I'm Roger Roberge. I'm the acting director general of the sustainability directorate at Environment and Climate Change Canada.
Thank you for the opportunity to discuss report 3, “Departmental Progress in Implementing Sustainable Development Strategies”, including the significant progress that has been made as outlined in the report.
I will begin by providing some context on the evolution of the cabinet directive on the environmental assessment of policy, plan and program proposals; the Federal Sustainable Development Act and how it relates to this audit of strategic environmental assessments, or SEAs; and the audit results themselves. I will also highlight actions that Environment and Climate Change Canada is taking to support decision-making for sustainable development.
In brief, the cabinet directive came into being in 1990 and outlines the requirement to conduct SEAs when two conditions are met: that proposals are submitted to an individual minister or cabinet minister for approval, and that implementation of the proposal may result in important environmental effects, either positive or negative.
The cabinet directive was amended in 2010 to include a requirement to link SEAs to the federal sustainable development strategy, or FSDS, and to include within them contributions to the FSDS's goals and targets. It also required the 26 departments and agencies contributing to the FSDS to include results of their SEAs in their own departmental sustainable development strategies.
These departmental strategies are designed to include measures to ensure decision-makers are able to take into account environmental considerations alongside economic and social factors.
To support the development of comprehensive SEAs, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency assists all federal organizations by promoting SEA and providing guidance and training. In addition to its own obligations under the directive, Environment and Climate Change Canada is responsible for providing departments and agencies upon request with expert policy, technical and scientific advice.
In the previous SEA audits beginning in 2013 and over the course of the past five years, the commissioner has looked at how each of the individual 26 departments and agencies has applied the cabinet directive and whether they had met their commitments to strengthen SEA practices in general. The commissioner's report shows that the 26 audited federal organizations applied the cabinet directive to 93% of the proposals submitted for cabinet approval in 2017.
This is a significant improvement over the findings of previous audits when the rate of compliance varied between 23 and 44%.
What is more, 17 of the 26 departments that were audited, including Environment and Climate Change Canada, presented a 100% rate of compliance. Seven other departments presented higher rates of compliance and two others presented no plans in 2017.
It should be noted that the report contained no new recommendations.
Under the cabinet directive, each department is responsible for conducting its own SEA, and with this in mind I would like now to mention some of the steps that Environment and Climate Change Canada has taken to implement the directive.
At ECCC, we are committed to conducting a detailed SEA for every policy, plan and program proposal going to cabinet or to Treasury Board for approval. This also applies to proposals led by other departments or agencies that are assigned by the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. This goes beyond the requirements of the cabinet directive, which allows for some proposals, such as those not expected to have important environmental affects, to undergo preliminary scans rather than full SEAs.
We recognize that SEAs must be high quality to support decision-makers. As a result, ECCC has a dedicated unit to provide advice and review SEAs for the department. This unit also provides online classroom training to ensure employees are able to carry out thorough assessments. Public statements are also made available online so that Canadians can be informed of the steps being considered or taken. These include a description of how ECCC proposals could affect the achievement of FSDS goals and targets.
In conclusion, these and other actions taken in individual departments and agencies are reflected in the commissioner's positive findings.
Thank you. I look forward to any questions you might have.