That's correct.
Evidence of meeting #43 for Natural Resources in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cleanup.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #43 for Natural Resources in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cleanup.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:05 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
That's correct.
4:05 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I guess my question is this. Why not reference either those plans or those authority guidelines in the act to give everybody assurance that the cleanup done under clause 17 will be compensated for and there will be no confusion so nobody hesitates on initiating the plan? We simply don't want any hesitation when something like this happens.
4:10 p.m.
Senior Legislative Counsel, Advisory and Development Services Section, Department of Justice
The names of provincial statutes change and the names of provincial authorities change. We did in fact think about that, but it was better to be generic so you didn't miss somebody than to be specific and then perhaps, with a name change or a new emergency organization established or a protocol in a province, we could accidently leave somebody out who we actually intended to be caught. So by being generic we leave it up to the judgment of the court into the future. It was better. I thought about it, we thought about it, and we thought it was better to be generic.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
The risk of potentially causing any confusion feels lessened because those plans, as they go through, will be updated. I'm just talking about competent authorities here in terms of environmental authority.
Who has the authority to clean up what? Who can issue it and pull in the contractors? The government, to my knowledge, doesn't actually own any of the equipment that would do the cleanup. Whether provincial or federal, this is all going to be done by either the.... I don't know if it would be done by the nuclear operator themselves. They can't be compensated, though, is that right? They can't be compensated for damages--we established that in subclause 16(1)--but can they be compensated for cleanup, under clause 17?
4:10 p.m.
Senior Legislative Counsel, Advisory and Development Services Section, Department of Justice
We have carved out damage to the operator's own installation from coverage, because we don't want the operator to syphon off. A lot of the expense would be there, and we don't want the money intended for third party victims to be spent there.
4:10 p.m.
Senior Legislative Counsel, Advisory and Development Services Section, Department of Justice
What we have in clause 17 is a requirement that if a competent authority, acting under legislation--and you'd have to establish that it was legislation and if he is or is not acting under the legislation--then reasonable costs of the measures are compensable. It doesn't matter who has been ordered to do it.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
One would assume the expertise exists within the nuclear industry itself in terms of cleanup. If it happens one kilometre or five kilometres off-site or further, it would be the one to know what they're doing, because odds are that local Joe Contractor down the road probably doesn't have the equipment to clean up a nuclear-contaminated site.
Just to be clear, the operators can then be compensated for that work under clause 17.
4:10 p.m.
Senior Legislative Counsel, Advisory and Development Services Section, Department of Justice
If they've been ordered.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
If the province or the federal government orders them to clean it up.
4:10 p.m.
Senior Legislative Counsel, Advisory and Development Services Section, Department of Justice
Whoever has been ordered to do the remedial measures, yes.
4:10 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
Yes, it wouldn't necessarily be the operator; many contractors could be responsible for decontaminating property.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I just wanted to make sure there wasn't an unintentional loophole created. I'm not passing any comment on your writing, but an exclusion to the operator receiving any compensation would not unforeseeably make it impossible for them to be compensated for environmental remediation that happens off-site.
I don't see the notion of remedial measures included in clause 17. Often under acts pertaining to the mining industry and to pulp and paper operations, when an environmental cleanup happens there are levels of cleanliness, I suppose, or a return to a pre-existing state, that are included in the directions to the company, and they're very explicit. They've had to be, because Canada has had an experience where I think Mr. Tonks's riding had a site that picked up, closed down, and the costs of remediation of the site were extensive, because our concern for the environment in 1940 was very different from what it is today. The expectations of the public are much higher in terms of what “returning to pre-existing state” means.
Clause 17 doesn't really get at what the expectation is as to the level of cleanup, and this is an important point simply because one person's cleanup can be extraordinarily different from what the tolerance is. I can imagine the public meeting where folks are saying five years down the road, after the box has been ticked and the contractors have all left, that they still think the site is contaminated. Under legislation, if it's not defined then it seems nebulous.
Can you help me see where the definition of mitigation really is? What is it considered to be?
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
It would be for the competent authority to define the level of remedial measures to be taken. For example, when you're talking about decontamination or the cleanup of property, then the competent authority would define to what criteria the property would be cleaned up, and then the claim would be brought to the court. Our legislation does not define what those cleanup criteria will be; rather, it relies on the competent authority to define the necessary measures.
4:15 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
If I'm using those other industrial applications under the mining act and others, that's not left up to other authorities; it's explicitly said what the post-use level of remediation must be. Mining effluent, potential acid rock drainage, and those types of issues are toxic in nature but not even anything in the stratosphere of the stuff we're talking about here. I don't know why in this act it seems more open than it would be in another act under Parliament.
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
In this situation the competent body would determine the necessary level of cleanup criteria, and I don't think that is different from any other industry where you have to undertake a cleanup when the regulator doesn't define to what level you clean up the property.
4:15 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
We can't reference those standards in terms of what the nuclear industry is contracted to do for a cleanup. Do those standards exist right now, or is it for Natural Resources Canada to decide after the fact?
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
No, Natural Resources Canada would not be the competent authority to define the cleanup criteria. It would be a regulatory body that would be responsible for that.
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.
4:15 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
So the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, under clause 17, would be given the authority to define when cleanup is done. Is that right?
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
No. It could be a competent authority under clause 17, and in that capacity it could order that certain remedial measures, such as cleanup of a property, would have to be done to a certain level that it may prescribe.
4:15 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
It sounds like what I said, though. Is it not given over to that authority to decide what the level of cleanup is?
4:15 p.m.
Director, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division, Electricity Resources Branch, Department of Natural Resources
That's correct.
