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.

Motion in relation to Senate amendments

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The amendment is in order.

It being 8:10 p.m., pursuant to order made earlier today, it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the consideration of the Senate amendments to Bill C-69 now before the House.

The question is on the amendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment?

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, one would think the Liberals would have learned from their wrong a year ago, since Bill C-69 was so badly crafted and so seriously flawed that they had to make 200 of their own amendments at the last minute before they shut down debate in the House and at committee and rammed it through. That is why senators had to almost completely rewrite it. The Liberals refused to let MPs do their jobs on behalf of Canadians, and they have prevented all of us from doing that duty here today as well. Even though last night it took the Speaker over half an hour just to read all the changes we are debating today, the Liberals are doing it again and will ram through this bad bill.

Canadians across the country are very concerned. Eric Nuttall, a Toronto-based senior portfolio manager with Ninepoint Partners who invests in Canadian oil and gas stocks, described what the Liberals are doing to Canada's oil and gas sector as “borderline treasonous”.

A recent Financial Post op-ed said that Bill C-69 is a bill “written by economic ignoramuses who have no understanding as to why Canada enjoys high living standards”, and called it “sabotage”.

Why is such a broad coalition of voices opposed to Bill C-69? It would damage all of Canada in different ways. It would seriously hinder the establishment of major energy infrastructure, and it is about whether Canada is a place where big-scale, capital-intensive major projects of many different kinds can be built. It is about whether Canada is competitive and can attract investments versus other jurisdictions around the world, often those with lower environmental, safety and labour standards, and fewer civil and human rights.

The Liberals are already doing so much damage. This year, the IMD world competitiveness ranking removed Canada from the top 10 most competitive economies in the world. It puts Canada 13th out of 63 countries, our worst performance in the annual survey's history, which goes back to 1997.

Bill C-69 would do so much more damage. The Liberal approach would introduce longer timelines with no maximum caps, despite the minister's claim, and vague criteria for assessments that would create more uncertainty and continue to drive money and jobs into other countries.

Bill C-69, as the Liberals will pass it, would undermine every element that is key to attracting and retaining investments and jobs in Canada, like certainty on the timelines and permanence of the process to mitigate risk as a factor in capital planning life cycles that are several years long.

There are also numerous ways Bill C-69 could create potential for delay and allow the Governor in Council to extend timelines arbitrarily without providing justification. The criteria for extensions would be defined in regulation, such that cabinet would be the only power to decide when cabinet delays a project. Project proponents, members of Parliament and Canadians would not know what the criteria are until after Bill C-69 is already law.

Among the Senate amendments the Liberals rejected that would fix their open-ended timelines are changes that would mandate the provision of reasons for suspending timelines, remove the ability for the indefinite extension of timelines, and introduce a legislated maximum time frame for the impact assessment review and for reviews under the Canadian energy regulator. The Liberals are rejecting all of those amendments.

Conservative measures in 2012 that gave certainty to the process led to dozens of oil and gas infrastructure approvals and builds, other resources projects, four major new pipelines, and the proposal of three major new pipeline projects focused almost exclusively on accessing new markets under the highest standards in the world, which Canadians expect and have always had. However, not one of these has been built, and all of them are gone because of the Liberal government.

Bill C-69 would also undermine certainty in regulation, which is critical for large-scale capital plans and to reach final investment decisions in Canada's favour, as well as performance-based policies, which benefit communities by tying incentives to measures such as job creation, R and D, innovation and capital investment. Bill C-69 would also create all kinds of uncertainty around which projects would require a federal review and around the vague project criteria against which a project would be measured.

This is one of the reasons the premiers are so angry. Planning for a provincial or federal review are two entirely different processes. The Liberals are including in the bill the power for a single minister to force any project to undergo a lengthy, costly, federal review, even if it has already gone through a provincial review. What proponent would want to take on the risk that assessment costs could double and a capital-intensive, long-term project could be delayed by years with zero warning?

The Liberals are rejecting amendments that would ensure there is a minimum threshold for project designations that guides the decision of a single minister and that would require that a single minister is not the only one giving guidance on the impacts of a project within federal jurisdiction. Liberals are rejecting these changes in favour of the unilateral, centralized power of a single minister.

Clear and concise criteria ensures predictability for all parties and that approved projects can get built, instead of having to repeat key parts of the process or spending years in court defending an approval. However, the Liberals rejected all attempts to clarify and specify criteria in Bill C-69, and are maintaining the requirement and discretion of the panel conducting the review to make determinations on subjective matters, on matters that are of public policy of any government of any given day and that are inherently political.

For example, this bill mandates that proponents must demonstrate health, social and economic effects, including with respect to the intersection of sex and gender with other identity factors. Obviously, job creation, R and D, innovation and capital investment from resource development reduce poverty, benefit the economy and provide revenue for governments and for social services like health care and education, as well as funds for academic and charitable organizations, but I think proponents can be forgiven for uncertainty around how their specific projects and investments impact identity factors.

To make matters worse, the Liberals are rejecting Senate amendments requiring that the responsible minister publish guidelines on these vague criteria. Let me repeat that. The Liberals are voting against providing guidelines on their own criteria to explain what the Liberals mean with these vague criteria, which is why uncertainty appears to be a design principle of this legislation. It is an actual intention, a deliberate objective of Bill C-69 and not just a Liberal mistake.

The Liberals cannot argue that Bill C-69 would enhance scientific evidence in reviews beyond what was already done in Canada's regulatory system. In fact, during committee, Mr. Martin Olszynski of the University of Calgary pointed out that the terms “science” and “scientific” are mentioned only five times in this 400-page bill.

Another major concern with Bill C-69 is that offshore projects on Canada's east coast are targeted now for automatic panel review assessments regardless of project scope or scale. That will scare away future offshore exploration in Canada. That is why the premier of Newfoundland and Labrador raised specific concerns about the Liberals fully taking over an area that has, up until now, been a jointly administrated federal-provincial responsibility. So much for co-operative federalism, even with a Liberal premier.

The Liberals talk a big game about making life better for middle-class Canadians, but this is the reality and why we see such passion, frustration and anger from my colleagues. The reality is that the Liberal Prime Minister has turned his back and is attacking the hard-working men and women who have given so much to every part of our country through responsible resource development.

The Prime Minister talks about phasing out the oil sands and that he regrets Canada cannot get off oil tomorrow. His legislation proves that is exactly his objective.

Kevin Milligan, a professor at the Vancouver School of Economics at UBC makes the point why the debate about Bill C-69 really matters. He stated, “Nothing has contributed more than natural resources to buttressing the Canadian middle class against the rapidly changing global economy of the 21st century.” He went on to say that the “overall prosperity of the Canadian middle class depends much more on good jobs than small policy shifts around the edges. The resource sector has contributed substantially to the good jobs that underpin that middle-class resilience."

Canada's responsible resource development is the major factor behind closing the gap between wealthy and vulnerable struggling Canadians. However, the Liberals keep attacking natural resource jobs across Canada in the forestry, minerals and energy sectors, which is killing jobs and making life more expensive for middle-class families. The Liberal and the left anti-energy and anti-resource agenda is extremely short-sighted economically and it is morally wrong.

It is also bad for the environment, because Bill C-69 is based on an attack on Canada's reputation as the world's most environmentally and socially responsible resource producer, which is a fact. Since the 2015 election, and the minister did it last night, the Liberals have constantly denigrated and undermined confidence in the regulator and in Canada's reputation. They have created a vacuum for resource development in the past three and a half years. That is what has led us to where we are today with hundreds of thousands of Canadians out of work. What is really galling is that the Prime Minister is sacrificing Canada's interests to the rest of the world.

Let us listen to the experts, because this is why this does not make any sense. In 2014, Worley Parsons issued a very comprehensive report benchmarking Canada against other major oil and gas producing countries around the world. It found that Canada already had the highest environmental standards in the world and the most responsibly produced resources. That was in 2014 before the last election, and it echoed a similar conclusion before.

These are the report's conclusions, which measured performance in areas such as overall decision-making processes, cumulative assessments for regions with multiple projects, implementation of “early and meaningful consultation with stakeholders and Indigenous peoples”, including the real integration of traditional indigenous knowledge, and the implementation of effective social impact and health assessments.

Here is the truth about Canada that the Liberals do not tell:

The results of the current review re-emphasized that Canada's EA [environmental assessment] Processes are among the best in the world. Canada has state of the art guidelines for consultation, TK [traditional knowledge], and cumulative effects assessment, Canadian practitioners are among the leaders in the areas of Indigenous involvement, and social and health impact assessment. Canada has the existing frameworks, the global sharing of best practices, the government institutions and the capable people to make improvements to EA [environmental assessment] for the benefit of the country and for the benefit of the environment, communities and the economy.

It continues:

[T]he review found that EA [environmental assessment] cannot be everything to everyone. In Canada, however, it is a state of the art, global best process, with real opportunities for public input, transparency in both process and outcomes, and appeal processes involving independent scientists, stakeholders, panels and courts.

However, the Liberals just stand up over and over again and attack Canada's reputation for their own partisan gain and to the detriment of every single one of us. Every time they are doing that, trying to keep their coalition of the left, the anti-energy, NDP and Green voters who voted for them in 2015, first of all, they are not being truthful, and second, they are actually empowering foreign and domestic anti-Canadian activists to shut down Canadian resources.

Perversely, Bill C-69 would ensure that countries like Iran, Algeria, Russia and Venezuela are the ones that meet the growing global demand for energy. In doing so, the Liberals boost regimes that abuse human rights and take virtually no steps to protect the environment. The world is no better off with dangerous regimes that are able to ramp up their economies because Canada has vacated the market.

The Liberal Prime Minister would rather the United States fill the void in the North American market and globally, ceding investment and jobs that should be ours to our biggest economic competitor.

The fact is that Canada has more than enough energy sources of all kinds to be energy-independent. Canada is no better off when it allows its competitors to take the field uncontested, and neither is that good for the environment. An energy-independent Canada would be a Canada firing on all cylinders across all sectors and regions.

The Liberals, therefore, need to accept 100% of the amendments made by the Senate. If they do not, this bill needs to die.

Therefore, I would like to move the following amendment to the government message:

That the motion be amended by deleting all of the words after the words “the House:” and substituting the following:

Agrees with amendments 1(a) to 1(y), 1(z)(ii) to (v), 1(aa) to 1(bc), 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17 made by the Senate;

Proposes that amendment 1(z)(i) be amended by deleting the words “conducted by a review panel”;

Proposes that amendment 2 be amended to read as follows:

2. Clause 6, page 94:

(a) replace line 19 with the following:

“site—establish the panel's terms of reference in consultation with the Chairperson of the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board and ap-”; and

(b) delete lines 34 and 35

Proposes that amendment 3 be amended by adding the following: “(c) delete lines 23 and 24”

That is the bare minimum that the Liberals must do for every single community in every corner of this country and for our long-term future, and to keep Canada proud, strong and free.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, words cannot begin to describe how alarming, outrageous and insane it is that the Liberals, after one hour of debate, are shutting it down and forcing a vote on their rejection of the majority of 187 necessary Senate amendments to Bill C-69.

The Liberals are gutting all the substantive amendments that indigenous communities and businesses, nine out 10 provinces, all three territories and resource and other private sector proponents insisted must be included to prevent Bill C-69 from harming the whole Canadian economy, interfering with provinces and burdening municipalities with, for example, the rejection of 11 of the 15 amendments to part 3 of the bill.

Instead of rising to the occasion and delivering their promise to work collaboratively with indigenous people and with other levels of government, the Liberals are ignoring most of their constructive suggestions for improvement and recklessly ramming it through, just as they did in the House of Commons a year ago—

The House resumed from June 12 consideration of the motion in relation to the amendments made by the Senate to 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

Motion that debate be not further adjourned

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, here is what is happening. This is the most destructive bill to this country that has been proposed by any government and the debate has been shut down. Members of Parliament are not allowed to speak their constituents' concerns, so there has been a lot of heckling going on. I agree because Bill C-69 is the worst piece of legislation—

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is really disappointing to be here tonight. I happened to sit in on the committee when Bill C-69 was being studied clause by clause. I sat in that night until the late hours of the evening and watched the government decide to lump all of the amendments together and vote on them as an entire group, with no discussion on each amendment, clause by clause. It was absolutely disgusting. There were over 600 amendments proposed at that stage. Over 300 of them came from the government's own Liberal Party. It is truly a bill that was so poorly drafted it should have been thrown out at that time.

Now we see 229 amendments from the Senate. Most of them have been thrown out by the Liberal government. We have six premiers, representing over 60% of Canadians, who are opposed to this bill saying it should be thrown out. How can the minister stand there and say that the government has truly consulted with Canadians and actually listened to them when 60% are saying it should be thrown out?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we have a problem in our country. We have polarization. We end up in courts. We cannot ensure that good projects go ahead. What system are we working under? We are working under the system that was gutted under Stephen Harper, that has reduced the trust of the public in how we review major projects, that has not met the constitutional requirement of engaging and consulting with indigenous peoples and, ironically, that did not ensure that good projects went ahead in a timely fashion.

We listened to industry. Industry stakeholders said that they wanted shorter timelines; we have shorter timelines under Bill C-69. They said they wanted certainty about what permits would be required; we said that we would give them certainty about the permits that were required. They asked about what indigenous consultation was required; we said that we would work with them to provide that.

We have created a system that would do a much better job to keep us out of court and make sure that good projects go ahead in a timely way. That should be everyone's goal. Companies and provinces should be saying that they are open for business, that this is a great opportunity to take advantage of the $500-billion investment opportunity, that Canada is a great country to invest in and that they are going to continue creating good jobs for Canadians.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to hear that the NDP will be supporting this motion and Bill C-69 and that it knows we need better rules to protect our environment, to engage properly and meet our constitutional requirement with indigenous people, and to ensure that good projects go ahead in a timely way with regulatory certainty.

I would point out that I had the opportunity to be here while the NDP House leader was speaking about his own piece of legislation, and he said that two hours of debate was the threshold for him, so we are also very similar in thinking that this is enough. We have been having discussions around this legislation for about three years: two expert panels, two parliamentary committees, consultations from coast to coast to coast. Canadians have written in. We have had formal submissions from businesses, environmentalists, provinces and territories. We have had meetings.

We believe that we have very good legislation that would enable us to take advantage of the $500-billion economic opportunity of getting our natural resources to market. That would help grow our economy, and we can do it in a way that protects the environment.

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

Mr. Speaker, the NDP will be supporting the government motion on Bill C-69, but we do not in any way support this toxic muzzling of the opposition. The motion that has just been moved forward in closure actually allows that. It is important to specify, because Canadians need to know, that this is the fourth time the government has used this new toxic muzzling of the opposition in a closure motion that accords only one member the right to speak for 20 minutes, and after that there is a vote. There is no reply from opposition members and no ability to question. Under no circumstances at all can this be called a true parliamentary debate. It is toxic. It muzzles the opposition, and it is something that even Stephen Harper did not dare to do in the House of Commons.

Next Tuesday, it appears that the government is going to rubber-stamp Trans Mountain. I firmly believe, and so does my caucus, that climate leaders do not try to ram through massive bitumen pipelines. The question is, are they going to use the same toxic muzzling of the opposition to try to ram through the Trans Mountain pipeline, which British Columbians oppose?

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, in relation to the consideration of the Senate amendments to 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, I move:

That debate be not further adjourned.

Business of the House

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate and acknowledge the opposition House leader's new-found respect and regard for the environment. It probably means the Conservatives will be coming out with a plan soon. We have been waiting for it for well over a year now.

In answer to her question, this afternoon we will begin debate on the Senate amendments to Bill C-58, an act to amend the Access to Information Act. This evening we will resume debate on the Senate amendments to Bill C-69, the environmental assessment legislation. We will then return to Bill C-88, the Mackenzie Valley bill.

Tomorrow we will resume debate on the Senate amendments to Bill C-68, an act to amend the Fisheries Act. We expect to receive some bills from the Senate, so if we have time, I would like one of those debates to start.

Next week, priority will be given to bills coming back to us from the Senate, or we may have an opportunity to continue to debate the motion referred to by the House Leader of the Official Opposition.

Personally, I am reassured to hear that the Conservatives want to talk about the environment. Perhaps they will also share their plan with Canadians.

The Environment

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, in January 2016, we released interim principles. There were two parliamentary committees that looked at Bill C-69. There were two expert panels. There was consultation across the country with businesses, with provinces, with indigenous peoples and with environmentalists. Then the Senate actually went on tour to listen to people. Then we accepted 99 amendments.

However, let us go back to what happened under Stephen Harper. What did he do? Through an omnibus budget bill, with no consultation, he gutted environmental assessments, which meant that good projects could not go ahead in a timely way.

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is the Liberal failures that have held up the TMX.

However, after only one hour last night, the Liberals said that they would shut down debate on their decision to reject 187 Senate amendments that attempted to fix their no more pipelines bill, Bill C-69. Nine provinces and every territory are demanding major changes. It will harm the entire Canadian economy.

The Liberals rushed this bill through the House last year. That is why the Senate was forced to try to repair it and rewrite it completely. Will the Liberals allow MPs to actually bring the voices of Canadians to this debate or will they shut it down and ram it through again?

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what she is saying is absurd. This centralizing government, which is a hallmark of the Liberals, has no respect for the provinces and territories. The Prime Minister does not even listen to the provincial premiers, who were duly elected by Canadians. The Premier of Quebec is also saying he is disappointed that the current federal government refused to accept the amendments to Bill C-69 on the environment. Rather than being constructive, the Liberals' provocative approach is undermining national unity.

Why does the Prime Minister think he has a monopoly on truth?

Natural Resources

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister and the environment Minister are doing everything they can to destroy Canada's energy sector. Their “no more pipelines” bill, Bill C-69, would be devastating to hard-working families in the oil and gas sector, and they know it.

Sadly, the Liberals will be shutting down debate on this bill later today, forcing this destructive legislation on Canadians. Nine premiers have raised concerns, but the Prime Minister is ignoring them.

Will the Prime Minister finally stop attacking our natural resources sector, listen to the premiers and withdraw this horrible bill?