Evidence of meeting #4 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was regulations.
A recording is available from Parliament.
James van Raalte
The answer to that question is categorically no. It's not about deregulation at all.
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
As it relates to Health Canada, have there been sufficient human and financial resources to adhere to all of the requirements under the act and its regulations and policies? Can you expand on that?
Director General, Policy and Regulatory Strategies Directorate, Department of Health
We are appropriately staffed to carry out our mandate. Is that the question?
Director General, Policy and Regulatory Strategies Directorate, Department of Health
Yes. On our resource allocation to develop regulations and the red tape reduction, there's no real connection between those things in my mind. We have the resources that we need to carry out our mandate.
NDP
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Okay. As it relates to the regulations calculations for administrative burden—this is a side question tangential to everything else I've been asking—how do regulators ensure that businesses provide them with accurate estimates of labour costs and time requirements?
James van Raalte
That's a good question.
Again, from a consultation process, there is an opportunity for businesses to comment on the calculation, but those calculations are done internally with data provided mainly by Statistics Canada and by other sources to come up with those calculations.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Tom Lukiwski
Thank you very much.
Colleagues, I think we can have one more round, but I'll cut it to five-minute interventions, rather than six, and that should bring us in right on time.
We'll start with Mrs. Block for five minutes, please.
Conservative
Kelly Block Conservative Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'm hoping to go quickly enough to share my time with my colleague Mr. McCauley.
Perhaps this is a good segue to something you mentioned about your upcoming “What We Heard Report”. I want to reference something from the last report that was made public.
From the report on the 2018 consultations, under the environmental assessment subsection of the “Additional Sectoral Issues” section, I'll read a quote:
Stakeholders noted that a lack of coordination between environmental regulations and sector-specific regulations leads to duplicative approval processes, delays, and increased administrative burden. They noted that an inconsistent approach to enforcing these regulations is creating an uneven playing field both nationally and internationally.
I'm wondering if you could provide this committee with copies of the stakeholder submissions—with the appropriate redactions, of course—of those who contributed to the environmental assessment subsection.
James van Raalte
I will commit, Mr. Chair, to tracking those down if I can. I'll need references to the specific materials. They may not be held by my department.
James van Raalte
They may be held by another department. We'll go through the hoops to try to secure those for the committee.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Tom Lukiwski
Mr. McCauley, you have the remaining time, which is approximately three and a half minutes.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Very quickly, Mr. Van Raalte, from your “Annual Report to Parliament for the 2018 to 2019 Fiscal Year: Federal Regulatory Management Initiatives”, can you walk me through how the department comes up with its benefits? For example, for the cannabis regulations, it shows a net benefit of $9.2 billion. How does the department come up with such numbers? Also, somewhere in there, it talks about how new regulations added on for trucking, for greenhouse gas emissions, are an $80-million benefit. I'm wondering how it comes up with regulations becoming a benefit.
James van Raalte
Those questions are better posed to the departments that are responsible for undertaking that analysis.
Conservative
James van Raalte
We bring together all of the material that has been provided by different departments. We put that under one....
Conservative
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Okay.
There are also numbers reported in here about the net administrative burden. Going back to 2012, it's $24 million net to the economy. I'm just wondering, over the same period, what the cost of overseeing the one-for-one has been.
The whole purpose of one-for-one, obviously, is to free up companies and grow the economy. We've seen $24 million net. What's been the cost of administering all of this? Is there any value in what's trying to be achieved?
James van Raalte
I have answered that question. The cost across government for administering the act would be department by department, year by year in terms of the regulatory package.
James van Raalte
As I said, it's between one and two FTEs a year, so maybe no more than $200,000.