Bill S-5

Strengthening Environmental Protection for a Healthier Canada Act

An Act to amend the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, to make related amendments to the Food and Drugs Act and to repeal the Perfluorooctane Sulfonate Virtual Elimination Act

This enactment amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to, among other things,
(a) recognize that every individual in Canada has a right to a healthy environment as provided under that Act;
(b) provide that the Government of Canada must protect that right as provided under that Act, and, in doing so, may balance that right with relevant factors;
(c) require the development of an implementation framework that sets out how that right will be considered in the administration of that Act, and require that research, studies or monitoring activities be conducted to support the Government of Canada in protecting that right;
(d) authorize the Minister of the Environment to add to the Domestic Substances List certain substances that were in commerce in Canada and subject to the Food and Drugs Act between January 1, 1987 and September 13, 2001, and provide that any substance may be deleted from the List when it is no longer in commerce in Canada;
(e) require that the Minister of the Environment and the Minister of Health develop a plan that specifies the substances to which those Ministers are satisfied priority should be given in assessing whether they are toxic or capable of becoming toxic;
(f) provide that any person may request that those Ministers assess a substance;
(g) require the Minister of the Environment to compile a list of substances that that Minister and the Minister of Health have reason to suspect are capable of becoming toxic or that have been determined to be capable of becoming toxic;
(h) require that, when those Ministers conduct or interpret the results of certain assessments — or conduct or interpret the results of a review of decisions of certain governments — in order to determine whether a substance is toxic or capable of becoming toxic, they consider available information on whether there is a vulnerable population in relation to the substance and on the cumulative effects that may result from exposure to the substance in combination with exposure to other substances;
(i) provide that certain substances be classified as substances that pose the highest risk based on, among other things, their properties or characteristics;
(j) require that those Ministers give priority to the total, partial or conditional prohibition of activities in relation to toxic substances that are specified in Part 1 of Schedule 1 of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 , or to the total, partial or conditional prohibition of releases of those substances into the environment, when regulations or instruments respecting preventive or control actions in relation to those substances are developed;
(k) expand certain regulation-making, information-gathering and pollution prevention powers under that Act, including by adding a reference to products that may release substances into the environment;
(l) allow the risks associated with certain toxic substances to be managed by preventive or control actions taken under any other Act of Parliament, and the obligations under sections 91 and 92 of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to be the responsibility of whoever of the Minister of the Environment or the Minister of Health is best placed to fulfil them;
(m) expand the powers of the Minister of the Environment to vary either the contents of a significant new activity notice with respect to a substance not on the Domestic Substances List or the contents of the List itself with respect to a substance on the List that is subject to the significant new activities provisions of that Act;
(n) extend the requirement, to notify persons of the obligation to comply with the significant new activity provisions of that Act when a substance that is subject to those provisions is transferred to them, so that it applies with respect to substances on the Domestic Substances List, and authorize that Minister to limit by class the persons who are required to be notified of the obligation when a substance that is subject to those provisions is transferred to them; and
(o) require that confidentiality requests made under section 313 of the Act be accompanied by reasons, and to allow the Minister of the Environment to disclose the explicit chemical or biological name of a substance or the explicit biological name of a living organism in certain circumstances.
The enactment also makes related amendments to the Food and Drugs Act to enable the assessment and management of risks to the environment associated with foods, drugs, cosmetics and devices by, among other things,
(a) prohibiting persons from conducting certain activities in respect of a drug unless the Minister of Health has conducted an assessment of the risks to the environment presented by certain substances contained in that drug;
(b) enabling the Minister of Health to take measures in respect of the risks to the environment that a drug may present throughout its life cycle; and
(c) providing the Governor in Council with supporting regulation-making authorities.
Finally, the enactment repeals the Perfluorooctane Sulfonate Virtual Elimination Act .

Strengthening Environmental Protection for a Healthier Canada Act

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

Madam Speaker, I have a quick question and also a comment.

The question is with respect to whether the Conservative Party will in fact be supporting Bill S-5. The member seemed to be implying that the Conservatives would likely be supporting it, at least in terms of referring it to committee. I would like some clarification on that, because the other day they brought in a concurrence motion in order to prevent debate on the bill.

My comment is regarding the member's reference to plastic bags. Many years ago, when I was an MLA, I was in favour of banning plastic bags. The member could google right now, as I just did, plastic bags in trees, and there are a lot more than what the member is putting on the record when we talk about a healthy environment. I see the banning of plastic bags as a good thing. Does the member support the banning of plastic bags?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, that was precisely my point around the banning of plastic bags. We make that trade-off between having plastic bags not end up in trees, but we then have greater CO2 emissions. That is the trade-off we are making, and that was my whole point. We have to see these things as trade-offs.

In the same way, when we were fighting the pandemic, we saw the trade-off between fighting the pandemic and seeing single-use plastic as not being a problem. Petroleum products have been a miracle product for humanity. As we have developed petroleum products, we have seen food waste dramatically reduced, and we have seen poverty being reduced around the world, so I am generally in favour of petroleum products being used. However, we must recognize that in most of these cases there are trade-offs to be made.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, in 2010, I believe that the government banned BPAs in baby bottles. Since then, some companies have been known to replace the substance with another substance that is just as toxic.

My colleague talked a lot about single-use plastics in the environment. Does he not think the regulations should be stricter in order to improve our health and the health of our children?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Yes, Madam Speaker, again, I was pointing out that perhaps we should tackle some of these issues more in relation to specific issues.

I mentioned reproductive toxicity. That is a noble cause to tackle, and I would like to see us tackle it. If there are environmental impacts that are causing that, let us get to the bottom of it. If it is the BPA in our plastics, let us prove that. Let us work on it. That is important, rather than these kinds of “boil the ocean” bills.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, my colleague from Peace River—Westlock talked about ways and the history of our working together, whether it be tackling acid rain; or working with Megan Leslie, the former member for Halifax, who put forward a motion banning microbeads, which has now been implemented; or my own motion, M-151, back in 2018, which my colleague supported and voted for, about reducing single-use plastics, including plastic bags, plastic cutlery, cigarette butts, and many different things that are lowering the impact. We are glad to see the government dedicate funding to address ghost and derelict fishing gear. That is actually being implemented on the coast right now. Is it enough? No, it is not. We need to go much further.

We know there are over 10,000 unique chemical ingredients used in various different products that are known to cause cancer, harm the reproductive system and disrupt the endocrine system. These are simple, low-hanging fruit that we can all agree on. Does my colleague agree that there should be mandatory labelling of hazardous substances in all consumer products?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, here we are, once again seeing these trade-offs that we have to make. We want to ensure that we have a healthy environment, but we also want to ensure that we have a healthy economy. In some cases, allowing consumers to make their own decisions on a lot of these things would ensure that we can get to where we need to be on many of these things. We have to take Canadians along on the journey.

I know the fight to end acid rain was a trying fight, but it was one worth fighting and there are no disagreements in Canada around that anymore. I hope we can tackle some of these things specifically, and we will come together on them, for sure.

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

Madam Speaker, the question I have for my friend really boils down to whether he trusts the government to determine whether a substance is toxic, like a straw or a pen. It is saying all plastics are toxic. Plastics are—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. If members want to have conversations, they should take them outside. If they have a question or comment, now is not the time; I did not recognize them.

The hon. member for Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke.

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

Madam Speaker, the real hypocrisy is that the Liberals had a previous member who was a minister, and in her riding in Chester, Nova Scotia, they have this technology, Sustane, whereby they can take plastics, distill them down to their original form, the different oils, and use them as biofuel. Instead of that, what do the Liberals do? They just ban straws all together. As my colleague said, these paper straws have an even larger carbon footprint.

Does my colleague feel that he can trust the government to politically ascertain what is toxic and what is not?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, yes, I agree with the hon. member that I do not think we can trust the government to get it right. I know the Liberal members were hopeful.

I would tell them to make a definition of what they deem to be toxic and maybe put out a schedule of toxins. That would have been nice to see. They could have defined the “right to a clean environment” and put that in the bill. Then we could be debating that. I am certain that I would not agree with the government, because it is generally playing politics with this kind of stuff.

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

Madam Speaker, I asked the member two questions, and he answered the second part.

My first question was whether the Conservative Party supports Bill S-5. Would it like to see it go to committee?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, we do have concerns about the bill. I imagine the bill will pass and go to committee, so we will look forward to working with the government to ensure our concerns are alleviated. We would love to be able to support the bill.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Madam Speaker, there are a lot of items in this bill that have been talked about. You mentioned plastic straws and things like that.

A few years ago, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle introduced a bill to ban sewage dumping in our country, which was defeated by all opposing parties in Parliament.

I am curious about your thoughts as to where something like dumping raw sewage into our rivers and oceans rates compared to the possible trade-off of a plastic straw. What is the trade-off on raw sewage? I am curious to hear your thoughts on that.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I want to remind members they are to address questions and comments through the Chair and not to members.

The hon. member for Peace River—Westlock.