Transport Committee on Feb. 21st, 2019

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much. We'll go on to Mr. Hardie.

Just as a reminder, this panel is only here till 12:30, so there's Mr. Hardie, Mr. Iacono and Mr. Liepert who we're trying to get through before we end this panel.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Okay. We'll do our best here.

Quickly then, going back to the fines that have been levied—your administrative fines. How many of them have been to short-line railways?

[Brigitte Diogo]

I would not like to say it from memory, but I believe it's two.

What I would suggest, Madam Chair, is we'll provide a list to the committee.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

The reason for that is just out of the ongoing concern we have for the financial health of the short-lines and their ability to stay up to speed on all of the safety regulations. The locomotive video and voice recorders, I think, are imposing quite a cost on them. That's not to say it shouldn't be done, but I think we're all continuously concerned about how well they can hold up, based on their own realities there.

Can you talk about your risk assessment process, particularly when it comes to the transport of dangerous goods? Are you satisfied that you have enough data? Are you collecting enough information about the kinds of shipments being made, how they're being made, when they're being made, etc.? We're managing risk as opposed to doing other things that some people would see as more effective. Talk to us about risk management.

[Kevin Brosseau]

I'll let—okay, go ahead.

[Benoit Turcotte]

From the perspective of the transportation of dangerous goods, we do a number of things. Our program has been organized around risk, and we take that very seriously. It drives a lot of what we do, including our inspections.

The first part of how we go about this is that we've developed a risk register. We update it on a continual basis in terms of all the intelligence we gather—the 6,000 inspections we do per year, all the research we do, what we're hearing back from the field and our inspectors when they actually do their inspections, where the non-compliances are and so on. That helps us tremendously.

Then, we produce every year a program environment document that documents all of that, not only the risks in the transportation of dangerous goods but program risks as well. That drives a lot of what we do. That influences our national oversight plan, which is a document we establish every year, and it lays out our priorities. We've developed a risk ranking of all our known transportation of dangerous goods, TDG, sites. That could be a Canadian Tire, an oil field or any place where dangerous goods are handled and/or transported.

From that, it drives a lot of our inspections. For example, when talking about crude oil, we inspect and put a high priority on inspecting transload facilities. This is where the crude oil trains are loaded with oil. This current fiscal year, we'll have inspected more than half of all known transload facilities. This is where we target those crude oil trains, to make sure that the crude oil is being placed in the appropriate tank car, that they have the appropriate transport documentation, that their personnel are trained, that they are loading the crude oil appropriately. We check all that very carefully.

That, again, feeds into our risk-based approach to inspecting dangerous goods.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you.

Mr. Iacono.

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

I would like to start by bringing some clarification and setting the record straight with respect to my colleague MP Liepert's comments before when he was questioning Ms. Fox.

Quebec now gets most of its crude oil from North American producers. Western Canada is now Quebec's top source of crude provider. Much of that stems from the 2015 reversal of Enbridge's Line 9 pipeline. Quebec's refineries now get 82% of their oil from North American sources, thus only 11% comes from, as an example, Algeria. This is just to bring some clarification to your comment.

My question is with respect to risk assessment. What oversight measures have been taken in order to see to it that the companies comply with the rules?

[Benoit Turcotte]

With our transportation of dangerous goods rules and rail safety rules we prioritize the sites based on the sort of risk they bring forward. For example, if a site hasn't been inspected in a number of years or if it has a history of non-compliance, we will inspect it more frequently, even on an annual basis. That's generally our approach in addition to what I just mentioned to Mr. Hardie a few moments ago.

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

Thank you.

Madam Chair, I'll give the rest of my time to Madam Pauzé.

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you.

Lac-Mégantic residents gave me photos they had taken of existing tracks that trains still use on their approach to Lac-Mégantic. I posted them on my Facebook page and I've shown them to a lot of people, and everyone's reaction is the same. No one can get over the fact that trains are still travelling on such badly damaged tracks.

And here's something else. A farmer in my riding showed me tracks that pass through his property. He said he's the one who maintains them and tightens the screws because no one else does.

By the way, those trains travel past General Dynamics, which is in my riding. Suffice it to say, if there were an accident, my entire riding would be obliterated. The company is like a powder keg.

That brings me back to what you said earlier: you should see an improvement in compliance.

Doesn't the situation call for rules that are much more stringent, given the two examples I just gave of companies not maintaining the tracks?

[Brigitte Diogo]

Thank you for the feedback.

If you have any complaints, you should share them with us.

We've done many rail inspections in the Lac-Mégantic area, further to concerns raised by residents. A special effort has been made in the area to make sure railways comply with the rules. Any specific issues should be brought to our attention.

I will just end by saying that we're in the midst of examining the rules and standards around rail maintenance, so that could result in changes in the future.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

We go on to Mr. Liepert.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Just to make sure that we have the facts on the table correctly, it was the Conservative government under Stephen Harper that approved the Enbridge reversal, so let's get that on the table.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

All right. I'm proud of you.

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

There is still oil going into Quebec by rail. There is still oil and gas coming from the United States, and it is not....The 82% is counting American products coming into Quebec. All of these jobs that are being created in Quebec, whether it's western Canadian oil, foreign oil or oil from the United States, are all jobs that are being created in Quebec at refineries, at petrochemical operations.

I'm glad that the member has put it on the table so that our friends who are sitting to the left of us, who keep talking about the oil and the bad things that come out of oil.... Maybe they need to know that there are thousands and thousands of jobs that are being created in Quebec every day at refineries, whether that oil comes from the United States, Algeria or western Canada. It goes in by rail because there is no additional pipeline capacity. If they would get out of the way and let pipelines be constructed and quit being an impediment to pipelines....

I'd like to ask our witnesses this. Can you give us an idea of how many extra employees Transport Canada has had to bring on to be inspectors of oil by rail because we don't have adequate pipeline capacity in this country?

[Kevin Brosseau]

I'll defer to my colleagues. I don't have that number available to me.

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

Give me a rough number. How many inspectors do you have? I think you said that you had increased it threefold.

[Kevin Brosseau]

We tripled the inspector cadre of our department. That was post-Lac-Mégantic, a number of years ago, obviously. Those numbers are tripled. My colleagues can give you the exact numbers, or we can provide them to the committee.

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

Is it fair to say that if oil wasn't being shipped by rail, we wouldn't have had to have tripled those numbers?

[Kevin Brosseau]

I don't know if that's really the answer. I can't give that answer. It was important that we were able to respond, and—

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

But you responded primarily because of Lac-Mégantic, right?

[Kevin Brosseau]

Lac-Mégantic was, obviously, a traumatic event for this country.

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

And that was oil being shipped by rail.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Thank you to our witnesses, to our officials from the department. We appreciate your coming.

We will suspend for a moment before we start the committee business.

[Proceedings continue in camera]