Environment Committee on March 8th, 2016

[John Cooper]

We share assessments, but we have no involvement in how they regulate the use of pesticides.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Yet you're the health department. The exposure of these pesticides to the environment and to human health is in your jurisdiction.

[John Cooper]

That's looked at through the pesticide management regulatory agency.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Health Canada doesn't—

[John Cooper]

We do look at pesticides in terms of exposure to drinking water.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Are there any concerns, then, with these conditional approvals?

[John Cooper]

Not that I am aware of, no.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Okay. Only, it seems passing strange, because some of the things that are being conditionally approved have been known to have negative health effects on humans and the environment, and often it's through the water table that those are released.

Why is that not a concern for Health Canada?

[John Cooper]

Because any pesticide that receives a conditional approval or an approval and is potentially in exposure through drinking water is added to our list of priorities for assessment separately. We do develop guides for pesticides.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Let's move over to air quality, which you deal with. Am I right?

[John Cooper]

That's right.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Do you have the power to bring in restrictions on CO2 release? Is CO2 listed as a toxic in your schedules?

[John Cooper]

It's listed under the GHGs as a toxic. Health Canada focuses on air quality, air pollutants, and critical air contaminants, GHGs to some extent where there are actions taken on GHGs, where there are cost benefits or co-benefits associated with—

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Kitimat, British Columbia, has elevated CO2 levels. They're actually maxing out their airshed right now. The province has been waiting on the federal government, who has the enforcement powers to limit the emissions of SO2 into the environment.

Kitimat has a 60% higher respiratory illness rate than anywhere else in the province. Why haven't you done anything about this yet?

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

We're over six minutes.

[John Moffet]

I don't think we can answer questions about why the government has not.... You'd have to ask the minister that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Yes. Unfortunately, we are out of time on that line of questioning.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

On a point of order, Madam Chair, there was a very specific question asked at the very beginning, which had to do with the 31 recommendations coming out of the 2006-07 report. There was quite a bald statement made by Mr. Amos that none of those recommendations had been addressed. I believe that Mr. Moffet was in the process of responding to that. Perhaps he could finish.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

He said that he's going to give us a summary on that and he's going to give us that information, so I think that we've had the answer on that. We'll be getting the answer sent to us after this meeting.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Chair, if I may, just to understand the limits of what we can ask, from what the official just responded to, the government's choosing to act on a certain provision or not choosing to act on a certain provision is within the purview of testimony.

If we can't ask questions about why the government enforced on this occasion and not on that occasion, and we have to wait for a political response to each of those questions, that would make the review of CEPA with government officials nearly impossible, both to the benefit of the review of CEPA and to members' understanding of what's happening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I have been trying to figure out whether we're in the right line of questioning or not, so let me just read this from O'Brien and Bosc, so that it's very clear for everybody:

Particular attention is paid to the questioning of public servants. The obligation of a witness to answer all questions put by the committee must be balanced against the role that public servants play in providing confidential advice to their Ministers. The role of the public servant has traditionally been viewed in relation to implementing and administering government policy, rather than the determination of what that policy should be. Consequently, public servants have been excused from commenting on the policy decisions made by the government.

That's why we've been.... We're kind of balancing on the head of a pin here.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

As we always are. I have great respect for the role that public administration has to play in enacting government policy, but you just referred to the implementation and administration of government policy. The line of questioning that I had was around the emission of SO2 with respect to human health. There is a policy and there is the question of the administration of that policy. I don't know how that steps out of bounds.

If I can't ask that, it makes the point of having public servants in front of us very difficult to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I'm hearing you. We are out of time on that line of questioning.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I understand.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I think we're going to have a discussion, because I do believe the questioning was appropriate when you talk about the implementation and administration, and that's where you were with it, but let's—