Transport Committee on Oct. 7th, 2014

[Serge Buy]

There are protocols set by Transport Canada and there are further protocols set by various companies on top of that.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

But again, it requires a voluntary.... You have to know what's in the truck to know where to put it.

[Serge Buy]

Absolutely.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

For you, Ms. Legars, with the handling of dangerous goods, again I assume you're going to know what's on each vehicle. Is that information conveyed to the handlers at the ports and to the municipalities themselves, so they know what's going through their towns?

[Anne Legars]

Yes, actually the ports and the terminals have all the information in advance. Not to [Technical difficulty--Editor] and so on and so forth. I don't know if they have it but it's certainly not something that is handled by the ports. The ship provides information to the port and terminals and to all the people who will be handling this cargo. So if it goes after that on a truck or a rail car, the train or the truckers will have the information. The information always follows the flow. We don't provide this information to the cities or to whomever. It's not something that is in the regulations, so I don't know how it's managed outside the port and outside of the stakeholders who are directly involved with the handling of these goods.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Do you have the same difficulty that the ferry owners have about the honesty of the shippers?

[Anne Legars]

Well, that's something, you know, especially on the containers. On the bulk side, you know pretty much what you have in your ships' holds because very often you have surveyors, for example, when the things are put in the holds and you may have some testing or whatever. But when it's in containers you rely on what the shippers said and you rely on the documentation that the shipper provides, because they are the ones who put the things in the containers and seal the containers. After that you basically have to trust the information you have received.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Does Transport Canada do routine inspections or random inspections of these containers, or is that left to the shipowners themselves?

[Anne Legars]

The shipowner does not make routine inspections of the containers. The only ones who will do inspections of containers are the customs administrators. They are the ones who can open containers.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

How often--

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Your time is up, Mr. Sullivan.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Oh, I'm sorry, I'm out of time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Mr. Sullivan, you're quite a bit over actually.

Mr. Leung, for five minutes.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

My question is for Ms. Legars.

In the United States they have an organization called the American Bureau of Shipping, and in London, I believe, there is Lloyd's that does ship inspections and certifications. Do we have an organization similar to that in Canada?

[Anne Legars]

Do you mean a classification society?

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

No, an independent organization like the American Bureau of Shipping or Lloyds in London? What is our closest organization in Canada that does that type of work?

[Anne Legars]

Well, actually the companies you named are classification societies. In Canada we have all the worldwide classification societies, and all the reputable ones are part of an international association where all reputable shipowners want to find their classification societies. We don't have a pure Canadian one. They are all international companies, even if some of them have a name like American Bureau of Shipping that you think is American. Actually, it serves people all around the world and they may have offices all around the world, too.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

So we don't have something that's purely Canadian but rely on international certification organizations to do this work.

My next question, then, has to do with marine liability.

Are liability limits established by international convention, or is there a specific liability that Canada establishes for our close-shore liabilities for accidents or oil spills?

[Anne Legars]

That's international. Those are international conventions, and then they imported into Canadian law via the Marine Liability Act.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

So we're relying on the international network of organizations for us to meet our standards or meet our requirements for our marine liability?

[Anne Legars]

Yes.

Well, the standards are actually the limits of liability and the access to the international funds, because you have access to international funds when you reach excess liability.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

My next question is for Mr. Buy.

Ferry transport is a very specific type of transport. The vessels are point-to-point or shore-to-shore, regardless of whether it's within 5 kilometres, 10 kilometres or even 30 or 40 kilometres. If that's the case, then would we not be better off to have a specific act that controls and governs the operation and safety of ferry operations?

[Serge Buy]

It's an interesting question. When Minister Raitt came to our meeting last week, to our annual conference, she certainly made a clear statement that she recognized the importance of the ferry sector. The fact that the operation of ferries is regulated by acts that regulate anything from the transportation of trailers, of different things, is something that we may want to look at and see whether or not an act specific to the ferries is relevant.

You mentioned that ferries go point to point, from a few hundred metres to a few kilometres, to 30 kilometres. It's actually much more than that, as some of them go hundreds of kilometres. You've got ferries from North Sydney to Argentia, in Newfoundland, and you've got the Northwest Passage and B.C. Ferries that go from the north of Vancouver Island to Prince Rupert. That's a lot of kilometres to cover. The difference, when you have the little ferry that goes to the Toronto Island airport, which is the shortest ferry in the world, to the Marine Atlantic ferry, is that they're very different operations. So I don't know if we can do that.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Let me reframe the question, because ferry operation itself is unique in a way. The vessels that are designed for it are actually point-to-point vessels, unlike ocean-going vessels or cargo or traffic vessels, which can land in any port, say, along the St. Lawrence Seaway or internationally. Because of that unique character, it usually serves not more than two or three ports.

Would we not then better off, then—well, not necessarily better off—or be more specific if we addressed this issue with a specific act?

[Serge Buy]

I'm not convinced of that, sir. I think we have some ferries that actually cover a number of ports. I think it's the port that has adapted to the ferry, not the ferry adapted to the port. I think you may see a new ferry brought into service in Atlantic Canada very soon, which is probably done in Europe. It will come here, and if the adaptation is done, the adaptation will be done to some of the ports, and maybe a little bit of the ship, but not by a huge amount. I don't think that the specificity of the vessel is the issue. I think the issue would be the specificity of the services it provided. You're dealing with passengers. You're dealing with people. When your family embarks on a ferry, they want to be safe. When you've got kids, you've got seniors, you've got different people, you've got people going back to their homes, they want to be safe, and that's where—