Environment Committee on Sept. 21st, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Good morning, everyone.

There are so many new faces that I'm not sure I'm actually at the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development.

[Sophie Chatel, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

It's green finance.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Yes.

We do have a number of new people joining us who are substituting for permanent members of the committee.

I'd like to welcome, first of all, Mr. Ali, who is joining us online and is replacing Mr. Weiler. I would also like to welcome Mr. Kmiec, who is replacing Mr. Leslie; Ms. Zarrillo, who is replacing Mr. Bachrach, who is replacing Ms. Collins; Mr. Aldag, who is replacing Mr. Longfield; and Ms. Chatel, who is replacing Ms. Thompson.

That said, I'm not sure whether we can now proceed to the election of the vice-chair or whether we should wait until the list from the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs is officially tabled. I'm informed that we can proceed to the election of the vice-chair.

To do so, I will give the floor to our clerk.

Do you want in, Mr. Kram?

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to nominate my colleague Dan Mazier to be.... That's unless someone else was lined up.

[An hon. member]

[Inaudible—Editor]

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Okay. All right. It sounds like we might be unanimous on this decision then, but I would like to nominate Dan Mazier for the position of vice-chair of the committee.

[An hon. member]

Hear, hear!

[The Clerk of the Committee, Ms. Natalie Jeanneault]

I'll just do my script. Pursuant to Standing Order 106(2), the first vice-chair must be a member of the government party. I am now prepared to receive motions for first vice-chair, which you have done.

It has been moved by Mr. Kram that Mr. Mazier be elected as first vice-chair of the committee. Is it the pleasure of the committee to adopt the motion?

[Leah Taylor Roy, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

I'm sorry. Could you please repeat what you said in the preamble to that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I think you said the “government” side, but they can't be a member of the government. They have to be a member of the official opposition.

[Leah Taylor Roy, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you.

I was happy to have you on our side, Dan, but I didn't think that's what you....

[The Clerk]

I'm sorry about that. It's the template.

Would you like me to restart?

[Leah Taylor Roy, Liberal, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

No.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We just wanted to make sure it was understood.

[The Clerk]

Okay. Perfect.

Is it the pleasure of the committee to adopt the motion?

(Motion agreed to)

I declare Mr. Mazier duly elected first vice-chair of the committee.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear!

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Congratulations, Mr. Mazier. I look forward to working with you on the subcommittee.

We will continue to discuss the motion proposed by Mr. Bachrach, but first I would like to go back to the invitation we received to visit a recycling plant in Montreal. It would be during a break week; I don't know the exact date. If the committee wants to travel, it has to make a budget request and obtain the approval of a particular committee. I'm prepared to do that if it's the will of the committee. However, I've canvassed the committee, and the committee doesn't seem to have much interest in travelling to Montreal to visit a recycling plant. Having said that, I could be wrong.

There are two options, actually. The first option is for the committee to request a budget to travel. The second option is for committee members who wish to use their points to travel to Montreal to visit the recycling plant.

I'll open it up for discussion.

Personally, Ms. Pauzé, I am going to go, because I live in Montreal.

I don't know what the committee thinks or wants to do.

Mr. Deltell, you have the floor.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I would like to welcome all the new members of the committee, especially the member for Pontiac, a member from Quebec; I say that out of good-natured regionalism.

I'd like to welcome you, Ms. Chatel, to this committee. You'll find that we generally work very well together.

As for the invitation to travel, Montreal is an hour and a half or two hours from here. You can get there by train or by bus. So it's not really a problem, I think, for our colleagues in British Columbia or elsewhere. Of course, for Quebeckers, going to Montreal is not a problem.

Now, I just want to say that we're absolutely determined, if the committee so decides, to visit the oil spill site in northern Alberta. We talked about it a lot last spring. Our ambition was to go there and use the opportunity to travel across Canada at the same time, but upon reflection, I think that we were perhaps a little too ambitious.

In any case, I would just like to make sure that this trip to Montreal won't hurt our chances of getting funding to visit the site of the oil spill and meet with the indigenous community there. It's very important for us to do this, out of respect for the people who have suffered from this situation and to experience the same reality as they have.

We understand that flights in that area are not very frequent. We're well aware of that. That said, one of our roles as members of Parliament is to see how people across Canada experience their daily reality. Even if, by chance, we had to take a lot of flights to get there and there were costs involved, even though I'm a very strong fiscal Conservative, and I feel that every expense is suspect and that there are no small savings, I believe that, in this case, it would be our role, our duty and our responsibility to do so. We need to go where the problems are and meet directly with Canadians who are experiencing problems like the one last spring.

I just want to make sure that this event in Montreal, although it looks very interesting, doesn't undermine our budget capacity to travel to Alberta later to see first-hand the impact that this oil spill a few months ago has had on indigenous communities.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Unless I'm mistaken, we submitted a budget request for a trip to Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, and it was denied in June, I believe.

Are you asking us to make a new request to travel to Alberta?

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

We can discuss this later with all our colleagues. I don't want to impose our intentions on my colleagues, but I think that, last spring, everyone wanted to go.

I think the reason our request was turned down—and it's a very valid reason—is that it involved a lot of travel. It was a full week's travel from coast to coast, so it's understandable that the bill would have been rather high.

Now, once we've visited a water facility in an urban area like Montreal, I think the work is done. However, it's our job to go and see an indigenous community that has suffered the despicable effects of an oil spill.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I understand that, but since such a request has already been refused, I'm trying to determine whether you want us to make a new request. I believe I received a letter from the Liaison Committee, which gave us a new deadline for new travel requests. Does the committee want us to try a second time to get funding to go to Alberta?

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

I have a point of clarification, Mr. Chair.

As I understand it, that request was denied because it was part of a series of trips. It wasn't just a round trip between Ottawa and Alberta.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

It's true that we had submitted a fairly complete itinerary, but my guess is that it wasn't the reason for the refusal. However, I can't comment on that, since I'm not part of the discussions between the whips.

Here's the question: Does the committee wish to make a request to go only to Alberta to visit the Kearl tailings pond site and then go up to Fort Chipewyan, and submit that request before the deadline that has been suggested to us, which I don't know?

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

What's the deadline?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

The letter was received the day before yesterday, I think, but we'll have to check that.

Next is Ms. Taylor Roy and then Mr. van Koeverden.