Environment Committee on March 22nd, 2018

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thanks.

I'd like to correct the minister here, correct the record. She made a statement that was incorrect. Under our government, from 2005 to 2015, emissions went down from 738 megatonnes to 722. I wish she would use the correct facts when she makes statements like that. At the same time, under our government, most environmental indicators in this country improved. I should advise the minister that if you're talking about the environment, using numbers is what actually counts.

I have a very specific question regarding the $50 carbon tax. How much will Canada's emissions be reduced under a $50-a-tonne carbon tax? I want a number here.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you very much. I would like to say that a large part of the emissions that went down in Ontario was because of the coal phase-out, so a shout-out to the Government of Ontario for taking action to improve health and also build a cleaner environment.

As I said, it's important to understand that putting a price on pollution is part of our broader climate plan. We believe in numbers so we spend a lot of time modelling. We also worked closely with provinces and territories, and each province and territory—

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

What is the number?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

—is different and—

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

What is the number?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

—they are the ones that are implementing the system that's consistent with our benchmark.

As I say, 80% of Canadians live in a jurisdiction where there's a price on pollution—

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

What is the number of the reduction?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

—and the good news is that all the jurisdictions that have a price on pollution—the four provinces of Alberta, B.C., Ontario, and Quebec—are the fastest-growing provinces in the country, so it's great to see that you can put a price on what you don't want, pollution—

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Okay. So quite clearly—

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

—so you can grow your economy.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Quite clearly, the minister is simply unable to provide a number, which is clearly ridiculous. When I ran the environmental program at a paper mill, we installed a waste-water treatment plant and we knew exactly how water quality would improve because of the installation of that plant. What you're telling Canadians here is that they will be asked to pay a $50 carbon tax—probably increasing over time—and there is absolutely no measurement of what the environmental effect will be. That's basically what I'm hearing, and that's fine.

I now would like to address the issue of competitiveness. What I heard from both ministers is simply beyond belief in terms of how this will help Canada's competitiveness. It will help to destroy it. In fact, my first job as a young fisheries biologist was doing pipeline assessments in the Mackenzie Valley. Twenty-five years of process on that potential project killed that project, and now we have impoverished communities all along the Mackenzie Valley because that pipeline was not built. Bad process kills projects.

For example, on February 9, 2018, Steve Williams, the CEO of Suncor, said that Suncor was to shun major new projects amid Canada's “difficult” regulatory environment, and we're one of Canada's major oil companies and we're not investing here anymore....

I have a paper here: “Pipeline shortage to cost the economy $15.6 billion this year”. Maybe you wouldn't run into so many deficits in your budgeting if you allowed the economy to actually proceed and create income. In terms of the legal review of Bill C-69, in the legal Daily publication, the headline reads, “Bill C-69 aims to expand and speed federal reviews, but lawyers doubt process will be faster or cheaper”.

Quite clearly what your government is doing is severely constraining the development of Canada's natural resource industries. You're reaping the remnants of the good governance under Stephen Harper, but that will quickly dissipate. How will you ensure investors with a process like this? Why do you think someone like Steve Williams has decided to shun Canada in terms of investing?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Bad process kills projects: I agree. That's what happened under the previous government.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Nonsense.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Their projects did not go ahead.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Nonsense.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

The government ended up losing in court a number of times because the duty to consult was not met. Unfortunately, when you don't have a system that listens to people, you don't make decisions based on robust science, and you don't meet your constitutional obligations, and, as Minister Carr said, your moral obligations to indigenous peoples, you can't get good projects built.

Under our government, we have approved major projects, and we have a system here that will provide the certainty that business is expecting. It will create a world-class system. In terms of the timelines, we heard loudly and clearly that we need to have clear timelines. We've reduced the timelines for impact assessment—

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I only have a bit of time and, to refute your argument, the Northern Gateway pipeline passed with flying colours through a proper regulatory process with some 238 conditions. The Prime Minister arbitrarily killed that project for political purposes. We had community after community all along that proposed pipeline route devastated by that political decision by the Prime Minister after a sound and rigorous environmental review process.

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Madam Chair, I would not want to refute my fellow Manitoban, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to. It was the Federal Court of Appeal that quashed Northern Gateway, not because of insufficient consultation from the proponent and not because of insufficient consultation from the regulator, but insufficient consultation from the Harper government. That is why we changed the process for Trans Mountain: because any sensible person would look at failure and say that we don't want to repeat it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you.

Next up is Mr. Amos.

[William Amos, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you to our witnesses, including the civil servants who work so hard to support our ministers.

I think your appearance here is an important aspect of our democracy. I note that, because when the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act of 2012—which was a gutting of the previous environmental assessment regime—was passed, I seem to recall that neither the Conservative environment minister nor the natural resources minister appeared before any committee to discuss this issue, so thank you for being here.

I would like to start by going into the issue of scientific integrity and the role of science in impact assessment. I think Canadians view this as being really important. The expert panel on environmental assessment processes concluded that, “stronger guidelines and standards are needed to ensure that [impact assessment] processes include rigorous scientific methods.” Clearly, science was a focus of the expert panel.

However, in clause 22 of the act, there a number of factors set out that are required to be considered in the context of conducting impact assessment. They include things like sustainability, traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples, etc., but science-based evidence isn't included as a factor.

I'm wondering if this is an oversight, and I'm wondering if there is not an intention to ensure that science is incorporated into the factors that are considered.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

We certainly agree that making sure you make decisions based on robust science, evidence, and indigenous traditional knowledge is key. That has to be throughout, so we've talked about the new sustainability, looking at the sustainability and all the factors, and we've said that would be throughout. We would be considering the science throughout that.

Government scientists would also be very engaged in that they would review any studies provided by companies. When there's public concern, there would be independent scientific reviews that would be done.

The indigenous traditional knowledge, as I mentioned, is a must-have, not a nice-to-have.

We are going to be making sure the science is put out in a transparent way. We believe transparency is extremely important, making sure folks can see what the basis is for decisions, so there's going to be a new online open science and data platform.

As you know, under our government, we brought in a new chief science adviser. That chief science adviser is tasked with reviewing the methods and integrity of the science of the decisions, and we think this brings a lot more rigour to how we will be making decisions and making sure we will be using robust science.

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Just to add, that's also true for the Canadian energy regulator. It says specifically in the bill that the commission will have to look at scientific information and data, so it's explicit.

[William Amos, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you.

I'd like to shift to the issue of strategic and regional impact assessments. As you're aware, the expert panel indicated the importance of these. It specifically said, “Regional [impact assessment] is too important to long-term federal interests to be triggered on an ad hoc basis...”.

Previous federal environmental assessment rules have provided for this kind of regional, and also strategic, impact assessment, but they've rarely been conducted. My own view is that, as we talk about environment and the economy going hand in hand, both of these regional and strategic impact assessment aspects are crucial to ensure that the economic aspect doesn't get the upper hand, if you will.

I wonder why the proposed legislation leaves strategic impact assessment and regional impact assessment entirely to discretion, and I wonder if there's not a way to put a better frame around it and to more firmly ensure that such assessments will occur. The suggestion has been made that there be an independent body created to carry these out.

I just wonder if you could speak to that theme, please.

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

We heard that loud and clear, not just from the expert panel, but across the board. It was proponents, indigenous peoples, environmentalists, and provinces and territories, saying that we need to use the tool strategic and regional assessments. Why? It's because one project can't bear all of the cumulative impacts. We were trying to bring much broader issues into one project assessment. It doesn't work that way, nor does it provide certainty. We certainly agree.

It's key to understand that we must do regional or strategic assessments with provinces. There is provincial jurisdiction. We certainly recognize that, as a federal government, we need to be working with provinces and territories. We have announced that we will be conducting the first strategic assessment on climate change. We've been very clear that we need to meet our international obligations. We are going to be starting with that. It's going to be launched in the coming weeks with a consultation paper, and this will be requiring close collaboration with provinces and territories, obviously, but also with indigenous peoples and other stakeholders.

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

I will just add that there also will be regional assessments in the offshore and that the continuing role of the Newfoundland and Labrador offshore board and the Nova Scotia offshore board will include those assessments.