Transport Committee on Nov. 27th, 2013

[Scott Kennedy, Executive Director, Navigation safety and Environmental Programs, Department of Transport]

Thank you very much.

In a port like Montreal, or any large port around the world, of course, the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code applies, and that's a uniform set of rules that apply to shipping of all packaged dangerous goods around the world. We have inspectors who do spot checks on containers in a port like Montreal, and if there are any deficiencies found, then often the container will be moved aside and the consignee or the shipper will be instructed to repack the container, which quite often leads to delays. In fact, it's a rather large penalty, although not a monetary penalty. When a container is delayed and misses a shipment, that's a severe penalty.

This applies to Canadian marine as well, which must comply with the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act and also the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code.

There have been very few incidents in the marine mode, very few that I can even think of, on packaged dangerous goods.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

I'd like to make a comment about the fencing you mentioned. There's the St. Lawrence River, the boats, the containers and the trains. You can see right through the fencing because it is open. Notre-Dame Street is just on the other side and there are houses. The fencing doesn't offer much protection.

Are the port managers aware of the kind of dangerous goods that are arriving at the Port of Montreal and how long they stay there and so on?

[Scott Kennedy]

Absolutely. At ports like Montreal, where there are dangerous goods that could potentially affect neighbouring dwellings or things like that, there are risk assessments done through Natural Resources Canada. They do what they call explosive limit risk assessments to determine the proximity of dwellings and populated areas with respect to the port and what dangerous goods could be stowed and where they're stowed. They're often stowed in particular areas in a port, and in some ports in fact certain dangerous goods are not even permitted to be brought in.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

I'm not sure if you're talking about dangers in general, but I'm talking about something specific. Are the port managers aware that on Thursday, for example, a train will arrive with those kinds of goods on board and that it will stay there for two days? Do they know what kind of goods the train contains and what to do in case of an incident?

[Scott Kennedy]

Absolutely. Dangerous goods are required to have a consignment and documentation, and this documentation is well known in advance. When ships arrive, any dangerous good on board the ship is known in advance. When they arrive in port, if there is a dangerous good, they're usually moved to a certain particular dangerous good area in these ports. It's similar under the IMDG code and other regulations like that.

So specifically, yes, there are dangerous goods areas, and documentation precedes the load.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

You mentioned ships. Is it the same thing for goods arriving by train or truck?

[Gerard McDonald]

Yes. A port would know any good that is being transported to it. There would be a documentation of what is arriving at the port, and the port would ensure that what they're receiving is actually what they have been told they would receive.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Your time has expired.

We'll now move to Ms. Young for five minutes.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Thank you again for being here today.

I noted in the questioning that you've been so patient in terms of the answers. Can we just tie off a little bit around the marine as well as the air safety? We've talked a lot about rail, which is appropriate and good, but perhaps we can wrap that up so that we know we have this comprehensive report on the SMS.

You've talked about the SMS system regarding the rail quite extensively. Can you highlight, then, what happens— and I think we touched upon that—with the marine as well as with the air?

[Marie-France Dagenais]

I can talk about the transport of dangerous goods and the air mode. As was explained before, carriers do have an SMS system in place where there's a component for dangerous goods.

The way the transportation of dangerous goods program works is we do targeted inspections of shippers and carriers, so we do an air mode kind of packaging inspection, because you realize that before being on a plane, a package will often be carried by a truck. So that's where we actually target inspection, and that's where civil aviation, under Martin Eley, the director general, who was here on Monday, will look at the SMS system, the safety management system, of a company like Air Canada and look at whether they have the proper component in place. We would do the targeted inspection at the origin, in terms of air.

[Scott Kennedy]

On the marine mode, there are actually three layers of protection for Canadian vessels. The first is, of course, the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act and regulations; secondly, the Cargo, Fumigation and Tackle Regulations; and thirdly, the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code. Those three tiers regulate the marine mode.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Would you say that the international codes are higher than the Canadian codes? And where are we in meeting those codes?

[Marie-France Dagenais]

Actually, in the Transportation of Dangerous Goods regulations we reference the international code. So we're basically equivalent. Sometimes we may add some requirements. At the other end, we try to avoid this because basically that would make it hard on international transport. We always try to align, and we make reference to each modes' international codes.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

What you're basically saying, then, is that railway, air, as well as marine codes meet or are the same as the international standards?

[Marie-France Dagenais]

For marine and air; there are no railway codes.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Right. What I'm trying to say is that for all three modes of transportation, the codes all meet the international standards. It's just to have that on the record.

[Marie-France Dagenais]

Yes. Sorry.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Okay. I found it quite interesting that Mr. Bourdon talked about the fact that for the safety aspects he looked after the rail lines and the wheels, and that sort of thing—I guess the mechanisms of the trains—whereas, Ms. Dagenais, you talked about the container. Where do the two systems of safety inspection intersect, then? If one person is doing an inspection on just the trains and another is doing inspection on just the containers and the contents, where do they intersect? Is it because they didn't intersect that Lac-Mégantic happened?

[Luc Bourdon]

What we've done in some of our regions is we have taken people who had the background to inspect cars and they were trained as TDG inspectors, so they could do both. So you would not have someone who would look at only the running gear of that particular car and then have someone who would never show up to look at the tank, or something like that—or the opposite, someone would look at the tank and not at the running gear.

In many of our regions we try to integrate both of them, so we could have inspectors who could do both.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Do the inspectors do both, or are they integrated so that if they have a specialty in a certain area they are doing spot inspections on those specific areas? How does it work exactly?

[Luc Bourdon]

Usually it's a bit easier to take someone who has a rail background and make them a TDG inspector, because the apprenticeship to be a car inspector is about 8,000 hours, which is usually what you get with the rail industry.

Marie-France's group will give them the training to be a TDG inspector.

In another region they just may work as a team.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Is that something you have on the radar? As you know, the federal workplace is aging, so what are you doing in terms of replacing the inspectors and training new ones, and all of that sort of thing?

[Gerard McDonald]

We're constantly monitoring the level of employment we have in our inspectorate. We want to make sure it remains current and that we have a sufficient number of inspectors to carry out the planned risk-based inspection for the year.

We have a number of initiatives ongoing to encourage people to join the inspectorate, a number of comprehensive staffing programs. I know on the marine side we're just finishing a collective staffing action where we have roughly 300 applications to bring in new inspectors. It's something that's continuous, obviously. With a workforce that large we have to make sure we're constantly replacing those people who retire or move on.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Your time has expired, Ms. Young.

I'll move to Mr. Braid for the last five minutes.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our representatives for being here today.

In the course of your opening remarks, someone mentioned that standards for tanker cars are reviewed every five years. When will the next review be?