Evidence of meeting #23 for Health in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chemicals.
A recording is available from Parliament.
6:45 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Is there anybody who could comment on that?
Mr. King.
6:45 p.m.
Department Leader, Health, Safety and Environment, United Steelworkers
The comment I wanted to make was to follow the line of thought that I perceived you were taking, which is that in a situation where the product already has a recognized standard—and electrical products would be a good example—then that's your pre-test. But for those products that don't have that kind of testing, toys for one—and there may be others—then there should be some system put in place to ensure that.
So you bring into the system those you can already rely on, and then you only focus on those that aren't in the system, and you do it strategically.
6:45 p.m.
Vice-President, Consumers' Association of Canada
The way I see it is that the act does in fact provide an onus on ensuring that a product is not hazardous to the health of consumers. So imports would be covered by virtue of the fact that the retailer of that product could be liable—and liable for a huge fine if they sold a hazardous product. That then puts the onus on them to ensure the product is safe. So we would hope that results in testing when there is any concern at all, and it would be a cost that is borne by the supply chain, rather than the public through government testing.
6:45 p.m.
President, Canadian Institute of Plumbing and Heating, Consumer Product Safety Coalition
I can speak about my industry on that topic. You must have a mark, for example, on a faucet. It has to have a certification mark. Sometimes you won't see it, because some of them are $1,000 and people want the mark underneath the product. We now have a mechanism within our industry. In the province of Alberta, inspectors have the authority to go into a retail outlet and remove product that doesn't meet that requirement. If it was brought to my attention, I would phone an inspector and tell him that there was a product on the shelf that didn't meet third-party certification. Remember, it's not a hazard—it just doesn't meet the requirement. They have the authority to go in and remove the product from the shelf. We already have regulations that work well within our industry. That's what I was referring to—our national system of codes and standards.
6:45 p.m.
Conservative
6:45 p.m.
Bloc
Nicolas Dufour Bloc Repentigny, QC
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
If I go by your comments and those from the representatives of other consumer and industry groups, I see once more that the problem is the lack of human and financial resources for inspectors.
Mr. Therien, you said something very interesting earlier, to the effect that no one ever sees an official. I would love you to tell us more about that, but also to finish what you were telling us earlier about the inspectors.
June 2nd, 2009 / 6:45 p.m.
Past President, Canada Safety Council
I'm an old-timer in this town. I go back many years. Director General of the Product Safety Branch of Health Canada was very high-profile in the public service in this town. I was told by officials at Health Canada that from 1992 until a surge of bad product came in from China in August 2007, not one inspector from Health Canada visited China. There was no oversight of what was going on. It's embarrassing and it's just despicable. No wonder we saw these problems.
A very effective regulatory oversight tool is spot audits, but they don't exist any more. The government has not put in the resources to get the inspectors needed to get the job done. That's the problem we have. In the U.S., the Consumer Product Safety Commission is going through the same trials and tribulations. They've been cut down to nothing. They have 400 inspectors in a country of 310 million people. We have one-tenth of that. Go figure. That's the problem.
6:50 p.m.
President, Canadian Institute of Plumbing and Heating, Consumer Product Safety Coalition
I think we have an opportunity to go down the right path and work with Health Canada to help train those inspectors to do what they should be doing. I wouldn't say it's a lost cause. I would say industry is working with government and Health Canada to ensure that something happens. Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. We have an opportunity to make some positive changes.
6:50 p.m.
Vice-President, Consumers' Association of Canada
I don't think the problems are with the act. Our concern is whether there will be resources to make the act work properly. That's what we're all alluding to. If we don't have those resources, this is not going to have the desired effect.
6:50 p.m.
Department Leader, Health, Safety and Environment, United Steelworkers
I agree in part with what has been said about the importance of resources. That is a critical thing. I wouldn't agree that the bill as currently proposed provides for the most efficient use of the resources. The requirement for some form of pre-testing or spot-audit process gives tools to the people and ensures that something will be done. If it's left blank, then it's totally a question of government policy. When it comes to government policy, choices have to be made. When you're dealing with consumer products that get into the hands of children, you have to have a more rigorous set of requirements as well as the necessary resources.
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
With respect to paperwork reporting requirements, I think there are some justifications for those pieces being in the bill. If you were asked how to meet the goals that make it as easy as possible for our small-businessmen, what would you advise?
6:50 p.m.
Vice-President, National Affairs, Canadian Federation of Independent Business
I think our members would give you lots of good suggestions on how that can be done. I think looking at what is already in the possession of a business owner would be the start. So is an invoice enough?
If you are going to go to a retailer, for example--many of the folks across the country in our membership are retailers--is it just enough to have the invoice from the supplier to be able to track it back? If it's not, then you have to be very clear on what it is you're looking for, and we would put the onus back on Health Canada to say this is an example of what we mean by compliance.
Small-business owners are asked every day about keeping records on their taxation, on their workers, and on all kinds of different areas from all levels of government. So it needs to be really clearly made to them what it is they need to have in their possession if the inspector comes to their door. That's not going to be an easy task; it's going to be very difficult. If you're talking about Susan who owns a household goods shop in small-town Ontario, for her to know that this is the requirement when the inspector walks in, it has to be made very clear. In fact, we would suggest the first time that it happens there be an opportunity for education. That's the point where you tell the small-business owner that these are the kinds of things that you need to have in place so that we can make sure we're protecting Canadians. This is why we're doing it.
6:50 p.m.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Is it your sense that working with Health Canada to set this up can be made reasonably easy?
6:50 p.m.
Vice-President, National Affairs, Canadian Federation of Independent Business
We've certainly been talking to them and we're certainly providing our ideas. It won't be easy, I can tell you that right now. We know about privacy legislation and needs for policies in certain provinces that have been in place for five years, and we still know a bunch of members don't even know about them.
That's going to be the challenge, getting businesses aware of the fact that they have this requirement to provide this sort of information. They want to do it. They want to comply, don't get me wrong, but they have so many things coming at them, and so often, that for them to know and pull out a piece of paper and understand that this is another thing they are required to do is going to be very difficult to do.
We're going to do our best to make sure that it's put out there clearly and communicated to them. But the best way to make it effective is to make it as simple as possible for them to understand.
6:55 p.m.
President, Canadian Institute of Plumbing and Heating, Consumer Product Safety Coalition
Corinne said yes, Health Canada had been aware of our concerns. We actually had product experts provide them with information on product recall from a global perspective. We want to make sure they get good data, not just data that's dumped from a recall because of an electrical outage or a faucet is not working properly. It has to be meaningful data to the point where they can take the trends they need--not data from all over the world to create a data bank--and also have a person on staff just managing this type of information when small companies can't afford to do that full-time.
