Environment Committee on Feb. 1st, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Just a moment, please. I have Mr. Davidson.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Through you, I respect everyone on this committee. We're in a minority Parliament, and for my colleague across the way here, Mr. Chair, they're making the assumption that we want to decrease the meetings on water. We just want to have an open discussion. Maybe we're going to need nine days. Maybe we're going to need eight. Maybe it is seven. We just wanted a discussion. We might need more. We know how important water is—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I don't think that's where people are going.

Apparently, Mr. Longfield, you could propose that we adjourn this discussion, in which case I will reschedule it and we can start with the commissioner, if that's what you want to do.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Okay. I propose that we adjourn this discussion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Just a moment.

We're going to vote on just adjourning this debate so that we can get to our discussion with the commissioner, and then I'll schedule another meeting to discuss this.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, if we end debate, we don't have a subcommittee report that allows us to go to the environment commissioner.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Actually, I think we kind of agreed to have the environment commissioner—

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Well, I just.... The whole point.... That's why I was just hoping that we could quickly vote on this or quickly just say, “Yes, let's have the subcommittee work.” I do want to hear from the environment commissioner, but I also.... We did not get agreement on the number of meetings. We had an agreement that we'd have a—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I understand that, yes. [Technical difficulty—Editor] the environment commissioner, but first we have to vote on Mr. Longfield's motion to adjourn this particular debate and do it at another time.

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Alexandre Longpré]

The vote is to adjourn debate.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 7; nays 4)

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We'll proceed with hearing from the commissioner.

Commissioner, welcome. It's nice to see you again.

I believe you have prepared a 10-minute opening statement. Please go ahead.

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We're happy to appear before your committee this morning.

I'd like to acknowledge that this hearing is taking place from the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.

With me today are Kim Leach, James McKenzie, David Normand and Michelle Salvail. They are responsible for the reports that were tabled in the House of Commons on November 25, 2021.

I will start by providing an overview of the commissioner's role before going over the findings of those reports. The Office of the Auditor General of Canada conducts performance audits, including audits of the environment and sustainable development that are led by the commissioner, who is appointed by the Auditor General. We examine whether the activities and programs of federal organizations are managed with due regard to economy, efficiency, effectiveness and environmental impact. We provide parliamentarians with objective, fact-based information and expert advice.

On behalf of the Auditor General, the commissioner reports to Parliament at least once a year on environment and sustainable development matters that the commissioner considers should be brought to Parliament's attention. In practice, I will normally be reporting twice a year. The reports are referred to this committee.

The commissioner helps the Office of the Auditor General of Canada incorporate environmental and sustainable development considerations, as appropriate, across its work. This includes considering the United Nations' sustainable development goals when selecting, designing and carrying out performance audits. These goals are a priority area for the work of the entire office.

The Commissioner also reviews and comments on the federal government’s draft sustainable development strategy under the Federal Sustainable Development Act. Once the strategy is implemented, we monitor and report on the extent to which federal departments and agencies contribute to meeting the targets of the overall federal strategy and the objectives of individual departmental strategies. We also review the fairness of the information in the federal government’s progress reports on the implementation of the strategy.

The Commissioner manages and reports on the environmental petitions process on behalf of the Auditor General. Through this process, Canadians can directly ask federal ministers specific questions about environmental and sustainable development issues under federal jurisdiction and are guaranteed a response.

In addition, as you are aware, the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act came into force in June 2021. The act requires the Commissioner to examine, report on, and make recommendations about the Government of Canada’s implementation of measures to mitigate climate change, including those meant to achieve the government’s most recent greenhouse gas emission target.

I’m going to turn now to our recent reports. The first report that I would like to focus on provides the findings of our audit of the Emissions Reduction Fund for the oil and gas sector. This fund was part of the measures that the Government of Canada rolled out in response to the COVID‑19 pandemic. It aimed to reduce harmful emissions while maintaining employment and encouraging investments in oil and gas companies.

We found that the program was poorly designed because it did not link funding to net emission reductions from conventional onshore oil and gas operations. For example, in two thirds of the 40 projects funded by the Emissions Reduction Fund, companies stated in their applications that the funding would allow them to increase their production levels. When production increases, so do the related emissions, and these increases were not reflected in Natural Resources Canada’s projections.

To help Canada achieve its national targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Natural Resources Canada should make sure that its policies, programs, and measures are based on reliable estimates of expected emission reductions.

I will now move on to our next report. In this audit, we examined whether Environment and Climate Change Canada and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada were working together using a risk-based approach to reduce algal blooms caused by excess nutrient pollution in three Canadian water basins. The three basins we examined were Lake Erie, Lake Winnipeg and the Wolastoq Saint John River.

Canada has a stated goal of increasing sustainable agricultural production, which could increase nutrient runoff. Excess nutrients can lead to a runaway growth of algae, which can in turn produce toxins that are harmful to humans, livestock, pets and wildlife.

We found that the two departments were moving in the right direction, but could have an even greater impact on freshwater quality outcomes if they further coordinated their science efforts and shared information with other organizations involved in water resource management.

For the next report, as we do each year, we assessed the progress of selected departments and agencies in implementing their sustainable development strategies, focusing on transparency and accountability in reporting. We reviewed departmental agency actions under three federal goals: healthy coasts and oceans, pristine lakes and rivers, and sustainable food.

Overall, reporting on actions to achieve the federal goals was poor. Departments and agencies did not provide results for almost half of the actions they reported on. Gaps in reporting make it difficult for parliamentarians and Canadians to understand progress being made against Canada's sustainable development commitments.

Our recent reports also included the annual report on environmental petitions. We received 14 petitions from July 2020 to June 2021. They raised concerns in areas that included biodiversity, climate change, and toxic substances.

I’m going to turn now to my last report, which is not an audit but a summary of lessons learned from Canada’s climate change efforts since 1990.

After more than 30 years, the trend in Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions, which create harmful climate impacts, is going up. Despite repeated government commitments to decrease emissions, they have increased by more than 20% since 1990.

At the heart of this report are eight lessons learned from Canada’s action and inaction on the enduring climate crisis.

Leadership is the first lesson. Stronger leadership and coordination are needed to drive progress on climate change.

Other lessons include reducing dependence on high-emission industries, learning to adapt to climate change impacts, investing in a climate-resilient future, increasing public awareness, acting on and not just speaking about climate targets, involving all climate solution actors, and protecting the interests of future generations.

In closing, there is a need for the federal government to achieve real outcomes on environmental protection and sustainable development, not just words on paper or unfulfilled promises. All too often, Canada's environmental commitments are not met with the actions needed to protect air, land, water and wildlife, now and for future generations, and this is a trend we urgently need to reverse.

It is my hope that you'll invite us and government officials to appear before your committee on every one of our audits and at any other time we may be able to support your work. Using our audit work and the expertise and insight of department and agency officials and other stakeholders helps your committee enhance accountability. Asking departments and agencies to provide the committee with action plans to implement our recommendations and any recommendations that the committee makes will also help raise the progress bar on environmental and sustainable development issues on behalf of all Canadians.

Mr. Chair, this concludes my opening remarks. We're happy to answer any questions the committee may have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you, Commissioner DeMarco.

We'll go to Mr. Albas for six minutes.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Thank you, Commissioner. I appreciate the work you and your office do.

In your opening comments, you suggested something similar to what the Standing Committee on Public Accounts does on a regular basis. When Auditor General reports come in, the committee reviews them. They have the Auditor General come in and speak to them, and then they will usually—again, I'm using this term habitually—agree with the Auditor General, make recommendations and ask for an action plan from departments.

Is that what you are suggesting in your comments?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

That is something that the committee could consider to enhance accountability. With your experience at public accounts, I'm sure you're aware that typically at the beginning of each parliamentary session the public accounts committee adopts a motion regarding those action plans. It's something that could be done with this committee, too, because as we are part of the Office of the Auditor General and there's that accountability measure for Ms. Hogan's reports that go to the public accounts committee, you could consider having a similar accountability mechanism with respect to the reports that I table with the Speaker that are referred to this committee, yes.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

We have a government that prides itself on its own actions, its own policies, and I will be getting into some reports that are very critical of the government, but this is more of a meta-question here, then, in regard to your suggestion. Are you not getting sufficient action plans and responses from the departments? Do they agree with you? If so, are they not taking action on your recommendations?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

That's a good question. One of the advantages of having action plans produced at the committee is that we give our draft reports to the entities, such as federal departments, and they provide an immediate response, which we include in a text box in our reports. Those are their immediate thoughts on our recommendations.

However, it takes longer to produce an action plan, and we would have to wait months to publish our reports if we waited for action plans, so there's an issue of the short-term feasibility of the response and the longer-term feasibility of an action plan. If we came to the committee with an action plan after having had time to digest a report and consider an action plan that would breathe life into the response that the department has given, that would enhance accountability beyond the audit cycle that we work with in producing our reports.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

The government will answer to your recommendation and say they agree, but it seems you are suggesting that the government doesn't take it seriously enough to actually respond with an authoritative action plan. Is it because they don't respect your office, or is it because they simply don't want to be accountable or follow through with your recommendations?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

I don't think there's an across-the-board answer for every report, because some of our recommendations are implemented more diligently than others. It was certainly one of the lessons learned for our own report on lessons learned on climate change. When we put together that appendix in the lessons learned on climate change, we saw how many of our recommendations, over the years on climate change, were accepted by the government. It wasn't a case of their rejecting our recommendations; they were accepted but we weren't seeing that follow-through in terms of results and actions. That's why the committee could consider this enhanced accountability of requiring action plans.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

If my wife asks me to do the dishes, and I accept her recommendation but then proceed not to do it over a long period of time, Commissioner, wouldn't my wife be willing to say that I have rejected that recommendation or that I don't respect her office?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

I can't speak for her or for you, but I would say that you didn't follow through on the commitment in your response.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Really, either the government is making pretty claims and then just letting things slide back to...whether it's bureaucratic inertia or whatnot, or it just doesn't care.

I'll just move on, though, to “Report 5: Lessons Learned from Canada's Record on Climate Change”, and I hope, in a second round of this, that I can ask some more specific questions. I'd like to again ask a meta-question. Why is it you've chosen historical analysis rather than a performance audit?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Be fairly brief, if you could, Commissioner. We're on a tight timeline today, for obvious reasons.

Go ahead, please.

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

We wanted to give Canadians and Parliament the full picture of Canada's climate record. Audits are very important, and that's the mainstay of our work, but they're typically time-limited and they focus on one program or another, like the emissions reduction fund, which we may talk about later. We wanted to weave together all of the lessons we could have learned from many years of audits on climate change into one comprehensive report. That was the point of that report.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Duguid for six minutes.