Evidence of meeting #17 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 enforcement.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
No, but we didn't go in.... I'm trying to present it diplomatically, but the lack of senior management involvement wouldn't give an indication that those actions were taken appropriately.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Did you interview anyone who had been charged under CEPA?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
I did not, personally, but I'll ask....
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
No, we did not.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
So you did not clarify with anyone who had been charged on the procedural follow-up? It was strictly a process audit?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
No, that would potentially be some legal.... Our role, as I'm sure the honourable member can appreciate, is to look at the management systems within Environment Canada and not at those cases against which action had been taken.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
So we have the courts upholding decisions, and we haven't had a review of those who have been charged under CEAA yet. What I'm trying to ascertain from this is that your assessment on fair and consistent and predictable enforcement at CEAA is based on the fact that some office forms weren't filled out.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Office forms? I don't stay up at night worrying that there's a lack of paperwork in the sense of paperwork to please auditors. But we base our work on evidence. Particularly when there are inspectors' reports, which are the evidence base for proceeding further—for example, into a potential criminal proceeding—the lack of that paperwork isn't to please auditors, but to ensure that the existing system works as intended. We've said in this case that there were major failings with Environment Canada's own system. It's not our system; it's their system.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
To follow that thought, you would agree, then, that the intent of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act is to protect the environment. Is that correct?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
That's correct.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
So it is perhaps not to charge and prosecute as many people as possible, but rather to protect the environment.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Absolutely, yes.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Great. So charges are used under the act as a way to prevent harm to the environment or harm to the public, etc.?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
That's correct.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
And sometimes you can prevent harm from occurring without charging people. Then sometimes a warning from an enforcement officer would be enough to deter someone from further harming the environment.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
On that point, one of the things we've said is that a warning letter could be a deterrent, but the only way Environment Canada would know whether it was a deterrent was if they were to go back and follow up to see whether or not the warning letter led to the regulated entity coming back into compliance. What we've said is that of 600 warning letters for minor violations, there was no follow-up for 50% of them.
I absolutely agree. The intent was to send signals, but you need to know whether or not those signals worked.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Along that line, you're speaking to the judgment of the enforcement officers. Officers are given discretion as to whether to issue warnings under the act. Is that correct?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Yes, that's correct.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Centre-North, AB
Great.
So what you're suggesting is that the judgment of the officers is in question here?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
No, not a bit. We haven't questioned that. The numbers speak for themselves: there were 600 warning letters in a year. We didn't question whether or not those warning letters were appropriate. What we said is that there is a requirement to do a follow-up, which is the policy of Environment Canada. If you issue a warning letter, did the warning letter lead, as the honourable member correctly says, to the past violation being corrected? If you don't follow up, you don't know.
We didn't question in any way whether those letters were appropriate.
Conservative
Megan Leslie NDP Halifax, NS
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for this presentation and the report. There's a lot in here. I can't imagine the amount of work that you put into this. Congratulations for what is a very thorough and credible report.
My first questions have to do with the transportation of dangerous goods.
In your report you say that Transport Canada has given only temporary, interim approval for nearly half of the emergency response plans. Then you stated here today that those temporary plans are actually subject to less verification. Can you paint a picture for us of what that means? I don't fully understand what that process looks like.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Yes, and I'll let me colleague, Mr. Sloan, amplify my answer. Yes, the temporary permits are intended to be given temporarily. We've said that half of them were for five years or more. Some of them were for 10 years. One was for 13 years. What the requirements are for a temporary permit from Transport Canada are significantly less stringent than they would be for permanent approval. There is a cursory checklist. The only concrete thing, which we note in the chapter, is for a temporary approval. There has to be a demonstration of an active phone number. By contrast, with the permanent approvals, there is a long checklist that the operators have to provide. They have to provide an assessment of the risk, if there is an accident, what the plan is for first responders, what some of the risks to communities might be, and what the risks are in terms of environmental damage.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Those thresholds aren't followed to the same rigour for the temporary approval.
