I don't know if people are aware of this, but at least in my province--and I've heard it from several provincial ministers--the navigable waterways act is often a duplication of resources, and it slows up a lot of development. It causes some environmental concerns. And indeed, quite frankly, it is a nightmare in rural Canada. I would like to put this motion that we deal with at least looking at the navigable waterways act and the impact it has on governance, on use, and on environmental protection. I would like to study it. It's an act that goes back over a hundred years in many cases, so it needs something up to date.
To put it into perspective, if I had a ditch, and if this pen--which doesn't float, but it could possibly be a pencil, for my example--floated, that ditch would be a navigable waterway, and it would require a tremendous amount of input by the federal government. The difficulty with that is it's already required by many provincial governments, the same exact work, and it takes sometimes up to two or three years to get something done. This includes building a bridge, building a walkway. Mr. Watson had an example this morning of something that happened in his riding. A little ditch requires just a walkway for pedestrians, but it can't be built and has been held up for some years, simply because it has been deemed a navigable waterway, even though a canoe would never float in it no matter what happened. This is the difficulty.
I've looked at interpretation bulletins. I've looked at different situations. And I think the best thing to do is study it and have all members of this committee do so. I think we do have some free time to do it. For instance, the suggestion of one hour with the department next Thursday may even be possible, to at least get a preliminary on it if we do have time. I know that's a bit fast, but I think it would be appropriate.
I just wanted to mention as well that the minister, even though he's coming to speak on Bill C-23, is also prepared to answer questions on infrastructure, because I know that's been an issue. I would like to see maybe some future meetings deal with the infrastructure aspect, probably some time in the next 30 or 40 days.