Okay.
Evidence of meeting #45 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was vessel.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #45 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was vessel.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Shannon Miedema
Thank you, Mr. Bonin.
Mr. Ross, we will go over to you for five minutes.
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you for your testimony, MP Weiler.
I grew up on the West Coast, and I still live there today, so I'm well aware of the scourge of abandoned vessels sinking on the west coast of British Columbia.
When I was a band councillor as well as a chief councillor, we tried to address this as well, and it ended up with us using our own resources to take abandoned vessels out of the water. We're well aware of the problem of buying a vessel for one dollar.
Bill C-244 puts more responsibility—and I might say more liability—on the seller. The seller has to ensure that whoever he's selling this boat to has “the ability, resources [and] intent to maintain, operate or dispose of the vessel in a manner that prevents it from becoming wrecked [or] abandoned”.
This is the way I read that: If I sell the boat to my colleague here, who has never owned a boat—I don't even think he's seen the ocean—then I have to figure out if he has “the ability, resources or intent to maintain, operate or dispose of the vessel”. I'm also assuming, on my part, that he has some kind of a document saying that the vessel is in good working condition and that my colleague has a résumé of items that he intends to do to operate this in an efficient manner. If not, the document has to stand up in the courts.
Are we assuming that this document we're talking about has to be notarized? Does it have to be legalized in some manner to protect my liability and my responsibility? I don't want to be fined $5,000 when I know he has the resources and I know he has the ability to use YouTube. I know all that, but he still lets the boat sink. I don't want it to come back to me.
What kind of a document do we need to ensure that I've done my due diligence?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Thank you very much for the question. I think it's a very important one.
I'll go back to how the legislation is written here. It says:
It is prohibited for an owner of a vessel to transfer ownership of it to a person, if the owner knows that—or is reckless as to whether—the person lacks the ability, resources or intent to maintain, operate or dispose of
You don't have to prove it, but if you know this person doesn't meet these conditions, or if you don't take any steps to ascertain this, that's when you would be committing—
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
What are the steps? Is it a notarized document to protect myself? Is it a notarized document, for example, or some other type of document to say that I did my due diligence? Does it say that I interviewed him and questioned his dad, his mom and his friends, and that I looked at his history? I don't even know what I'm looking at here. I investigated him as much as I could.
What kind of a résumé does that look like? What is going to protect me and ensure that I did my due diligence? How extensive does that document have to be, and does it have to be legal?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
My view is that you wouldn't have to get something notarized, but you would have to ask those questions. Again, going back to the original thing, disclosing what the condition—
Conservative
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
If Transport Canada wanted to issue a penalty under it, you would have to show this. That's what it would require. It would be....
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I would still be fined, so then I would take it to court. I would still need a document from him that could stand up in court to say that I did my due diligence.
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Yes, you did your due diligence, and remember what the standard is here. You don't have to prove that he meets all these conditions, because those are things that would be very difficult to do, but you have to prove that you took steps to ascertain it.
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
If I didn't verify that in some document, I'm breaking the law. It's prohibited for me to sell that vessel to Branden here without checking all these checkboxes. It's going to come back to the courts.
In terms of enforcement, I assume that Transport Canada is going to enforce this, so will they be enforcing by looking at the documents? Marine assessment is not a problem. Marine survey is not a problem. They already exist. Will I have to submit to Transport Canada the résumé that Branden gave me to ensure that he's not a reckless boat owner?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Yes, it's exactly that. You would have to submit the statement or the documentation wherein the buyer shows that he has the ability to maintain it.
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
How will this apply on reserves? How will it be enforced on reserves?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
This would be enforced the same way right across the country. This is in addition to the vessel registry system.
Conservative
Ellis Ross Conservative Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
No, it's not—not on reserve. There are a lot of laws that aren't enforced on reserve, whether provincial or federal. Most of the time, you ask permission to come onto reserve and enforce. Will the band council...? Band councils own boats and sell them as well. Will this need council buy-in, say, under the Indian Act?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
I know there are.... I think, unfortunately, the time is up. I'd love to get more into that one afterwards. I know in some cases you do need band council resolutions to do those things.
Liberal
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, MP Weiler.
Is the problem of wrecked, abandoned and hazardous vessels because our laws are insufficient or enforcement is insufficient, or are there other factors too?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
I'm sorry, but can you repeat that?
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
Is the problem of wrecked, abandoned and hazardous vessels because our laws are insufficient as they currently exist or enforcement is insufficient, or are there other factors?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
I think it's all of the above.
There was a major legislative gap before the Wrecked, Abandoned or Hazardous Vessels Act was introduced in 2019. I mentioned before that it was not even prohibited anywhere to abandon your vessel. That addressed one of the problems there.
One of the issues that have long existed is that we don't understand who owns most boats. It's based on a paper-based system, so it's very outdated. Earlier this year, we introduced a new system, so it's all going to be in one database, and you're now going to have to update the system every five years so we have a better sense of who owns it. Those are really important changes. There are many issues when people don't register when a boat changes hands. These are things that are major gaps in our laws.
Then there are major issues in enforcement on the water. Part of the challenge is that so many of Transport Canada's, DFO's and the Coast Guard's resources are centralized in different areas, and many of these issues end up happening far away from them, so there's a lack of capacity in many respects. Frankly, there were a lot of regional bases that were shut down in the early 2010s as well. I can tell you that my riding on the Sunshine Coast used to have a DFO site, and that was shut down in 2012.
I'd say that those are both issues that are there, and they need to be addressed.
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
What options are available to vessel owners in properly disposing of a vessel?
Liberal
Patrick Weiler Liberal West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
This is one of the areas that are a big gap in Canada, because, in many respects, for a lot of these vessels, to properly dispose of them, you're sending them to a landfill. There are better ways of dealing with it than that.
There are a number of different organizations that want to set up shipbreaking facilities and recycling facilities, where you could properly break them down and recover some of the materials in there that are still valuable. We don't have those facilities. We need to invest in those in Canada. Other jurisdictions have them. As a west coast example, Washington state has a lot of those facilities. We also need to make it very cheap for people to dispose of their boats that way, because, if you send it to the dump, it's very expensive. These are some gaps that need to be addressed.
I mentioned earlier in my testimony that one way of doing that is the long-promised vessel remediation fund, so you know you're going to have a capitalized fund over the long term for that vessel disposal. Right now, those are not there, and that's one of the other gaps that have to be addressed.
Liberal