Bill C-22 (Historical)

Energy Safety and Security Act

An Act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts

Part 1 of this enactment amends the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act, the Canada Petroleum Resources Act, the Canada-Newfoundland Atlantic Accord Implementation Act and the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act (the “Acts”) primarily to update, strengthen and increase the level of transparency of the liability regime that is applicable to spills and debris in the offshore areas.
More specifically, Part 1, among other things,
(a) expressly includes the “polluter pays” principle, which is consistent with the notion that the liability of at-fault operators is unlimited;
(b) increases to $1 billion the limit of liability, without proof of fault or negligence, to which certain operators are subject in the event of a spill or damages caused by debris;
(c) provides that an applicant for an authorization for the drilling for or development or production of oil or gas must demonstrate that it has the financial resources required to pay the greatest of the amounts of the limits of liability that apply to it;
(d) establishes a regime in respect of the development of transboundary pools and fields;
(e) provides for new circumstances in which information or documentation that is privileged may be disclosed;
(f) establishes a legal framework to permit the safe use of spill-treating agents in specific circumstances;
(g) harmonizes the environmental assessment process for projects for which the National Energy Board, the Canada-Newfoundland Offshore Petroleum Board or the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board is the responsible authority, as defined in the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012, with the requirements of that Act, including by establishing timelines for carrying out environmental assessments and creating participant funding programs to facilitate the participation of the public in environmental assessments; and
(h) creates administrative monetary penalty regimes.
Finally, Part 1 makes amendments to remove certain discrepancies between the English and French versions of the Acts, as well as to modernize the language in the Acts.
Part 2 of the enactment repeals the Nuclear Liability Act and enacts the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act to strengthen the liability regime applicable after a nuclear incident. It also provides for the establishment, in certain circumstances, of an administrative tribunal to hear and decide claims and implements certain provisions of the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts.

Natural Resources

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I was pleased to speak yesterday during the debate on Bill C-22, the energy safety and security act. This important piece of legislation will modernize and increase accountability in Canada's offshore and nuclear industries. Our government understands that there are enormous economic benefits stemming from the offshore and nuclear industries. Bill C-22 will allow these industries to continue to grow while ensuring they are done in a responsible manner.

Bill C-22 will raise absolute liability in the offshore and nuclear regimes to $1 billion. Our current liability limits have not been updated for over two decades. This is clearly unacceptable. While the NDP's plan would put Canadian taxpayers on the hook for the costs of incidents and increase the costs to Canadian ratepayers, Bill C-22 strikes a balance between ensuring protecting Canadians and ratepayers.

Our government is committed to our nuclear and offshore industries, and I urge all of my hon. colleagues to support Bill C-22.

Energy Safety and Security Act

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague, the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue, for graciously sharing her time with me in this important debate about Bill C-22, an act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations that would also enact a nuclear liability and compensation act and make consequential amendments, including repealing the existing Nuclear Liability Act.

I also want to congratulate my colleague, the member for St. John's South—Mount Pearl, for his very forthright and passionate speech on this issue and on the industry in Newfoundland and Labrador, which has been so important to the fiscal position of the province and has provided opportunities for legions of workers, both in the offshore field itself and in engineering and related matters, bringing about great prosperity for Newfoundland and Labrador.

I am pleased to speak to this bill because it is an opportunity to talk about this issue and its importance within the Canadian context.

We hear a lot about western Canada. I went to law school in Alberta. I am very aware of the importance of that industry there and the oil sands, as well, but I think sometimes it overshadows the role that east coast oil and gas plays in total production and its importance to the overall Canadian scene.

We are concerned, of course, as is every country and anyone else aware of the consequences of potential oil and gas spills, both on land and at sea, about the danger of pollution and the danger of a spill that could have a catastrophic effect. We saw that in the most recent Macondo case in the Gulf of Mexico, which had huge consequences for Gulf, for the fishers in the area, for the communities, for the environment, and for all of the sea life affected by this particular spill. As as result, the need to take a close look at the liability regimes has been brought into sharp focus.

We support the bill at second reading. We want it to go to committee. We think that significant improvements have been made here. I do not know if it has been mentioned before, but the words “polluter pay” actually appear in the bill. I think that is the first time they have ever appeared in a bill in Canada. It is something that our leader has spoken about as a basic principle of our party when it comes to sustainable development. One of the hallmarks of sustainable development is that to make it sustainable, it is the polluter that should pay if there are any consequences of its economic activity, and not the public.

Here, we have a significant rise in liability from what has to be considered a ludicrous amount of $30 million, to $1 billion in the case of offshore oil and gas, and generally from $40 million to $1 billion in the case of the Arctic, for no-fault risk.

Some people might say, “Well, if it is not our fault, why should we have to pay at all?”

The reason is that they are the author of the activity they are engaging in to obtain profit and they have to pay the consequences if something goes wrong.

It is not as simple as “no fault” or “your fault”. As a lawyer, I know that deciding who is at fault and what the fault is, is often a very long, tortuous, and expensive process. In case of the kind of activity we are talking about here, we need to know that the initial responsibility rests with the person who causes the damage, that the damage is going to be fixed, and that people who need compensation are going to be compensated. A no-fault system allows that to happen.

The at-fault position is that there is not a limit on liability. The limit, I guess, is the ability of the operator to pay. That also comes into effect and we need to know that people who are engaged in this kind of activity, which is dangerous to the environment and to life and limb, are responsible and capable operators and companies that can actually carry out this work.

I say life and limb; it is often overlooked that the Deepwater Horizon project that blew up and caused this big damage also cost 11 workers their lives in that explosion. It is still a very dangerous activity, as we know from the Ocean Ranger disaster in 1982 and the Cougar helicopter crash recently and another crash a couple of decades ago. It is a dangerous activity that requires serious and responsible actors in the business, and so we would want to make sure that they are responsible for the damage they cause.

The act itself has some significant limitations. I am still puzzling over why one would say we are going to raise the liability from $40 million to $1 billion and then say the minister can waive that requirement. There does not seem to be any particular conditions as to when he or she might do that, and so one wonders why it should be there at all.

I can see the lineup now. Everyone would want an exemption because they would say they cannot really afford that or would not be able to get insurance or not be able to operate. Everything would supposedly come to a standstill if that were enforced. The minister is going to have a lot of people at the doorstep, looking for the exemption.

In the United States, the limit is $12.6 billion. In Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Australia, and in numerous countries, there is no liability limit. In those countries, Norway and the United States being good examples, this has not prevented the development of robust and successful offshore oil and gas developments. We need to know why Conservatives are asking for that, but we would have a great deal of difficulty supporting that kind of exemption unless they convince someone that it was limited to one or two particular circumstances that may make sense. I do not know what they are. We have not heard the case for that yet.

However, we do see some progress here. The $1 billion, in fact, was an amendment suggested by the NDP in the last Parliament when a piece of legislation was brought forward, never really seriously, because it was left on the order paper for a year before the last election, but $650 million was proposed. The NDP recommended it be put at $1 billion at that time, which of course did not happen and the bill died on the order paper. This is a step forward, but there is a very strong case for unlimited liability and certainly a number more than $1 billion, and that is something to discuss at committee.

When we are talking about oil and gas development and pollution problems, there is the issue of spill response and what the capability is of dealing with an oil spill if it occurs. There is significant concern about that in the Atlantic and the existing regime right now. In fact, in a 2012 report, the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development was critical of the industry and critical of the regulators, both in Nova Scotia and in Newfoundland and Labrador, for not being in a position to take over responsibility for oil spills if they occurred. In the case of Newfoundland, a study started in 2008, just to define and determine what the operator's capability was regarding oil spill containment and activity, has not been completed.

Officials tried to determine what the capability was. They had to review the spill response capability of operators. They said they were going to do it, but they have not done it. They said they were going to do it by March 31, 2013, after five years in the making. As my colleague from St. John's South—Mount Pearl pointed out about a month ago, officials still have not produced that report.

The member for St. John's South—Mount Pearl, the member for Burnaby—Douglas, and I met recently with the C-NLOPB, which promised to have this report out very shortly. We look forward to that. We do need to know that if there is any kind of a spill, the oil companies have the capability to respond to it, to give the public confidence that this industry can be operated in safety and that the environmental concerns are taken into account.

I see that my time is up and I look forward to any questions and comments members may have.

[Christine Moore, NDP, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for St. John's East.

Bill C-22, introduced by the Minister of Natural Resources, develops measures for sharing the financial burden of an industrial incident between industry players and taxpayers.

As far as principles go, I support the merits of these measures. However, after a detailed look at Bill C-22, I must express my reservations and criticisms about liability levels and other provisions in the bill.

Companies working in the nuclear and oil industries have the potential to cause health and environmental damage and, unfortunately, they do not assume all of the social, health and ecological costs associated with their high-risk activities.

This issue adversely affects the world outside the industry because taxpayers will take on the majority of the financial, health and moral problems of a high-risk activity, yet they will not take part in the business deal or benefit from the resulting monetary profits. In the end, taxpayers will suffer the consequences of these activities without directly reaping the financial benefits.

It is important that we have responsible, effective legislation that encourages technical and technological advances without shifting the majority of the costs of an industrial incident onto taxpayers.

A responsible legislator must pass measures that require the entity responsible for a disaster to absorb the various costs related to an industrial incident. This is straightforward. In other words, the company responsible must ensure that its production costs include a major part of the potential social, ecological and health care compensation paid out if an accident occurs.

I support the idea of the polluter pays principle. It is a founding principle of environmental law. However, it is clear that the government is talking out of both sides of its mouth when it claims to ensure that the polluter is morally and financially responsible and then puts a limit on that responsibility.

The liability limit set by the government does not embody the spirit of the polluter pays principle. A nuclear incident has long-term negative consequences. From a health standpoint, it can result in bodily harm that is sometimes only discovered years after the incident.

Since the federal and provincial governments are involved in nuclear plants, we can assume that they will be directly affected by any potential consequences. Therefore, it makes sense to ensure that these accidents do not happen. Nuclear plants are often owned by the government. If an accident were to take place, the government would likely be footing the bill and will therefore ensure that there is no accident, since it knows that it will end up paying. Operational safety automatically becomes cost-effective and logical.

An industrial accident has a negative effect on economic growth, and especially tourism.

For example, if we had an oil spill, the region affected would certainly see fewer tourists. There would also be less foreign investment if an area were to become radioactive.

Bill C-22 provides for limited liability by setting the cap at $1 billion. Furthermore, it does not allow for indexing the amount of compensation, for example, with inflation. The government could have chosen to automatically index this amount, but it would rather let 15, 20 or 30 years go by before it realizes that this amount still has not changed and that it does not reflect the new reality. It would have been a good idea to insert provisions for this, since the effects of a disaster can last many years, and during that time the value of money fluctuates.

Bill C-22 provides a rather narrow definition of the polluter pays principle, in that the polluter would be more encouraged to pollute than to adopt best practices and standards to prevent industrial disasters.

The NDP is the only party that has credibility when it comes to environmental protection. The other political parties are not doing anything about the outdated shared liability regime. Outdated protections cost Canadian taxpayers a lot of money, since the taxpayer could be the victim of an accident and end up being taxed on that very same accident.

Unfortunately, we had a specific example in Lac-Mégantic. The insurance coverage the company was asked for was totally inadequate to cover the damage that the incident caused. The insurance was clearly inadequate to cover accidents.

In the event of an incident, the government should not expect taxpayers to act as potential contributors to its subsidies for these various forms of energy. If the government assumes that, at the end of the day, taxpayers will pick up any shortfall, it is indirectly subsidizing those two sectors by playing on the potential risks and playing with those who are going to pay the bills.

I also have to stress that other countries are planning to adopt the principle of unlimited liability, because it really is not such a good idea to set the compensation at a fixed amount. I do not believe that the negative consequences for public health and for economic activity can be reduced to a fixed amount. The responsibility comes with grave consequences for the community.

That is why it is necessary to look at a compensation plan in which liability is unlimited. Besides the effectiveness of the compensation mechanisms, public authorities must also establish safe and effective ways of reducing industrial accidents. In that context, Bill C-22 must be marked by a proactive approach.

Since I had the opportunity to attend a briefing on this bill given by the Department of Natural Resources, I asked how the limit of $1 billion was arrived at. I expected that they would have looked at accident scenarios in order to assess the cost, but that was unfortunately not the case. I received no precise answer.

To me, it would have been logical to have simulated various reasonable accident scenarios in an attempt to say how much it would cost today, and then set the amount. That step seems logical and appropriate to me.

However, the only answer I have received to date is that the amount of $1 billion is enough. I have received no technical or logical explanation that would allow me to understand why the $1 billion figure was arrived at.

I repeat that I support the principle of the bill. However, there are a number of unanswered questions, including the one dealing with the fixed amount, which seems strange to me. Since I am fortunate enough to be a member of the Standing Committee on Natural Resources, I will be asking departmental officials more questions about this bill.

I feel that they need to be asked, because we must not limit ourselves to partial liability in this case.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I stand in support of Bill C-22, the energy safety and security act. It is measured support. The act deals with both offshore oil and gas operations and the nuclear liability and compensation act, but I am only prepared to speak on oil and gas.

My riding of St. John's South—Mount Pearl in my province of Newfoundland and Labrador is not exactly known for its nuclear industry, although the word “nuclear” could be used to describe my province's dislike of the Conservative government, a nuclear dislike that will redline in 2015. I could not pass that up, Mr. Speaker.

The issues surrounding oil and gas development are paramount in Newfoundland and Labrador. Oil and gas have made us a rich province, a have province. For too long, Newfoundland and Labrador was seen as a drain on Confederation, although that was never the case. The contribution of our ore, our fish, our hydro, our forestry, and our people to the rest of Canada and the world are practically immeasurable.

Today, officially on paper, we are a net contributor to Confederation and are proud of it. That is due, in large part, to offshore oil fields such as Hibernia, Terra Nova, and White Rose. The $14-billion Hebron development is due to come on stream in 2017.

Then there is the potential, the incredible, massive potential. This past September, the news broke of a major oil find off Newfoundland, a reservoir of light crude believed to hold as much as 600 million barrels of recoverable oil, the 12th largest oil discovery in the world in the past four years. That discovery, which happened in August, is the third recent find in the Flemish Pass basin in the North Atlantic in recent years.

The potential for oil off Labrador, which is practically frontier, virgin territory, is through the roof, and the exploration is not nearly what it is in the North Sea.

I had a meeting just a couple of weeks ago with the head of Nalcor, the crown corporation in Newfoundland and Labrador responsible for energy development. The member for St. John's East and I met with the head of Nalcor, and I can tell the House that the future of oil and gas in my province is incredibly exciting. Ed Martin, the CEO of Nalcor, had a hard time containing his excitement, and it was good to see on his face.

As parliamentarians, we must ensure that worker health and safety and the environment are first and foremost, front and centre, and protected at all costs. Bill C-22 maintains unlimited operator liability for fault or negligence. In other words, if there is an oil spill and a company is found negligent and responsible, the blame is 100% theirs. There is no limit on the liability, no cap on the liability, and that is the way it should be.

In the case of no fault, the bill increases absolute liability in the Atlantic to $1 billion from $30 million. That is an increase of $970 million. That may sound huge, and there is no doubt that it is huge, but is it enough? That is the question. Is a $1-billion cap on no fault enough to cover the damage from an environmental catastrophe?

The United States has an absolute liability cap of $12.6 billion U.S. versus, again, our absolute liability cap of $1 billion Canadian. That is a difference of more than $12 billion Canadian. I would say that the absolute liability amount is not enough, certainly not compared to the United States. Do Canadians, do Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, deserve at least the same amount of liability protection as the United States? Yes, we do. The answer is obvious. Of course we do.

The 2010 British Petroleum spill in the Gulf Mexico was expected to cost as much as $42 billion for total cleanup, criminal penalties, and civil claims. British Petroleum is reported to have already spent $25 billion on cleanup and compensation.

In addition, it faces hundreds of new lawsuits that were launched this spring, along with penalties under the Clean Water Act that could reach $17 billion. Therefore, how far would our absolute liability cap of $1 billion go? It would not go very far. It would be a drop in the oil barrel. A $1 billion liability cap is not enough. It is a start, but it is not enough. It is not nearly enough.

This bill references the polluter pay principle explicitly in legislation, to establish clearly and formally that polluters will be held accountable. This bill is most definitely an improvement upon the current liability regime, but it is not enough to protect Canadians or the environment. In fact, it continues to put Canadians at risk. More specifically, it continues to put Newfoundlanders and Labradorians at risk.

The reality is that the $1 billion cap is not enough. It is not sufficient. The artificial cap actually acts as a subsidy to energy companies by reducing the cost of insuring the risks that they create. Energy companies make a fortune. They make billions of dollars a year, and yet we would be subsidizing them and increasing the risks to ourselves. That does not make sense. If this were truly polluter pay, the polluter would be responsible, period.

Norway and Greenland have unlimited absolute financial liability for oil spills. To point out the irony, Norway has unlimited liability for a spill in its own waters, but as the owner of Statoil, the company that made the recent oil discovery off Newfoundland, it would have a cap in our waters. Does everyone see the difference?

What is most scary about Bill C-22, the energy safety and security act, is that it provides for ministerial discretion to reduce absolute liability levels to below the legislated level of $1 billion. That discretionary provision could undercut the advantages of the legislated cap. It leaves the door open for reduction of absolute liability levels for certain projects as a form of economic incentive for oil and gas development that the government wants to encourage. Therefore, if the government of the day wants to lower the $1 billion cap, it can. That is where the word “scary” comes in, especially when the $1 billion liability cap is not nearly enough to deal with a massive spill.

To conclude, New Democrats support this bill at second reading, but we would also push for expanded liability and the implementation of global best practices. Worker health and safety and the environment should be first and foremost in our oil and gas industry, and certainly not left to ministerial discretion to potentially lower what is already inadequate liability. Why can this country not lead the way in environmental protection? Why are the Conservatives accepting anything less?

This is a step forward; make no mistake, this is a step forward. However, why should we expect anything less than elite?

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would like to inform the House that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from St. John's South—Mount Pearl, who is an excellent speaker.

I rise today in the House to speak to Bill C-22, An Act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts. I have read the full title of the bill for those few brave souls listening to us on CPAC.

We are going to talk about this bill in a little more detail because, for the vast majority of Canadians, the title may be confusing. This is the fifth time that a similar bill has been introduced in the House. Previous versions were about nuclear safety. This version also deals with the liability of offshore oil and gas companies. Consequently, entire sectors of the oil industry are not covered by this bill. I will come back to this later, at the end of my ten minutes allocated for today.

The NDP is the only party that opposed the previous version of this bill, which dealt with nuclear liability, because the liability of nuclear companies was capped at $650 million, which was clearly not enough. We have heard ad nauseam from members opposite that we vote against this and that. Yes, we often oppose bills because what is suggested is outrageously inadequate. This is another fine example.

The NDP's current position on Bill C-22 is that we are going to support the bill in principle at second reading, because, even if it is inadequate, it is a step in the right direction.

For the brave souls listening to us on CPAC, I would like to take a few seconds to explain exactly what second reading is. It means that we support the bill and that it is going to go to committee. Committees are going to study the bill. If the government of the day shows good faith, because committees always have a majority of Conservative members, we can try to improve the bill and perhaps we will be in a position to support it on third reading. That is why we are supporting it at second reading. Our yes depends greatly on subsequent events. Canadians can therefore rest absolutely assured of this aspect of our approach.

Let us start with the few steps in the right direction that Bill C-22 takes in the specific case of the nuclear industry, even though they are still inadequate.

First, there is a clearer process through which the victims of a nuclear accident are compensated by the operators. Basically, that is a valid approach. The limit of absolute liability goes from $75 million to $1 billion. That may seem like a major step, but, in the light of current realities and compared to other measures in place around the world, it is quite inadequate.

The limit of liability for the operators of nuclear installations has remained unchanged at $75 million for 38 years. So it is urgent to move on that. This justifies our efforts, in committee, to try to make this bill provide Canadians with genuine protection, along the same lines as measures taken by other major legislative bodies.

Since the last time the obligations of nuclear industry operators were considered, the inflation rate has increased more than 300%. That tells us that we absolutely have to move on this. The limit of $75 million, that may possibly change with this bill, is so low that international courts, where victims would seek recourse in the event of a nuclear disaster, do not even recognize it. Even the suggestion of a billion dollars is much lower than what has been set by most other countries with a nuclear industry.

The bill extends the limitation period for submitting compensation claims for bodily injury from 10 years to 30 years to address latent illnesses. This is another step in the right direction. It is overdue.

Here is a disturbing example to illustrate just how overdue it is.

The Chernobyl nuclear disaster took place on April 26, 1986. In 2011—or 25 years after the tragedy—the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation counted 7,000 cases of cancer in the most exposed areas of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. These cancers have a very particular profile. They affect only adults. The epidemic primarily affects a population that was under the age of 18 at the time of the accident, due to the important role the thyroid plays during childhood and the teenage years.

Someone could be exposed to a nuclear disaster at the age of 18 or younger and not develop cancer until they are in their thirties. The 10-year period that was previously applied for the limitation period for submitting compensation claims for bodily injury was not enough. We are starting to see that a 30-year period is more reasonable for dealing with the reality of the effects of a nuclear disaster.

Bill C-22 will enable Canada to ratify the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage. This convention gives the party states an additional $500 million in compensation, drawn from an international fund financed by the various signatories to the agreement. Until recently, our requirements were so low that we were not even worthy of being considered by other countries that had signed international agreements. Bill C-22 will help improve somewhat that aspect of the problem.

What steps in the right direction does Bill C-22 take when it comes to offshore oil and gas development? It updates Canada’s offshore liability regime to prevent incidents and ensure a swift response in the event of a spill. We agree with the bill's premise. Bill C-22 increases the absolute liability limit for offshore oil and gas projects in Atlantic waters from $30 million to $1 billion. All the limits are $1 billion. The figure was chosen somewhat at random. Very little consultation took place. Someone on the other side thinks that $1 billion is a good number. Why not $4 billion or $3.9 billion? For oil and nuclear energy, it is $1 billion. This number really shows that there was a lack of consultation with experts, since they certainly would not all have come up with a nice round number like $1 billion when asked how much would be required to deal with a nuclear disaster or an offshore oil spill. The bill also contains the polluter pays principle. It is a good principle that we are prepared to support.

Now, let us look at the problems with Bill C-22, which is insufficient, particularly when compared with international best practices. The basic question is this: why do Canadians not deserve to be just as well protected as people in other countries where there is major legislation governing their natural resource production?

Bill C-22 ignores best practices when it comes to recognizing the dangers of inadequate liability regimes. However, on June 2, 2010, all members of the House adopted a motion moved by the NDP member for Edmonton—Strathcona. To everyone's surprise, the Conservatives voted in favour of that motion. The motion called on the government to ensure that Canada has the strongest environmental and safety rules in the world and to report to the House for appropriate action.

We need look no further than this for an example of the government's complete failure to support a motion. Since the Conservatives voted in favour of this motion, Canada has collected booby prizes from the Climate Action Network, a coalition of 400 competent non-governmental organizations. These prizes are awarded at United Nations climate change conferences, no less.

Let us look at some specific examples of what might protect Canadians. For instance, offshore operations in the North Sea are regulated. Companies have no choice. Relief wells must be in good working order before the main well can be drilled. The moment the main well does not work, the relief well is already in place, ready to take over. If this system had been in place in the Gulf of Mexico, the oil spill could have lasted 30 minutes instead of weeks.

Also, if the Conservatives had meant it when they supported my colleague's motion, this is the kind of regulation we would have found in a document seeking to regulate offshore operations.

In Germany, nuclear liability is absolute and unlimited, regardless of fault, and financial guarantees are as high as $3.3 billion Canadian per nuclear plant. In the United States, that figure is $12.6 billion. Clearly, there are several pieces of legislation with a much stricter framework.

I have one last thing to say to our colleagues opposite. To my knowledge, the capital of the nuclear industry in the United States or the offshore oil and gas industry in the North Sea has not vanished into space. There is still activity. We can do much better.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise and speak on Bill C-22, a bill respecting nuclear safety and liability in the nuclear and oil and gas sectors.

First of all, I want to congratulate the new minister on his new portfolio. I will be interested to see what he does with a number of issues; for instance, what his approach will be to the Keystone XL pipeline and other pipelines. I will be interested to see what degree of support he will show for rare earth elements and that whole sector, not to mention other files like Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, and how he will deal with the whole nuclear sector.

I hope that he is not prone to inflated rhetoric, like blaming everything on foreign radicals. I also hope that he can foster better relations with our first nations communities. I believe that his background suggests that he may be able to do that. I wish him well on that and I hope that he can. It is very important to improve those relations and to improve consultations with first nations and aboriginal groups. It is a very important part of his portfolio. In relation to so many natural resource developments, there are many first nations and aboriginal communities that need to be properly consulted, and he can be part of that process.

I am curious to see if he has any more success in getting this legislation passed than his predecessors, who made four or five attempts to update this legislation. I suspect that he will. As far as I know, the next election will not take place until October of next year, assuming that the Prime Minister allows the fixed-date election law to come to fruition and does not call an election ahead of that, or change the law or something else. We will not know though, of course, until it happens. I suspect, though, that the government will be able to pass this bill in the coming weeks or months. We have seen in the past sometimes that the government brings forward a bill and then does not move it further forward for months, sometimes even years. We will have to wait and see.

This bill would make a number of improvements regarding the offshore energy sector and the nuclear sector. It would increase liability limits to $1 billion.

When I say liability limits, that is not the limit where a company or operator is found to have done something wrong or taken wrongful action that has caused an accident or spill, for example. In this case, it is where no such proof is there or there is no indication of wrongful action. However, we want to make sure that operators are held responsible, regardless, so that they have to live up to the highest possible standards. That is why there is this kind of legislation. It is to provide liability limits for absolute liability, regardless of whether any wrongful action is found to have been taken.

This bill also expressly includes the polluter pays principle. The principle has been around since the 1980s or earlier. It is a very important principle, and I am pleased to see it in this legislation. It is overdue.

The bill would update safety and security regimes and, as I said, the liability of at-fault operators remains unlimited. There would be no limits at all on those operators, whether in the nuclear sector or the offshore sector. That is important.

This is an important piece of legislation, given some of the disasters that we have seen recently around the globe. We heard today some mention of the devastation of the meltdown of the Fukushima nuclear plant. The estimation made by Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology suggests that it has cost at least $31 billion. I heard a different figure from a colleague a few minutes ago. I am not sure what the source of that is, but the information I have is from Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology.

The damages in the BP Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico are currently estimated at $42 billion. These are very substantial sums and, yes, they are well in excess of $1 billion. It is also true that in the vast majority of events of this nature involving the offshore and nuclear sectors, the cost has been well below $1 billion.

We have to measure these things as we discuss and examine this bill.

The Liberal Party recognizes the need to raise the absolute liability limit for the offshore oil and gas sector and the nuclear sector. That is why we will support this bill at second reading. However, we will also look at ways to strengthen this legislation in committee.

For the nuclear sector, the liability cap will go from $75 million to $1 billion. This change brings Canada into line with promises it made when it signed the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage in December 2013.

In the offshore oil and gas sector, the absolute liability for companies operating in the Atlantic offshore will increase from $30 million to $1 billion and in the Arctic from $40 million to $1 billion.

Operators will have to have $100 million specifically earmarked for spill response.

While this updated legislation is long overdue, we need to ensure that the level of liability is in line with the level of potential damage of either a nuclear incident or an offshore spill. As well, we need to take this opportunity to review our ability to respond to an offshore spill, particularly in the Arctic, as I was saying earlier in my question to my hon. friend from Newton—North Delta.

The bill has two parts. Part one amends the offshore petroleum regime to enhance incident prevention, response capacity, and liability and compensation. It primarily updates and strengthens the liability regime that is applicable to spills and debris in offshore areas.

Part two, on the other hand, amends the nuclear regime to establish greater legal certainty and to enhance liability and compensation in the event of a nuclear accident, something we would never want to see in Canada, or anywhere else in the world for that matter.

It also provides for the establishment in certain circumstances of an administrative tribunal to hear and decide claims. It implements certain provisions of the convention on supplementary compensation for nuclear damage.

The Liberal caucus will support this bill because it is a step in the right direction, but we will seek to strengthen it at committee. We hope the government is not once again blinded to any potential improvements. So often we have seen bills passed in the House, passed with the government majority perhaps, that go to committee. In the House, there had been all kinds of noise about how we could perhaps look for ways to improve it, and of course then the government does not accept any amendments or really consider any of the arguments made for the amendments at the committee stage.

I urge the government to listen to what expert witnesses tell us at committee, for once, and act on their advice to make this an even stronger piece of legislation. That is what this process is really about. Unfortunately, too often the government simply uses its majority to ram through what is flawed legislation.

Bill C-22 is the culmination of several years of discussion started under the previous Liberal government with regard to operator liability. It addresses the recommendations to raise liability limits from the 2012 report of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. The bill establishes in statute that operators are liable for contractors, and it also allows government to seek compensation for environmental damages.

I think that is an important point, the first one in particular, that the operator cannot simply pass on work to a contractor and that contractor not be liable. Both are important, and so the way to establish that is by saying that the operator will be liable for mistakes the contractor makes. Often a contractor may be a much smaller company doing the work, with much less ability to cover the cost, which might be enormous, and at the very least would certainly be substantial.

While Bill C-22 is a step in the right direction, it also serves to illustrate that the Conservative government still lacks a coherent nuclear policy.

When it comes to the government's record on nuclear energy, unfortunately, in terms of comments made earlier today, the member for Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke seems to be quite misguided. The member talked about how important the nuclear sector is for her riding, and no one here would argue that point. However, she seems to think that the current mean-spirited Conservative government supports Canada's efforts and achievements in the nuclear field. The member seems to completely ignore the fact that the Prime Minister's chief spokesman called Atomic Energy of Canada Limited a “$12 billion sinkhole”. That certainly is not an indication of support from the Conservative government.

Thankfully, members like my colleague from Ottawa South are here to set the record straight. As my friend from Ottawa South said earlier today in his excellent and eloquent remarks on this legislation, the $12 billion sinkhole reference, in his view and in mine, was a deliberate strategy by the Conservatives. It seems to have been part of a plan to degrade AECL, which was once a global symbol of Canadian know-how, so they could sell it at rock-bottom prices. It is shameful behaviour. In the process, the Conservatives compromised the country's future, as my colleague from Ottawa South said, with regard to nuclear power plants; with regard to the production of medical isotopes, an important part of the nuclear field; and with regard to obtaining a certain share of that marketplace.

It is important to note that we have quite a range of ways of producing electricity in this country. For instance, in my province a lot of electricity is produced by burning coal, but we are moving away from that. A lot of it is produced from natural gas from offshore Nova Scotia from the Sable project. More and more is being produced by wood, and some by solar. The solar-generated electricity in most cases is produced by individual family homes.

A few years ago, my sister, who lives in California, bought 14 quite large panels at a substantial cost to her and her husband. The panels were to be the main source of electricity in their home. I was very impressed that she did that. We do not have a lot of that in terms of a major production of power, and there are parts of this country where that would not work. Someone pointed out to me that it is no surprise that in the Northwest Territories there might not be a lot of solar power, because it would not work too well in the winter months for fairly obvious reasons.

Getting back to the nuclear sector, there is speculation about the future of the nuclear lab in Chalk River and speculation that the so-called GoCo model may be in trouble because of intellectual property issues.

I am hearing from the nuclear industry that it is concerned about what the Conservative government will do with the NRU reactor, the national research universal reactor. Industry feels that science should be there to help develop policy. That is a problem. I am not even sure my colleagues on the Conservative side hear that. I am not sure they hear industry saying that science should help develop policy, because we all know that the Conservatives prefer policy-based evidence as opposed to evidence-based policy. While the Conservatives should be supporting the need for a national research reactor to replace the NRU, which may only have about five years left in its life cycle, they are too busy selling off assets and botching the management of this important sector.

Bill C-22 also raises the question of whether liability limits are adequate, and that question should be explored, in my view. Hopefully it will be explored in some depth at the committee stage of the bill.

Some groups that have taken a preliminary look at the legislation have also noted that despite the fact it represents a positive step forward, there are several fundamental weaknesses as it is currently drafted. Ecojustice, for instance, has raised five concerns.

The first of the five concerns raised by Ecojustice is that in its view, the $1 billion limit in absolute liability is too low to cover the cost of major spills like BP's Deepwater Horizon blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, especially if something like that were to happen in the Arctic.

The second concern is that there is a need to clarify the provisions for ministerial discretion to reduce absolute liability levels below $1 billion. It is a good question. Why do the minister and the government feel that there is a need to have discretion to lower that limit in some cases? I suspect it may involve small gas fields, but it is an area we need to examine at committee.

The third concern mentioned by Ecojustice is that in some cases the bill provides relief from liability for the effects of dumping toxic spill-treating agents into marine environments. Clearly there is an interest in cleaning up spills and in using the best agents that can be found to clean up those spills, but it is worth examining whether permitting the spill of those agents is too broad a permission to give.

The fourth concern Ecojustice raises is that the bill does not require an operator to provide proof that it has the financial resources to pay the entire at-fault liability when wrongful conduct is demonstrated. While most of the bill is about absolute liability when there is no wrongful action, what it is suggesting is that in a case in which wrongful conduct is shown—because we will have cases like that from time to time—it is important for the operating company to prove in advance that it has the financial resources to pay the entire costs for that kind of a cleanup operation if it is found to have acted wrongfully in causing a spill or other type of disaster.

The fifth concern Ecojustice raises is that the bill fails to provide regulation-making provisions for the calculation of non-use environmental damages.

Hopefully, these and other issues can be addressed as we go through this legislation in committee.

The legislation also raises several issues that need to be studied. Will the bill make it more expensive for offshore energy companies to operate in the Atlantic and Arctic, and what impact would raising their financial liability and increasing the funds they must have on hand for disaster response have on those coasts? We would like to ask our witnesses these questions and hear their reactions.

Is $1 billion adequate in the Arctic, where environmental conditions make full response efforts very challenging, particularly under the ice? In my view, from what I have read so far, we do not have the capacity to clean up a major spill under Arctic ice. To me, that is a major concern.

Why does the bill provide for ministerial discretion to lower that $1 billion limit, and what are the implications of this provision?

The Liberal Party recognizes the need to raise the absolute liability limits for the offshore oil and gas development sector and the nuclear sector. That is why we will support the bill at second reading.

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague's speech with great interest.

A Conservative member told her that there was a nuclear power plant in his riding and that it was very safe. However, one of the weak points in Bill C-22 is that the industry will not have to assume any financial liability greater than $1 billion. We have questions about that because it is the people whom we represent in the House, Canadians from coast to coast, who will have to pay for the rest.

If the industry is so mature and safe, should it not have to assume a much greater part of the risk? A nuclear disaster can sometimes cost hundreds of billions of dollars. I shudder at that because, if we pass Bill C-22 as it stands, without going through a committee, it would be dangerous. We would be placing the risk on the shoulders of the taxpayers.

Is that not just another way of providing the nuclear industry with indirect subsidies on the backs of Canadians?

[Corneliu Chisu, Conservative, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, regarding the issue we are discussing here, Bill C-22, I think the hon. member should go back to discuss the issues regarding liability and the content of the bill.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege to stand in the House and speak at second reading in support of Bill C-22, an act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other acts. That is a very long name for this legislation. What we are really talking about is Canada's liability when it comes to the nuclear and offshore oil and gas industries.

These are the major issues covered in this bill, and the NDP is pleased to see that it is back here again, though I understand that it has been through many iterations during previous parliaments and has never quite been enacted. This is an area in which we have wanted to see action for a very long time, as the existing legislation is so outdated. Our rules and regulations around liability for the nuclear energy and offshore oil and gas industries are so outdated that they go back to the 1970s. We have learned a lot since then, or I hope we have, and we need to address this in all kinds of ways.

As I started to go through this piece of legislation and read some people's reactions to it, I began to see a common thread that I have seen since I became a parliamentarian. That common thread, once again, is the lack of meaningful consultation with those who are well informed on these issues. It is not just me saying that; it is being said by many people.

What really concerned me in this area is the tendency of my colleagues on the other side to ignore those who are really knowledgeable. Parliamentarians are pretty well informed, but we cannot be experts in everything. Therefore, we need to consult the experts who work in these areas. We have scientists who have spent lots of time and energy looking at these areas. We have researchers and governments that we could learn a lot from. But once again, having an allergy to data and science and informed input seems to be what has won the day with this piece of legislation.

Here is a direct quote from the Canadian Environmental Law Association. We are not talking about lay people getting together to come up with some issues, but lawyers at CELA who requested that the federal government “...undertake a meaningful public consultation on how [the] Nuclear Liability Act (NLA) should be modernized to acknowledge lessons from the Fukushima disaster...”.

They also noted the following:

Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) has been privately consulting Canadian nuclear operators on how to revise the NLA. This behind-closed-doors consultation with industry is unacceptable. The NLA transfers the financial risk from reactor operations from industry to Canadians. Canadians thus must be consulted.

As I said previously, there is a tendency not only to ignore broad-based Canadians but also many groups, such as lawyers and other knowledgeable people. This allergy to data, science, and informed advice does not serve Canadians well. Neither does it serve us as parliamentarians well, because we need to have that kind of an education and expertise informing the decisions we make.

There has been lack of consultation not just with this bill but also with the elections bill, which some members have called the “unfair elections bill” currently before Parliament. The current government, once again is not listening to the grassroots, not listening to the experts, not listening to the Chief Electoral Officer, and certainly going off to make some changes based on some ideological agenda. Instead of trying to make Elections Canada work for Canadians and improving our democracy, it is choosing to make the system less democratic, even when it has been made very clear by academics and researchers, who do not often come out jointly to issue or sign statements, that this is not good for democracy.

In a similar way, there has been lack of consultation with the legislation before us. In here, of course, we are not following what I would consider good practice. We just have to look at good practice around the globe. Germany, for example, has unlimited absolute liability, fault or no fault, and financial security of $3.3 billion Canadian per power plant. What is in this piece of legislation? The Canadian taxpayers pick up the liability after the first billion dollars. Germany is not the only country. There are also Japan, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Austria, and Switzerland with the same. Even the United States has an absolute liability limit of $12.6 billion U.S. The research has shown me that other countries are moving to unlimited absolute liability, whereas our government is quite willing to saddle hard-working Canadians who pay taxes. After Canadian taxpayers have put in an incredible number of hours to survive, and many of them struggling with affordability issues, the government is willing to burden them.

I will give one example. The offshore BP Gulf oil spill of 2010 is expected to cost as much as $42 billion in cleanup costs, criminal penalties, and civil claims. So if we were to apply that same formula, though I am sure that the costs have gone up, the Canadian taxpayers would be on the hook for $41 billion for the cleanup and only $1 billion would come from BP Gulf. In a similar way, looking at Fukushima's nuclear disaster in 2011, the Japanese government has estimated that the cost will be over $250 billion, and with Canada being liable over the $1 billion cost if it had a similar accident, Canadian taxpayers' liabilities would be $249 billion at best.

We often hear my colleagues across the way talk about the hard-working Canadians who pay taxes and how we must protect them and protect their buying power. I agree with them, but what I see in this bill is a government that is not living up to what its members preach quite vocally in other areas.

It seems that the NDP is the only party that is very serious about protecting the interests of ordinary Canadians, while the other parties take a cavalier attitude to nuclear safety and offshore oil and gas development. Whereas other countries, of which I have listed a few, have deemed that their citizens deserve much higher protection in the event of a nuclear accident, our government is willing to look the other way or just have a limited liability for the polluters.

It seems that if polluters must pay, then it would be really good if the legislation here in the House today were current with that principle and really encompass it as well.

Let us get back to the hardworking Canadians. Let us also talk about Canadians who are working very hard to find a job, but cannot find employment. When I was in my riding over the last two weeks, these are the kinds of things I heard from hardworking Canadians and those looking for work.

One of the key things I heard from them was the feeling of community safety. I heard directly from seniors who said, “We do not have enough policing. I do not feel safe at home any more. Why is it that all these cuts are being made to the veterans? Why is it that we are not looking after our veterans who served in World War II and other military engagements on which we have sent them out?”

Constituents came to my meetings and said, “We did not say this before, but we are telling you, we have had enough. Why is it our taxpayers money is not being used wisely?” I would say it is because the government has other priorities. Rather than moving toward or actually implementing unlimited liability, what we are doing once again is putting Canadian taxpayers on the hook.

At the same time, we have hardworking Canadians who are struggling with quick fixes because of the government across the way. Businesses are hurting because they are paying high transaction fees, constituents are hurting because of the high rates on Visa cards, and others are hurting because the cost of living has gone up and their minimum wage jobs are just not cutting it.

Over and over again I heard about the proposed new cuts that could limit access to training and helping people to re-enter the job force because they face challenges in their lives. Changes have been made to the job grant. Negotiations are happening with the provinces and some changes will take place, but really, we will really be denying access to the most vulnerable Canadians so they can re-enter the workforce and be self-sufficient. The savings on that program alone when people re-enter the workforce would be just huge.

I also heard while I was in my riding a very direct quote that somebody read to me—

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-22, An Act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to stand in the House on behalf of my constituents from Surrey North to speak to Bill C-22, an act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other acts.

Before I get to the main point of the bill, I want to talk about some of the things that happened in my constituency during the break week. It is important to bring the concerns of my constituents from Surrey North to Ottawa, rather than the other way around. I know that most of the Conservatives would rather take everything from Ottawa back to their constituencies.

I had an opportunity to knock on doors during the last two weeks. Some of this relates to the issues in this bill.

In one young family, which has been in Canada for the last five years, the spouse is a truck driver and the wife works in the health care industry. I want to bring to the attention of the House the lack of credentialling and recognition of the degrees they have from the country they came from. They like staying in Canada, but one of the issues they brought up was their inability to practise in the fields they are trained in.

They have a young child. The mother was a registered nurse in her home country. She has been trying to upgrade her skills here. She was very distraught that there is not enough help from the government. There are not enough pathways for her to take some schooling to upgrade and contribute in a meaningful way in a profession she worked in for 10 years. She was a supervisory nurse in emergency care at a very prestigious hospital in her country, and she is very distraught that her skills are not being translated to this country.

Her husband is a trained IT specialist with an engineering degree. He also pointed to the lack of ability to translate his credentials to Canadian standards so that he could work in an industry in which he has considerable expertise. He could contribute in a meaningful way to the Canadian economy as a new citizen. He drives a long-haul truck. It is difficult for the family.

It is important for me to bring forward those concerns. Those are the kind of issues we need to address when we are bringing in skilled workers or skilled labour from other countries. We should provide adequate training and adequate liaison into the fields they have practised in. That is woefully lacking across this country and is something the government needs to address in the House.

Another fellow I met was very unhappy with the unfair elections act. He let me and the government have it in regard to an institution that has been built over many years and is world renowned. Our ability to conduct fair and democratic elections is a role model for all countries. In fact, other countries use our model to bring in new laws to improve their democracies. He told me that the government's introduction of the unfair elections act was doing an inadequate job of consulting with citizens in regard to what changes need to be brought in.

This brings me to Bill C-22. He talked about the inability of the government to consult Canadian citizens to bring about change.

In particular, he was talking about the inability of the current government to consult Canadians when it brought forward the unfair elections act. We heard it throughout the day yesterday and throughout the discussions on the unfair elections act, and clearly, the government had not consulted Canadians when it brought forward the unfair elections act.

This leads me to Bill C-22. It has been two and a half years since the NDP has been the second party, and I have not seen a bill brought forward by the government on which it has consulted the very people who are going to be impacted. On this bill also, I do not think it has consulted communities, citizens, stakeholders, and Canadians on what needs to be in this liability bill with regard to nuclear and offshore gas and oil. That clearly shows some of the flaws in this bill.

Liberals talked about certain issues in the House today, and the Conservatives have asked certain questions of the NDP. Where have they been for 25 years? There has not been a change to this bill for the last 25 years. The Conservatives have had five tries at it and it is still not law. The Conservatives are very good at throwing mud at the NDP, with help from the Liberals today. It is beyond me, because the Conservatives have had the opportunity to bring in legislation that would improve the liability issues and the safety of nuclear power plants and offshore oil drilling.

Canadians will be astounded to hear that this is the fifth time this bill is being introduced. We on this side of the House are hoping that the fifth time will be the charm. It is time we acted to strengthen liability limits for nuclear operators and offshore gas operators. This change is long overdue. It has been 25 years and it is long overdue that we address this issue to bring it into the 21st century.

In fact, Canada's liability limit for nuclear operators has not changed for 38 years, and we are falling behind the actions other countries are taking to protect their citizens. Similarly, offshore oil and gas liability limits have not changed for over 25 years. The sentiment behind this bill is a good one and I am sure we can all agree to it in principle, but on the fifth go-round, it is time to get the bill right. This is the fifth try by Parliament in the last 25 years. We owe it to Canadians to get it right after the fifth time.

These are some of the things I am going to talk about in my speech. We need to expand liability and ensure that Canada falls in line with best global practices. Again, I go back to consultation. Not only should we be consulting Canadians, the very stakeholders who will be impacted by this particular bill, but we should be looking at what is happening in the United States and in Europe. We should be learning from best practices about what works to protect our pristine waters, whether they are in British Columbia or off the east coast, how to protect Canadians, and how to protect areas around major cities where there are nuclear plants. What are the best practices? What are the other countries doing to ensure that their citizens are protected? What is the level of safety that would reassure Canadians that they can live in those situations and that the environment off our coasts will be protected?

The pristine waters off British Columbia are an important resource to our economy. They generate hundreds and thousands of jobs, whether they are fishing, coastal logging, or tourism. Those are the kinds of jobs we need to protect.

We need to ensure that offshore oil and gas drilling and nuclear safety are intact, so we can grow the expanding tourism and agricultural industries off our coast. When it comes to protecting our beautiful country and our citizens in the event of a major environmental disaster, we need to take strong action.

This bill is based on the polluter pays principle. In its simplest terms, this means that polluters are held accountable for their actions. I am sure this is a principle that all Canadians can get behind. It makes sense to all Canadians that a polluter should pay for the costs from polluting. Every Canadian would agree. The Conservatives often talk about it, but they do not really practise it when it comes to the oil, gas, and nuclear industries. It is a fundamental principle that we should ensure that those costs are not passed on to the next generation.

I will give members an example of how the polluter pays principle works. I know that the Conservatives would love to hear it. I will talk about my own family. I have two young children, a son and a daughter. My son often makes a mess, and his toys are often all over the place. His mom usually tells him to pick up his toys. He runs around, picks a few of them up, and takes them aside, but he leaves the rest floating around. He then dares to ask his sister to clean up the mess. Guess what my daughter says? She says no. She says it is his mess and he should clean it.

That is the basic principle. My seven-year-old understands this. I am astounded that the Conservatives do not understand the polluter pays principle. If people make a mess, they clean it up. In my example, the mess is not my daughter's fault. She gets up and tells her brother that he made the mess and he has to clean it up. It is a basic principle.

The member across is pointing to himself. I know he has his family business, too. We have heard the pizza analogies, and now I am bringing my own family into this.

A seven-year-old understands it. He is okay with cleaning up his mess once his sister tells him that, no, it is his mess and he needs to clean it up. My daughter is clearly for the polluter pays principle. Children understand this polluter pays business, where whoever makes the mess cleans it up. The Conservative government, however, does not seem to want to address that particular issue. It is such a simple concept that whoever makes the mess cleans it up.

Let us extrapolate this example further. The liability limits proposed in this legislation are a step in the right direction, but they do not go far enough. It is just as it is with my son. He cannot get away with just cleaning a little bit of the mess. He needs to clean the entire mess. It is his responsibility. It is his mess.

Based on what is proposed right now, if a nuclear accident were to happen, the operator would be liable for $1 billion. That seems like a lot, but it is actually not a lot. Compared to the disasters we have seen, it is very little, and I will give some examples in my speech. If we look at the disaster that happened in the Gulf of Mexico with BP, there was about $42 billion of assessed damage. The limit of $1 billion would be less than a couple of percentage points. It is not very much at all.

It might sound like a lot of money, but on the grand scale of nuclear accidents, we have seen enough examples to know that it would only cover a fraction of the cost. Who would be on the hook for the rest? It would be the Canadian taxpayers. They would be on the hook for the rest of the money.

On one hand, we understand the polluter pays principle. If people make a mess, they clean it up. Why would Canadian taxpayers be held accountable for pollution they did not contribute to in the first place? This is the Conservative logic of cleaning up the mess.

The Conservatives talk about profits. Whenever there is a profit, they privatize. Whenever there is cost or expenses, they socialize those. Guess who gets to pay those costs? It is the taxpayers.

Using the example of my house where my son gets to clean up his mess, it is time we hold people accountable who make those messes or cause a disaster. It is the polluter pay principle. We need to ensure there are adequate resources available to clean up a mess, God forbid. It has been fairly good in this country. Again, we want to ensure the principle of fairness is upheld. We want to make sure the taxpayers are not being left holding the bag at the end of the day.

It would be as if my son cleaned up a few of his toys and then expected his sister to come and finish the rest of the job. It is not the greatest way to enforce “his mess, his responsibility”. If the government truly believes in the polluter pay principle, the taxpayers should not hold the risk of these energy projects.

The nuclear industry in this country has strong roots. We are not talking about a new industry or providing subsidies to a new industry entering in the economy. This is a mature industry, and mature industries should be able to factor in those costs and ensure that Canadians are not responsible for any liabilities.

The current liability limit for the nuclear operators is about $75 million, which is so low that international courts would not even recognize it. This bill proposes to increase the absolute liability limit for nuclear operators from $75 million to $1 billion.

As I mentioned earlier, this is a step in the right direction but this does not go far enough to protect Canadian taxpayers. Using the example of my son, parents set rules such as, if my son makes a mess, he cleans it up, and if my daughter makes a mess, she cleans it up. As parliamentarians, I think we have a responsibility to taxpayers to set some rules to ensure that those who are liable for pollution, whether it is nuclear, oil, or gas, are held accountable.

We have a joint responsibility to protect all Canadians, all taxpayers, not just the big corporations, letting them have a free hand at liability.

Here is another example. If I had $100 and went to a casino, and I knew that my risk was only that $100, I would be betting as much as possible and taking as much risk as possible to gain more profit. If my liability were only $100, I would be taking major risks.

If the liability is higher, risk-takers or any business would ensure safety in the facilities whether they are nuclear, oil, or gas. Having that additional responsibility to ensure the provision of safeguards for those industries is important, and Canadians clearly expect that.

I also want to illustrate just how arbitrary this number is in light of nuclear costs. Let us look at the costs of Japan's 2011 nuclear disaster. The estimated costs of that disaster are at about $250 billion, and yet we have set the liability limit at $1 billion, which would only cover a fraction of that.

Many other countries have already deemed that their citizens deserve much higher protection in the event of a nuclear accident. Germany has unlimited, absolutely clear liability, fault or no fault. We can learn from these other countries that have actually set very good examples.

I urge my colleagues to defeat the bill. We will gain some insight during committee and we look forward to providing some additional amendments to the bill.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to follow my colleague, who gave some outstanding reasons as to why we have concerns about Bill C-22, An Act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the Nuclear Liability and Compensation Act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts. I will be focusing on some of the nuclear aspects of this legislation, but I will include some of the offshore issues as well.

First and foremost, we have to recognize how long it has taken for this legislation to be updated. The legislation was first tabled in 1976, and it is extremely outdated. It has been a low priority for the Conservative government, and it is sad that it has taken so long to come to the chamber. That is regrettable, because some important decisions need to be made with regard to the shipping of nuclear steam generators that need treatment and with regard to deep geological repository storage of secondary nuclear waste. I will focus on these two issues shortly.

The issue that we are really concerned about is the $1 billion liability covering Canadians. Canadians have been subsidizing nuclear energy for decades, and they are now facing the consequences of outdated legislation and not having proper safety regimes in place. Should there be an accident requiring some cleanup and damage control, there would be major subsidies. That is important to note, because taxpayers need to be aware that they are at risk.

People would not have insurance like this on their houses. This would be like having house insurance that only covers a fraction of what could be written off, despite paying a high price for the insurance. That is the equivalent of what is in this legislation. It is similar to having auto insurance that would only permit the bumper to be written off if the entire car was wrecked in an accident. We cannot stress enough the negligence in this measure, because other countries have been doing a much better job, and I will name a few of them.

They really understand nuclear energy. Part of their overall strategy is to require companies to clean up when necessary. There have been disasters and costs associated with those disasters, and I will highlight some of the costs to those countries with respect to liability.

Germany has unlimited absolute nuclear liability and financial security of $3.3 billion per power plant. The United States has absolute unlimited nuclear liability of $12.6 billion. Other countries are moving toward unlimited liability.

The cost could be over $250 billion with respect to Fukushima. This shows us that $1 billion is not a lot, given some of our aging nuclear facilities and the requirements they have.

I would like to note two examples in particular that we have been working on in southern Ontario. One was the Bruce power plant proposal to ship nuclear steam generators across the Great Lakes, which was fortunately scrapped. In February 2011 the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission issued a statement allowing the transport of these steam generators through the Great Lakes. This would have exposed people to radiation. The problem was that the generators would go from Canada to Sweden for treatment. The generators were going to be scrapped, but it was claimed that the contaminated nuclear material could be recycled and then sent back to Ontario.

Sending these huge steam generators through the Great Lakes would have exposed Canadians to great risk, as was brought up by the Ontario New Democrats, in particular Peter Tabuns. I would like to thank Mayor Bradley from Sarnia for his advocacy and strong leadership. First nations also expressed their opposition to this idea, and the Council of Canadians had petitions signed by 96,000 people.

These radioactive steam generators also created problems on the U.S. side, as American politicians started speaking against this idea. That was important, because the commission wanted to do this without a full environmental assessment, but when it became clear that it was not going to take place in the United States, it backed off from this program.

I am thankful, because the Great Lakes it is one of the world's most treasured ecological systems for the environment and for our economy.

Just this past week, I and a number of members of Parliament had the opportunity to go out on ice-breaking manoeuvres on Lake St. Clair with our great men and women of the Coast Guard. I can say that shipping goes on during the winter. Those men and women do an incredible job. It is critical for our economy and our environment. As opposed to putting that at risk for steam generators and recycling and having no plan, we should be taking care of our own nuclear waste. We have had a lot of concerns. I again want to thank a number of organizations that are opposed to that.

There is another important situation that is still evolving. In Kincardine, the Bruce Power plant wants to store its secondary radiation elements down a shaft, basically, within one kilometre of Lake Huron. They want to bury it in a layer of limestone 680 metres underground near the Bruce Power station. There are a lot of concerns about that. The scientist Dr. Frank Greening, a former employee, raised the fact that the numbers for the many radioactive elements that would be shipped there have been underestimated. This is of great concern. There has been a huge public outcry with respect to storage facilities so close to our water system, placing it at risk.

I want to thank a number of organizations that have been active with respect to this. If members are interested in this issue, because a decision has to come forward at some point in time, these groups are the Inverhuron Committee, Northwatch, Save our Saugeen Shores, and Bluewater Coalition. People can sign a petition online at the Stop the Great Lakes Nuclear Dump website. I want to thank those organizations for their leadership, because they have seen that the exposure of our Great Lakes system would hurt our economy, our transportation, and our environment. There has been a lot of work done by these organizations to raise public awareness, because we still do not treat our Great Lakes properly. That is one reason we need to start investing in it. We must be cognizant that with the nuclear power plant situation, there would be costs. There should be the polluter pays principle. That is not happening. We saw that in the past with Three Mile Island and other situations in North America.

I will quote from The Star with respect to an incident that happened most recently. It states:

A U.S. nuclear waste site near Carlsbad, New Mexico leaked radiation in February. Proponents of the Bruce site have taken local municipal officials on tours of the Carlsbad site. Thirteen workers at Carlsbad were exposed to radiation, where an investigation continues.

That is important, because the type of work it is talking about in terms of this site operation has been described as a guinea pig, which is not the way we would expect to be dealing with our nuclear waste and the problems associated with the cost of it. We need to be responsible.

Cities like Windsor, Toronto, Kingston, London, and Hamilton have all opposed this. Also rejecting the site are Oakville, Mississauga, the town of Blue Mountain, Sarnia, Lambton County, Essex, and the town of Kingsville, just to name a few.

That is why we think the bill needs a lot of work at committee. We are willing to try. This liability issue of $1 billion is a childish way to approach dealing with this serious problem. We would like to see that fixed. We will see what happens at committee in the future.

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This gives me the opportunity to say that I will be splitting my time with the member for Windsor West.

Mr. Speaker, this is an important piece of legislation. As I said, it is the fifth time that the government has tried to get this right over the past nearly 40 years. It is long overdue. It is a chance for us to try to at least catch up with what other countries are doing around the world with similar forms of liability.

Our concern is that Bill C-22 does not offer Canadians the protection they need. The bill talks about the principle of polluter pay. It would have many reassurances for Canadians, and I will concede that it would make a step forward in terms of protecting Canadians from liability in the event of an accident in this sector. However, the bill's major shortcoming is that it would set the amount of liability at just $1 billion. What that would mean is that Canadians would be on the hook for any additional costs for the cleanup.

Now, $1 billion sounds like a lot of money. However, Canadians watching this should remember that any costs in addition to the $1 billion would come from the pockets of Canadians. All Canadians would share in the liability for any costs exceeding $1 billion.

I want to give some examples of what other countries are doing and the costs of some cleanups that have taken place.

Germany, for example, has unlimited absolute nuclear liability and financial security of $3.3 billion Canadian per power plant. This is not $1 billion overall; it is $1 billion per power plant. The United States has an absolute liability limit of $12.6 billion U.S. Other countries are moving to unlimited absolute liability.

The amount of $1 billion in liability for nuclear accidents would cover just a small fraction of the costs.

I want to say that our nuclear industry in Canada has been safe. We have been fortunate that we have not had accidents that other countries have experienced. There are many people who earn their livelihoods in the oil and gas industry and the nuclear industry, and this industry has had a positive safety record compared with other countries. I want to cite, for example, Japan's 2011 nuclear disaster at Fukushima. The Government of Japan estimates that the cost of the nuclear disaster at Fukushima could cost over $250 billion. Canada is talking about a $1 billion liability in the event, God forbid, that any disaster happened here.

We have had a good record. We plan to prevent disasters. However, that is the thing with disasters; they are often unexpected.

I would argue that the higher the liability for the industry itself, the greater the focus the industry will put on preventing accidents and maximizing the safety in our facilities. That, surely, is for the greatest good of all Canadians. If the industry believes, “Okay, it's $1 billion liability and we want our facilities to be safe, but anything that exceeds $1 billion is on the hook of Canadians”, then I think that changes the thinking of those who are responsible for safety in these facilities.

Let us look at the oil and gas sector. We all remember the disastrous offshore BP oil spill of 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico. That spill is expected to cost as much as $42 billion in cleanup costs, criminal penalties, and civil claims against BP. The firm is reported to have already spent $25 billion on cleanup and compensation. In addition, it faces hundreds of new lawsuits that have been launched this spring, along with penalties under the Clean Water Act that could reach almost $17 billion. A billion dollars sounds like an enormous amount to Canadians, but they have to realize that we are talking about huge sums with the possibility of anything going wrong in this sector.

It is not just New Democrats who are speaking out on this issue and putting Canadians first, before the needs of the industry. Others as well are saying that the government needs to really keep pace with best global practices. Let me cite some other examples.

The Canadian Environmental Law Association has requested the federal government to undertake a meaningful public consultation on how the Nuclear Liability Act should be modernized and to learn from the Fukushima disaster. Natural Resources Canada has been privately consulting Canadian nuclear operators on how to revise this legislation, but these behind-door consultations with industry alone are simply unacceptable. The NLA transfers the financial risk from reactor operations from industry to Canadians. Therefore, it makes sense that Canadians should be consulted.

Martin von Mirback of the World Wildlife Fund says:

To put it bluntly, there is no oil spill response capacity to address a sizeable well blowout or large-scale spill in Arctic waters. ... In conclusion, there is currently insufficient knowledge and inadequate technology and infrastructure to safely carry out drilling in Canadian Arctic waters. More time is required to address these gaps, but this necessity can become a virtue if at the same time we collectively invest in the research, planning, infrastructure, and dialogue that are the key characteristics of responsible stewardship.

Responsible stewardship—that is what we are asking for here. Let us take advantage of this opportunity to modernize this legislation to show responsible stewardship.

Let me end with a well-known, progressive, leftist organization, the Fraser Institute, on nuclear liability caps. I quote Joel Wood, the senior research economist. He says:

Increasing the cap only decreases the subsidy [to the nuclear industry]; it does not eliminate it. The government of Canada should proceed with legislation that removes the liability cap [of $1 billion] entirely rather than legislation that maintains it, or increases it to be harmonious with other jurisdictions.

We have an opportunity that only comes around once every 40 years to protect Canadians, modernize our legislation, show that we are at least attempting to keep pace with the rest of the world, and protect the public good. Let us not fail to seize this opportunity.

[Peggy Nash, NDP, Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak on Bill C-22, an act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the nuclear liability and compensation act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act and making consequential amendments to other acts.

This particular bill is a long time coming. It is the fifth attempt by governments to improve and modernize our legislation when it comes to liability in the case of nuclear accidents, and now in the case of accidents with the oil and gas sector.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as the member of Parliament for Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, which includes the Chalk River Laboratories of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, I say thanks on behalf of the almost 3,000 employees at the facility for the opportunity to discuss Bill C-22, Energy Safety and Security Act. It is an important piece of legislation that would increase accountability in Canada's nuclear and offshore industries.

As my hon. colleagues are aware, Bill C-22 has both a nuclear and an offshore component. Given the importance of the nuclear industry to my riding of Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, I would like to speak to the nuclear aspect of the bill today.

Our Conservative government is strongly committed to responsible stewardship in support of a strong and sustainable nuclear industry in Canada. Nuclear energy is a key part of Canada's energy mix and one of the main reasons that our electricity supply is among the cleanest in the world. In fact, here in Ontario, more than half of the entire province's electricity is provided by safe, clean, and reliable nuclear power.

Canada's nuclear power industry is an important contributor to our national economy. It generates close to $5 billion a year in revenues and provides employment for more than 60,000 Canadians, most of them here in Ontario.

As Canadians, we are aware that our Conservative government is focused on Canada asserting its role as a clean energy superpower. Nuclear energy is an integral part of that energy mix. We know that modern and effective nuclear liability legislation is essential to the sustainable growth of Canada's nuclear industry. It helps to protect Canadians, and it provides stability to the entire industry.

In the highly unlikely event of a nuclear accident that results in civil damage, it is crucial that Canadians be compensated equitably and quickly. In order for that to happen, the operators of nuclear facilities must know their financial obligations so they can undertake appropriate planning. With this in mind, we are demonstrating our commitment by reintroducing legislation with new improvements to strengthen Canada's nuclear liability regime.

What most hon. members might not realize is that Canada's nuclear liability regime is already nearly 40 years old. Certainly, times and standards have changed when it comes to the nuclear industry in Canada. Therefore, this legislation clearly needs to be brought up to date.

When it comes to nuclear power, it is absolutely important to note that times have changed. Unfortunately, there are environmental extremists like Gerald Butts, the principal advisor to the trust-fund-pampered Liberal Party leader. Mr. Butts is co-author of the so-called Green Energy Act in Ontario that is causing electricity bills to skyrocket out of control, and hollowing out the manufacturing sector in Ontario as business flees to places like New York State, which receives taxpayer subsidized electricity from Ontario. These people, and others like them, are living in the past.

It used to be just the NDP that had its head in the sand when it came to economical, greenhouse gas-free nuclear power. With the dangerous presence of people like Gerald Butts, the Liberal Party has become a threat to the thousands of Canadians who work in our nuclear industry. Whenever the word “nuclear” is raised, informed Canadians, like the individuals in my riding who work in the industry, understand that the world has come a long way in 40 years when it comes to nuclear research.

When it comes to nuclear waste, the CANDU nuclear system, our Canadian nuclear success story, leaves behind a lower volume of waste due to its superior design utilizing more of the nuclear fuel than our competitors do with their light water reactors. As we work to perfect this technology, the end result is to reduce the radioactivity in spent fuel from the tens of thousands of years down to just hundreds of years or fewer, all the while generating emission-free electricity.

Our nuclear industry can supply this power, all at an economical price, compared to the industrial wind turbines that are bankrupting Ontario and making a few Liberal Party insiders rich.

Our government has sought advice from and received input on this legislation from a broad range of stakeholders over the years. They include the governments of nuclear power-generating provinces, as well as the nuclear industry. We are confident, therefore, that this legislation is a solid reflection of what we have heard from Canadians and the industry itself, both operators and insurers.

The current operator liability limit was set in 1976. This is clearly unacceptable. Under Bill C-22, our government would increase the liability beyond the current $75 million to an amount of $1 billion. This amount would put Canada's liability limit among the highest internationally. In the event there is an accident resulting in civil damages exceeding $1 billion, Bill C-22 would require the Minister of Natural Resources to table a report before Parliament estimating the cost of the damages. This report would allow the government to make any decisions about additional compensation on a case-by-case basis, and any final decision would be decided by Parliament.

Let me assure all hon. members that Bill C-22 would maintain the key strengths of the existing legislation. Most importantly, it would ensure that the liability of the operator would be absolute and exclusive. Put another way, it means that there would be no need to prove fault and no one else could be held liable. The new liability amount of $1 billion would ensure equitable compensation for civil damages—that is, within the capacity of insurers—and would not burden taxpayers.

This legislation would include a number of other significant improvements. First, it would include a new mechanism to periodically update the operator's liability. Under the legislation, the Minister of Natural Resources would have the authority to review the limit regularly and the amount could be increased by regulation. This would ensure that our nuclear liability system remained current at all times. Second, it would contain detailed new definitions of compensatory damage, including certain forms of psychological trauma, economic loss, preventive measures, and environmental damage.

Third, it would include a longer limitation period to submit compensation claims for bodily injury from the current 10 years to 30 years. The 10-year limitation period would be maintained for other forms of damage. Finally, it would elaborate the features of the quasi-judicial claims tribunal to be established to replace the regular courts if necessary. This would significantly accelerate claims payments to Canadians.

Under this legislation, operators would be permitted to guarantee their financial liability with traditional insurance and up to 50% with other forms of financial security, such as provincial government guarantees, letters of credit, and self-insurance.

The government would provide coverage for certain risks for which there is no liability insurance. It would also provide increased coverage for lower-risk nuclear facilities, such as small research reactors at universities, through indemnity agreements with operators. All of the measures I have highlighted in Bill C-22 have the same goal in mind: protecting the environment and the health and safety of Canadians.

Our government is taking concrete steps to address important issues in the nuclear sector. This includes responsibly managing legacy waste, restructuring Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, and promoting international trade. I would like to touch upon the international efforts our government has undertaken with regard to Bill C-22.

In December 2013, our Conservative government signed the international Atomic Energy Agency's Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage. By joining the convention, Canada will bolster its domestic compensation regime by up to $450 million by bringing in significant new funding for compensation. In Canada, this would bring the total potential compensation up to $1.45 billion, and by joining this convention, our government is advancing our commitment to a strong and secure global nuclear liability regime.

Given that the United States, our closest ally and neighbour, is already a member of the convention, our membership enables us to establish civil liability treaty relations with it. By becoming a member, Canada is playing an important role in making this convention one step closer to reality.