Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My questions will focus mainly on the document that was submitted to us by the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, and more specifically on Appendix I of this document. In my opinion, this document provides the best information on the enforcement provisions of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act since 1999.
I think it was a good idea to postpone the Canadian Environmental Protection Act review, because when looking at this document, I realize that we had to wait until 2004-2005 for the first environmental protection compliance orders to be issued by virtue of this Act.
Mr. Chair, this means that if we had proceeded with a review five years after passing the Act, as specified, we would probably not have recorded a single compliance order.
How can we explain that we had to wait five years before obtaining the first compliance orders under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act? I am referring to the 2004-2005 period, when some 100 compliance orders were issued. This number represents the total number of issued orders registered in this report.