Foreign Affairs Committee on Oct. 20th, 2009

[William McGuinty]

It is my ability, as a Canadian exploration person or as a Canadian exploration company, to return to that piece of ground in that country, chastised, if that's the way it is, or vindicated and still be able to conduct, with any positive impact, my work on that ground. It isn't about my business. It's about whether I get hived off this project because, as a Canadian company, I can no longer support it or I can no longer support my activity on that--

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I'm sorry. Could the inverse be true, though? If you have a process and Canada has a standard--and I'll use the word “brand”--that says we actually don't take this, as was mentioned, as a voluntary process, we're serious about it and we put resources.... And the contextual piece I want to put into play here is that we are actually involved, in industry and government, in bringing forward serious CSR practices and support capacity development. I actually think that's great.

So I'm concerned because I'm hearing you say this is a 300-pound gorilla, on the one hand, and on the other hand I don't see evidence based on the context. It's not just one bill here and that's it. We are doing many other things, and I want to see my country being welcomed because of our practices...and by no means anyone being affected dishonourably with any process that is put forward.

I don't see your argument in this bill because of the provisions that are provided. As you've read the bill, there is a whole component part about vexatious complaints, and if anything, I hope this would be something that would protect you and shine up your reputation, because there are accusations. Some we have heard today and there are others that you hear on a more regular basis.

At the end of the day, I hope you would see this as not some Trojan horse and not another agenda. The agenda is simple, and it's that Canadian companies, when they are abroad, apply the same standards as here in Canada. I think that is what was understood by the round table. At least from this member, that's the intention, and that's what we're trying to do here. It is not some way of trying to assert another--

[William McGuinty]

All of the things described this morning by the members of Natural Resources Canada were things that my colleagues in the industry, the major associations, individuals who worked on those through the round table process and through the corporate strategy process, worked hard on to make sure that everything was that way. Most of us are trying to make sure that what is done in our practices elsewhere is fair.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I'm not challenging that.

[William McGuinty]

The issue for me, when I look at this process, is that the Canadian government is going to say, we will remove the ability of the Canadian company, in some cases, to possibly develop this asset. That is what this bill is saying.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

According to what clause?

[William McGuinty]

You're going to remove the financing mechanisms. EDC or--

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

You could. You're not--

[William McGuinty]

Maybe I missed it in the law, but I didn't see anything that said there was something you could do otherwise.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

There's a process first.

[William McGuinty]

You either did it or you didn't.

So say if you did it, for whatever reason, there's no remedial process...

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

But you were saying there were no sanctions before and that was a concern for you.

[William McGuinty]

There are no sanctions for an exploration company.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Right. Should we go wider then?

[William McGuinty]

Yes, let's go to the point of the bill, which is to remove this money from the operability of an exploration or development project. Say its legitimate purpose would be to have that company stop. Because there isn't anything in here saying we will remove it if you do this; it says if you're doing it, we'll remove it. So that means that company and the government's ability to move that company in a direction that Canadians think is appropriate is gone, so now the Canadian government steps up and says, we don't think this company was behaving right. The next guy may not be any better, so we want to continue to intervene to make sure those people who we felt were badly impacted don't get any worse treatment. But that's not in the law either.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

If anything, I'm hearing you say we need to have a wider reach, and not many of us would agree.

[William McGuinty]

I think if the government thinks it should be asking in a socially responsible way and it could move in that direction, then it's going to have to take up the gauntlet.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much.

With that, we've gone over time. We appreciate all five of you being here this morning, giving us your testimony.

I'm going to ask those of you on the steering committee to stand back. We're going to have an informal discussion about our meetings coming up next week.

We are adjourned.