Environment Committee on May 13th, 2019

[Wayne Stetski, NDP, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

Yes. It's a serious problem. You just have to step outside to see how much of a problem it is.

If any of you come up with any recommendations or solutions for dealing with cigarette butts, I would love to hear them at some point.

[Helen Ryan]

Our colleagues at Health Canada put a focused effort into having people understand the health risks associated with smoking as well. There's a broader issue there that needs to be considered, but we'll think about that part of the issue as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, John Aldag]

That takes us to the end of the two rounds of time that we'd scheduled.

We are a bit ahead of schedule. I do want to go into our committee business because there are a few thing that we need to talk about, but does anybody have any last questions? I'm happy to go once around each side if anybody has an unanswered question that we haven't got to yet.

While they're thinking about it, I had a question or a point of clarification. I think Sarah may have raised it before we started.

Question 4 relating to the scale of the ocean plastic problem notes that on average about eight million tonnes of plastic waste enters the oceans from land every year worldwide. Further on, under the same question, it notes that some 150 million tonnes of plastics ends up in the oceans annually.

Those are quite different numbers. I don't know which is the true number or what the sources are. We don't need to know now, unless somebody actually knows what that annual amount is. I was trying to figure out if there was nuance in the material, that if one were perhaps land-based versus rivers-based. What is the magnitude of the problem we're up against?

[Jacinthe Seguin]

There are three numbers. The 150 million includes fishing nets, largely. That's the large portion that comes from sea-based or aquatic activities—fishing gear and those kinds of things. It tends to be very heavy, so you go from eight million to 150 million. Then, in the Canadian context, you go from eight million to eight thousand. It's the same “eight” but you drop the million. Sometimes we get it confused, but it's eight million globally from land, and then eight thousand tonnes from land in Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, John Aldag]

It's 150 million tonnes in the oceans globally per year.

Okay. Thank you.

On the Liberal side, did anyone have a last question before we move on?

Martin.

[Martin Shields, Conservative, Bow River, AB]

You may have covered this. You have done a lot of work on it. You talked about a list of the top 10 items collected on beaches.

Is there any idea of the origin of that? Do they do any research on the origin of where it comes from?

[Nancy Hamzawi]

The top 10 is an EU number. Peter Ross spoke about the dirty dozen in Canada. In terms of origin, at this point in time, we are not able to draw a straight line between that piece of plastic and its source, but work is being done on that.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you to the Liberal Party for giving me time to speak. It's most appreciated.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a very simple question.

Within your department and across all departments, is there a policy to reduce the use and recovery of plastics?

[Helen Ryan]

Thank you for the question.

It's one of the things my colleagues at Public Services and Procurement Canada are working on.

There are two things. One, we are putting in place a policy within Environment and Climate Change Canada—and we hope to have that policy in place by the summer—that will deal with the purchases that we make within our department and the nature of the materials we can use, including the use of single-use plastics.

The Government of Canada is also putting in place directives for all of the government operations, including the specifications for our procurement requirements. It is also looking at its building and lease facilities in terms of putting in place requirements there as well.

There has been a commitment made to divert 75% of plastic waste by 2030 from federal government operations, and that's supported by our greening government strategy. There's a commitment as well to eliminate unnecessary use of single-use plastics in government operation events and meetings, and there's specific guidance that is rolling out with respect to that.

Then there are also procurement strategies targeting sustainable procurement, so that we're using our buying power not only to influence what we purchase, but also, then, to influence what others purchase as well. That's going on as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, John Aldag]

Wayne, before I go to you, Mr. Fisher had something.

Darren, we'll go quickly to you, and then we will let Wayne conclude.

[Darren Fisher, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

It will be a short question.

Ms. Seguin, you talked about fishing gear being a major problem. You're probably well aware of the Nova Scotia trial project to deal with abandoned or lost fishing gear. We spoke earlier about sort of “going to school” on other people's science and other's possible trial projects. Do you think that is something that could be looked upon around the world as a success? Are you aware of the Nova Scotia trial project?

[Jacinthe Seguin]

I'm not aware, but that's also DFO.

[Helen Ryan]

Yes. With respect to that, I would defer to my colleagues at DFO with respect to whether or not they view it to be a success, because they are leading on the issue of ghost fishing gear and other marine sources of plastic pollution.

[Darren Fisher, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, John Aldag]

Mr. Stetski.

[Wayne Stetski, NDP, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

I'm just reflecting on some of the quite disturbing testimony we heard from one of the scientists. It was about the fact there are plastics in our drinking water and in our waste water.

As a former mayor, I'm always interested in municipal infrastructure and the cost of improving standards in any way. Municipalities never have enough money to deal with the new regulations that the federal or provincial governments sometimes send their way. I don't know whether we'll get there on plastics. I'm assuming that it would probably be the health people that ultimately might set some of those standards.

This is just a heads-up. If we start talking about getting plastics out of our drinking water and plastics out of our waste water, there's likely a very large cost that could not be borne by municipalities in meeting those standards going forward.

[Helen Ryan]

Yes, and those are important considerations.

Again, then, it's about looking at it as we undertake the science assessment to help us determine what the nature of the risk is, the areas we should be targeting for action and then the nature of the action that should be done. We look at issues such as textiles and the plastics that then can be derived from those. We think about what's the best way to approach that. Those are the kinds of issues that we're contemplating and that we're working with provinces and territories around.

[Wayne Stetski, NDP, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

It's not an easy one to deal with, but it could be important for our long-term health.

[Nancy Hamzawi]

For sure, and I think that testimony was specifically with respect to microplastics in drinking water, including airborne microplastics. That is an area—both micro and nano—where the science is least definitive, so there's a lot more work to be done there.

That's why we started the work last year through the Canadian G7 presidency by pulling together chief science advisers from all G7 countries. France has taken on that work this year through the Metsä communiqué that came out recently. France will be hosting a follow-up workshop on that. You will note that the EU directive was clear that they were not in a position yet...because, on the science, there's more work to be done there.

[The Chair, Liberal, John Aldag]

That ends the data- or information-gathering for this brief study that we've done.

I'd like to thank the departmental officials for the knowledge they've brought to the table and their openness to being here twice during this particular study. It's always a pleasure to see you, and thank you once again.

For the members, I'm going to suspend now for a moment while we clear the room. We're going into a closed session, with the first order of business to be our drafting instructions, per the notice of meeting. Then there's some other committee business that we need to deal with.

So, I'll suspend. But members, please don't leave, and your staff are welcome to stay. Otherwise, everybody else can head off, and thank you so much for being here.

[Proceedings continue in camera]