Environment Committee on Dec. 8th, 2010

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thanks, Mr. Calkins.

Madame Gagnon, c'est votre tour.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Thank you.

Good afternoon. This is the first time I have sat on the Standing Committee on the Environment. I am replacing my colleague Bernard Bigras who is in Cancún at the moment.

I am pleased to be here because there is an issue that is very important to me, and that is the issue of water contamination in Shannon.

In chapter 2, you talk about water monitoring. You make a somewhat disturbing observation. You say that the government has not defined its responsibilities in relation to water monitoring on federal lands, and that Environment Canada does not verify the data collected under the water quality monitoring program.

I am in contact with the Shannon residents' association, which has had to bring a class action against the government in relation to water contamination. I would first like to address Mr. McDonald, who is the assistant deputy minister of Transport.

Just now, Mr. Keenan said there was a basic principle in the department's responsibilities called "polluter-pay". I want to know whether the same basic principle applies to the environment. Because it is a lot easier to bring an action against an offender, an individual, than it is for an individual to do it against a government. I know something about that from the Shannon committee that has had to turn to other resources.

The residents' committee has had a lot of trouble getting data about the analyses that have been done. In fact, I had the support of all of the opposition in the House to get the documents produced.

A lot of departments have responsibilities relating to this contamination. There are National Defence and the environment department, for the water analyses. When there are several departments, how can we require that there be coordination, in the case of actions against the government, for example to make the job of the people bringing the action easier, when they want to get data and have accurate facts about the water they drink everyday?

The water has been contaminated by trichloroethylene for several years, and people didn't know about the quality of the water they were drinking everyday. There have been consequences. There has been a rise in cancer. In fact, the Department of Health also comes into this. So it lands on several doorsteps.

Would you have any recommendations to make? Also, have you observed the extent of the problem with the quality of this water, which is undrinkable and unfit for consumption?

[Scott Vaughan]

Thank you for the question. I will say, generally speaking, that one of the problems we noted in this chapter concerns the data from the Water Quality Monitoring Program. Environment Canada has no system for ensuring that the data from all the monitoring stations are reliable. That is why there is no system to ensure that the data from all the stations is accurate, or not. There is no system at Environment Canada that can assure us of this. As a result, the public can't know clearly whether there are water quality problems in certain lakes or rivers.

On the other hand, the National Hydrometric Program, for measuring water quantity, is a good system with reliable data.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

I have another question. When a department is involved in soil contamination that affects groundwater, could more draconian measures not be taken against the government?

You talk about polluter-pay. So when we know, and we determine, that there has been soil contamination that has extended to the groundwater, should funds not be allocated to the members of the public who are harmed, who didn't know what to expect?

[Scott Vaughan]

Mr. Chair, may I ask my colleague Andrew Ferguson to answer that question?

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Ferguson, you can come to the table.

[Andrew Ferguson, Principal, Sustainable Development Strategies, Audits and Studies, Office of the Auditor General of Canada]

I believe the question had to do with whether there is funding to help remediate groundwater pollution problems that are caused by, I could maybe say, government polluters. We didn't look at that question during the course of our audit work, and that would be a more appropriate question to ask the Department of Environment on whether there would be funding for remedial cleanup activities. It's not a question we examined in the audit.

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

In the case of—

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you.

Mr. Blaney, you have the floor.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Mr. Woodworth has agreed to share his time with me. So I am going to be brief.

My question is for you, Ms. Thomas.

In his report, the commissioner stated certain concerns regarding large spills. Today, the Commissioner of the Environment has mainly evaluated the management framework, and in the case of a spill, you are in fact somewhat reassuring. You are telling us that the Coast Guard is in a position to provide all the resources available, in collaboration with its partners.

Is that an accurate reflection of the reality?

Then, I will ask the commissioner whether he is satisfied with the explanations given today concerning large spills specifically. I think that question is of concern to a lot of people. So I would like to hear you on that question.

I will then yield the floor to my colleague.

[Jody Thomas]

With regard to major spills, the coast guard would work with all available partners to respond. The system remains a polluter pay and a polluter responsibility, so the shipowner would be primarily responsible and then the response organizations would be involved. If the shipowner were unable or unwilling to respond, then the coast guard would take over as the primary responder to the incident. It is very much a system of cascading resources to respond in the best possible way as a total partnership. No one agency can respond on its own.

If I go back to the question asked earlier regarding a spill the size of Deepwater Horizon, 16 countries supported the U.S. government, the national guard. It wasn't the U.S. coast guard on its own or any single federal agency; it was a multiplicity of support and response.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Mr. Commissioner, what do you have to say on that subject?

[Scott Vaughan]

At paragraph 47 of our report, we noted that the Coast Guard conducted an exercise in March 2010. In that exercise, it identified concerns relating to response systems for major spills. This was an internal Coast Guard review, which showed that there are gaps.

We made recommendations and we are satisfied with the responses given by the department.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Thank you, commissioner.

I will leave the remaining time for Mr. Woodworth.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I just want to begin with a question to the commissioner regarding the suggestion that there's only one federal monitoring station in the Athabasca system. In the course of many hours of testimony on the oil sands and water resources, I learned about an organization called RAMP, the Regional Aquatics Monitoring Program, in which the federal government is a partner.

If my memory serves me, they mentioned that they had about two million data points collected over 10 years of water monitoring in the Athabasca region. Can you explain to me, does your report include all of the water monitoring that the federal government does in partnership with agencies like RAMP or in other respects?

[Scott Vaughan]

We looked at the stations that are under the direct responsibility of the water quality program.

I will say a couple things related to that, if I may, sir.

First of all, I was very interested in Mr. Wicklum's comment. At the time of our audit, when our team went in, the station in Wood Buffalo National Park did not have the capacity to monitor PAHs. If that has happened since, then that's an excellent development.

Regarding the other part of the data that's generated both from CEMA and from RAMP, in the course of our work we asked, is that data then somehow entered into or does it become part of the data systems that the federal government maintains? The answer is no, because much of it is proprietary, as you know.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I agree that we need to integrate data, but I just wanted to be sure that you are not recommending that the federal government now discontinue dealing with water monitoring in partnership with others, including an agency like RAMP, or including provinces, or including all the water monitoring that private industry does and reports to the federal government.

You're not in any way being critical of the federal government for undertaking water monitoring in partnership with others. Am I right about that?

[Scott Vaughan]

There have been observations, for example, from the joint panel reviews on issues related to water quality and water quantity issues, but we didn't make any recommendations.

We've used that as one of several examples where—and I think this is the important point, if I may, sir—it would be important for Environment Canada to understand and do a risk analysis of where they think the largest risks are and then to make some resource allocations based on those risks.

Mr. Keenan alluded to the World Meteorological Organization standards that Canada has helped develop.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Mr. Woodworth, your time has expired.

Mr. Andrews, you have the floor.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for coming, ladies and gentlemen.

My first question is to you, Ms. Thomas. In the commissioner's report he states, “...the Coast Guard is not able to determine how much oil spill response equipment it should have....”

If you can't determine how much equipment you should have, how do you know how you're going to respond to an oil spill?

[Jody Thomas]

We know how much equipment we have at a regional level. What we don't have is an overarching framework at a national level to determine where it is, and we don't have a life-cycle management system. That life-cycle management system is going to be put into place in the next fiscal year.

The management framework will be influenced by the risk assessment we're undertaking with Transport Canada, so that we ensure we have the right amount of equipment in the right locations. Right now it exists at a regional level. It's tested; it's monitored. We know what's out there, but we need that overarching management framework.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

The commissioner also says that most of this equipment is out of date and needs to be updated. Even your coast guard staff says they're concerned about the level of investment in this equipment. Has the level of investment in this response been a concern of yours as well?

[Jody Thomas]

I've been in this job for about two and a half months, so I don't think I'm ready to respond to that question. However, we will complete our risk assessment and then we'll do a cost-benefit analysis of what the next steps have to be to ensure that the coast guard can respond.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Where's the highest risk for an oil spill right now in Canada? Is it the south coast of Newfoundland, in Placentia Bay?

[Gerard McDonald]

It's a difficult one to answer. Certainly, if we look at the east coast of Canada, it has the largest number of traffic movements at this point, roughly about 3,000 vessel movements, as opposed to about 50 on the--