Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Let me start by thanking you for inviting me here to give you a chance to talk about my appointment in the Department of the Environment.
I understand that this is the main reason you have invited me today.
I will begin with a very brief statement. After that, I would be very pleased to answer any questions.
It wasn't that long ago that I was here in front of this committee. It was a couple of years ago when I first came to be the associate deputy minister at environment and talked about my appointment then, so I'm pleased to be here.
Perhaps I'll begin by giving you a quick history of how I got here.
I began my career with the Tax Policy Branch at the Department of Finance. I was a member of the team that implemented the goods and services tax. I spent several years working in tax policy.
I also worked at the Financial Sector Policy Branch for a while. Afterwards, I returned to the Tax Policy Branch, at the Department of Finance. While there, I held the position of Senior Assistant Deputy Minister.
I was then appointed Associate Secretary of the Treasury Board and, after a short period of time, I became Associate Deputy Minister of Environment Canada in 2009. I held that position for almost two years, until I left in 2010.
After that time at Environment Canada, I went on to be the Canadian representative on the Canada-U.S. Regulatory Cooperation Council, which was an initiative that the Prime Minister and President Obama set up to streamline regulations between Canada and the U.S. I am happy to speak about that.
I passed about 18 months in that position leading up to my recent appointment at Environment Canada. I have been in the job for a couple of months. I have had a brief introduction to some of the issues that we are facing. I have to say I am very pleased to be back at Environment Canada. I think it really does provide an opportunity to work on a diverse set of issues. It is a science-based department so it provides very interesting perspectives on the science aspects of environmental policy. We have the Meteorological Service of Canada, which provides a great opportunity to understand weather and climate while monitoring water and air across the country.
We at Environment Canada consider ourselves to be world-class regulators. There is a significant regulatory component to what we do, whether we are regulating GHG emissions or pollutants of other forms in the water or the air. As well, a fair amount of our activity is concerned with protecting species at risk. This is a pretty diverse work agenda from what I can see in the first couple of months that I have been here and one which I think presents a number of interesting challenges and opportunities.
I look forward to using the experience I had at the Department of Finance and Treasury Board as well as the regulatory cooperation activities I was engaged in just prior to accepting this position.
That's a little bit of the history of how I got here, what I think I might bring to the table, and how I see, in a preliminary way, some of the challenges and opportunities that we face.
I am happy to answer any questions you may have after you hear from my colleague, Alan.