Bill C-13 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Food and Drugs Act, the Hazardous Products Act, the Radiation Emitting Devices Act, the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, the Pest Control Products Act and the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act and to make related amendments to another Act

This enactment enables Canada to implement the Agreement on Trade Facilitation, which was done at Geneva by members of the World Trade Organization, including Canada, on November 27, 2014, as an amendment to Annex 1A of the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization.
It amends the Food and Drugs Act, the Hazardous Products Act, the Radiation Emitting Devices Act, the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, the Pest Control Products Act and the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act, to bring them into conformity with Canada’s obligations under the Agreement on Trade Facilitation.
It also makes related amendments to another Act.

Food and Drugs Act

[Jane Philpott, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-13, An Act to amend the Food and Drugs Act, the Hazardous Products Act, the Radiation Emitting Devices Act, the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, the Pest Control Products Act and the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act and to make related amendments to another Act.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Phil Benson, Lobbyist, Teamsters Canada]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My name is Phil Benson. I'm a lobbyist with Teamsters Canada, and with me today is Don Ashley, national legislative director for the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, TCRC.

With our maintenance of way division, the Teamsters represent about 65% of rail labour, and almost all of the running trades.

Safety management systems, SMS, are nothing more than corporate best practice. Every company should have one. There was no need to incorporate safety management systems into legislation, other than to deregulate a sector and provide self-governance and self-regulation to corporations. Studies and committee reviews of rail safety in 2009 and 2010 were driven by a Transport Canada study of rail safety management systems.

When they actually inspected rail equipment and track, it was discovered the information provided by companies and the resulting Transport Canada audits were pure fiction. That led to the 2011 amendments to the Rail Safety Act, which changed the SMS provisions. We do not know if the amendments will make any difference; we assume that the companies did not want the changes, as no action was taken to implement the amendments until after the Lac-Mégantic disaster forced the government's hand.

At the end of the last Parliament, Bill C-52 further amended the Rail Safety Act, giving the minister the power to order companies to make corrective measures to their SMS and also to remove the requirement that fatigue management must follow science. Given that the minister's corrective powers show the lack of faith the past government had in the SMS regime, can we say that even the Conservatives had doubts about corporate intentions?

The government has allocated $143 million in this budget to enhance rail safety, including strengthening oversight and enforcement. Added to the monies expended by the last government, we're approaching $175 million in taxpayers' money to shore up—from what you've heard from previous witnesses—an existing strong, safe regulatory scheme. If the Rail Safety Act were amended post-Lac-Mégantic, it would not look like the act we have in place today. We recommend you review that act and review it soon.

We were puzzled when Bill C-52 removed the requirement that fatigue management must follow science. We were told that it was to overcome problems in drafting regulations, and that it would be and is part of the regulations. First, the 2011 act was passed unanimously by voice vote in the House and the Senate, where all discussion was focused on fatigue.

At the time the act was passed, we were informed that the justice department demanded the definition of science within the act to ensure that regulations could be created to fulfill the wishes of Parliament. In our opinion, companies didn't like the fact that Parliament wanted fatigue dealt with based on science-based evidence. Thank goodness we now have a government that demands it in rule-making.

The Hinton disaster led to what are by today's knowledge weak control over work hours, leaving the rest to collective bargaining. For over six decades, through the application of back-to-work legislation, Parliament violated the constitutional rights of railway workers to collectively bargain to strike.

Collective bargaining will not be normalized, and it will be impossible for hours of work to be adequately dealt with through the bargaining process, unless charter rights are protected. Hours of work are set by regulation in trucking and air and should never be left to collective bargaining in the first place: fix it for rail.

I've given you a little chart that highlights the monthly rest rule violations. These are the collective bargaining violations by one company over a three-year period. I think the current tally is 5,000. Why? When you leave it to a company, collective bargaining in this becomes a cost of doing business and has no place in setting regulations that provide health and safety to workers and safety to the public.

Fatigue science is clear: long hours of work and fatigue lead to disease and cognitive damage. Transport Canada's mandate is to ensure an efficient transportation system, protect public safety, and to make companies money. Labour Canada would not permit the long hours TCR members work because it is a health issue. Transport Canada cannot look at the damage caused to health in dealing with fatigue science because it is not in their mandate. Science-based rule-making demands that the silo approach of departments ends.

We recommend, first, that Labour Canada takes the lead when Transport Canada deals with hours of work and fatigue in rail and all transportation sectors. At a minimum, Labour Canada must be at the table and the health of workers must be part of the science-based rule-making process in Transport Canada. Second, the Rail Safety Act should be amended to give Transport Canada the power to set hours of work, as is the case in other sectors.

The minister does have the power to change those basic rules now. This is more in the reference of safety management systems, which Mr. Ashley will deal with.

Also, we recommend that a joint study be undertaken by Health Canada, Labour Canada, and Transport Canada to assess the health costs of fatigue in the transportation and publicly funded health care sectors and of the social costs to transportation workers, their families, and society.

Brother Ashley.