Evidence of meeting #4 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was process.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:15 p.m.
Director General, Energy Safety and Security Branch, Energy Sector, Department of Natural Resources
Indeed. One of the principles is to ensure that the decisions are based on science and the traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples and other relevant experts.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
Thank you.
Thank you for the presentations. It's really great to have the NEB before us. We really appreciate your public service. I've had wonderful interactions both with Natural Resources Canada and with the National Energy Board, and I would agree entirely that the NEB staff are exceptional. There are some really exceptional people there.
I want to zone in on a piece that isn't really included in this commissioner's review but that I think is an elephant in the room.
Ms. Touchette, you talked about the issue of public confidence. The emphasis was placed on change and on a modernization program. You talked about regulatory excellence, safety and engaging Canadians, but you did not say anything about the relationship between the National Energy Board and aboriginal communities.
Engaging Canadians is broadly written, and you could throw it into that category, but there's a question that I would like to ask today. Do you feel that the National Energy Board, in its position not only as the regulator but also the body statutorily obligated to conduct environmental assessments, is in a strong position to engage in consultation?
I know, Madam Touchette, that you're an expert in this area. You've taught in this area at the University of Ottawa. You were formerly with the Department of Aboriginal and Northern Affairs. You know this area well. I'm very curious to hear your remarks in that regard.
12:20 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
Thank you for assuming my expertise here. Hopefully, I won't disappoint.
Let me perhaps step back a little bit and talk about how there are a number of processes and circles within circles in what you referred to, Mr. Amos.
First, when we talk about consultations or mobilization, a distinction should be made between mobilization as part of the request process—which is quasi-judicial—and mobilization as part of our daily pipeline oversight activities. Consultations and mobilization will take place in both cases. In the case of a pipeline construction request, that will generally be done through a very long process. In the other case, it may be more specific to a particular site.
When it comes to requests, the government turns to the National Energy Board and trusts its processes as much as possible. For example, among our activities are meetings where we hear from aboriginal community representatives in order to obtain what is called oral aboriginal traditional evidence. We want to add that to the file and consider it as the file progresses.
However, as part of this—and I am talking about requests here—the Department of National Resources will seek the mobilization of aboriginal communities to ensure that everything is complete, in addition to the consultations it holds. So there are files where the process will start even before the request is considered, even before it is completed and before the file is finalized, since we all think that it is very important, as is this dialogue.
As far as pipeline regulation and oversight go, we want to do more. Peter Watson, our CEO and Chair, recently attended the First Nations Forum on Energy. That meeting was held earlier this month in Vancouver. One of the things he said was that we had to do a better job and learn to collaborate with aboriginal peoples on ongoing issues. How can we have a better dialogue when ensuring pipeline oversight and regulation? We have initiated processes to be able to better respond to aboriginal groups' concerns.
Of course, this is a learning process. If you have not done so already, I suggest that you read our report on the National Mobilization Initiative, which is available on our website.
Last year, our CEO undertook some mobilization initiatives. He met with more than 80 communities across Canada, several of which were aboriginal groups, in order to find out how the situation could be improved. We will never achieve perfection, but we are trying to do the best we can. There is a proverb that says, “If at first you don't succeed, try, try again”. We will go back and try to improve things.
Is there a willingness to move forward and to be better mobilized? Yes. Is what we are currently doing perfect? Of course not, but we are striving toward constant improvement, and we are really listening to people.
I would add that, in the particular case of the energy east project, the draft principles make it possible to appoint three temporary members who would carry out more consultations or put forth more mobilization efforts, especially with communities.
12:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
You were on a roll and I didn't want to interrupt, but we are way past time. My apologies.
Did you want to say something to finish?
12:25 p.m.
Liberal
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to everyone for being here today.
I'll try to keep my questions brief and answers correspondingly, because we'll run out of time.
Madam Touchette, how important is it for the public to have trust in the National Energy Board?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
It's very important. I'm very grateful that you're asking this question. It's something that preoccupies us greatly at the National Energy Board. I've just talked about—
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I'm going to interrupt you just because there are a number of topics I want to delve into here, as well as the general topic. It's good to hear the importance of that, and I believe you.
How important is it for the public to have trust in the process that the NEB uses to evaluate pipelines?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
It's equally important that the public have trust in the process.
I would like to expand a little here, if I may. I think that you'll see in this report that the chair is very clear that part of the issue is that people don't know the board, don't know the work we do, and don't necessarily understand our role. A fundamental component of trust is that understanding. We want to build that.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I wouldn't necessarily assume a lack of knowledge from the public in what the NEB has done.
If I were an intervenor right now on the Trans Mountain project, can I cross-examine the proponent under your process? Can I challenge their evidence?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
The evidence can be challenged, yes.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
That hasn't been the intervenors' experience in Trans Mountain, when challenging cleanup evidence or evidence about how the pipeline will be constructed.
I have one question and I think you may have said this. You accepted the commissioner's findings and conclusions—
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
—and in half the cases those conditions, which are held up to give the public that confidence that you need them to have, weren't tracked in that they were inadequate and your systems were outdated. This causes me and perhaps many Canadians great concern, considering the risks of a pipeline failure. There are about two major failures per year in Canada, according to you and the Alberta regulator.
Take one that didn't happen in Canada, in Kalamazoo, and this is a quote from the Environmental Protection Agency about the condition of safety at the company that spilled, I think it was, four million litres of bitumen:
This investigation identified a complete breakdown of safety at Enbridge. Their employees performed like Keystone Kops and failed to recognize their pipeline had ruptured and continued to pump crude into the environment....
If you're not tracking half the conditions and you're unable to report as to whether the company is following through, does this not prime us for similar accidents in which the culture of safety is not adequate to protect Canadians?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
I take it we're not talking about TMX. We're talking about your question, where you've given context, but about incidents that we do not regulate.
Let me take you back to the audit report, which at paragraph 2.34 talks about our tracking being out of date, and at 2.116 it says that when asked to do a manual search, we were able to respond to the questions.
I will take you back to my opening remarks where I said we recognized there were issues in tracking, issues in our systems, and that we have started to address them. I think you will see with the table that we produced yesterday, and that is now up on our website with 2,869 conditions, that we are indeed tracking and we have improved our systems. It's not perfect yet, and we prefer to put those on the web now rather than wait to have the perfect system.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
But it's not perfect yet, and we're updating now. It's 2016, and I used the analogy earlier, if I were boarding a plane this evening and they said they didn't have half of their safety checks in, but they'd like to load rows 30 to 35, I wouldn't get on the plane and neither would you. Simply not being able to track whether companies are following through on these conditions that weren't optional.... These are imperative. You cannot operate this pipeline without those conditions being performed, and your agency doesn't know whether they are or not, in a factual way.
Can you understand why the public may lose confidence, not only in the process but also in the regulator itself?
12:30 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
Let's clarify the facts. At paragraph 2.116, the commissioner states that when doing a manual search people were able to find the documents.
12:30 p.m.
Chief Operating Officer, National Energy Board
In most cases, I believe is the language that she used.
When we look at conditions, conditions are but one part of the entire regulatory framework.
That is the general structure of regulations.
You have a regulatory framework. Companies have to comply with that, and conditions are but one part of that.
In addition, we do inspections. We do a number of.... I have the data here, which I'd like to share with you.
