Fisheries Committee on April 7th, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Hanley. You have about three seconds left to get in a question or an answer—

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Okay. I will stop there. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you.

We'll now go to Mr. Arnold for five minutes or less, please.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll go back to Mr. Butterworth, if I could.

Mr. Butterworth, the province was obviously involved in this and was contacted about the cleanup, I'm sure, and the potential damage to the environment. In your opinion, how could the government's response to the Zim Kingston incident have been improved? Were there lessons learned? How could the government's response have been improved?

[Kevin Butterworth]

There were definitely lessons learned. I would agree with Mr. Hall that having a stronger coordination, which would allow us to respond in a faster manner, would be very useful. Also, a main federal lead that has a lot of oversight for these different areas would work very well, from our perspective.

If you have a look at the way the ships come in from the open ocean, on the Pacific there, they come up a fairly long narrow channel. There are a couple of tight turns in there and they head into the ports in Vancouver. The shipping numbers are only going to get higher, so the more we can do now, it's all into that prevention and our ability to respond quickly. We need to work together to get that done, because the number of ships is going to increase and, with that, the chances of there being an unintentional release of a container increase too.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

You mentioned a better-coordinated response. Is that a better-coordinated response between the provincial and federal governments or between the volunteer organizations or the local communities...? How would a better-coordinated response look and within what organizations?

[Kevin Butterworth]

I would say it's more on the unified command. Having a higher level of coordination through the unified command and making sure that there are indigenous communities involved in that right off the bat, as well as the volunteer organizations, would be a good starting point.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

I'll switch back to Mr. Hall again.

Mr. Hall, you just mentioned that the key to this is preventing the containers from going overboard in the first place. Within the shipping industry and the Shipping Federation of Canada, how could the retention equipment be better handled? Is it weather conditions that are causing the problems? Can you elaborate on how we can better prevent the containers from going overboard in the first place?

[Christopher Hall]

Thank you. That's a great question.

Whether the cause is a structural issue with the ship, or the size of the ship, or the height of the stow or the way in which the container is secured, all of those things come into play, but all of those factors are looked at on a regular basis by the shipowner, the ship operator and the various agencies that ensure they meet the required regulations—even the safe operation of the ship and its safety management systems. All those things are reviewed on a regular basis, on a very prescripted legislated basis.

Reporting an incident is one thing that is highly regulated in the marine industry now, so any shipping company would have to analyze those incidents and put preventative measures in place for preventing them in the future. There are a number of checks and balances. Are we there yet? No, because it's still happening, of course, but there are a number of checks and balances on the regulatory side to look at what the failures have been and at taking action to prevent them.

I'll give you just a simple example. Let's say that there was an incident on a ship and a container went over and the investigation by either the ship or another agency found that there was a flaw in one of the security mechanisms. Well, you can assume, quite rightly, I think, that the company would then up its inspection regime of the securing equipment to make sure they could detect any problems with that equipment in the future.

That's just a very simple example. I hope it answered the question.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Does Canada have adequate input into what those standards are and into the inspection methods in the shipping industry?

[Christopher Hall]

I think Transport Canada should answer that, but I would weigh in by saying that I believe we do. Canada is very active at the IMO. I know our country is a very strong participant, and I would estimate that, yes, we are very involved in those types of regulations.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Arnold.

We'll now to go to Mr. Hardie for five minutes or less.

Go ahead, please.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you, again, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Hall, I'm going to go back to the insurance question.

Having had a little experience in the insurance industry along the way, I know those rascals don't really like to pay out money and that they will look for ways of doing things on the cheap if necessary. I'm just giving you that preamble so you can get your thoughts together on this question.

When there is a loss and there is debris washing up on the shore, and the insurance company knows it's going to have to help to pay for that cleanup, is it the one that then calls the shots in terms of who is hired to do that work?

[Christopher Hall]

The marine insurance regime is quite complex. In a situation like that where there's a liability issue, the “protection and indemnity clubs”, as they are called, would come into play, and it would be the club that the ship used as its indemnity provider.

My experience is that, yes, they do become involved, but as for how involved they would be in determining how the response is carried out, I think the marine insurance industry itself would be the best one to answer.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

We heard from witnesses earlier that whoever was hiring contractors to go out to do this work wouldn't necessarily hire the contractors with the best local knowledge, or the contractors with connections to the various first nations or NGOs that might be available to assist up and down the coast. So a lot of people who had capabilities that would be very useful in the case of the Zim Kingston were not necessarily included in that effort, maybe because whoever was calling the shots didn't even know they existed and much less wanted to spend the money.

Who do we talk to about all of this? Is it the marine insurance industry, or should we be cooking up a recommendation that maybe takes some of that decision-making out of their hands and really allows the jurisdiction, either the regional jurisdiction or the provincial jurisdiction, to call the shots with respect to assigning a pre-qualified contractor to lead the cleanup effort? Is that a reasonable thing to ask for?

[Christopher Hall]

That's very interesting.

I am not aware of the situation you refer to with the Zim Kingston and the perceived problems with the insurer, but I would comment that during the cleanup phase when unified command was being stood up, I would estimate that the actions of the shipowner, through its P and I club, would all be reviewed through unified command. I would estimate that the various government agencies participating in unified command would have been involved in that type of process. That's just my estimation.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

I get the sense that the unified command maybe, though, wound up its real oversight a little too early in this process.

[Christopher Hall]

I'm sorry but I don't have enough information to comment on that.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Hardie.

We'll now go to Madame Desbiens for two and half minutes.

Go ahead, please.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Dr. Langlois, I'd like to come back to my last comment about the St. Lawrence River. You know as well as I do that the fresh water of the St. Lawrence is an important source of drinking water for our riverside residents and for all of Quebec. At the Saguenay, fresh water meets salt water, and there is so much activity there that the water in the St. Lawrence contains a significant amount of food for marine mammals, which come there in large numbers.

In 2014, the supertanker Minerva Gloria went through the St. Lawrence Seaway. At the time, we were told that it could only be filled two‑thirds with oil from the oil sands because the ship might otherwise rake the bottom of the river.

Since then, huge oil tankers have been allowed to sail on the St. Lawrence, and their width has increased from 32 metres or 34 metres to 44 metres.

Dr. Langlois, is the St. Lawrence River in danger?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

That's an excellent question, Mrs. Desbiens.

The greater the risk of spills of any kind, the greater the danger to the St. Lawrence River. However, the more prevention is done to prevent spills from occurring, the lower the risk to the St. Lawrence River.

There is no doubt that the production of goods is on the rise, and shipping is increasing accordingly. We must not forget that the goods produced are transported from one country to another and that ships discharge their wastewater into the waters they use. This also has an impact on the St. Lawrence River, but that is another issue.

The St. Lawrence is obviously at greater risk than before due to increased shipping. That's the only answer I can give you.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

The goal isn't to prevent shipping on the river, but in your opinion, doesn't it go against the logic of using larger vessels?

Shouldn't we be allowing more small tankers to pass through our waters rather than letting big tankers, which pose more risks, navigate our waters?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

What's important is the quality of the ships. If they're smaller but less well equipped, that's not better either. There has to be some security.

I can't comment on the issue of vessel weight. However, I would like to come back to an important aspect. There is currently a very good oil spill response plan for the St. Lawrence River. We could call on the group responsible for this plan, which is already in contact with various organizations, not‑for‑profit organizations, or NPOs, and various levels of government, to respond to spills. I think there's a lot to be gained by giving them additional responsibility for container shipping.