Transport Committee on Sept. 26th, 2018

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you, Obviously, I would be interested in reading that study.

I have another question. To your knowledge, is there a sole pilotage provider model in the world that opened its market to competition and that then returned to a sole provider model? If so, what were the benefits?

[Captain Robin Stewart, Captain, Vice-President, British Columbia Coast Pilots Ltd.]

Thank you. It's a good question. It's one that is broached with us on a regular basis, quite frankly.

Yes, there have been other jurisdictions globally that have tried it—not within Canada, but some areas like Australia or some parts of Europe. Florida was moving in that direction. They've all moved back. There are one or two areas in western Europe.... I believe Norway has some small pockets where they do have competitive pilotage.

Consistently, though, it's proven that the competitive nature of that process would be similar to instituting a competitive process in the aviation industry, for example, where you have air traffic controllers providing a competing service, or in police departments or fire departments. It has not worked. The result has consistently proven a degradation of safety. Really, it's about establishing the priority. In a country like Canada, where public safety or environmental safety is accepted by the public as a priority, the risk of a degradation of safety is not worth the change.

In that context, though, we do have two pilotage areas on the west coast, both under the federal mandate of the Pilotage Act. One is with the entrepreneur pilots, ourselves, and we cover the entire outside coast. Then there's the employee model, with the Fraser River pilots, obviously within the Fraser River.

We have no problem in sharing a district, from our perspective, as long as we share it in isolation. In the Fraser River, they focus their expertise on the Fraser River; we do ours on the coast. The risk, as we see it, would be providing a process where someone can float in between. If you had a group that was able to provide pilotage on the coast or in the Fraser River, you would have potential for conflict.

We can talk about Kinder Morgan, for example, and the movement of oil. If you have a situation where you have agreed on principle to apply safety mitigations and you allow a negotiation with that process—which is what competition will always lead to—you run the risk of compromising that safety mitigation.

It has been tried. Consistently, it hasn't worked, especially in countries like Canada and the United States.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you, Mr. Stewart.

We'll move on to Monsieur Iacono.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My first question is for Ms. MacVicar from the Canada Border Services Agency.

How does the Agency ensure a balance between the application of border security measures and a smoother circulation of goods between Canada and the Pacific Region?

[Rosyln MacVicar]

Thank you for that question. I know it's a really good one because we get it often.

What I would suggest is that we do a really good job in terms of assessing the risks, either known or unknown, that we would be facing at any given time. We rely upon a number of factors that influence our definitions and our determinations of risk, and those relate to the systems we use, whether it be one of our own business rules and applications or whether it be through our national targeting sector, which enables us, as a result of early receipt of information, to determine what may or may not be coming our way.

In addition to that, we work with our law enforcement partners, nationally, federally or locally, in addition to the intelligence professionals who work with us at the CBSA. In that instance, it allows us to notify our front-line operation if there are risks or threats coming our way, and we can plan accordingly.

At the same time, our front-line operations have the opportunity to randomly select and make referrals for more detailed reviews as part of our secondary operations. For the most part, however, we reserve those for the most high-risk situations, so that we cannot and do not impede the free flow of low-risk traffic and goods into the country.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you.

In your opinion, what aspect of the modernization of ports must the federal government address first to help the Agency monitor border crossings? What is the most important element?

[Rosyln MacVicar]

I would suggest that we focus efforts in two distinct areas. One is in the area of infrastructure, to ensure that we are modernizing and enhancing our current infrastructure across the country as it relates to how our business has evolved. That would be the first area, and that includes investments in port operations, the facilities themselves.

More importantly, I would suggest that we need to make real investments in the technology. As you'll note, the transformation we're undertaking as an agency is predicated on new forms of technology, and this all comes at a cost. As we evolve and modernize as an organization, we rely more heavily on technology. I believe that this creates opportunities for both the federal government and industry to align those systems and create a more seamless flow.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

My next question is for the Chamber of Shipping representatives.

The Government of Canada implemented the national Oceans Protection Plan to create a marine safety system that will improve responsible marine transportation. What is your position on that plan? How does that plan help you support marine transportation?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

Thank you for your question.

I will have to respond in English. My apologies.

From an industrial perspective, the oceans protection plan is facilitating a better understanding of the ecosystem we're operating in, the effect industry has on that ecosystem, and how best to mitigate that. We know that's important to Canadians. We know it's important to indigenous communities, and we're sailing in those areas all the time.

That's a very complex and big agenda. I mentioned earlier that it's important to bring the competitiveness and efficiency formula into the oceans protection plan, because they are intrinsically related. The ports modernization review is probably the avenue in which to do that well, in a timely manner.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you.

We'll move on to Mr. Badawey.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My first question is for the chamber.

When we look at multimodal road repair, water and rail, are you currently having discussions in an integrated fashion to look at future strategies collectively, or are you simply basing your strategies individually?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

I'm sorry if I sound a bit hypocritical here—yes and no.

On the positive side, there's more involvement across different transportation modes than there has been. When we're talking about infrastructure investments and prioritizing recommendations to the federal government, we're not quite there yet. Largely, ocean carriers have been excluded from that dialogue. We're working closely with our transportation partners to change that, but we're not there yet.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

To that same point, mandates are sometimes dated and therefore impede the perception of whoever is responsible for them to invest in infrastructure that would be more conducive to today's strategies. Of course, the collective discussions and strategies ultimately lend themselves to the development of a national trade corridor, which is why we're here.

Do you find that, to align with today's business strategies collective, some mandates may have to change?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

There is probably an opportunity for change, likely within the Marine Act.

However, I don't want to be overly prescriptive at this point. More evidence needs to be brought to the table for this.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

That's a good point. I'd like you to delve a bit deeper into that, because we heard that in Niagara, too, with the St. Lawrence Seaway and the mandates that are governed by the Marine Act. Could you delve a bit deeper into that in terms of what has to change?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

This isn't a criticism of port authorities, but the reality is that the trading corridor in this region goes from 200 miles out in the Pacific Ocean to dockside, and the moment the jurisdictional boundaries are defined on a map—or a chart, if you're a pilot—we're not looking at that trade corridor on the marine side holistically.

There needs to be a discussion about how best to do that, especially in a complex environment like the Salish Sea. We're getting competing demands. Obviously, everybody knows there are species at risk. All of these factors have to be managed holistically, and at the moment the Marine Act doesn't facilitate that.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

What do you think the next step should be?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

It's likely looking at governance and how the various pieces of legislation and the authorities they devolve to integrate. That's probably our biggest challenge in the marine sector in the future: how to operate in that more complex ecosystem, with higher traffic volumes, larger ships and hopefully more trade.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Governance may therefore have to be changed in its own right, with respect to who is doing what and who is in charge of what.

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

I don't want to be prescriptive, but it's an area that deserves some attention, yes.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Now let's dive a bit deeper into that.

With respect to your experiences in the shipping industry in this area, what's the how to the what?

[Robert Lewis-Manning]

I think we have to take a hard look at how the different authorities integrate. Whether it's the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, the Coast Guard, Transport Canada, Environment and Climate Change Canada or the port authorities, all of them have jurisdictional leadership somewhere, from where that ship travels 200 miles out to the dockside.

I think we're probably looking at the potential of having some overarching agency, not to build more bureaucracy into the system but to maybe alleviate some of that bureaucracy, because it is getting very complex. Imagine a ship that calls on the port of Vancouver once a year or once in five years. Operating in that environment—obeying all the laws and moving people and commodities efficiently—is going to get much more complex. The gentleman to my left manages some of that complexity in a certain area, but there are a lot of moving pieces to that, and I think we need to do a better job of it, for the sake of both the Canadian economy and the ecosystem.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

You—

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much. I'm sorry, Mr. Badawey.

Mr. Liepert, you have four minutes.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Mr. Lewis-Manning, we get a lot of presentations, and I must admit that I don't personally really pay attention to every word in every presentation, but I'm an Alberta MP and you said something that caught my attention. It was something to do with bulk cargo that was impacting Alberta. Can you either repeat or expand on what you were talking about?