Environment Committee on Dec. 7th, 2023

[David O'Connor]

I think that we need to look at the best examples, which are the places where things work. I often refer to the Western Aquatic Invasive Species Resource Center as an example of a measure that works. Large areas of the west don't have aquatic invasive species, given the control systems in place.

In Nevada, for example, some lakes are badly contaminated. These lakes are home to what are known as “mussel boats.” Since these boats remain in contaminated waters year‑round, they're covered with a layer of mussels a few centimetres thick. When these boats arrive at the border of other states, they're decontaminated so that they don't pose a threat. That way, the states can prevent the introduction of these mussels into their lakes.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Could you briefly describe what Canadian National's rail lines have to do with all this? When we met this summer, I believe that we discussed how CN played a major role in the spread of invasive species, not in the water, but on its rail lines.

[David O'Connor]

I don't think that you discussed rail lines with me. Sorry, but I'm not very familiar with the CN situation.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Okay. In that case, I have one last question for you.

Have you worked with other regional councils in Quebec to develop recommendations for federal entities?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Please be brief. There are 45 seconds left at the most.

[David O'Connor]

We're hoping to introduce legislation on drain plugs.

In addition, we want to group together watersheds and surrounding municipalities so that they can work together on washing stations.

We also want to provide a training program for people who work in reception areas at launching stations, to ensure standardized training on how to inspect and decontaminate boats.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Garrison, the floor is yours.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Once again, it's a real privilege to be at this committee to talk about fresh water. It's very important, even though this morning was a surprise to me; I was planning to be here next week. Hopefully, I'll be back.

There are very few times in Parliament when we actually focus on real problems and real solutions. I think this study is going to be an important part of that.

My first question is for Mr. Stegemann. You talk about the importance of reconciliation when you talk about fresh water, and your suggestion is that shared governance is one of the ways to address this.

Can you give us some examples of where shared governance over fresh water resources is already working? Perhaps, if there aren't a lot of those, you can talk about the models that provide the most prospects for success in shared governance.

[Andrew Stegemann]

Thanks for the question.

It's a really complicated landscape. Obviously, the waters are shared. It requires a more integrated approach, and all jurisdictions are needed: federal, provincial, regional and indigenous nations and people.

There are a few examples where this is taking place. At a really large level, an example that many point to is the Mackenzie River Basin Transboundary Waters Master Agreement. It's a really long title. Multiple governments have come together to determine what might happen in the Mackenzie River.

At different scales, governance can occur differently. We also see local examples in the Cowichan Valley on Vancouver Island, which is something I think Deborah Curran could also speak to really well, and probably in a more intimate manner than I can. The Cowichan Valley example is one in which indigenous nations, in addition to other jurisdictions, come together to determine the governance of that water body by making decisions together in ongoing tables.

To bring it back to the federal government, there's an opportunity here in the federal approach to water management. The federal government is the perfect jurisdiction to have a high-level overview and to bring together multiple jurisdictions as part of a federal government approach to water governance by creating the space and resources for governance tables that include all jurisdictions.

I think it's a wonderful opportunity for the government to recommend in its report that the Government of Canada bring together governance tables like this at multiple scales. I know that's complicated, because every scale would need its own bespoke approach, but bringing together governance tables that include first nations governments—provincial, territorial and regional—is an opportunity that the federal government can take in supporting water health across the country.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Stegemann, and thank you also for highlighting the need for resources for governance, because that's sometimes something I think we all forget about, and of course, you foreshadowed my questions to Ms. Curran.

Essentially, Ms. Curran, I would ask you the same question, and I know that you will talk about Cowichan.

[Deborah Curran]

Thank you. Yes, I think the most interesting and perhaps innovative water governance that's going on right now is taking place where local communities have partnered with the provincial government, and in some cases the federal government, to do things in a very different way. I'll give you three examples.

Maybe I'll start with the most controversial and the hardest one to deal with. You're all familiar with the Mikisew Cree First Nation and the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation in northern Alberta, and their long-standing relationship with the Peace-Athabasca delta and the Wood Buffalo National Park. They are in the place where they rely extensively on water flows for accessing their traditional territories to hunt and do other traditional activities. They are impacted by the flows coming in from British Columbia and the Peace because of the variety of dams that are there, and also the pollution that is coming up from the tar sands in Alberta, so they have entered into various agreements with the federal government to address both flows and contamination, primarily pushed by an international body, UNESCO, at the United Nations level, so there's a lot. There's been an action plan and there's been a lot of movement in that in a way that hasn't been seen before on such a very large scale.

Two other examples, as Andrew mentioned, are the Koksilah and the Cowichan. The Cowichan tribes entered into an agreement with the Province of B.C., and the federal government has been involved integrally from a fisheries perspective, but they've entered into an agreement to do a joint water sustainability plan. The idea is to address flow issues in a comprehensive planning way so that farmers don't get shut off every year.

That's the problem: In August and September there's a pretty integral flow problem. To make sure that all the fish don't die, the farmers have to go to a watering regime that's not ideal for them, as primarily they're dairy farmers, so they've entered into an agreement to deal with the upland aspects of flows—the forestry and other things that are going on in the watershed.

The idea is that this is a 500-year plan. It really gets beyond the short-term approaches to collaborative management and it's saying that we're in this relationship for a very long time and we have to start to fix it properly.

The final example is the Gitanyow Hereditary Chiefs, who have just recently declared their water policy based on their indigenous legal order and have actually established their own flow and quality parameters for using water within their territory. They have a long-standing relationship with the province around land use planning and they've now just brought it over to water flows.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

We'll start our second round with Mr. Mazier for five minutes.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Gilvesy, in a press release on your website from last year, ALUS wrote, and I quote, “Farmers are often left out of the sustainability conversation.”

Many farmers feel the same way. They feel that the current government neglects their concerns when it comes to their environmental policy development.

How do we change this?

[Bryan Gilvesy]

I think it's through through the leadership that we provided across our community partnerships, leadership from a group that you know well—the Keystone Agricultural Producers, for example, who originally sponsored this ALUS idea in the early 2000s.

The way we challenge the concept is by understanding the opportunity. There are people on the land who have the knowledge, skills and energy to help solve some of the world's biggest environmental crises if we would only turn to them and engage them in a productive way.

Our program is built on a set of principles and has been developed and led by farmers to lay out not a treaty but a set of terms that work for farmers to provide this engagement and to provide massive opportunity. The scale at which we can provide opportunity is increasingly large. We are a bit of a fledgling organization, but we've already changed the landscape on 200 square kilometres of land. That's the size of a small national park. That's Elk Island National Park, and we've done it through what is a small not-for-profit led by farmers, developed through community partnerships. It makes you understand that the potential through engagement is enormous.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you.

Last year, Sustainable Development Technology Canada, known as SDTC, announced a $5-million investment to support the environmental work of ALUS. Much of that investment would contribute to projects relating to fresh water.

Since then, Canadians have learned that SDTC has turned into a slush fund overrun with conflicts of interest. The Ethics Commissioner and the Auditor General are both investigating this slush fund.

Seeing that the fund has been suspended, I'd like to know if the corruption at SDTC has impacted the $5-million investment announced for ALUS.

[Bryan Gilvesy]

I will say that the SDTC process that we participated in to receive their $5-million investment was a very intensive, deep-dive, due-diligence process wherein I saw no malfeasance, no corruption. That due diligence process was intense. It's supported through audits, and I believe that for us, at least, our experience was that there was a clean process.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Have you received the funding, then?

[Bryan Gilvesy]

Yes, we have.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I'll pass my remaining time over to Mr. Kram.

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

Thank you, Mr. Mazier.

Mr. Chair, with the time we have left, I would like to quickly move the motion that I tabled last week, and then we can return to the witnesses.

The motion reads as follows:

Given that:

(a) the Chiefs of Ontario have filed a judicial review in Federal Court on the Liberal government’s carbon tax

(b) the Chiefs of Ontario have noted that Indigenous communities would face greater challenges in switching to lower emitting technologies;

(c) Grand Chief Abram Benedict of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne stated:

“The government has boasted that Canadians will pay a carbon tax, but through the rebates, through the subsidies they will actually receive more than what they have paid. That doesn't ring true in First Nations communities”;

(d) Canada's Environment Commissioner and Parliamentary Budget Officer acknowledge that the carbon tax disproportionately punishes Canadians who live in rural, remote, and northern regions;

(e) and the Liberal government failed to provide a temporary carbon tax exemption on home heating for 97% of Canadians;

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(1)(a) the Committee invite Grand Chief Abram Benedict and the Chiefs of Ontario to testify for no less than 2 hours by December 12, 2023, on their judicial review filing on the federal carbon tax.

Mr. Chair, we have all heard from our constituents about the effects of the carbon tax on the rising cost of living. We've recently seen the federal government announce a pause on the carbon tax for home heating oil. We may be seeing an exemption from the carbon tax for certain farming activities, assuming that Bill C-234 gets passed into law. Now we are looking at a judicial review from the Chiefs of Ontario.

I think it would be reasonable to invite the chiefs to the committee and hear the details and the particulars of what exactly they are proposing in terms of a carbon tax exemption and how that could be implemented in a way that respects indigenous rights.

Mr. Chair, I think I'll leave it at that.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Go ahead, Mr. van Koeverden.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll just note that the Conservatives are consistently wasting the witnesses' time when they raise these motions outside of committee business. We had committee business for an hour two days ago, and we could have done this then.

I move to adjourn debate on this motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We will have a vote.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 6; nays 5)

We'll go now to Ms. Taylor Roy for five minutes.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for being here and for the work you're doing on this really important topic.

I particularly want to thank you, Mr. O'Connor, for your challenge to this committee to focus on the topic at hand, because water is life. We know this is a very important study that we're doing that has been interrupted several times by diversions on other things that are not necessarily on our agenda right now.

You also mentioned that we all have a favourite body of water or lake. Mine is Lake Simcoe. I'm the member for Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill. It's a medium-sized lake, a large watershed, and almost 500,000 people live in the watershed area. It's been faced with many challenges, especially phosphorus loads, climate change, and many invasive species, although different from the ones you have.

One thing that I have found to be very disconcerting is that even though we might agree the federal government should have jurisdiction over some of these issues, often when provinces are not in accordance with the same goals or have different goals, we cannot see progress made.

In this case, there has been extensive development. There are new highways, and many things are threatening, or continue to threaten, and continue to increase the phosphorus load and other problems this lake is experiencing.

How do you think the provincial and federal governments should collaborate? How can we work to help these freshwater bodies when provincial governments are not of the same mind?

[David O'Connor]

I'm honestly not quite sure how to convince our provinces to act, unfortunately. Politicians at every level of government don't want to get too involved in defending our waters.

I think that finding the answer to this question is a top priority. We must find a way to ensure that all levels of government work together more effectively. Water doesn't recognize borders. It transcends them. The watersheds of our bodies of water can be very large and can cross borders, hence my focus on the need for coordination and collaboration.

Too often, local stakeholders must shoulder the responsibility for their own bodies of water. Often, they must go up against provincial or federal governments.

I think that one of the main questions right now is this following. How do we protect our waters? As I said, my favourite lake has changed over the course of my life. It's no longer the lake that it used to be when I was young and visiting my grandparents. This outcome must be prevented for all other lakes. The matter can't be taken seriously for just one four‑year term. It requires action over decades.

I know that I haven't really answered the question, which was how to encourage collaboration. Instead, I'm sending a personal message to all governments. They must take action. It's not a matter of power or political games. It's about taking the necessary steps, regardless of political alliances or election strategies.