Thank you very much.
I'm the national manager for the navigable waters protection program for Canada. Joining me today is Madam Brigit Proulx, who is our legal counsel with a specialty in the Navigable Waters Protection Act and who has been working on the amendments quite extensively with us over the course of the last several months.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to participate today. I'd like to start out by expressing our appreciation for your consideration of the amendments as proposed for the Navigable Waters Protection Act. The current amendments will allow a more flexible regulatory regime, intended to support the diversity of the modern-day Canadian marine environment overall and, in particular, the development of infrastructure and natural resource projects.
Streamlining of the federal government regulatory process for such projects, we understand, remains a priority for the government and for Transport Canada as we continue to move forward towards change and economic growth. As you are aware, the main objective and scope of the new bill, of these amendments, is intended to meet the needs of proponents of works and those who use Canada's vast waterways in order to allow for a balanced approach to the shared use of those waterways.
The current legislative and regulatory process fails to provide a review and approval process commensurate to the degree of potential interference to navigation. Small infrastructure projects with little impact on navigation as well as projects over waterways that cannot be reasonably used for the purpose of navigation are being caught in extensive review processes presently required within the legislation. As a result, current infrastructure project development timelines are being seriously affected and financial opportunities for funding are being passed by. For example, the North Channel Bridge, which connects Akwesasne and the city of Cornwall, serves 2.2 million auto trips and over 125,000 truck trips per year. The replacement of this bridge is long overdue. However, due to a gap within our legislation, a separate act of Parliament would have to be passed to bring it to fruition, a process that will take much, much longer than simply providing for its review, as with all other bridges in Canada, under the proposed amended provisions of our legislation.
Even the smallest but most common infrastructure projects, such as bridge re-decking and guard rail replacement, projects that have no impact upon the navigational envelope underneath the bridge structure, currently generate a need for a navigational assessment. Simply put, we do not feel that such requirements are warranted or reasonable.
In order to make the Navigable Waters Protection Act relevant to today's operational and economic climate, the amendments would introduce a tiered approval process that would ensure a review and approval process more commensurate with the degree of potential interference that a work may have upon navigation than what is provided for today.
In saying this, we do recognize that there is concern among some interest groups that these amendments will adversely impact the current public right to navigate and that major infrastructure and resource projects will no longer be required to complete environmental assessments under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. I'd like to take this opportunity to assure the committee that the act will continue to protect the public right of navigation and that the environmental requirements for such projects will remain.
The new provisions of the act will define classes of navigable waters that would not reasonably be used for navigation. Those waters, by the way, are very much as Mr. MacLaren has so kindly described: a private lake, for example, with the land of a single landowner surrounding it. The intention of defining classes of minor waters is to better focus our efforts on truly navigable waters as opposed to farmers' drainage ditches or water courses too small, too shallow, too obstructed, or too steep to be reasonably used for the purpose of navigation.
Similar to minor waterways, the concept of minor works will be introduced in the new legislation. Criteria are being developed for small structures, such as private docks and boathouses, that have little to no impact on navigation. This will allow the department to reallocate the necessary resources required to manage the regulatory process for major projects involving infrastructure development, energy, mining, aquaculture, and forestry.
Furthermore, the removal of the term “main works” will allow for the review of any work commensurate with its potential impact on navigation and not on the basis of simply the type of work in question, allowing for better oversight and regulatory control over the installation of works on Canada's waterways. New provisions will also provide a system of increased fines to act as a deterrent to non-compliance.
In closing, I'd like to say that a modernized act will help us do a much more effective job of protecting the public interest in navigable waters, while at the same time expediting the infrastructure growth and redevelopment required today. Without them, we will continue to experience delays in approval of critical infrastructure projects. Our desired result is to stimulate the economy and remove the unnecessary regulatory burden while continuing to provide the due diligence with respect to the administration of this act.
I thank you.