Evidence of meeting #11 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 41st Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was nations.
A recording is available from Parliament.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Mining Association of Canada
Could I jump in, though you didn't ask me, just to point out...?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Mining Association of Canada
Industry, environmental groups, and first nations are calling for the renewal of that funding.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mark Warawa
Thank you.
Ms. Rempel, you will be our closing speaker. You have four and a half minutes.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Sure.
To Mr. Collyer and to Mr. Gratton as well, you talked earlier about environmental assessment processes in comparative jurisdictions, in other countries. Since we're looking at best practices, perhaps we could get into that a little more deeply.
Mr. Collyer, certainly your member companies operate in other countries as well. Have you encountered any best practices that perhaps aren't in effect in Canada that we should be looking at?
President, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers
There are some differences, and I think we have to acknowledge those. The best one that we've run across is some of the work that's been done in Australia. Mr. Gratton referenced that earlier. I think it is an example that ought to be looked at, and we can--
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Sir, could you just give us a little bit more detail on that?
President, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers
We can provide more information on that, yes.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
With regard to those specific regulations--whatever, review processes--what about them was effective and how could they be useful in Canada?
President, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers
I think there are some good examples there of the equivalence and substitution piece we talked about and also how timelines are applied. We'll follow up on that.
Conservative
Justyna Laurie-Lean Vice-President, Environment and Health, Mining Association of Canada
It's a very different jurisdictional division, with much clearer separation between what the states do and what the federal jurisdiction does. They have various prescribed processes that they go through very quickly. We could ask our sister organization--well, not sister organization, but the equivalent--in Australia to compare. There was a workshop or conference of federations that looked at this issue, and there may be a report available from it that could be helpful.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
My previous question dealt with pieces of legislation or processes in other jurisdictions that we could learn from. In your experience with working with other jurisdictions, what are we doing right? What are some of the key pieces of this act that perhaps let Canada be a world leader in environmental assessment or where we're seen on the world stage as a country that is very cognizant of environmental stewardship and environmental assessment in projects?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Mining Association of Canada
I would just point out that if you look at the quality of environmental review that goes on, it's tremendous. The amount of attention that is brought to all aspects of a major project is huge.
I'm thinking of this image of the daughter of someone who is involved in the Mt. Milligan project. They've got a photo of her when she was about five years old, and the piles of documents are stacked next to her, two and a half times her size. Every aspect is looked at.
In terms of the substantive quality and level of review, I don't think that's at issue. The issue has been around how you get there and what the process is to undertake that and how long it takes.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Maybe I can close with Mr. Collyer.
Compared to other jurisdictions, does the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act provide that social licence to operate for your member companies?
President, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers
I think we've got a world class regulatory system in Canada. We can do better. I think we've got a regulatory system that stacks up extremely well relative to most other jurisdictions. The areas that we've talked about, timelines and processes, making sure we've got a world class monitoring and baseline science foundation for our regulations I think are all opportunities. I start with the premise that we're doing very well, and we're talking about getting better, as opposed to the system being broken and delivering flawed environmental assessment or flawed environmental outcomes. It's absolutely not the case.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Mark Warawa
That's it.
Thank you again to the witnesses for being here and for your briefs. It was very good testimony we heard today.
The meeting is adjourned.
