Bill C-57 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act

This enactment amends the Federal Sustainable Development Act to make decision making related to sustainable development more transparent and subject to accountability to Parliament.

Federal Sustainable Development Act

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

There is quorum in the House.

Questions and comments. The hon. parliamentary secretary to the minister of international development.

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development]

Madam Speaker, I do not know if I should be impressed or offended by the member opposite claiming to be a steward of the environment when the Conservatives so deliberately gutted environmental protection over the 10 years of their mandate. They gutted the Navigable Waters Protection Act at the time, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, the Fisheries Act, the Species at Risk Act, and I could go on. How can he stand and preach about environmental stewardship, knowing full well that his previous government blatantly abolished, dismissed, and disregarded environmental laws?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, one often gets moved by the concept of chutzpah. Today we just saw a good example of chutzpah, when someone complained about the changes to the navigable waters act, which a mere couple of hours ago an NDP members noted the Liberals had said they would change but had not done so. Words but no action, I believe, was the theme I was speaking about. Judge them by their actions. That is what Canadians are doing increasingly.

My constituents in the Lake Simcoe watershed are not the kind of people who have a lot of time to sit down and write letters. They are busy people. They have busy lives, but the cancelling of the Lake Simcoe Clean-up Fund, shutting down the best thing that has happened to the environment here in years, has had an impact.

I do not want to say bad things about my predecessor in my riding because I believe she cared passionately about the environment. She said that Lake Simcoe was her top priority. She was there for over a decade, and not one penny was provided for Lake Simcoe. There was not one legislative change to help Lake Simcoe. There were none of the regulatory changes we brought in to ban the dumping of waste waters, the mandatory rules on invasive species to stop bilge water from being dumped into the freshwater Great Lakes, and things like that. We did all of those things. There was no ban on phosphates in dishwasher detergent, like we did. None of that stuff happened. However, she did have some success at the end of her time. She was appointed Canada's ambassador for the environment. That was something.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, I sat in opposition when Stephen Harper decided to kill the Experimental Lakes project in western Canada, Ontario, the northwest, and Manitoba. The Experimental Lakes were contributing to all sorts of wonderful projects beyond the Prairies and Canada. It was a fantastic organization. If it had not been for the provincial government of Ontario, there is a chance it might not even have survived. That is a real, tangible example of Stephen Harper's actions.

If we want a tangible example from our government, within a few months we were in Paris. We came up with a national program to put a price on carbon. All provinces and territories, except one, of all political stripes got on board with it. Countries around the world support a price on carbon. Only the Conservative Party of Canada in the House of Commons does not think it is a good idea.

Why does the member feel that the Conservatives are so out of touch with Canadians on such an important environmental issue when other political parties and countries around the world are saying that it is about time we had a price on carbon?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, again, that is chutzpah at work.

This member comes from Winnipeg. Who set up the Lake Winnipeg cleanup fund? It was the very government of Stephen Harper, who the member was criticizing. It was a parallel fund to the Lake Simcoe cleanup fund. Once again, it was something that focused on real results, on the ground, for the environment. Where did it come from? It was the Conservative government once again.

The member stands up and complains about what happened. The actual facts are that in Manitoba, what happened was that the Lake Winnipeg cleanup fund was created. For the first time, there were real measures undertaken, which had never been done before by any previous government, particularly the previous federal Liberal government, which claimed to care about the environment but never spent a penny on it, not one penny.

Along came a Conservative government that did it. Why? It is because there were real results. It was not words. It was not going to a fancy conference. Jetting off to fancy conferences is Liberal action. Funding small community groups to do cleanup projects, to do tree planting, to do shoreline restoration, and to try innovative ways of reducing phosphorous inputs, working with hundreds of citizens, that is Conservative action.

It was not as fancy as the trip to Paris, and there was maybe not as much in carbon emissions as the trip to Paris, and there were maybe not as many great meals. Tim Hortons kicked in some Timbits. It was not like those fine dining opportunities the Liberals had at the climate change conference in Paris with all their friends. However, I put it to members that the Lake Simcoe cleanup fund did a lot more in terms of real results for the environment here.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Madam Speaker, my colleague speaks with much wisdom on this.

As a former park warden and conservation officer in the province of Alberta, someone who has worked for Alberta Fish and Wildlife, someone who is an active member of the Lacombe Fish and Game Association as a hunter and a fisherman, I have spent a lot of my life actually working towards conservation, real conservation that actually produces real results.

I want to thank my colleague for his eloquent speech. Money is leaving Canada to be spent in various countries around the world, billions of dollars for the climate change fund, money the World Bank has said it is using for project development in third world countries under some other means, other than combatting climate change. I am sure the member has been privy to the same discussions I have as a lowly member of Parliament, when he was an esteemed cabinet minister for year.

Would the member please elaborate on the value of something like the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters and the local groups that are actually doing real work on the ground instead?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, I went through some of the messages I was sent. I actually skipped some. There were quite a few that actually made the exact point the hon. member has made. Why is it that we are sending money overseas and at the same time are taking away the money that was helping improve our local environment? What kind of trade-off is that? Someone asked, “Is this the Government of Canada or the government of some other faraway place?”

People care about their communities. I did not want to quote those things, because I am not going to necessarily dispute that we have a role internationally. I think we have a role to help internationally. However, our very first role is to help our own communities, to get our own house in order, not the environment somewhere else. If we cannot get our own house in order, if we cannot clean up our own lakes and our own lands and focus on them, then we are not doing our job.

That is why I say that it is not words like “sustainable development” that matter but actions that show that we are actually making sustainable development happen.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, parenthetically I will note that the previous government under Stephen Harper slashed funding for the Great Lakes cleanup.

I just want to make the point to the hon. member for York—Simcoe that the Paris negotiations did not take place in the city of Paris. There were not fine dining opportunities. It was hard work in a place called Le Bourget, in a set of airport hangers. The hon. member from Okanagan can clarify for the member, because he attended, that we were in large warehouse facilities doing work to negotiate.

I would wish it was possible to negotiate among 193 countries by Skype, but it is an intensely physical process. It requires 24-hour, round-the-clock negotiations. The Paris agreement is not yet fulfilled, but it holds far more promise than anything done by the Stephen Harper administration.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have been out there in the community with young kids and senior citizens in their boots, in the mud, when it is raining and pelting us, trying to do some of these remediation works and planting trees and so on. It is not hard work; it is work they love. It is messy, dirty, cold, and tough, but that is what they are doing for their environment. They are not asking for any thanks. They are not asking for their expenses to be paid. They are Canadians who care about their country and their environment, and the Liberal government has said to them, “Your efforts do not matter. The little bit of seed funding you needed to do your stuff we are cutting off. Your view of the environment is not part of our view of the environment.”

I think that is a mistake.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-57, An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to speak to Bill C-57, an act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act.

I had the pleasure of serving as vice-chair of the environment committee when we studied the Federal Sustainable Development Act, a study that has resulted in some of the amendments before us today.

As had been noted before, the original act was an opposition private member's bill that was passed in 2008 under our previous Conservative government. Our Conservative Party recognized that sustainability needs to be included in every decision to ensure a balance between social, economic, and environmental factors. This type of policy-making ensures not only that today's generation will have a healthy and prosperous lifestyle but that we can pass health and prosperity on to future generations to come. I have 11 grandchildren and a great-grandchild. I am very proud of them. I want them to have a good life, as I have had. I want them to enjoy what I have enjoyed travelling throughout this great country of ours. I want them to appreciate the beauty of this land.

The importance of sustainable development is something on which all parties agree. This is proven by the fact that the report by the environmental committee was unanimous. While we are on that, a number of the aboriginal witnesses who came, from coast to coast to coast, to give evidence at committee also agreed that it was very important for them to be involved and that sustainable development was part of the agreement made between Canada and the aboriginal community.

Sustainable development is important to the future of Canada and our grandchildren. Not only should environmental factors be considered but social and economical pillars should be considered. For example, the National Energy Board's mandate is to promote safety and security, environmental protection, and economic efficiency in Canada's public interest and the regulation of pipelines, energy development, and trade. This ensures that Canada's pipelines are built to protect our environment while they create jobs and get our oil to foreign markets. This is one of the reasons the National Energy Board gives compliance conditions to companies, with literally hundreds of conditions on the list.

Given the board's commitment, as well as the commitment of companies, to build safe pipelines in Canada, it baffles me why the Liberal government has found it so hard to make progress on pipelines, such as the now dead energy east pipeline and the gridlocked northern gateway pipeline.

Our party is committed to sustainable development, because it is about protecting our kids and grandchildren. However, it seems that the current government is having a hard time implementing any of its policies.

In a recent report titled “Departmental progress in implementing sustainable development strategies”, tabled by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, the minister and her government were given failing grades in applying a cabinet directive. The directive requires federal departments and agencies to consider environmental concerns early in the planning of policy and program proposals before making irreversible decisions. The commissioner concluded that the directive has not been applied to almost 80% of the proposals, which is a clear failure by the Liberals. If the Liberals were in school, they would not have received a passing mark and probably would not have gone on to the next grade because of such a failure. The same thing applies in 2019. This is a one-term government. It has failed Canadians and the environment.

In another report, titled “Progress on Reducing Greenhouse Gases”, the commissioner concluded that the minister's department did not make progress toward meeting Canada's commitment to reducing greenhouse gases. Just before me, the hon. member for York—Simcoe talked about the Lake Simcoe project and Ladies of the Lake. He asked that we judge the Liberals on what they have done and not on the talk they are giving. The Liberals are all about talk and no action.

I find it hard to believe when the Liberal government says it is championing sustainable development and protecting the environment. According to the last surveys, the Liberals are not doing that. They are not doing any of that, nor are they protecting Canadian jobs in the process. With all this considered, it concerns me how the government is planning to protect future generations, not to mention the mountains of debt that the government is piling on our grandchildren, or the massive new taxes being proposed. Liberals really need to rethink their policy.

Liberals always say they have a plan, but we never see any action on that plan. It makes sense that economic, social, and environmental priorities be advanced through an integrated whole-of-government approach. We cannot advance one of these priorities while ignoring the others. This brings me to a point where I have a lot of concern. During the past break week, Parks Canada announced a hunt in Jasper Park. It was allowing aboriginals from B.C. to go into the park and hunt deer, elk, and sheep. No one was told about this until it slipped out that they were allowed to go into a designated area to shoot. Many of my hunting and fishing constituents are very upset about us taking animals from our national parks.

We cannot advance one of these priorities while ignoring the others, yet this is exactly what the Liberal government did in allowing a hunt in our national parks. It did not take everything into consideration. Canadians expect that their government will consider all three priorities when designing policy and legislation. I do not believe that last week the Liberals took all those priorities into consideration. They were trying to please a small group of Canadians and ignored the interests, economic viability, and the environment in doing so.

The Liberals seem to forget about the economic aspect. If we are going to allow hunting in our parks, one of the largest attractions in our national parks are the animals. When I travel through the national park going to Jasper, which is in my riding, I love to stop on the side of the road and look at the elk and deer. In fact, I feed approximately 15 deer in my yard every winter. I love watching them in front of the house, and they stay there during the day. It costs me a little money, but I believe I am helping the environment and I am helping the deer.

We have a government that is allowing people to go into our national parks and to hunt there just to meet some of the Liberals' ideas. They think they are doing the right thing. However, they are not consulting with all the groups that should be consulted. I know that many people working within the parks were very upset when this was brought to their attention only days before the hunt started.

Instead of considering the economic component, the government has completely neglected our economy and the importance of small businesses across Canada. As Conservatives, we have confidence in the private sector and small and large businesses. They all contribute to the prosperity of this country, and they should be encouraged rather than punished for the risk they take. The government's approach to sustainable development and its policies seems very lopsided from the economic factors.

I was extremely disappointed this summer when I learned what the government proposed to do with the tax changes for corporations. I was very sad to hear two weeks ago about the cancellation of the energy east pipeline. Why? It is over-regulated. Liberals changed the regulations midstream, making it economically not viable for the company to proceed.The government is throwing in rules and regulations to make it not economically viable to retrieve natural resources from this country that help our economy, help develop jobs, and so on.

I have heard from small business owners, farmers, nurses, doctors, and accountants from all over my riding of Yellowhead, who tell me that the tax changes would endanger their businesses and family farms. In my riding of Yellowhead, which is in Alberta, the effective tax rate on investment income could be well over 70%, and new capital gains rules would make it more expensive to pass down a family farm then to sell it to a third party.

I was serving at a farmers appreciation breakfast on Saturday in the community of Wildwood. A couple of people came to me who were very concerned about their children taking over the family farm. They are third generation, and their fourth generation wants to take over the farm, but they are terrified by this tax. They are not sure which way to go, whether they should sell it to an outside concern or see their children struggle to try to buy it due to the unfair tax system that the Liberal government is planning.

A just and fair tax system should reward success and reasonable risk-taking. Most small business people take a tremendous amount of risk.

My son-in-law is a small businessman. He has a small oil company in the town of Edson. He has been successful. His company has grown. He employs over 100 people during the winter months. He is taking a large financial risk to employ these 100 people and to increase the economy of the town of Edson, the riding of Yellowhead, the province of Alberta, and the economy of Canada. He takes the risk, yet the government across from us wants to punish him for taking that risk. If he makes a little extra money and puts it aside, the government wants to punish him and take it. The government wants to tax it, up to 73%. Is that fair?

Going forward, I hope the government will honestly consider sustainable development throughout its departments when drafting new proposals. Again I go back to the commissioner's report, which said that the government failed. There are 80% of departments that did not comply with what they were asked to do. That is alarming. It is a total failure.

One of the amendments to Bill C-57 would require more departments and agencies to contribute to the federal sustainable development strategy, bringing the total to 90 departments and agencies. That is a lot of departments. Currently, only 26 departments are affected.

The bill would also require them to prepare strategies and to table progress reports on their implementation. If we go by today's figures, a failure rate of 80%, only about 18 departments out of 90 would possibly do what they are supposed to do. That would be if we follow what has been happening over the last two years with the government. That is sad statistical data.

We cannot continue to be so short-sighted in policy-making that we rack up billions of dollars in debt, and yet the Liberal government is doing exactly that. When the Liberals were elected, they said they would have a small deficit of about $10 billion, but that grew to well over $30 billion in the first year and the second year. We will probably be shocked at what it will be in the third year, but we have to wait and see.

I have four children, and we taught them when they got their first credit cards that they should not accumulate long-term debt in exchange for short-term unnecessary spending. We taught them not to spree and buy things they cannot really afford, that it might be nice to have a credit card, but if they cannot pay for them, not to buy. The current Liberal government is not setting a good example for my grandchildren; your grandchildren, Madam Speaker; the grandchildren of the secretary of state across there; and the hon. member directly across from me whose son is in the RCMP and is going to have to pay. We need to be cognizant of the money that the government is spending.

However, let us remember one thing. Sustainable development is a requirement in this country. This is an energy-producing country, and whether mining companies, oil companies, or gas companies, if a sitting government puts numerous hurdles in front of them that make it impossible for the companies to do economic research and development, where is the money going to come from to pay the bills of the government? Right now, the Liberals are blocking that. The oil and gas sector was one of the largest contributors to Canada's economy, and the Liberals have made it virtually impossible to take the natural products from the earth, the oil and gas in the provinces of B.C., Alberta, and Saskatchewan, and get them to an international market. The government members across think it is all right that we can just ship it down to the United States and we should be happy with that. That is one market. It is a big brother that controls us pretty hard. Will we get fair world prices on our oil and gas products? The country of Canada would be much better off if we could get our products, especially the oil and gas, to our coastal ports. Whether it be the east coast or the west coast, or even into the James Bay area, it would make it very reasonable.

We heard discussions yesterday about the ban on oil tankers on the west coast of British Columbia. We heard people standing up across from us, over to our left, talking about how unsafe it was to have oil tankers on the west coast of British Columbia. Under the pressure of the current sitting Prime Minister, they want to put a ban on oil tankers on the west coast. It is so bad, but it is okay on the east coast. Yesterday, one of the Liberal members was talking about how bad it was. I explained that when they go up the inlet into Stewart, which is about 130 or 140 miles, the line goes up the centre, so on one side of the inlet they can have a tanker, and on the other half they cannot. The Liberals are trying to tell us, logistically, that it is unsafe on one half of the inlet but it is okay on the other half. This is the logic that the current government is passing on. When we go back to the commissioner, and I brought her up a few times, it is obvious that same logic is being passed down hill to our bureaucrats, because we failed.

The Liberals have not reduced greenhouse gases one bit since they have been in government. I can stand here and say that when the Conservatives were in government, we did decrease carbon gases, in transportation and in coal-fired energy. They cannot say that. It is a failing mark. It is easy to talk, but when we walk the talk, it is much more difficult. Our former Conservative governments walked the talk. The current government just talks the talk, and there is no form of action.

Therefore, I am looking forward to this bill moving to the committee stage, so that it can be studied more and have more input and more evidence received.

[Bob Bratina, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have the greatest respect for my friend from Yellowhead, and I plead ignorance on the notion of animal welfare and species in his part of the world. I have travelled through it on my way to visit my son in the Peace River country, so I see a little, but I am a little puzzled. In our part of the world, first nations, under the direction of Parks Canada, are culling deer herds that are destroying the sustainability not only of farmlands but of the deer herds themselves.

Would my friend from Yellowhead tell me how sustainability works with the deer he is feeding, as opposed to allowing first nations, which were coming back to the traditional lands from which they were taken, to look after this issue?

I am puzzled, and I am sure the member for Yellowhead will have a good answer, but could he tell me how feeding wild deer is a sustainable practice?

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Madam Speaker, using aboriginal communities to cull herds in specific protected spaces is nothing new. I grew up in a community called Chipman, Alberta. It is about 35 miles east of Edmonton. Elk Island National Park is there. It is famous for its buffalo herd. We moved there in about 1959. In 1960, my dad worked for Parks Canada. It had a culling program going on at that time. Some of the aboriginal communities were invited as were local farmers. They kept the herd down to a manageable size. There was only so much land, and as we know, buffalo take a large amount of land to roam, as do caribou and elk. Therefore, we need to look at conservation in these areas.

I have no problem in some of the northern parts of our country where aboriginal people are hunting to keep the herds culled to a manageable number to sustain the growth of the herds, etc. However, in the case I brought up, it was a traditional hunt, because their forefathers hunted in the park. It has nothing to do with culling the herd or anything like that. However, 12 different aboriginal groups claim rights to Jasper National Park and Banff National Park. If all 12 groups want to hunt, that becomes very serious. If we open the door, we have to be prepared for the flood.

Yes, I feed deer. Do I call it sustainability? Yes, because the mother keeps coming back with twins every year and the twins are starting to come back with young ones. I call that sustainability. The herd is growing.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, I was not able to put a question to the member for Yellowhead after a particularly moving address he gave to the House a few days ago. It was relevant to the topic of sustainable development. He included an anecdote, I believe about his grandfather, who put mud directly from the land into an open wound from a farming accident. I wanted to share with the hon. member that I found his grandfather's connection to the land very moving, and also very profound.

I would like to thank him for his role as vice-chair of the environment committee, because it certainly was the unanimous report that has led to the amendments before us today.

In the work of a sustainable development strategy for a whole-of-government approach, could the member see ways in which procurement by government agencies could advance sustainable development through the government's purchasing powers?

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is very important that government invests in sustainability. I encouraged that our committee report put a special fund aside to pick up land that may be very crucial for the sustainability of maybe the animals in the area, or maybe for industry that might be affected. We have a lot of concerns about the cariboo situation in a number of areas. However, cariboo, which is an endangered species in some areas, could be affected by industry. The government could work with industry, maybe to buy out the land it might have rights to. It is very important there is a fund to pick up more protected lands in Canada.