Environment Committee on Feb. 13th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Maybe you can just give us a number, because the time is up.

[Paige Thurston, Program Manager, Columbia Basin Water Monitoring Framework, Living Lakes Canada]

Sure. We have over 130 monitoring sites established here in the Columbia Basin through our program.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much.

We'll go to Madame Pauzé for two and a half minutes.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll start with a few comments for Ms. Holman and Ms. Livingstone, but I'll ask them the same question.

Ms. Livingstone, when I read in your speaking notes that $73 million has been invested in water-related research but “the data generated by this kind of research isn't always shared publicly”, I about fell off my chair. I can't believe that there's money available and we just can't coordinate our efforts. What I understood earlier in answer to my question was that, if you had the resources required, it would be possible to do this huge job of compiling all the data.

Ms. Holman, in your brief to the committee, you say that many data gaps could be filled using collaborative approaches to data collection and sharing.

I have the following question for you both.

Would the Canada Water Agency be a solution to the problems many have raised concerning the lack of data on freshwater?

Would this be a solution?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We have about a minute for both answers.

[Aislin Livingstone]

I can be brief.

Absolutely. I think the Canada water agency, because it's the only organization looking at water from a national scale, is really well placed to look at what information and data is already out there being collected either by communities or by other government departments, agencies, researchers and academics in order to pinpoint where some of those gaps are, especially looking at the freshwater issues that are transboundary, interprovincial and interterritorial in nature.

[Larissa Holman]

I would just quickly add that so far, what we've heard about the Canada water agency is this emphasis on government and academic relationships in solving many of these questions that have to do with fresh water.

Again, I would just like to highlight the value that watershed organizations can bring to these conversations, and highlight localized issues. We have people who live in these areas and we have connections with many communities and indigenous communities that really need to be at the forefront of these conversations as well.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

I would like to make a brief comment. I still have 10 seconds remaining.

You say that the Canada Water Agency is taking action in this regard. You know more than we do. The Canadian Water Agency has barely been set up and we're already hearing from several people who come before us to say that it does this or that. We also want to give it a whole lot of mandates.

That was just an editorial comment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Mr. Blaikie.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Hartwig, I want to come over to you and ask you a question. As the new Canada water agency gets set up, what do you think are some of the potential pitfalls that it may run into and should be looking to avoid in its approach?

What do you think are some best practices it should look to adopt in order to create the best possible relationship with the existing network of organizations that are doing important work in the water space, and to ensure that it's adding value to that network, instead of starting to compete with various elements of the network on work that's already being done?

[Kat Hartwig]

Great. Thank you so much for that question. I think it's an important one.

We don't really have time for the luxury of silos anymore. I think we need to meet communities and groups on the work that's being done, where it's being done, and then augment and work off it. We've already been doing that with some of the data hubs that you hear being spoken about, like DataStream and the Columbia Basin Water Hub. We've worked on these for the past six years to collect data and have a repository for data that's been collected by people in our communities for our communities.

I think that dialogue seems to be taking place.

On the sense of urgency, I can't tell you how concerned we are about droughts, flash droughts and long-term projections.

One of the things we haven't spoken about very much around the Canada water agency is that a data collection strategy is one thing and data standardization is another thing. I think the problem will be when we have multijurisdictional gridlocks on where the rubber is going to hit the road in local communities.

For example, the Columbia River wetlands, where I live, are the most important migratory flyway remaining in North America. They're 150 kilometres long. They're Ramsar-designated wetlands. They have no fewer than 98 management plans and policies that are currently meant to be applied. I feel like that's going to be a challenge. Multisector tables to help problem-solve will be necessary. We need to have these paradigm shifts.

I feel like the Canada water agency is a really good step in that direction. I think it behooves us to look to our neighbours to the south and to the EU for some of the best practices being done there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Deltell.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

My question is for Ms. Holman and it has to do with Chalk River.

On the Canadian government site, there's a page on the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission stating that, under the Nuclear Safety and Control Act, the CNSC fulfills its mandate by carrying out certain activities. These include the dissemination of objective scientific, technical and regulatory information on CNSC activities.

Would you say that, in the case of Chalk River, the dissemination of information, as prescribed under the act, is properly done?

[Larissa Holman]

If I understand the question correctly—

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

My question is whether you think this commission is doing its job correctly.

[Larissa Holman]

There are many different parts of the CNSC to do its work. There are many different projects that it is overseeing. It is a regulator. It reports to a minister for its decisions and whatnot.

It's really challenging to understand how some of these decisions are made based on the lack of transparency on how the process happens. As an organization that has intervened on multiple occasions around what's happening with Chalk River, we don't always feel like intervenors are heard in these processes. It's a very challenging subject matter to properly grasp and then be able to provide critical feedback on.

There's definitely a lot of improvement that can be made to the CNSC. Even just proper oversight and how licences are provided for such long periods would be one step. Share more information about how these decisions are made when they are re-evaluating them.

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

By law, they have the obligation to give information and to spread it.

I'm not talking about a lack of transparency. If I understand you correctly, right now, the commission is not doing a good job of disseminating information.

[Larissa Holman]

When a project is proposed, we focus primarily on its effects on freshwater, especially on the Ottawa River. I can talk a bit more about what we can do to improve the situation.

With the new radioactive waste policy that is coming into play, I think there's a lot of room for improvement for these types of policies to be able to provide the correct oversight. Oversight is the key here. These facilities exist, and the waste needs to be dealt with in appropriate ways. There is a lot of improvement that could be done.

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

There is a lot of work to do to be more transparent.

[Larissa Holman]

Yes, very much so.

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

Thank you, Madame.

Mr. Chair, as you know, last Friday I tabled a notice of motion. I will move it now. It reads as follows:

Given that: (a) the Liberal government is planning to hike taxes on Canadians by increasing their carbon tax by 23% on April 1, 2024; (b) a typical family of four will have to pay $700 more in groceries in 2024; (c) nearly two million Canadians used a food bank in a single month in 2023; (d) Canadians cannot afford further tax hikes; (e) Minister Guilbeault admitted that “the government does not measure the annual amount of emissions that are directly reduced by federal carbon pricing”; (f) Canada now ranks 62 out of 67 countries, dropping four places from the previous year, according to the Climate Change Performance Index; The committee call on the Liberal government to cancel their planned tax hike on April 1, 2024; abandon their plan to quadruple the carbon tax to provide Canadians financial relief on their gas, groceries, and home heating; acknowledge that the carbon tax is not an environmental plan, it’s a tax plan; and that the committee report its opinion to the House.

We know that the economic situation is very difficult for all Canadians. We believe that creating a tax and then quadrupling it as of April 1 is really not a good idea if we want to help Canadians.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We'll go to Mr. Mazier and then Mr. Longfield.

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

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to my colleague for bringing up this important motion. I think the committee and, actually, the witnesses here, can really benefit from this.

On the carbon tax scam, as I guess we're calling it, we're finding out that they're not measuring for the carbon tax the amount that the tax is actually reducing emissions by. I think that was probably the biggest finding that we found out here in the last couple of weeks.

The carbon tax is costing especially rural Canada a billion dollars if they don't cut out the carbon tax for the space heating for barns and for grain drying as well. It is imperative that this carbon tax stop. Canadians can't afford any more taxes. That's quite evident. We have—

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair. It's a question of relevance on talking about the carbon tax while we're studying fresh water. I also have a question—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

It's because there's a motion.

Mr. Mazier can continue. It is a motion about the price on carbon.

Go ahead, Mr. Mazier.