Transport Committee on June 4th, 2007

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Order. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, meeting 55. The orders of the day are pursuant to the order of reference of Tuesday, November 7, 2006, Bill C-6, An Act to amend the Aeronautics Act and to make consequential amendments to other acts.

Joining us today from the Department of Transport are Franz Reinhardt, Susan Stanfield, and Merlin Preuss; and from the Department of National Defence, Jacques Laplante and Alex Weatherston.

Welcome.

(On clause 12)

When we wrapped up the last committee meeting, we were dealing with amendment G-2, moved by the government. I think we were making headway. Is there perhaps another resolve out there, or are we going to continue to debate this?

Mr. Jean.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

We do have another handout for the committee that probably will resolve this, just based on all the discussions we had at the previous meeting.

I would ask the clerk to hand that out.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

We're on page 29 in your program. This is government amendment G-2.

Mr. Jean, do you want to briefly outline what this document does?

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Actually, it's a reflection of what the other committee members mentioned, a low-risk representative. The changes are set out as far as what we discussed last time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Is it in the form of an amendment or a subamendment?

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Well, it actually is a subamendment. I think it would have to be, in this case.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Perhaps I can get you to read it.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Certainly, Mr. Chair, I'd be happy to read it, as follows:

(a) an aeronautical safety study has been carried out in respect of the organization and the results of the study show, in that Minister's opinion, that the organization's particular activities in respect of which it would be able to exercise the powers, duties and functions to be set out in the certificate of designation referred to in subsection (1.1) represent a low level of risk in relation to aviation safety and security;

That was in relation to the comment that we should mention the low risk level instead of the high risk level.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Any comments?

So we're changing the terminology to “low level of risk”, correct?

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Yes. In fact it's underlined and in bold.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Julian.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

I think, Mr. Chair, the issue is why this wouldn't be worded as the “lowest” level of risk.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Jean.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

To my understanding, and I'd like to hear from the department, they indeed have an indicator in place now that allocates the risk, and of course there are risk assessment procedures in place. I would think the drafters of this particular clause addressed it to the design of the program itself that allocates the risk assessment.

Am I correct on that?

[Franz Reinhardt, Director, Regulatory Services, Civil Aviation, Department of Transport]

Yes. There's always a certain level of risk in any operation. Of course, if you didn't want to have any risk, you would ground all the airplanes and nobody would be flying.

In the case of the designated organization, if we conduct a safety study and we determine there's a low level of risk following a risk assessment and analysis, that should be considered sufficient to allow the minister to designate--with, of course, many of the other criteria that you will see later on.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

If I may, Mr. Chair, it certainly answers some of the Bloc's concerns. I think the department is correct; the only way to remove all risk is to ground all aircraft and stop flying. I think the reality is that the stake's at the lowest common denominator, and it matches up with their risk assessment procedure. It seems to make sense. And it certainly is a long way removed from where it was before.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Further comment?

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Also, I would like to hear from the department, if possible, Mr. Chair, in relation to (b). If you look further on down the page, “air transportation of fare-paying passengers”, I don't really understand the rationale there.

[Franz Reinhardt]

Following the discussion we had at the last committee meeting, we removed the qualifier “scheduled”, and in French “régulier”.

So if you go to the actual section, the previous one was “the organization's activities do not include the scheduled air transportation of fare-paying passengers”, and now it would read, “the organization's activities do not include the air transportation of fare-paying passengers”. So it removes the qualifier “scheduled”.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Excellent.

I don't know, Mr. Chair, if you want me to talk about the rationale that the Bloc also used in the three-year coming into force section, which is obviously another section, but it's encompassed within the same, and the government is in favour of that amendment as well.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Are you suggesting that the coming into force is going to be in clause 49, though—

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Subclause (2). Yes, I wanted to give confirmation to the Bloc that we did listen to their suggestion on that and are, quite frankly, in favour of it. We think it's good.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Further comment?

Mr. Bell.

[Don Bell, Liberal, North Vancouver, BC]

I wanted to clarify in terms of the removal of paragraph (b), that's what we talked about. Some large carriers are non-scheduled, but that allows particularly the smaller carriers who don't have scheduled flights, is that correct?

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Just for clarification, I don't think we're removing paragraph (b)—