Evidence of meeting #19 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
A video is available from Parliament.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
On a point of order, I would just say again that this is not in regard to the bill itself but to the study. It should be ruled out of order. We all came prepared for clause-by-clause. Everyone knew this. This should have been done in committee business prior to today's meeting.
Mr. Chair, I would ask you to rule it out of order. It is not on our agenda to be changing this.
3:35 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
I consider this in order. It's totally related to what we're doing.
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
3:35 p.m.
Conservative
3:40 p.m.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
No, I'm not challenging it, Mr. Chair. I'm going to speak to the debate. I do respect it when you make a decision.
3:40 p.m.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I find it very troubling that we had officials just here, who could have stayed for clause-by-clause, suddenly logging off and giving the rationale that they weren't needed today. We all had the ability to submit witnesses. We planned to do this in an orderly way with two meetings. All parties agreed to that. We all got the chance to put forward witnesses.
Mr. Chair, this will delay the work of the committee. You know better than anyone that we have several different motions that have been referred to this committee, many of them Liberal, and they will be pushing other things back.
As the House of Commons has given this to us to do, I would simply ask all members who are concerned about not being able to get to the important work the House has sent to us.... Out of respect for the House that sent this to us, I believe we should vote this out. We've had industry. We've had environmental groups. We've had the government itself come and talk about its policies. We all agreed to a two-step process.
I would ask all members to vote against this motion. I'm very disappointed that this was done with no consultation. Obviously, since the member read it out, he has had this for quite some time. To not be consulting with other party members or other parties I think really just shows that the member didn't do his homework at the correct time to work with other parties to have an orderly schedule where everyone's concerns could be made out.
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
I'll go to Mr. Baker.
Mr. Albas, thanks for taking your hand down. For some reason, I can't seem to do it at my end.
I have Mr. Schiefke.... No, wait.
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
3:40 p.m.
Liberal
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
Yvan Baker Liberal Etobicoke Centre, ON
—as per your request. I was too quick, yes.
Chair, speaking to the motion presented by Mr. Schiefke and what I think what Mr. Schiefke is trying to do, I'm not speaking for him, but I see a lot of merit in what he's recommending. At the end of the day, we have a situation where we have a bill and concerns have been raised, and I'll cite one that concerns me. It's something that Mr. Saini was trying to ask questions about, but I don't think there was enough time to explore it, which is an example of why Mr. Schiefke's motion has merit.
Mr. Saini was asking about something that at a prior committee meeting I was also asking witnesses about, which is what the impact of this bill would be on Canada's waste disposal system and on our landfills. It's incumbent upon us as a committee studying this bill and digging into the details and the implications of this bill to understand what that is. Can this bill actually be implemented? Is it realistic? Is it feasible?
The concerns that have been raised if the bill were to be passed, and that I'm alluding to, are around what would happen to waste that's currently being exported that could no longer be exported, whether that's to the United States or anywhere else, because that's what this bill would do. It would ban the export completely.
From officials who were here today, we heard a figure for the number of tonnes of waste exported every year, and that's just to the United States, never mind all the other countries that we export waste to, so you can imagine that if you suddenly shut the border to that complete export, that waste has to go to landfills.
In response to a question I asked at our last meeting, that was the answer we were given by one of the witnesses. We know from the officials today that landfills are at capacity. They said that to us today. In fact, the quote from Ms. Ryan—I wrote it down—is that capacity of landfills is “stretched”. Also, “Adding material...to handle will be very challenging and potentially...very problematic”.
As a member of the committee whose responsibility it is to evaluate the pros and cons of legislation that comes to us, I think this is one of the potential cons that officials are flagging for us. It's a legitimate concern. Without even hearing from officials, I already had that concern. If I think about these millions of tonnes of waste that suddenly are not going to be exported and have to be put somewhere, they have to be put in landfills that are already at capacity, and that means the landfills will not be able to handle them.
From my experience and in consulting with people who know a lot about this, it takes around five years to get a new landfill set up, because they have to be permitted and regulated and put in place. If I think about just that issue alone, which I have concerns about, I'm concerned about the idea that we would go ahead without getting that additional input that Mr. Schiefke's motion would allow us to get from officials and from others to make sure that we know whether or not this bill could actually be implemented.
That would be my argument for Mr. Schiefke's motion.
Thank you, Chair.
3:45 p.m.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I would simply point out that as parliamentarians and as members of this committee, we have a responsibility to thoroughly vet the legislation that comes before us. In the one and a half meetings we've had so far—we've had only one and a half meetings on this—we have heard significant feedback that there are huge challenges with this piece of legislation as it stands. I took notes as we went. I listened to every single one of them. I want to share some of those with you.
The bill sponsor himself, Mr. Davidson, acknowledged that he was rushed in drafting this bill, as he drew number five in the PMB lottery. He told us:
Understand that I was probably as shocked as you that I drew number five in the PMB...and had to get this bill drafted quickly with the House of Commons. That was actually a bit of a chore, and meeting with witnesses, all at the beginning of COVID.
We heard from other witnesses as well—the Basel Action Network, the Chemistry Industry Association of Canada, the David Suzuki Foundation, the Recycling Council of Ontario—and we just finished hearing from government officials, all of whom raised significant concerns with the bill as it's currently drafted.
James Puckett of the Basel Action Network raised concerns that this bill will not be effective in addressing the root problem. He said:
In fact...the biggest global problem, which Mr. Davidson and others hope to address with this bill, will not be addressed, because the bill currently only looks at exports for final disposal, which is landfilling or incineration. The bill currently does not address the heart of the problem, which is exports for recycling.
Bob Masterson, the president and CEO of the Chemistry Industry Association of Canada, raised important considerations about the redundancy and technical issues with the bill. He said:
On many levels, Bill C-204 is redundant to those requirements, and at the same time it adds confusion. On the list of plastic wastes, we include things like ethylene, which is a feedstock. It's not a plastic waste.
He said there is no definition.
MP Davidson gave a nice definition of “final disposal”, but [that is not] in the bill itself. There's a lack of process that will allow for the continued movement of post-consumer materials, specifically between Canada, the United States and other OECD countries.
He said this would frustrate the circular economy.
Jo-Anne St. Godard with the Recycling Council of Ontario raised important considerations around transparency. She said:
...I think the spirit here is to get more transparency on what it is we are collecting and sending to other shores, and certainly that is similar to what we should be doing domestically as well. Under the guise of recycling...not all recyclable material is in fact recycled. We need traceability from points of generation through to final disposition. An outright ban...is not really [going to get] at the heart of the issue, which that is no matter what we are generating or how we are generating it or where it is actually managed, we need to have a line of sight on what that is to ensure that the materials are managed to the highest end uses, and also under very strict human and health protections.
It is my strong view, colleagues, that this committee needs to hear from additional witnesses before we can reasonably be in a position to move to clause-by-clause consideration of the bill and send it back for report stage.
I'd like to add that we just heard from department officials about their serious concerns relating to international trade, to our international agreements and to how this bill as it currently stands actually puts us at odds with many of those international agreements that we've signed on to.
With that said, I strongly encourage all my colleagues, from the NDP, the Bloc and the Conservatives, to consider giving more time to this bill. It could be as soon as two weeks from now, at our next constituency week, our off sitting week. For those of you who think that this is being booted down the road and that we don't want to see this move forward, it could be as soon as that—perhaps sooner, if the chair can tell us there's an opening.
Committee members need to do their due diligence on this to try to better address the issues that have been raised by witness after witness from the private sector, the government side and not-for-profit environmental organizations.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
3:50 p.m.
Bloc
Monique Pauzé Bloc Repentigny, QC
I have two questions.
First, we heard from representatives of the chemicals sector, government departments and environmental groups. I feel that is quite comprehensive and diverse. What other witnesses do we want to hear from? Are there others we should invite?
Second, if we extend the time for study, do we have the right to move new amendments?
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
That is an interesting question.
What is your answer, Madam Clerk?
3:50 p.m.
The Clerk of the Committee Ms. Isabelle Duford
The answer with respect to the amendments is yes.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
Very well. If I have understood correctly, there is no time limit for moving amendments, and they can even be moved during a meeting.
Thank you for your question, Ms. Pauzé.
Ms. Saks, you have the floor.
3:50 p.m.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'd just like to follow up on the comments by Mr. Schiefke and my colleague Mr. Baker. Throughout the conversation today with the officials we had here, there seemed to be a tremendous amount of uncertainty when it came to terminology regarding waste and plastic waste. There doesn't seem to be anything in the bill.
We're talking a lot about what we would export out, but we're not even discussing what potentially could be imported.
In addition to that, I do have significant concerns regarding an absolute ban on export, in that we are almost logjamming the internal waste management here in Canada and creating an even bigger disposal problem here, when we're actually trying to resolve it. A chain of events would be sparked by this. The officials are saying that we have mechanisms and solid agreements in place in the current structures we have, which may make Bill C-204 redundant.
We're not sure about that yet. I'd like to share my concerns regarding that uncertainty. We do need more time with this, but a very limited timeline is being proposed. We're not dragging this out.
My colleague Mr. Schiefke and the chair didn't disagree that there is a possibility of doing this in a shorter time. We have all clearly committed time over our constituent weeks to be here to do this important work, and I just don't feel we are there yet.