Environment Committee on March 12th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Give a quick 30-second answer please.

[Carol Najm]

Yes.

The departmental plan reports annual results. A number of programs that we deliver need a longer period of time in order for us to capture the information on performance. For that reason, the information is not available within the year that the departmental results report is issued. We follow it on a longer term throughout the program life cycle.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you.

Mr. Scarpaleggia, you have five minutes.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I have a quick question to begin. Do you have a number that describes how much the department would spend in any given year on programs and activities related to fresh water? Do you have a summary figure, or is it just too difficult to pull together?

[Carol Najm]

I know that we do have the information based on our core responsibilities. Water is one of them, but it's not fresh water separately. We would have to get back to you with how we would prepare that.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Would it include oceans?

[Carol Najm]

It would include the oceans protection plan.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

I think it would be a useful measure to allow legislators and parliamentarians to get a better grip on this issue in your department. I would also ask the same questions of NRCan and Fisheries, and so on.

I would like to speak about the freshwater action plan. The departmental plan for 2020-21 indicates that funding for the plan will be decreasing in 2022-23. Is that correct?

[Carol Najm]

Yes, that's another sunsetting program.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Okay. I don't mean to interrupt, but I have limited time.

I'm specifically concerned about the sunsetting of the funding in budget 2018 for the national hydrological service.

The reason I'm concerned is that, referring to Mr. Redekopp's point, there are only four indicators in the departmental results report of 2018-19 that were not met. Two of these were in relation to water. I will try to find them here.

One of them has to do with the national hydrological service and the satisfaction that the provinces expressed with the service and their interactions with the service.

It says here that in regard to the hydrological service program, the indicator is a percentage of provincial and territorial partners rating their satisfaction with Environment Canada's hydrometric services. The target is 80% and the actual result was 56%.

I am concerned about the fact that funding for the service.... I'm told it is in the process of trying to upgrade its monitoring stations. Is that correct?

[Diane Campbell, Assistant Deputy Minister, Meteorological Service of Canada, Department of the Environment]

I'm Diane Campbell, the assistant deputy minister of the meteorological service of Canada.

The funding that was received in the budget that you were referring to was targeted towards three specific themes. One of them was to deal with some serious rust-out in our monitoring equipment. That is midway through the delivery. We have focused on the high-risk stations. We plan to complete that infrastructure renewal by the time the money sunsets.

There were two other elements as well. One was to work more closely with provinces and territories on a number of things, including data-sharing mechanisms, and then to enhance the capability of doing hydrological and weather modelling combined, so prediction.

With respect to the second point you raise on satisfaction, this is part of our ongoing approach in the meteorological service, to always talk to out clients, find out how satisfied they are.

We are definitely acknowledging that the provinces and territories would like to have greater real-time access to data on a number of issues. We have formal mechanisms in place with them where we work with them on a monthly basis to co-deliver the programs but also collect what the needs would be. The way we then work with that data and information is to use that to see the gaps for future programming needs or technological needs or innovation needs in the next cycle of program planning and delivery.

[Francis Scarpaleggia, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Will the sunsetting of these funds make it harder to upgrade these interactions with the provinces?

[Diane Campbell]

We put a specific plan in place when we requested that money. We plan to deliver that but a component of that program also tested the implications of new technologies. It will then give us the pros and cons of introducing new ways of monitoring, and depending on the science results, we would then bring that in to a business case of whether we would implement that more fully after the money has sunsetted.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you.

Madam Pauzé, you have two and a half minutes.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you.

My question is for the Parks Canada Agency officials.

The supplementary estimates allocate $175,000 to the Parks Canada Agency for "innovative approaches to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in government operations". I'd like to hear what those approaches are because I'm always interested in new ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Could you describe some of the approaches for us?

[Michael Nadler, Vice-President, External Relations and Visitor Experience, Parks Canada Agency]

Thank you very much for your question.

The Parks Canada Agency is in the midst of setting up a reinvestment program for all of its assets. We are currently fine-tuning the program to make sure we can operate our sites more efficiently in the future and further green our operations. Although nearly all of our operations are affected, it relates primarily to our capital program.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

That's fine, but you didn't provide any specific examples.

When you have some, I'd be interested in hearing about them. When I asked about tree planting, you referred me to Natural Resources Canada, but you are the tree experts. Have you put together a plan setting out the species to be planted? Obviously, there will be mixed vegetation, but what else?

How far along is the work?

[Darlene Upton]

That work is beginning now but as I mentioned, Parks Canada is working in collaboration with Environment Canada and Natural Resources Canada to look at developing that plan.

[John Moffet]

I'd like to add something, if I may.

I think it's important to emphasize that in addition to the expertise of Parks Canada, the Canadian forest service has considerable expertise and they will be leading this exercise.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Are you done?

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Okay. Thank you.

Ms. Collins, over to you.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

I want to follow up on the questions about the $2-million transfer, specifically around the investigation into VW. Out of that $2 million, what were the costs for that litigation?

[Carol Najm]

I don't have that information with me.