Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a few brief comments. I don't think I want to belabour this. A lot of the witnesses dealt with these issues far more eloquently than I possibly could.
I do want to touch immediately on the issue of first nations. I in fact added the Assembly of First Nations to the recommended list of people to appear. Unfortunately, the timing just did not work for them. I certainly will, when I leave this meeting, encourage them to submit a written brief.
I was of the view that once we had ended our hearings, we would not be soliciting further briefs and witnesses. If we're still welcoming them, I'll certainly encourage those who have not contributed to do so. In fact, I've spoken to a number of people who said they would have happily submitted written briefs. They didn't realize it was still possible. So I'm glad to hear that the Conservative members of the committee want to encourage additional people to submit their views. I will do so as well.
The government has done a good job of endeavouring to present the viewpoints of one group of witnesses, and that was from industry. Not surprisingly, they are coming in and opposing a new environmental law, particularly one that would enable impacted communities to participate in environmental decision-making. I've dealt with this kind of opposition for 40 years, so it comes as no surprise. I fully expected that, although I have to say I was disappointed that.... There are a good number of senior representatives of industry in Alberta who, had they appeared, I think would have put forward a somewhat more measured perspective as they've been participating multi-stakeholder groups with people across Alberta for five decades.
So we've heard a wide array of viewpoints. Yes, we heard from some industry saying it would open the floodgates for litigation. On the other hand, we heard from a good number of witnesses saying, contrary to that, in both the U.S. and Canada there had not been a floodgate of litigation. We heard that most strongly from the Environmental Commissioner of Ontario, who very clearly said that the most valuable result of their provincial Environmental Bill of Rights is that it has encouraged and facilitated more members of the public to step forward and express their views on any new environmental law or policy.
Some intervenors, some witnesses, in fact called for even stronger expanded citizen rights, and were disappointed that my bill did not go far enough. Everybody has those proposed amendments before them. I did not choose to bring forward those amendments. I stuck to my guns and tried to keep the bill more measured. Of course, it's open to any member to represent all of the witnesses who testified. So far, we've only heard from a certain perspective.
I'm a little taken aback that the government would criticize committee members who've gone to the effort to sit down and actually submit amendments that they think will strengthen the bill. We may have different perspectives on these amendments when we finally get to them, but I respect them. I respect that they take the time with their colleagues and their staff to sit down and go through the bill and come forward with amendments.
I would have welcomed a number of friendly amendments, frankly. I would have happily accepted amendments, as the government has spoken to, on amending the “precautionary principle” definition. I would be happy to accept any amendments. But they've chosen not to strengthen the bill and provide that it be more measured; that's their discretion.
I want to thank the witnesses and our analysts for their hard work in expeditiously turning around that material and reviewing the various environmental bills of rights that exist in Canada. I note that pretty well every other environmental bill of rights uses the term “resident”, so I'm a little puzzled why we couldn't use that in the federal bill when in fact that's the term used at the provincial level. That remains puzzling to me, having heard the evidence and having received that useful information from the analysts.
On the matter of redundancy, far from being redundant, the bill simply makes rights consistent under all federal environmental laws that are already extended under CEPA, and in some cases extends them somewhat. In fact, that's what Bill C-16 did, and we all worked assiduously to assist the government in processing that bill, which they still have not seen fit to put into effect. And that's in fact what this bill does: it extends equal rights under whatever manner that we're reviewing in the environment.
As far as impacts to permits and revision of legal approvals are concerned, the government always has the power to revise any regulation, any law, any policy, any permit, any approval, any authorization. That's allowable under the law. All this bill does is to give the public a right to be at the table when those decisions are made, or to ask that such a review be undertaken.
I'm a little puzzled at all of this speaking on and on about the lack of certainty. In fact those in industry are themselves often calling for government to open up and relax laws. There's been a major campaign orchestrated from this country by industry for the United States to relax their environmental laws. So there are lobbyists on both sides. All this bill does is ensure that the public have a right. The reason it's in there....
Frankly, as the tabler of this law, I have to tell you that if there's anything in this bill that I would want to survive, it would be those provisions. I'm saying that for a very specific purpose. I had the pleasure of serving as the first head of law and enforcement for NAFTA's environment commission. That commission operates under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation. Under that agreement, signed by Quebec, Alberta, and the federal government, as well as counterparts in the United States and Mexico, all of our Canadian jurisdictions who have signed on have undertaken to enable advance notice and opportunity for the public to be engaged in the development of any environmental law and policy. All this bill is doing is enacting that at a domestic level.
I'm kind of astounded that I haven't heard on this from the parties on the other side, who are usually great defenders of NAFTA—and the NAAEC is a side agreement to NAFTA.
So that's precisely what the bill does. It simply takes an international agreement and implements it domestically, which is the way the system works in Canada.
I don't want to elaborate any further. I think we have clearly heard that certain members of our committee like what they heard from industry. Probably there's a variety of opinions around the table about how they would weigh the evidence heard, and that's why we tried to hear from as broad an array as possible.
In closing, Mr. Chair, I want to move that this debate now be adjourned.
