I'll get back to the crux of the matter here.
I think my colleagues across the way understand that our position has always been, from the outset, that the bill seems to be redundant in a few cases. My point in this particular case would be that this section of the bill really doesn't offer anything new. It does specifically outline in quite detailed mechanisms now how a process would actually happen. But we all know that the more prescriptive things get, the more bureaucracy there is, the more red tape there is. And that concern alone, in and of itself, is going to create work where there doesn't need to be any work. We should be focusing on responding to our constituents' needs, and not responding to what the commissioner tells us we can and can't do within prescribed timelines, which is quite frustrating.
However, my own opinions aside, we heard quite clearly from testimony--in fact I believe it was Mr. Stewart Elgie, from the University of Ottawa, who stated that a similar power already exists under the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. I'll go back to his testimony. He was talking generally about this bill and the overarching six things this bill would do differently. He said,
Second, it establishes a right to participate in environmental decision-making, particularly in regulatory and legislative decisions of the government. Again, such a right exists under certain statutes—CEPA and SARA, for example—but does not exist across the board under environmental land use and resource statutes generally. This would be an important expansion. On access to information as a basic right, again, that exists, more or less, under ATIP already.
But he also said,
On the right to request review of federal policies, regulations, and laws, currently a similar power exists under the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development act, and I'll talk in a minute about what its effect has been. But again, this also exists under Ontario's Environmental Bill of Rights.
I understand that Ms. Duncan is trying to make this more consistent with what we see in Ontario, but we've already heard quite clearly from other witnesses that the same power already exists through the petitions process, and that is done under the Auditor General Act, where the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development already gets his or her power.
The existing process under the Auditor General Act sets out a more complete timeline for responding to those petitions where constituents can get together, put forward a petition, and sign it, which is a lot more weighty than just having individual letters coming in. And under the existing process, petitions must be forwarded to the appropriate minister within 15 days of receipt--so faster timelines. The minister is obliged to acknowledge the receipt of the petition with 15 days--a faster timeline than what's being proposed here--to consider the petition, and to send the petitioner a reply within 120 days of receipt, a more reasonable timeline to respond to the individual request.
That has brought overarching legislation, which allows Canadians who want to be involved in their democracy to make those kinds of petitions under any statute, under any provision of Canadian law, under any issue of concern to Canadians, not specifically dealing with anything in the environment. So I don't understand why we would create a whole new set of rules, red tape, and bureaucracy to deal with an issue when we already have an overarching policy and mechanism in place where Canadians can have their concerns addressed.
So based on that, Mr. Chair, I appreciate and I believe that the tabler of this legislation has goodwill and that some around this table believe they are doing what's in the best interest of the environment and for Canadians, but I don't see how this would significantly impact or make a change to the process that's already in place. As a matter of fact, what I see this clause doing is transferring a lot of the decision-making capability away from the hands of the elected officials--which is what we are sent here by our constituents to have--and placing it in the hands of the office of the Commissioner of the Environment.
I think that's the wrong way to go. I think we want to use the existing process. It seems to be working fine. Members of Parliament are already obligated to table petitions on behalf of their constituents, so that's not a problem. We already have a bona fide way of getting those concerns in front of the minister of the crown for any particular department on any particular issue with a prescribed timeline, and I just don't understand why we need to duplicate it here. I think it's redundant. It adds, as I say, red tape and bureaucracy where it's not needed and actually creates more difficulty rather than clarifying a process.
