Evidence of meeting #13 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was liability.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Capt Stephen Brown
Well administrative monetary penalties have become a mainstay of legislation enforcement here in Canada across all agencies, so we were not surprised that for the sake of consistency, Bill C-3 is a continuation of same.
NDP
Mike Sullivan NDP York South—Weston, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to come back to the notion of the limits on liability that are a part of Bill C-3. Essentially it raises the limit of liability, but anything that goes above that limit would fall to other players, principally the government. The Lac-Mégantic debacle has shown us what happens when somebody doesn't have enough insurance; it's governments that pick up the cost. The tanker safety panel has actually not finished its report on hazardous and noxious substances, so we seem to be putting the cart before the horse in a way. We're amending the act before we have the tanker safety panel's recommendations.
But they have made recommendations on ship-source oil pollution. Without getting into oil—I know Mr. Watson will be offended if I talk about oil, because it's not really here—I want to talk about the concept they've put forward that polluters should pay, that taxpayers should never be on the hook for exposure to oil spills on our coasts, or to hazardous and noxious substances on our coasts. So recommendation 23 in their report suggests that if the government were to bankroll the additional...but then go back after the fund—whether it's the hazardous and noxious substance fund or the ship-source oil pollution fund, it doesn't really matter. The government would bankroll anything over and above the current limits or the limits as being proposed in the act, and that would then fall upon itself to back over the funds. But we would require some legislative change to this act to do that.
Are you suggesting or would you agree that we should amend this bill to provide that taxpayers won't be on the hook for exceedances of what the limits of liability are in these funds? I invite all three of you to respond.
Perhaps Ms. Legars first, because you're so far away.
Vice-President, Shipping Federation of Canada
I would say that, from our standpoint, Canada is overdue to be able to ratify the HNS convention and implement it because it's the first building block of the system.
I might be afraid that this would be pushed back. Waiting to have a whole regime after the tanker panel finishes and it goes into all kinds of consultations again and so on and so forth, it might be years from now before we have these next amendments. So I would say let's grab this low-hanging fruit now, which is to put in place the HNS convention in Canada and build from that. Then it would be in place already, and you could build other things. I believe that sooner is better.
Capt Stephen Brown
I think that is correct, given the extreme doubt that the limitation of liability would be exceeded. At this point, I'd be dissuaded from trying to address what is being addressed by the tanker safety panel in terms of spill response. The likelihood of an HNS incident escalating to the level of a major oil spill is extremely remote.
I think Ms. Legars hit an important point there. One thing we also have to focus on is getting the international HNS convention ratified as soon as possible and then working with our partners at the international level to address exactly the point that you're raising.
Vice-President, Corporate Social Responsibility, Port Metro Vancouver
I'd echo Captain Brown and Ms. Legars; I think that it's an important step and I don't see it as putting the cart before the horse in the case of this bill. I think these are progressive steps that we need to take towards an ideal regime.
The member had asked a question about whether taxpayers or government should be the backstop, basically. It seems to me that the critical thing is that action needs to be taken in the event of an incident and until such a time as we've got a perfect regime, and I'm not sure such a thing exists, I think it's very important for government to be prepared to step in if it needs to, and yes, absolutely, go after the polluters to recover those costs.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Chair, I want to quote the testimony at our last meeting from one of the government officials, Mr. Marier, who is with us here today in the audience. I just want to remind members of the quote:
The convention applies to 6,500 substances, including oils. Those include persistent oil in so far as we're talking about loss of life and personal injury claims. It also applies to non-persistent oils, which are usually refined fuels, like jet fuel and gasoline.
So if any members, Mr. Chair, have any concerns talking about oil under BillC-3, they should perhaps read the testimony and understand that it includes variations on oil and oil in terms of its application to loss of life and personal injury claims.
May I ask all three witnesses a general question? Maybe they could respond for 30 seconds each, starting with Ms. Legars.
What's not in Bill C-3 that should be here?
Vice-President, Shipping Federation of Canada
From our perspective everything is here. Maybe in a couple of years Canada will want to move further, but for the time being, everything is here.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Your members in the Shipping Federation believe that this bill is not capable of being improved in any way?
Vice-President, Shipping Federation of Canada
What we have a direct interest in is strictly part 4, the one on the implementation of the HNS convention. For the other parts we have only an indirect interest; we are not experts on that. Basically our submission is that part 4 move forward and that it become part of Canadian law, and we are fine with that at this stage.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
So we're moving to implement HNS standards in anticipation of the HNS agreement actually becoming ratified and becoming international law, right?
February 25th, 2014 / 10:10 a.m.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Thank you.
Captain Brown, how is Bill C-3 capable of being improved? What can be added to Bill C-3 so we can do right and better by Canadians?
Capt Stephen Brown
I think Bill C-3 as it stands is good.
I had a long discussion yesterday with the HNS panel, Captain Houston's panel, and it focused very much on a couple of concerns. One was that, as I mentioned earlier, a lot of the substances are carried on container vessels and we need to ensure we have the capability to deal with an incident in a Canadian port, should one occur.
The second part of that is ensuring that we, as Canada, set a leading example for providing ports of refuge for vessels that might be involved in this type of an incident.
Vice-President, Corporate Social Responsibility, Port Metro Vancouver
As I said earlier, it's a process of continuous improvement. I think the bill, in its current form, is worthy of support. When the panel finalizes its report on HNS, there may indeed be other things that the government would wish to take a look at in terms of implementing the legislation. To get all the benefits from the liability regime and the other benefits we've talked about this morning, I don't think there should be any delay. I think the bill is in good shape.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
Captain Brown, can I go back to your earlier testimony? You singled out three instances of spill or accident. What were those?
Vice-President, Corporate Social Responsibility, Port Metro Vancouver
You were talking about three incidents of container....
Capt Stephen Brown
I'm sorry, on the container side, yes.
There were three container vessels in 2013 that were involved in incidents which, it is assumed, involved hazardous and noxious substances. One was a container vessel in the mid-Atlantic which had a major explosion under deck and it was assumed that that was a result of some instability of a substance.
There was a vessel leaving a port in Asia that, while she was actually leaving the port, had to be attended because of a similar incident there, there was an explosion from a container.
Third, there was a small chemical tanker that suffered a similar incident in 2013.
They were the three incidents that come to my mind immediately that serve to, perhaps, underline that we talk a lot about tankers, but many of these substances are carried in containers. Everything is declared. We have to ensure the accuracy of those declarations, I would say.
As I mentioned earlier, also, it's very important that we, here in Canada, prepare ourselves to deal with those types of incidents, should we ever be confronted with them.
Liberal
David McGuinty Liberal Ottawa South, ON
What would you describe as the riskiest substance regulated?
