Bill C-69 (Historical)

An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

Part 1 enacts the Impact Assessment Act and repeals the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012. Among other things, the Impact Assessment Act
(a) names the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada as the authority responsible for impact assessments;
(b) provides for a process for assessing the environmental, health, social and economic effects of designated projects with a view to preventing certain adverse effects and fostering sustainability;
(c) prohibits proponents, subject to certain conditions, from carrying out a designated project if the designated project is likely to cause certain environmental, health, social or economic effects, unless the Minister of the Environment or Governor in Council determines that those effects are in the public interest, taking into account the impacts on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada, all effects that may be caused by the carrying out of the project, the extent to which the project contributes to sustainability and other factors;
(d) establishes a planning phase for a possible impact assessment of a designated project, which includes requirements to cooperate with and consult certain persons and entities and requirements with respect to public participation;
(e) authorizes the Minister to refer an impact assessment of a designated project to a review panel if he or she considers it in the public interest to do so, and requires that an impact assessment be referred to a review panel if the designated project includes physical activities that are regulated under the Nuclear Safety and Control Act, the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Resources Accord Implementation Act and the Canada–Newfoundland and Labrador Atlantic Accord Implementation Act;
(f) establishes time limits with respect to the planning phase, to impact assessments and to certain decisions, in order to ensure that impact assessments are conducted in a timely manner;
(g) provides for public participation and for funding to allow the public to participate in a meaningful manner;
(h) sets out the factors to be taken into account in conducting an impact assessment, including the impacts on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada;
(i) provides for cooperation with certain jurisdictions, including Indigenous governing bodies, through the delegation of any part of an impact assessment, the joint establishment of a review panel or the substitution of another process for the impact assessment;
(j) provides for transparency in decision-making by requiring that the scientific and other information taken into account in an impact assessment, as well as the reasons for decisions, be made available to the public through a registry that is accessible via the Internet;
(k) provides that the Minister may set conditions, including with respect to mitigation measures, that must be implemented by the proponent of a designated project;
(l) provides for the assessment of cumulative effects of existing or future activities in a specific region through regional assessments and of federal policies, plans and programs, and of issues, that are relevant to the impact assessment of designated projects through strategic assessments; and
(m) sets out requirements for an assessment of environmental effects of non-designated projects that are on federal lands or that are to be carried out outside Canada.
Part 2 enacts the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, which establishes the Canadian Energy Regulator and sets out its composition, mandate and powers. The role of the Regulator is to regulate the exploitation, development and transportation of energy within Parliament’s jurisdiction.
The Canadian Energy Regulator Act, among other things,
(a) provides for the establishment of a Commission that is responsible for the adjudicative functions of the Regulator;
(b) ensures the safety and security of persons, energy facilities and abandoned facilities and the protection of property and the environment;
(c) provides for the regulation of pipelines, abandoned pipelines, and traffic, tolls and tariffs relating to the transmission of oil or gas through pipelines;
(d) provides for the regulation of international power lines and certain interprovincial power lines;
(e) provides for the regulation of renewable energy projects and power lines in Canada’s offshore;
(f) provides for the regulation of access to lands;
(g) provides for the regulation of the exportation of oil, gas and electricity and the interprovincial oil and gas trade; and
(h) sets out the process the Commission must follow before making, amending or revoking a declaration of a significant discovery or a commercial discovery under the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act and the process for appealing a decision made by the Chief Conservation Officer or the Chief Safety Officer under that Act.
Part 2 also repeals the National Energy Board Act.
Part 3 amends the Navigation Protection Act to, among other things,
(a) rename it the Canadian Navigable Waters Act;
(b) provide a comprehensive definition of navigable water;
(c) require that, when making a decision under that Act, the Minister must consider any adverse effects that the decision may have on the rights of the Indigenous peoples of Canada;
(d) require that an owner apply for an approval for a major work in any navigable water if the work may interfere with navigation;
(e)  set out the factors that the Minister must consider when deciding whether to issue an approval;
(f) provide a process for addressing navigation-related concerns when an owner proposes to carry out a work in navigable waters that are not listed in the schedule;
(g) provide the Minister with powers to address obstructions in any navigable water;
(h) amend the criteria and process for adding a reference to a navigable water to the schedule;
(i) require that the Minister establish a registry; and
(j) provide for new measures for the administration and enforcement of the Act.
Part 4 makes consequential amendments to Acts of Parliament and regulations.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

All these bills, Bill C-49, Bill C-50and Bill C-69, which is from a previous Parliament, obviously have a far-reaching impact across this country.

If I recall correctly, after I moved my subamendment, I was speaking to the types of witnesses we would need and the importance of them. I moved the subamendment because we need to hear from witnesses from all across the country.

Mr. Chair, I promised you earlier that I would talk about the good people from southeastern Saskatchewan—actually, south Saskatchewan, the southeast corner of my riding. Geographically it would just be the due south of Saskatchewan there in Coronach and Rockglen and Willow Bunch. It's a great part of the province, a great part of the country.

There are going to be witnesses coming from that region for sure, but, as you know, the reason we have the subamendment is to make sure we don't forget about other parts of the country that are going to be impacted potentially by Bill C-49 and Bill C-50 but also if we do not make changes to Bill C-69. We do know this is the “don't build anything” bill, as it's now become and as we've heard numerous times in committee, whether this committee or industry or environment or any other. Even in finance we hear that regularly. I think it's important that we make sure we address Bill C-69 with witnesses from all over.

I know some of my colleagues from Atlantic Canada are looking forward to bringing witnesses as well. They are obviously going to be bringing in multiple witnesses for multiple pieces of legislation, whether it's Bill C-49 or Bill C-69. I'm sure they will be very keenly interested in Bill C-50, because the fate of Bill C-49 is going to be tied to what happens with the just transition as well, since they are from part of the country that generates its electricity largely from coal and other means. They will also be disproportionately impacted by all the pieces of legislation we're talking about in the motion, the common-sense amendment and the subamendment.

I spoke a little bit about the jobs that are going to be impacted in Saskatchewan. I spoke a little bit about what's happening in Alberta as well, and in Atlantic Canada. I think it's important that we get a good list of witnesses.

Really, people are going to be concerned and talking at length, I would imagine, about the Supreme Court ruling.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Oh, thank you.

Mr. Chair, I was speaking about the fact that Saskatchewan relies on natural gas and coal for the majority of its baseload power right now. Interestingly enough, on their website for the Government of Saskatchewan—it actually lists this on the SaskPower portion of that website—you can go through and you can see where the province, within the previous 24 hours, got its energy from. You can see where all the kilowatt hours were produced and where they came from. Routinely, about 70% of that was drawn from natural gas and coal. The third highest would be hydro power there. We have a couple of hydro dams in Saskatchewan. Unfortunately, I don't know that we would actually be able to build and complete one single hydro dam in the amount of time that the government is trying to phase out fossil fuels.

We've heard about timelines for approvals. That's part of the problem with Bill C-69, and now we have the largely unconstitutional part with what the Supreme Court made their ruling on. There's also the practicality of what we are going to replace the generation of gas and coal with.

We look at how long it has taken for a few hydro projects around the country to be complete. We're talking decades. Yet the government has this plan that by 2035 there will not be any natural gas. Natural gas would be basically banned at that point in time. Coal is suppose to be gone by 2030. We're seeing some difficulty around the country in trying to get the reliability factor for wind and solar. We've seen the blocking of new technologies such as tidal power already. Now that wasn't in Saskatchewan where the tidal project was moved, of course. It's a landlocked province. I'm just speaking generally about around the country how that's going to work and how that's going to play out.

With wind and solar, solar regularly accounts for less than one per cent of the power usage and energy consumption in Saskatchewan. Wind is regularly less than 10%. It's regularly a single-digit number. Sometimes, it goes a little bit higher. Sometimes it's a little bit lower. Specifically, people are concerned about peak usage and peak demand, right?

Now, for those of you who don't follow the weather patterns of Saskatchewan, in the past week, it's been as cold as -15° already and -19° in some areas. I think it's important that people realize that this assertion that you can just throw a heat pump or two on and you'll be good in the middle of winter—I mean, already in October, most heat pumps wouldn't have worked in Saskatchewan. I think it's important that this be noted.

In fact, when I was driving home on Friday after flying home from Ottawa, one of the news talk radio shows in Saskatchewan had a conversation around heat pumps. There are people who do use them up at their cabins. The people who have them speak specifically to how that is a three-season solution, mainly because it can be used as an air conditioner in the summer. You might be able to get some warmth in late May or early May at the cabin. Certainly, September into October you can get a little bit of warmth out of it.

As I said, it's already been close to -20° in Saskatchewan. That's a common occurrence at this time of year. If you look at October, November, December, January, February, March and into April, the majority of the year, you're not even going to be able to use that as a source of heat in your home reliably.

I think that it's important to have that on the table. We talk about the issue of a supposedly just transition and where people are going to get their energy from to heat their homes, to do their laundry, to cool their homes, and we have those severe differences in our temperatures from summer to winter.

We can be in the plus mid-thirties or in the minus mid-thirties, and sometimes you can see that in a span of a week, depending on the time of year. It's important that people have reliable energy, reliable power.

That's why Bill C-49, Bill C-69 and Bill C-50 all need to be discussed, but it's also why Bill C-69 needs to be dealt with first: because Canada's strategic advantage over the last number of decades has been the affordable, reliable, sustainable energy sources that we have in this country.

There are many countries around the world that would be jealous and envious of the situation we have with our abundance in natural resources and also the diversity of ways in which we generate power and our energy. I think it would be important for us to make sure we keep that. Certainly, Bill C-69 has been a barrier to enabling that to continue, because our population continues to grow, which is always a good thing.... It's good to see our population growing, but it also means that we're going to need more energy.

It's interesting to note that it's not going to be very long before, in a province like Quebec, which has a very robust hydro-powered grid, demand is going to outgrow capacity. I'll give credit to Quebec. They do have one of the more robust energy...where's the specific phrase I had here for it? Its grid is one of the most extensive systems in North America. To their credit, that includes the Americans. Also to their credit, they have a very extensive system, but that doesn't change the fact that if we don't have the capacity we need to continue to grow our population, it becomes a problem. That's where Bill C-69 comes into play.

Certainly, the folks in Atlantic Canada want to see growth in their capacity to produce energy, to produce power, and that's why they want to see Bill C-69 dealt with and addressed, but because it's also tied in with Bill C-49, which is obviously the Atlantic accords, that is why we have a motion and an amendment before us here today.

When we talk about what's happened in other provinces.... For example, with the coal transition that supposedly happened, there were thousands of people who at the end of it were put out of work. They were not transitioned to new jobs. We've seen entire towns in Alberta decimated by that. Bill C-50 is the government's attempt at doing this across the entire country, which is why Conservatives talk about the hundreds of thousands of jobs that are going to be lost, eliminated, because we do have a model to go on that the government has tried.

We've heard in other committee studies about how, when there was a transition that was going to happen in fisheries, it just didn't work. Mr. Angus has talked about how workers have been left out in his riding when it comes to plants being shut down or mining projects being closed. I think it's important that this Bill C-69 that has been looming over our country for the last four or five years gets dealt with, gets addressed and gets prioritized.

Mr. Chair, when it comes to a potential subamendment, I think of one thing that would help to make the original motion work.

I'm just going to discuss this out loud here. I'm not officially moving anything. I just want to talk this out quickly. Some of the dates that are trying to be prescribed in this programming motion obviously are going to be problematic.

In order to make sure that this motion works, getting rid of those dates or bumping them down the calendar at least a little bit, for the flexibility of the committee to be able to properly and appropriately deal with the study—I'm just thinking out loud here—removing those dates is probably going to be best.

We want to make sure that we hear from Canadians, from employers, employees, and certainly we'll hear from the private sector unions. We're definitely going to hear from people who aren't in a union, because we have heard from many people that if we talk about what this just transition supposedly is going to do, it's going to drastically impact the work of folks who don't belong to a union.

When we talk about the indirect jobs, that number is huge as well. We have to make sure that it considers those folks.

That's part of why I think putting in rigid timelines in the programming motion is going to be problematic. It also is going to be a barrier to getting the proper ordering of the motion with the amendment in it that my colleague from Lakeland moved. It would be appropriate for us to look at removing that.

With that, Mr. Chair, I'm going to move a subamendment that in section 3, as it's been ordered by my colleague from Lakeland, there be a subamendment that we would remove the reference to the dates in paragraph (a).

Paragraph (a) would read, “That the minister and officials be invited to appear before the committee on Bill C-50”. We'll just leave that open-ended so that we have that flexibility as a committee. Then (b) would say, “That the minister and officials...”. I think we would have to remove (b) all together. Again, that's one that's prescribing. It's programming a set date for officials in there. We haven't even agreed to our witness list yet. We have to do that first before we can start putting dates in there for what point officials should appear.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Thank you, Chair.

I thank my colleague for her respectful intervention there.

No, I've been working toward.... I've been speaking off the motion and the amendment here. I think it would be important, Mr. Chair, that, first of all....

I'm working on a subamendment here, looking at the original motion. When we order Bill C-49 and Bill C-69 ahead of Bill C-50, obviously it will cause some issues, I think, with the original motion as it is. I'm just kind of working toward that subamendment that I think will be needed to address a few things here.

I just wanted to finish a thought I had about the impact on jobs in Saskatchewan. You know, 41% of our available generating capacity comes from gas, and 26% comes from coal. We're already looking at close to 70% of our energy capacity being gas and coal. Yes, we have the just transition legislation in front of the committee, but it still doesn't lay out a plan or a path to actually do something to replace that. It's just a plan to have a plan. That's essentially what that bill is.

I think this speaks to why the priority and the precedent should be given to Bill C-49 first and foremost, so that we can deal with that issue. If we're going to change the generating capacity in Saskatchewan, we need the regulatory certainty to be dealt with, which the government is trying to ignore in Bill C-69. If we don't deal with that, how will any provinces, for that matter, whether it be Saskatchewan or Alberta or whether it be the Maritimes, as we're seeing with the Atlantic accord, deal with that?

Bill C-69 clearly needs to be the priority for this committee. That is the point we have been trying to make all along here. I think it will be important to get to those bills first, to Bill C-49 and Bill C-69, ahead of Bill C-50.

National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to talk on the update to Bill C-34, an act to amend the Investment Canada Act.

When it comes to business investment, it is clear that, after eight years under the Prime Minister and the Liberals, the government is not worth the cost. Since coming into power, business investment per employee in Canada has actually dropped 20%. At the same time, business investment per employee in the U.S. has actually increased 14%. It puts things into perspective in terms of Canada's dropping productivity and, as we go forward, the fear of declining prosperity in our country. What is more shocking is that, in the very final year of the Harper government, Canada's business investment, as a percentage of GDP, was actually higher than that of the U.S. After eight years of the government, we are at about 15% lower.

According to the National Bank of Canada, for the first time ever, business investment is now lower in this country than housing investment is. We can think about all the manufacturing, oil production and everything else. The investment is actually lower than it is in housing.

Manufacturing capital stock is the lowest that we have had since 1988. Two-thirds of our 15 main industries experienced declines in business investments under the government, including wholesale trade, accommodation and food services, utilities, professional services and manufacturing. All these numbers fell prepandemic; this is not because of the pandemic.

The Business Council of B.C. has issued a report on investment in Canada, calling it “Stuck in the slow lane”. What better title is there for what is going on right now with investment in our country than being stuck in the slow lane? The report noted that, out of 38 members in the OECD, Canada is going to have the slowest economic growth over the next decades. We will have the lowest real GDP per capita growth in the OECD going forward. That has been brought up, I think, in previous speeches about Bill C-34 in this House. The report lists several reasons for this, among them, inefficient regulatory approvals. Does anyone remember Bill C-69? Of course, we have seen Bill C-69 ruled against by the Supreme Court. Hopefully, the government will recognize what the Supreme Court has said and eliminate Bill C-69; however, Bill C-69 was only one of many regulatory burdens added by the government that has chased away business investment in this country.

The Business Council of B.C. also noted punitive tax rates as companies grow; lack of relief for energy-intensive, trade-exposed industries under the carbon tax regime; and high internal trade restrictions. Something also noted in this report is that our anemic business investment would be all the worse if it backed Alberta out. Alberta has the highest per capita investment in the entire country. If we back out Alberta, our numbers are even worse. What do we get with the government? Every possible regulatory move, every possible attempt to strangle the growth in Alberta. Therefore, we have one province driving most of the business investment in this country, and the government is trying to destroy it.

There will be some members across the way, such as, perhaps, the member for Winnipeg North, who will get up to ask this: Are there not some things the government has done? Would we not agree that it is good? There are some things the government has done to spur business investment in Canada, such as green-lighting the purchase of ITF Technologies by a China-based company. This was a deal that the Harper Conservatives had kiboshed. The Liberals reversed it and allowed a China-based company to buy out ITF Technologies. ITF has done national security work with National Defence, and the government overrode the ban on a purchase by a China-based company. We should remember that China's national intelligence law of 2017 requires companies to “support, assist and cooperate with state intelligence work”.

I will read that part again. It says Chinese companies “shall support, assist and co-operate with state intelligence work”, and we have the government approving the sale of a technology company that has done work for National Defence. It waived the security review of the Chinese takeover of Vancouver's Norsat, despite Norsat being involved in communication tech for Public Safety Canada, the defence department and the Coast Guard. Norsat had also done work for the Pentagon. The U.S. and our Five Eyes allies asked us not to allow the sale to go through, but it did.

When not allowing the sale of sensitive tech companies, the Liberals are going out of their way to bring Chinese regime companies into our security systems, such as Nuctech, which my colleague from Barrie—Innisfil talked about. Nuctech is called the Huawei of scanners. It is a Chinese-based company partially owned by the Chinese state. It has been fined, charged and convicted around the world over various fraud, regulatory and spying issues, and the government went out of its way to give it a contract to bring its technology into every embassy we have around the country.

The CBSA, which is meant to protect us, for some reason basically jury-rigged the RFP to ensure that only Nuctech, ahead of two Canadian companies, one in Quebec and one in Calgary, got the contract. It wrote in the requirements the exact specifications of a type of scanner, down to exactly how many inches across and how many inches high, and guess what. Only one company in all of the world happened to have a scanner that was 33 inches across and 21 inches high: Nuctech. Oddly enough, PSPC warned the government not to buy it, and the CBSA went ahead anyway.

When this was exposed, the government said it would hire an outside consulting company to do a review. Apparently, McKinsey was not available at the time, so it hired Deloitte, and for a quarter of a million dollars, Deloitte did what had been done at the mighty OGGO. Of course, I cannot make a speech without mentioning the operations and estimates committee. Deloitte exposed the fallacy of buying equipment from Chinese security companies. For a quarter of a million dollars, it came out with a four-page report that basically said Canada should not buy sensitive IT technology from despotic regimes.

I went to the West Edmonton Mall that week with the report and randomly asked kids and adults, strangers, about this, and they all laughed. Not one person said we should buy sensitive technology from despotic regimes.

I appreciate that the government is finally getting around to updating the issue with Bill C-34, but one major change the Conservatives would like to see is taking away the ability of a minister to make the final decision. We would like to see a minister bring it to cabinet so that cabinet is consulted. For an issue as important as our state security, too much power is left with the minister. The minister should be required to bring the purchase of a sensitive company elsewhere. Whether it is a mining company or a tech company, it should not be the role of the minister to decide. We have seen the government repeatedly bring bills to the House that would give ministerial power over such a thing, and we would like to see that change.

There were a couple of other amendments we brought up that were shut down, and I would like the government to reconsider them. One of them would modify the definition of a state-owned enterprise to include any company or entity headquartered in an authoritarian state. This goes back to my previous comment about the Chinese intelligence law that forces those companies to act and assist in concert with that regime.

I will just briefly bring up a couple of other amendments that we would like to see. One is listing specific sectors necessary to preserve our national security rather than a systematic approach. Another is exempting non-Canadian Five Eyes intelligence state-owned enterprises from the security review.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Exactly. He's going to get a chance to learn today how important Canada's energy future is to our generation, to his generation and to the generation that is going to follow after his and how our country is going to work.

It's an important opportunity for us to discuss the division of powers in this country as well, because Bill C-69, as the Supreme Court of Canada clearly ruled, has trampled all over that. That is why there is a priority and a precedence on our side to see that we deal with Bill C-49 first, because it directly quotes and references Bill C-69 no less than 33 times.

It is causing some grief for members on the other side that we keep talking about Bill C-69, but, because they are so incredibly linked together, we continue to hammer home this point. We want to make sure that people understand that, in order for us to properly get the best result for Canadians, we are going to start with Bill C-49, which means that we have to deal with Bill C-69 and, as the amendment that was moved states at the very end in point 2—it's a very simple line that we have at the bottom—we complete consideration of Bill C-49.

What that is doing is ordering Bill C-49 to be first. Deal with Bill C-69, as part of it ties in with Bill C-49, but we are going to complete deliberation on Bill C-49 and, at that point, at the end of the amendment, point number 3 would then be the a), b), c), d), e), f), g), h) and i) that was part of the original motion. It includes the original wording and lettering of the original motion, but it includes direction to have an order prioritizing Bill C-49 in advance. It's a very substantive amendment, and I really appreciate the wording that we have in it here, which we came up with to make sure that it was compliant and in order.

It might be worth going over that one more time. At the start of the motion, point 1 is going to be that first we undertake the study on Bill C-69. It references in the opening dialogue about the need to do Bill C-49. We're already establishing that those two bills are going to be part of the motion.

We're going to say that we first undertake the following study on Bill C-69:

1. First undertake the following study on Bill C-69: “Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling that Bill C-69, An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, is unconstitutional; for the purposes of this study, the committee: (a) hold at least 5 meetings, (b) invite the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and the Minister of the Environment and Climate Change to appear for one hour each, (c) report its findings and recommendations to the House and, (d) pursuant to Standing Order 109, request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report.”, then 2. Complete its consideration of Bill C-49.

That's effectively—if I'm allowed to use the term—killing two birds with one stone here, because, when we deal with Bill C-49, we have to deal with Bill C-69. We have to start with BIll C-69 to make sure that Bill C-49 is compliant with that law that is now in place. It has been largely unconstitutional since its implementation, which the government was warned about back then and continues to be warned about now.

This is why we want to prioritize the order of the bills that we have here in this amendment.

There are a few parts to Mr. Sorbara's motion that are still going to have to be addressed and dealt with, possibly in a subamendment.

Before we get to that, Mr. Chair, I think we need to really discuss the impacts that this will have if we don't deal with Bill C-69.

I have read a little bit about Saskatchewan and their response to the reference case and the importance of that. I'll just remind members that at no point in history has a government ignored a reference case. They've always acted upon it and prioritized it. Let's take Saskatchewan as an example. We hear a lot about the government doing consultations and how they've been very engaging with people. Well, only about 15% of Saskatchewanians have heard of the just transition. I would suspect that if the other 85% knew what was happening and what was going on, people would have a lot of concerns.

In particular, as we have seen and heard, the government's initial attempt at a just transition of coal workers substantively and spectacularly failed. I'll get to that in a bit. People have seen their energy prices already go up. That has already happened. At this point, the shuttering of our coal plants has not fully happened just yet, but we have seen energy prices increase as the government has implemented very strong anti-energy development legislation.

Take the cost of the carbon tax alone, for example, on energy production in Saskatchewan. I've heard workers at the coal station talk about how the carbon tax might put them out of a job far in advance of 2030. This is because of the excessive costs that will be associated with producing power as the power plant is phased out and winds down. That escalating cost gets thrown on top, onto the Crown corporation SaskPower.

Then you have the case of Swift Current, where I live. They buy the power from SaskPower. In a sense, you have a doubling of costs and regulation here that is causing this issue of affordability of energy for folks. We've heard the government's own regulations speak to the fact that the people who will be disproportionately impacted are seniors living on a fixed income and single mothers. That was right in the government's own regulations, and yet they are plowing ahead with this legislation that is problematic and causing massive cost overruns for people.

In fact, we just heard on Friday that the government is going to put a pause on the carbon tax in one area of the country because of the issue of cost, but yet we've constantly been told that people receive more than they pay, so therefore it shouldn't be a problem. Well, clearly it is. This is why people are concerned with Bill C-50, Bill C-49 and Bill C-69. This is why getting to Bill C-69 first will be of the utmost importance to people.

In Saskatchewan the working population is 598,000 people, give or take. There were over 43,000 construction jobs, 32,000 manufacturing jobs, and 25,800 agricultural jobs. In forestry, mining and gas there were 19,700 jobs, in utilities about 8,500, in wholesale and retail trade 98,000, and in transportation and warehousing about 30,000 jobs. The potential just transition job impacts are 10,432 direct jobs and 131,500 indirect jobs. A lot of that can be attributed and traced back to the ripple effect of Bill C-69.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Yes, exactly. No more building anything ever anywhere.

I think it's important that we address the issues around Bill C-69, because we've heard from many people, many stakeholders, private, public and otherwise, that this is a problem. I think what we're going—

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Thank you very much, Chair. I do appreciate that.

I think this amendment is solid. We're trying to order Bill C-49 ahead of Bill C-50 with our amendment because of the at least 32 times that Bill C-69 is referenced in Bill C-49. Because the Supreme Court of Canada has provided a reference on the largely unconstitutional nature of Bill C-69 and since it is referenced in Bill C-49, that is why there is a priority by Conservatives to start with Bill C-49, but that would of course mean that we need to deal with the case of Bill C-69. The court specified that legislators had to find ways to answer to the reference—not maybe they should find ways, but they had to find ways.

We spent a big chunk of this meeting laying out the case as to why we need to do the order in this manner now that we have our amendment on. Again, it's of the utmost importance that we do it in this fashion because part of Bill C-50 talks about the jobs. This is a jobs bill. It's a just transition. It's going to kill jobs, but let's just say that the government somehow is able to be successful and transition people to jobs. They won't be, but the issue is that we have heard in this committee—I have been on other committees as well where we heard this—over and over again from the private sector, but also from the public sector, and perhaps even more importantly from indigenous leaders, that Bill C-69 is the single largest barrier to actually getting projects done of any kind of any type of energy, or any type of project they are trying to do whether it's traditional oil and gas, whether it's renewables, whether it's various projects, and we've heard it numerous times.

That speaks to the urgency as to why we need to address Bill C-69 and particularly as it pertains to Bill C-49, because this is obviously about jobs in Atlantic Canada and trying to deal with the energy situation there. It would absolutely be appropriate that we deal with Bill C-69 and the impact it has first and foremost.

There's a good note from the Supreme Court of Canada ruling that Parliament can enact impact assessment legislation to minimize risks that some major projects pose to the environment. However, “this scheme plainly overstepped the mark.” That's what the Supreme Court said. Moreover, “it is open to Parliament and the provincial legislatures to exercise their respective powers over the environment harmoniously, in the spirit of co-operative federalism.” That's another quote from the Supreme Court ruling.

The whole point about Bill C-69 was every single province, every single premier said there were issues, and the territorial leaders did too. It is important that is noted, that going all the way back to 2018-19 when this was debated, flags were raised over issues with this bill by members of Parliament. In particular, all three at this table on the Conservative side spoke to it. In fact, my colleague from Lakeland did multiple times, and the Premier of Saskatchewan, the Premier of Alberta, all the premiers spoke against the overreach of this. Particularly the Ontario premier very strongly stated on it.

It's important that this be considered as we look at the ordering of these bills. That is why the Conservatives have put this amendment forward, because we need to respect provincial jurisdiction, which is why the Provincial Court of Alberta made a ruling on Bill C-69, which of course the federal government challenged at the Supreme Court. We then saw the Supreme Court make its ruling in the reference case.

I would just like to note that all throughout the history of Canadian parliaments, any time the Supreme Court has made a reference ruling, Parliament—the government of the day—has decided to make the necessary changes to it.

For the certainty of communities and people who are looking for certainty going forward, I think it's extremely important that we address this first.

I'm going to read something from the Saskatchewan government. The first line here is, “5-2 Decision Finds That The Federal Government Overstepped Constitutional Authority And Should Be More 'Cooperative' With Provinces In The Future.”

The opening statement lays out the case as to why and how co-operative federalism is actually supposed to work. It clearly was not done in this case. The rest of the quote contains kind of no-brainer points. It reads:

Saskatchewan welcomes the Supreme Court of Canada's...ruling against the federal government's environmental Impact Assessment Act, formerly Bill C-69.

“This decision is nothing short of a constitutional tipping point and reasserts provinces' rights and primary jurisdiction over natural resources, the environment and power generation,” Justice Minister and Attorney General, Bronwyn Eyre said. “It should also force the federal government to reassess other areas of overreach, including capping oil and gas production and electrical generation. The IAA has stalled everything from Canadian highway and mine projects to LNG facilities and pipelines. It has thwarted investment, competitiveness and productivity across the country. This major decision will correct course.”

That last sentence, “This major decision will correct course”, is why our amendment has been moved. That's why we feel this bill needs to be done first.

I'll finish the article:

The IAA received royal assent in 2019. In 2022, the Alberta Court of Appeal (in a 4-1 majority) held that the IAA was unconstitutional, violated the division of powers between Ottawa and the provinces, and took a “wrecking ball” to exclusive provincial jurisdiction under Section 92 and 92A of the Constitution Act, 1867. The federal government appealed the decision to the [Supreme Court of Canada].

Last March, Saskatchewan was part of the constitutional intervention, along with seven other provinces, before Canada's top court, arguing that the IAA had exceeded federal jurisdiction.

The majority recognized that the IAA is a clear example of federal overreach. Specifically, the Supreme Court majority held that the IAA's designated projects scheme, by which the federal authorities could permanently put a project on hold was an “unconstitutional, arrogation of power by Parliament” and “clearly overstepped the mark.” The majority also found that the Act “grants the decision-maker a practically untrammelled power [of] regulated projects qua projects.”

In 2023, Saskatchewan passed the Saskatchewan First Act to [deal with] matters of provincial jurisdiction.

My own province has made it very clear where it stands on this case and on this point. We know all of the other provinces did as well when it came to the government tabling Bill C-69 back in 2018-19.

The fact that the Supreme Court has made its ruling kind of puts us in the position we're in now, where we have a largely unconstitutional bill impacting a lot of things that the government is trying work on—multiple pieces of legislation. It's not just Bill C-49 and Bill C-50. Other issues will arise if it is not dealt with and addressed.

Quite frankly, it is hamstringing the provinces to be able to proceed with projects. We heard about LNG. We heard about simply trying to get highways built or repaired.

I mentioned earlier that some of the first nations leaders were concerned about this as well because they're looking at timelines. They're looking at how there will be opportunity for self-determination, economic participation for their residents and economic reconciliation.

Many of them have earmarked and flagged natural resource projects and development and also renewables, which also gets to the point though of why we have a problem with Bill C-69. They have told us over and over again that even on the renewable side, Bill C-69 is a problem. It's not even just about this being the.... It was originally dubbed the “no more pipelines” bill. This is just a “no more energy” bill. That is what we have here in front of us.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Yes. Thank you, Chair. I appreciate it.

Of course, right before we broke, I suggested through you, or directly to my colleague, that I would be happy to work with him on it. However, since you want that crystal clarity from me, we would suggest this amendment:

1. First undertake the following study on Bill C-69: “Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Supreme Court of Canada's ruling that Bill C-69, An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, is unconstitutional; for the purposes of this study, the committee: (a) hold at least 5 meetings, (b) invite the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and the Minister of the Environment and Climate Change to appear for one hour each, (c) report its findings and recommendations to the House and, (d) pursuant to Standing Order 109, request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report”

That would go after the opening paragraph of my colleague's motion, ending with “have both been referred to committee, that the committee initiate its consideration of both C-50 and C-49 with the following schedule”. It would then say “(a)” with what I just outlined, and the next one would be:

2. Complete its consideration of Bill C-49.

After that, it would be 3, and thereafter it could flow.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Yes, I don't believe that this is a proper amendment, because, again, it attempts to hijack the amendment by introducing a motion that Ms. Stubbs wanted to bring on Bill C-69 and completely circumvented—

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Thank you, Chair, for giving me that opportunity.

It's so bizarre. I know that the NDP-Liberals do favour censorship and dictating what people can say, see and these sorts of things, but it's all muddled up if you want to accuse a person of delaying and not doing a thing that they were already doing and then you interrupt them twice.

As you have just suggested I do, I will go back to the amendment that I was already reading. I'll start again:

1. First undertake the following study on Bill C-69: Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Supreme Court of Canada's ruling that Bill C-69, An Act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, is unconstitutional;

Even more, this is how big a deal it is. That bill's been law and unconstitutional for half a decade. I'll continue:

for the purposes of this study, the committee: (a) hold at least 5 meetings, (b) invite the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources and the Minister of the Environment and Climate Change to appear for one hour each, (c) report its findings and recommendations to the House and, (d) pursuant to Standing Order 109, request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report; and 2. Complete its consideration of Bill C-49.

Unfortunately, I have no option except to do it this way, since this motion for scheduling was was brought to us today. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources did reach out to me over the weekend about planning the schedule for this committee and, of course, I got back to her. I said that our concerns remain the same and our perspective of why this must happen in this order remains consistent with what we've said before and is what we're saying today. Of course it makes sense, because it's the exact order in which the NDP-Liberals have brought in their own legislation.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate that.

There was no harm, no foul on the headset and all of those things. It's just amazing. Even on Friday, I was in a call and forgot to unmute my mike. You'd think that this far in we would know these things, but here we are.

Again, colleagues, I hope I have made an effective case to you and all Canadians about the importance of this work and why we must put first things first in this common-sense approach to our scheduling for this committee, especially because it's so important to bring home affordability and combat the cost of living crisis the NDP-Liberals have caused. They've admitted this as of Friday, with their temporary sham of a relief of the carbon tax for only one area, which pits Canadians against each other. This is their MO. Obviously, all these things are interconnected, and they are extremely important. I agree.

As Conservatives, and as our leader Pierre Poilievre has always said, we want to accelerate both traditional and renewable energy development, exports and technology in Canada. We want light, green projects. We want to make Canada the supplier of choice for all kinds of energy sources and technologies for our allies around the world. We also want to bring home energy security and self-sufficiency, as well as affordable power and fuel bills, especially for people who have no other options, which is the case for many Canadians right across the country.

This is connected to Bill C-69, Bill C-49 and Bill C-50. They all work together. In different ways, they are going to hold back, roadblock and gatekeep both traditional and renewable energy development, which will cause a brain drain and limit innovation as well as entrepreneurial and private sector creativity in Canada—for which we are world-renowned—when it comes to developing the fuels of the future and continuing the energy transformation that has been going on for decades among oil and gas workers, energy developers and innovators in Canada. All of these things are extremely consequential. They certainly are to our ridings individually and to the entire country as the resource development-based economy and country we are, which we should be proud of.

I have an amendment to the NDP-Liberal programming motion that seeks to dictate all of the work unilaterally, complete with dates for our committee. Again, I note it's the opposite of the legislative way they brought these bills through in the first place. It still doesn't make any sense.

I move that, before the committee consider Bill C-50, the just transition....

You'll note there was only one committee witness who called it “sustainable jobs”. It was quite clear that when the NDP-Liberals put their documents out, they had done a last-minute copy and paste everywhere it said “just transition” to replace it with “sustainable jobs”. That's because Canadians didn't know what the just transition was, at first. Once they found out, they sure didn't like it. Of course, the NDP-Liberals are masters of words and words over action, and they tried to slip that in and pull the wool over everybody's eyes. I suggest that's not going to happen here, but we'll see.

To that end, I would like to propose an amendment to this programming motion by the costly coalition. Before the committee consider Bill C-50, that it, one, first undertake the following study on Bill C-69: Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee undertake a study of the Supreme Court of Canada's ruling that Bill C-69, an act to enact the Impact Assessment Act and the Canadian Energy Regulator Act, to amend the Navigation Protection Act—

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

I appreciate so much your giving me the opportunity to do this. I know in your riding in Calgary, you represent many oil and gas workers and their families, and oil and gas businesses, so I'm sure that's why you also believe that this is a very critical and crucial discussion for the people that you represent.

We're both Albertans. I have been working on this file for a long time, and I worked on these policy issues long before I was elected, as you may know. I'm certainly very familiar with Calgarians, their values, their priorities, and their deep concern about all these bills, so thank you for this, despite all the interruptions which are delaying this point, for still giving me the time to address this. Thank you.

I do have an amendment, but as you can see, I feel it's my duty, given the delay on dealing effectively with Bill C-69 I really want to make sure I'm making the comprehensive case to Canadians and to all the members here why we certainly cannot support this scheduling motion as written, and as was just brought to this committee with no notice to any of us, and seeks to dictate every single aspect of the work and the timelines of what we do in this committee.

I hope I have already addressed why failing to deal with Bill C-69 is nuts and destructive to the country. The way that Bill C-69 is in Bill C-49 certainly will open it up to litigation and delays, which no person in Atlantic Canada or the premiers want. They want a clear, predictable regulatory environment for both offshore petroleum and offshore renewable energy. That's why they want the bill and they want the provincial ministers to have a say. They don't want this all just to be cooked up on the back door by the federal representatives. I hope I have explained why those two things are linked and why Bill C-49 has to come first.

Of course, according to the NDP-Liberals' own schedule under which they brought the bills through the House of Commons, which was Bill C-49 first and then Bill C-50.... Of course, the arguments about other ministers or other ministries aren't really relevant on any of them since Bill C-69 was a joint initiative by the environment and natural resources ministers. Bill C-49 was the same. Of course, Bill C-50, the just transition, which will be transition to poverty, was also brought forward jointly by the environment minister, the natural resources minister and the labour minister.

To the schedule which the NDP-Liberals have put on the table today to dictate every single aspect of the work of this committee, here are the problems.

For Bill C-50, we have this date.... No, this one is good. If we can get the minister....

Actually, the minister hasn't been here for a while, so I really appreciate that we do have this date for him to come. Of course, he should come for a whole bunch of other reasons so that's cool beans to me.

Let's go down here. We have the minister again. That's fine. We should have the minister in, obviously, as soon as possible as this motion does outline. Definitely.

Here's where we start getting into the problem. There are dates here that are tying us based on the other work that we have to do to ensure that all Canadians who will be impacted by all of these bills will be heard. They must be heard. In the House of Commons and committee, it is our job to demonstrate our diligence, to demonstrate accountability, to do the work that Canadians expect of us to pass legislation that, for example, won't be litigated until kingdom come and won't be declared to be unconstitutional five years later. We don't want to do that again. I'm sure we all agree. This is why it's so important that we do our jobs.

One can understand that even though parties, various groups and the government have been working behind the scenes—and they have; I mean that's how things get developed—for a year or two years on Bill C-49 and Bill C-50.... For Conservatives as the official opposition, of course, our tools are to litigate that and to do our due diligence in the House of Commons and in committee.

We in the official opposition—Conservatives—who also did gain more votes individually from individual Canadians in 2021 and in 2019, haven't been working on this in the back doors with NDP, Liberals and various other groups for one to two years.

The only thing we can do is fight for the ability to do our jobs on behalf of the common sense of common people who have sent us here. That's our job.

I hope that this helps explain why we can't possibly support this scheduling motion that is aiming to drive through and dictate every step of what we do next on this committee.

Viviane, you asked me if there was an amendment, and there is.

Let me get to it at long last, unless members are still unclear why I am making the case that Bill C-69 is so important and that Bill C-69 is in Bill C-49 and why Bill C-49 must come first and then we must do Bill C-50. Is anyone still questioning that?

Certainly, not to further delay, but I understand, Marc, that when you have the official opposition, who hasn't been included or involved in any of this work, and they're now really trying to do their jobs as members of Parliament, as the official opposition.... In my case it's as the vice-chair of this committee, as a shadow minister for natural resources. There are my colleagues representing the Saskatchewan riding, Manitoba riding; my colleague, Earl, who's been here, I think, the longest of any of us, and he represents an Alberta riding; and Mario, who needs to do his due diligence for his constituents.

I understand that my colleagues in the NDP-Liberals might find this inconvenient. They might be annoyed at this. I mean, this is democracy.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

An hour and a half in, I hope I will finally be able to finish.

To that point, I certainly support the subamendment, but I would carve it out after we do this.

If the Conservatives are serious about dealing with mining, indigenous and clean energy issues, I think representatives from the regions I represent would be more than willing to correct the record in terms of the Ring of Fire. It's not Bill C-69 holding it up. It was a decision by Doug Ford to exclude the Eabametoong and Neskantaga first nations that caused the trouble, which resulted in a $95-billion lawsuit by Treaty 9 against the Ontario government. It is very problematic, because we have multiple mining projects that are set to go ahead and will go ahead with good programming.

To end my comments—

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Well, from my perspective, there does continue to be a delay in my ability to do just that because of all the interruptions. We'll see how far I get this time, Chair.

Here's another section of Bill C-69 that is in Bill C-49. This is why Bill C-69 has to be dealt with first—I'll get to that in a second—and then Bill C-49, and now Bill C-50.

As I was saying, Bill C-49 incorporates section 64 of Bill C-69, which, again, as we all know, was ruled unconstitutional by the SCC. It was called largely unconstitutional by the majority of the Supreme Court.

Section 64 of Bill C-69 is fundamentally connected to the consideration of factors set forth in section 63 of Bill C-69, which, the Supreme Court made clear in paragraph 166, “represents an unconstitutional arrogation of power by Parliament”.

I'll conclude on Bill C-49, hopefully, but this is a fact: Bill C-49 has incorporated all these proposed decision-making processes and facts into several sections in Bill C-49. Given that the decision-making power and the entirety of the “designated projects” scheme are unconstitutional, the risk, and lawyers will certainly litigate this, is that components of Bill C-49 are unconstitutional as well, as written right now. This is why the government had to actually deal with the massive mistake, disaster and mess on Bill C-69 that they were warned about, that's been unconstitutional for five years and that has caused untold destruction in communities, the economy, and jobs and businesses. That's why it has to be dealt with first.

Then with Bill C-49, because that then flows to us being able to deal with Bill C-49, knowing and being confident that these sections from Bill C-69 have been fully corrected and fixed, it seems to me that there's no way we can really do our due diligence on Bill C-49 unless that part is fixed first. Of course, there's Bill C-50, because the topic is relevant, but it's not the same as Bill C-49, where literally verbatim sections and words from Bill C-69 that have been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court are in Bill C-49 as written. It was in Bill C-49 as written when it passed the House of Commons. That's why Conservatives opposed. It's in Bill C-49 right now, when it's going to come to us. This is why we're making this issue.

Now, the worst part is that Bill C-49 already had all kinds of problems even before this decision. It already had these lengthy and uncertain timelines with all kinds of opportunities for political intervention. It tripled the timeline. Bill C-49 actually triples the timeline for a final decision on offshore renewable energy as compared with petroleum.

Of course, this bill deliberately—NDP-Liberals do want to shut it down, because that's what the just transition is about—is a death knell for offshore petroleum developers due to all the uncertainty and the lack of clarity in the timelines for private sector proponents, for provinces and for workers in the sector. Those were already problems in the bill. If we'd had more debate in the House of Commons, maybe we would have wrested all this out and known about it.

With that Supreme Court decision, which was an utter indictment of the NDP-Liberal cornerstone major legislation that impacts the entire economy and Canadians everywhere, this is now urgent. I can't get my head around how we are able to assess Bill C-49, given that it contains these various verbatim and as-written sections from Bill C-69 that have now also been declared unconstitutional.

To the scheduling motion, this is why Conservatives, we in the official opposition, who were elected by more individual Canadians in the 2021 election and in the 2019 election....

We might just remind everybody that we're not actually in a majority government scenario here. We are in a minority government —

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Thank you for congratulating me for getting to the point that you want me to get to.

I will just finish, if I could, Chair. I know you're trying to give me every opportunity. Maybe the others around here could help a guy out once you give me this opportunity that you're so generously offering.

I will just finish my explanation, though, about what else of Bill C-69 is in Bill C-49 to make the case that Bill C-49 has to come before Bill C-50.

Here's another fact about Bill C-49. Perhaps if there was more debate in the House of Commons all of this would have been wrestled out. Again, it was introduced, time allocated, debate was limited and here we are. So here we are. Bill C-49 also incorporates section 64 of Bill C-69, which was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada.