This is a guaranteed way of chasing away investment in Canada. Basically, you're compelling the minister to order an assessment “when there are public concerns or when information is otherwise brought to the Minister's attention”. It doesn't stipulate the gravity of those concerns or the science that backs up those concerns. If somebody comes forward and complains, those are concerns. They complain and say, “Hey, I have a concern about a particular project; there will be some adverse effects.” Remember, the wording is “may” cause significant adverse effects.
If one person comes forward, the minister must act. The minister, in a situation like this, needs to have the discretion available to assess the seriousness of a complaint about a project and the cumulative effect of a number of complaints on a project.
It goes back to ministerial discretion. I don't believe that we should have ministerial discretion as a rule, but there are times when it makes eminent sense for a minister to have that discretion, so that you don't have situations where projects that really should not have to undergo an impact assessment by any stretch of the imagination suddenly have to, and incur all those additional expenses that will likely chase away that particular investment.