Evidence of meeting #51 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was subamendment.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Damien Kurek Conservative Battle River—Crowfoot, AB
Thank you.
You're saying that this functionally already happens. This just makes it explicit in the requirement. Am I interpreting that correctly?
Director General, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Environmental Protection Branch, Department of the Environment
I don't think that right now we report in the annual report when substances are unmasked, so this just makes it explicit. I'm not sure that anybody has ever turned their mind to it as being something that we should include in the annual report. It just makes it explicit.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
We've just passed an amended motion on proposed sections 317.1 and 317.2 so that “may” will be used instead of “shall”, and here we're saying that the minister “shall include...by section 342”—so in proposed sections 317.1 and 317.2—the biological name. The way I read this is that the “may” disappears in the annual report. Am I wrong?
Director General, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Environmental Protection Branch, Department of the Environment
Right.
That's right, because you're saying that if the minister did unmask the names, then a summary of what's been unmasked would be included in the annual report so that people can see it and there's some transparency about which names have been unmasked during the year.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
It doesn't say “unmasked”, though, in this section. It says, “shall include in the annual report”—
Director General, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Environmental Protection Branch, Department of the Environment
It says “disclosed”. It says which ones have been “disclosed” under that discretionary power.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
Are there any more comments or questions? Can we go to a vote?
(Amendment agreed to: yeas 11; nays 0)
(Clause 53 as amended agreed to on division)
(On clause 54)
We are on amendment NDP-39.
Go ahead, Ms. Collins.
NDP
Laurel Collins NDP Victoria, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
You'll notice that this amendment talks about environmental and biological diversity and human health. In particular, we are talking about pollution hot spots and regional differences.
I want to thank the Manitoba Eco-Network for their work on this topic. It's an important move forward, and I hope the committee will support it.
Liberal
Terry Duguid Liberal Winnipeg South, MB
Mr. Chair, I would defer to the officials. I know, because I've spoken to the Manitoba Eco-Network a number of times, that the provisions in the new CEPA actually strengthen a geographical approach to areas like hot spots and not the opposite. I wonder if the officials could elaborate on that.
Director General, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Environmental Protection Branch, Department of the Environment
Sure.
The section in the original CEPA, section 330(3.1), said that you could make regulations that were geographically targeted for regulations authorized under certain sections of the act. The policy objective was to make sure you could make geographically targeted regulations for regulations made under any part of the act.
It's true that it could have been explicitly provided in CEPA. However, in the Interpretation Act in section 8, it says that federal statutes and regulations apply “to the whole of Canada” by default, but may be expressly tailored to apply in specific regions. We're basically relying on the Interpretation Act, which says that you can make geographically targeted regs so that we can do geographically targeted regs under any parts of CEPA.
Bloc
Monique Pauzé Bloc Repentigny, QC
I'm sure you won't be surprised by my question, Mr. Chair.
Are there any elements here that may conflict with Quebec's and the provinces' jurisdictions?
Director General, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Environmental Protection Branch, Department of the Environment
Anything the federal government does must be done within its jurisdiction, which is why regulations can target certain regions. It cannot go beyond federal jurisdiction.
Bloc
Monique Pauzé Bloc Repentigny, QC
In the Bloc Québécois, we like to have a belt, suspenders and velcro to make sure that everything is respected. So I will propose a subamendment.
After “may be made applicable in only a part or parts of Canada”, I would add the notion of respecting constitutional jurisdictions.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
Okay.
I believe that everyone has received Ms. Pauzé's subamendment.
Are you done, Ms. Pauzé?
Bloc
Monique Pauzé Bloc Repentigny, QC
Yes, I think the explanation is simple. I talked about constitutional jurisdictions, but it's a matter of respecting provincial and territorial jurisdictions in the document you received.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Mr. Chair, I'm going to make my esteemed colleague from the Bloc Québécois happy: I absolutely agree on this.
The problem is that we feel compelled to include this in Bill S‑5. It goes without saying that all of our legislation must respect the various jurisdictions. If we feel compelled, here in parliamentary committee, to enshrine in a piece of legislation that it must be applied while respecting provincial and federal jurisdictions, we have a serious problem as a country. Some may say that, for some years now, we have had the impression that the federal government is encroaching on areas of provincial jurisdiction. However, this subamendment expressly enshrines it in a piece of legislation.
Liberal
Terry Duguid Liberal Winnipeg South, MB
Mr. Chair, I was going to speak on the amendment. Are we going to deal with the subamendment first?