this idea of changing things to this extent, we would be better off going with less control and oversight than our friends to the south and in other jurisdictions. It really does beg the question of what we believe we know better than others.

I certainly would not submit to the House that we should do things our own way. Our party suggests that the Canadian way is often the better way of going about things. However, when we are talking about aeronautics and aeronautic safety and we look at this industry, and the fact that it is global in proportion and needs to be carefully viewed, we have to look at this bill and ask, “What is it that the government believes it is helping Canadians with?”

Again, I go back to experts in the field and, if I may, cite an article that I believe has already been referenced but is one that I think bears repeating. The headline says it all: “Judge calls for review of 'sliding' air safety”. I think that says a lot about where we are going here.

We know that the 1989 report on the Dryden crash in which 24 people were killed led to many improvements in air safety. We had fears, and I remember that instance very well, that we were in fact backsliding, that we needed to strengthen air safety. We heard from one of the authors of the report who looked at air safety, and the quote is pretty straightforward:

I believe the government is moving away from more vigorous inspection and enforcement strictly as a cost-cutting measure, much as was done in the mid- and late-1980s preceding the Dryden crash.

If that is not a call for oversight and to review more thoroughly this file, I do not what is. What the good judge was saying, and he was given an Order of Canada for his work in this area, was to not repeat the mistakes of the past. When we allow things to be deregulated without the proper oversight, without protection, for instance, as already mentioned for whistleblowers, we are essentially saying that it is okay to allow for further crashes, for further mishaps.

I point to what we have seen in the rail industry as of late. Since we have given over rail maintenance, and it is not regulated to the extent it should have been, we have seen, and we just have to turn on the radio or read the paper, more crashes and derailments, be it passenger or cargo trains.

I want members to think about this because I think it is important. There is a connection between what has happened with rail safety and what is contemplated with aeronautic safety in Bill C-6. It is the following proposition. When we had the tools and the oversight, and we had the regulation involved in rail safety, we were able to be more nimble, to be stronger in our response when we had instances where rail safety was failing. We had citizens and people, be it in unions or in management, et cetera, who were able to cite problems in rail safety, be it at crossings or, and we see this presently, with cargo trains that have too many cars on their load.

We need to do something about it. It used to be that we had the public sector there to respond. Unfortunately, what we did is we gave that up. We gave away the tools to properly respond vis-à-vis rail safety.

What has been the consequence of that? As I said, just turn on the radio, read the paper, and look at the evening news, the consequence is cargo and passenger derailments. There is a lack of confidence. At the very time we need to be more reliant on our rail system, we now have problems with rail safety.

In fact, many of my friends who would like to see our government go further in building the capacity for more rail as a form of transportation see that we have problems because of lack of oversight. So, let us take that lesson from the problems with rail safety and oversight, and the fact we gave that up and gave it away, and let us take a look at—

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, again we have the NDP standing up in this corner of the House and actually fighting for safer air travel in Canada. It is surprising to me that only the NDP members seem to be standing up on this issue against the Conservative government. This is an extremely important issue.

Since the Conservatives are not standing up to defend the absolutely reckless and irresponsible actions of their government to put Canadian families in dangerous situations because a few lobbyists told them to do it, I am going to take the opportunity to read into the record more witness accounts that were given at the transport committee.

We have Mrs. Kirsten Brazier, the president of Dax Air, who came and testified. She said:

If we are really concerned about safety and truly want to become the safest country in the world, then we need to start sharing information with a view to discussing and learning from our mistakes.

She comes from northwest Ontario which suffered in the Dryden air crash. Ken Rubin, a public interest researcher, said:

Bill C-6, clause 43, places air safety reports in a permanent secrecy category...It's being placed in the same category as tax information. Even cabinet confidences are only 20 years, and security intelligence information doesn't get exempted forever.

Canadians will never get to learn about the safety violations that put their family members in peril. It is absolutely absurd.

My question for the hon. member is this. Why are the Conservatives pressing ahead with something that witnesses have told them is irresponsible, reckless and puts people's lives in danger?

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague not only for his question but for the work he has done on this issue. I would submit that if my friend from B.C. had not been as tenacious and vigilant on Bill C-6, Canadians would not know about the problems that are in the bill. In fact, it reminds me of the softwood sellout.

To answer the member's question, I do not know why the government wants to put all of this important aeronautic safety information in a locked box for no one other than those who are involved in the industry to know about. It really begs the question as to whose side the government is on. Is it on the side of everyday Canadians or is it on the side of citizens who every day put their trust in government, in fact in all of us, to ensure air safety?

Yesterday we saw this whole idea of a no-fly list which has been given attention and prominence by the government, when in fact what it should be doing is sharpening its pencils, or in fact taking out erasers and doing this bill over again because it is not up to speed and not good enough for Canadians.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I share the concerns that my colleague in the NDP expressed about air safety. However, in view of the fact that these safety management systems already exist in actual practice, one of the things that we wanted to ensure in committee was that the government oversight and inspections would continue. This is not always the case now. This provision was added in response to the representations made by federal inspectors. We also added a detailed description of these famous safety management systems.

Insofar as the necessary safety and protection are concerned, this bill is effective and adds to the safety we should have. I would like to know what the hon. member’s views are on this.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member will know that there are a hundred vacancies right now for the positions that Canadians entrust for oversight inspectors.

Instead of the government put its time and money into a flawed bill, it should be getting out and putting the word out that it needs people in these positions. It makes sense. Why does the government not hire the hundred new inspectors?

It is the same with rail safety. I have no idea and I cannot fathom why the government is so focused on selling out privacy, freedom of information, whistleblower protection and in the end the safety of Canadians, and not spending more time hiring the hundred inspectors that we need to make sure that our skies are safe.

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today in this debate on air safety. There is reason, though, to wonder why the government wants to rush this bill through despite its many flaws. I think that Canadians are right to be concerned. They should be seriously concerned about this bill.

It seems that people can say anything these days and get anything passed so long as it will reduce government involvement, as if that were a good thing in itself, without any care for the consequences. In this case, the consequences are very serious because public safety is at stake. That is something the government has apparently forgotten. It would rather worry about the profits of the big corporations than the safety of the general public. We should wonder, though, what the effects will be on public safety.

Canada has often been recognized—as other hon. members have said—as a leader in the field of public safety. There is an expression that when something is finally perfect, people often want to start changing it. In this case too, I have the feeling that the changes are for the worse.

This morning, my hon. colleague, our transport critic, who has done a lot of work on this, compared what happened in the railway system with what could happen in the airline industry if the government’s proposed amendments are passed.

In British Columbia where I come from, there have been many accidents, sometimes virtually weekly, on the railways. We know that these accidents started to increase after the safety system was simply handed over to the companies. The government more or less just offloaded its responsibilities.

The law that is proposed in Bill C-6 contains many flaws. The policy issue that is important to note is that this will have impact on Canadians who travel by air. The financial bottom lines of Air Canada, WestJet and others have been preferred and that is going to be the factor in setting safety levels in the sky.

Transport Canada will be relegated to a more distant role as a general overseer of safety management systems. That is why I asked, with the government saying it is going to reduce government intervention, is that in itself a good thing when public security is being sidelined for commercial interests?

Let us talk a bit about the impacts of Bill C-6. It seems to enshrine the safety management systems which allow industries to decide the level of risk they are willing to accept, tolerable levels of risk in their operations, rather than abide by the level of safety established by the minister acting in the public interest. Safety management systems allow the government to transfer increasing responsibility to the industry itself to set and enforce its own safety standards.

The government seems to think that because it says something it makes it true. We have seen that all too often in the way the government has acted on accountability and in the way it has acted on Bill C-30 in tackling environmental issues. The government takes half measures and proclaims it has acted in the interest of public. Canadians are not fooled by this kind of talk.

The bill does not exempt whistleblowers. A worker who identifies a problem, for example, a loose wing nut, and I will not talk about the kinds of wing nuts, reports it and no action is taken, he or she will be silenced. That is a problem with what the government has proposed.

Furthermore, the government would like us to think that companies will automatically report any problems to the public. Any of us who have negotiated with the private sector knows there are many financial interests to protect. The private sector is very guarded in anything that will affect its financial bottom line. I fear very much for transparency, for what Canadians will find out about some of the problems that can occur.

While the NDP agreed to an amendment in the transportation committee, which emphasizes reduction of risk to the lowest possible level rather than tolerating risk, we are still concerned about the delegation of safety to corporations. Acting in the public interest is still, as I see it, the responsibility of the government. It is not the responsibility of corporations. Their responsibility is to make money. By giving that responsibility over to corporations, the government is abdicating its own responsibilities.

Adequate safety costs money. Safety management systems will foster a tendency to cut corners in a very competitive aviation market racked with high fuel prices. What will happen to safety when the need to make a profit and save money is paramount? I do not think the bill adds to that and it does not answer that question adequately.

I will close by asking one last question. What happened to the government's responsibility to protect public interest?

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my colleague's remarks. I am alive today because of aviation safety. My career has been in aviation. I have spent a lot of time in the front end of airplanes and now I spend a lot more time in the back end of airplanes. I know the guys who are in the front end of the airplanes in which I fly today. I do not have any problem with getting on any of their airplanes at any time. I always feel I am in safe hands.

The member made a couple of suggestions, as did other members of her party, that somehow there is a laissez-faire attitude toward safety, particularly in the United States. That is just hogwash.

Aviation is about risk management, with the emphasis on management and on safety. Those members somehow seem to think we are taking away whistleblower protection. In fact, Bill C-6 talks about non-punitive voluntary reporting. I am not sure what the member does not understand about non-punitive.

She also talks about the bottom line and suggests that airlines are only interested in making money. Airlines are interested in making money, but I suggest that the worst attack on an airline's bottom line would be the lawsuits, the loss of reputation and everything that goes with that as a result of a major aircraft accident, loss of life and so on. Airlines are very good regulators because that is their bottom line.

Does my hon. friend understand the relationship between safety and the bottom line from the positive point of view of the necessity to protect safety to protect the bottom line?

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer with a question. I suppose it is the same mechanism that has encouraged CN to implement safety measures throughout Canada, especially in B.C., where rivers have been irreparably damaged by derailment after derailment.

I am glad my hon. colleague feels safe at the back of an airplane, but I suggest that is because of the rules we have had, which the government is about to change.

I also add that if my colleague feels the government is that interested in safety, then why have the hundreds of positions for aviation inspectors, which have not been advertised but they exist, have not been filled at the moment?

[Roger Valley, Liberal, Kenora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the committee heard from a lot of people who came forward. The Moshansky report on the crash that happened in Dryden in 1989 has been mentioned many times in the chamber today. I was not on the airplane, but that is my home town and I was on the site shortly after that. I was the mayor of Dryden, serving 10 years later, and we did a memorial to that, so I know the issue well. I met Justice Moshansky a number of times.

What came out of testimony from people from my riding, who travelled to the committee on DaxAir, based out of Red Lake, was that a number of small commuters, a number of small operators, a large number in northern Ontario, were literally out of sight, out of mind. They are serving the communities in the north. They are under pressure constantly to adjust the regulations so the operators can make more money. The pilots and the passengers could be put at risk if this is allowed.

What would the member say about the small operators? When we use the safety management system, we do not have inspectors and we leave them to look after themselves. The problems they can get into—

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

I have to leave enough time for the member for Victoria to answer the question.

The hon. member for Victoria.

[Denise Savoie, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think I could have explained the NDP position any better. That is why we hold the position we hold. I agree that problem has not been considered.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to join the debate at report stage and third reading of Bill C-6, An Act to amend the Aeronautics Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.

I want to begin by recognizing and paying tribute to my colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster and the transport critic for the New Democratic Party, for being a stalwart champion of the interests of the consumer during this lengthy debate, the study of Bill C-6. It is generally agreed he has been a leader among the opposition parties to ensure that the voice and interests of Canadians are put front and centre as we go through this whole interesting debate about air transportation safety.

We are very concerned that both the tone and the content of Bill C-6 are really geared toward the financial bottom lines of these air transportation carriers and we could put at risk, or at least put back in the order of priority, the best interests of Canadians.

I should note that my colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster, worked in collaboration with stakeholders such as the Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents a great many airline personnel and workers, and IAMAW, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. Both these unions have advocated on behalf of the best interests of their own members, but also the best interests of the public at large when it comes to any changes that we make to the air transportation system.

A number of amendments were made at the committee stage, put forward by my colleague, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster. That is perhaps why so many of us are taken aback today. We made amendments at committee that we believed were progress, with the cooperation of the various stakeholders such as the unions. However, then today, we find the federal Minister of Transport making a bid to sweep aside the changes to the airline bill, which were intended to ensure safety in the skies.

We find it very troubling that the government has tabled a motion to gut the very critical amendments to Bill C-6, which my colleague, Burnaby—New Westminster, and other members of the transport committee so diligently put in place. We cannot understand how a minister of transport, in all good conscience, could undermine the work of the committee. Its earnest interest was simply to do what was right for Canadians. It certainly has my colleague, the NDP transport critic, scratching his head and wondering what possible motivation there could be. What possibly could be driving the government to, if anything, back away from safety as priority number one. It is a grave concern to us.

We are very critical of Bill C-6 in its current form. There are a number of issues, in fact too many issues for me to deal with in any depth in the 10 minutes that have been allotted to me. I will point out some of the concerns in which I have a particular interest. One is Bill C-6, as contemplated by the government, will actually undermine and reduce the freedom of information, the freedom of Canadians to know what the safety situation is of airlines, in that it withdraws seven sections of the act from the Access to Information Act.

I sit on the committee that is responsible for privacy, ethics and access to information. It troubles me greatly to see government in any of its activities pull back from freedom of information. On those grounds alone, I would criticize the bill. The public has a right to know what the government is up to and surely the public has a right to know the safety and maintenance information about airlines. Airlines and carriers of the general public are not just the average private business.

Canadians have a right to be more involved in airline safety and they certainly need more thorough information. I am critical that Bill C-6 would remove sections from the scrutiny of the Canadian public through freedom of information laws.

I am also critical that the systems maintenance regime would now be put under the scrutiny of the airlines. We believe this is a stepping back again of government scrutiny and government supervision of airline safety management and essentially the airline industry would be permitted to increasingly define its own safety level of its operations.

One would think that the airline would make this a priority and that safety interests would be the airlines' top key concern and priority, but in our experience it is a legitimate role of government to take responsibility for those things.

I am also very concerned that another element of this bill would become very weak or in fact non-existent, and that is the whistleblower protection. While a form of whistleblower protection for employees has been introduced, there is no effective redress mechanism for employees who might suffer reprisals as a result of blowing the whistle.

I would remind members that this is one industry sector about which, for heaven's sake, the public has a right to know. The public has an interest in knowing if there are any shortcomings in the maintenance regime, and whistleblowers should be rewarded, not criticized and certainly not suffer any form of reprisals. Those three things, piled together, give more than ample reason to be critical of Bill C-6.

The bill has a rather rocky history in that it was introduced in the last Parliament by a senator in fact. It came to the House first known as Bill S-33, introduced by the other place. We are always suspect, frankly, when bills come to us through that back door mechanism. After a great deal of debate there, it was later reintroduced as Bill C-62 under the Liberal regime in September 2005, but it died on the order paper and did not go past first reading.

When we came to it in this particular Parliament, I note that a great deal of time has been spent on this already. It was introduced on April 3, 2006 as Bill C-6. After a brief staff meeting, the NDP was disappointed that the Conservatives and the Liberals initially struck a deal to pass Bill C-6 without any further amendments. This is why I began my remarks by complimenting my colleague, the member for Burnaby—Douglas, for the yeoman's job he did, virtually alone at the committee, to overturn that alliance that was put together by the ruling party and the official opposition that they would somehow ram Bill C-6 through in its flawed state.

There was clearly a lack of consultation with the stakeholders or these many amendments would not have been developed. I cannot imagine any government going forward with legislation like this without doing a comprehensive consultation with groups like CUPE and the IAM. When we received it back today and realized that this was not only not in its original form but that the amendments made at committee would be stripped back and undermined by the minister and that the Tory amendments intend to gut air safety, we could not help but stand up and be critical.

People will notice that a number of speakers from the NDP are speaking back to back on this bill because the public has a right to know and the public deserves to know. The public should know what is going on in our air transportation safety system and I do not believe, if it were left to the devices of the ruling party and its partners in crime, the official opposition, which has been absent, AWOL as it were, in terms of doing its job as official opposition and bringing the government to task for the glaring problems and oversights with this--