Transport Committee on June 1st, 2017

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you all very much.

Thank you to our witnesses. I think we got valuable information from you.

I will suspend momentarily for the witnesses to leave.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Resuming our meeting, we have Mr. Badawey.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

As I started to do at the beginning of the meeting, I would like to introduce the motion I was speaking about at the last meeting and that I submitted to the clerk as a notice of motion in both official languages on May 30. I move:

That the Committee meet from Monday, September 11, 2017, to Thursday, September 14, 2017, inclusively, for the purposes of the consideration of Bill C-49, An Act to amend the Canada Transportation Act and other Acts respecting transportation, and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts, provided that the order of reference is received prior to the adjournment of the House for the summer; and, that each party send their lists of proposed witnesses for the purposes of this study to the Clerk of the Committee by Tuesday, August 1, 2017; and that the Chair be empowered to coordinate the necessary witnesses, resources, and scheduling to complete this task.

Madam Chair, may I speak on this motion?

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Please do.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

As I alluded to at the last meeting, colleagues, you will recall that we conducted a study on freight rail transportation in 2016 and, more specifically, the transportation of grain and agricultural products. We heard from numerous stakeholders that the measures in Bill C-30, also known as the Fair Rail for Grain Farmers Act, including extended interswitching, were not in fact ideal. The legislation was often characterized as a temporary band-aid, hastily applied after the grain-handling crisis in 2013 and 2014, a piece of legislation with many flaws.

Many farmers and other shippers felt that the 160-kilometre extended interswitching did not go far enough. Notably, sectors such as mining and forestry, in particular, pointed out that they too would like to benefit from interswitching but were usually outside the 160-kilometre radius. At the same time, rail companies objected to the rates not being determined on a commercial basis and argued that this would be a disincentive to them as regards making needed investments in their infrastructure.

In the absence of a solution that could address these various conflicting interests, this committee ended up passing a motion calling on the government to extend the provisions for interswitching that were due to sunset for one year, until August 2017, but only until such time as the minister could find a better—and I want to stress this point—longer term solution.

The good news is that with Bill C-49, the proposed transportation modernization act, the minister is proposing just such a long-term solution, including a new measure, calling for longer haul interswitching, which will be available to captive shippers within a 1,200-kilometre radius.

I understand that the initial reaction from shippers, including farmers, has been very positive thus far. However, there will be a legislative gap between when the interswitching provisions in Bill C-30 sunset in August 2017 and when Bill C-49 receives royal assent, assuming it does, likely sometime later this year, depending upon how long it takes to get through the House and, of course, the Senate. Some shippers are understandably concerned about this gap and would like to start benefiting from the new and improved measures contained within Bill C-49 as soon as possible. I know our government has heard these concerns and wants to help, and I'm sure that members of the committee, especially those in sensitive areas such as Saskatchewan, have heard the same concerns.

I understand that the government House leader has indicated a willingness to deal with Bill C-49 at second reading and get it to our committee before the summer adjournment. If that in fact happens, I propose that our committee meet prior to the House's returning in the fall to study Bill C-49. This would provide us an opportunity to hold extended meetings and do a lot of work in a relatively short period of time. Ideally, we could even complete our study before the House gets back in September.

I think this would go a long way to speeding up the process and delivering results for our grain farmers and other captive shippers who are eagerly awaiting the passage of this bill and will certainly be supportive, in our view, of the certainty that this bill will provide.

Bill C-49 also includes a number of other important measures, notably a passenger rights regime for air travellers that is long overdue and that I'm eager to start studying.

I hope our colleagues in opposition will join me and the rest of the members of the committee in supporting our farmers and agree to hold the meetings prior to the return of the House in September. I know that on this side of the table we're prepared to do that work. We're prepared to bring this bill forward, we're prepared to support our farmers, and we're prepared to expedite this process to hopefully get Bill C-49 through and fill the gap between the August 1 sunsetting and the passage of this very important bill.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you, Mr. Badawey.

Mr. Aubin.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My thanks to Mr. Badawey for this motion.

The first thing is that the date of our work does not matter to me. We are elected to do this work. As soon as it is necessary, we will be there. It could be in July, August or September. That's not really the issue.

However, there are some questions I cannot find an answer to.

First, let's face it, Bill C-49 is an omnibus bill because it amends 13 pieces of legislation. If we meet before work resumes in September to answer questions about Bill C-30, we will be late because the deadline is August 1 or July 31. I do not understand why we would meet in September to solve a problem for which we would already be late.

If I were told that we would be meeting for one or two weeks, holding two to four meetings to deal urgently with what needs to be done for grain transportation, it would be one thing. However, I also see that we want to study Bill C-49 in the interval between the dates proposed in the motion and the return to the House for the new session. In that case, I say no.

Before I vote in favour of the motion, I would like to get an idea of how many hours we want to spend on Bill C-49. No less than 13 pieces of legislation are affected. There is no way that we will manage to do it properly in four meetings. That doesn't quite make sense. I wonder where the urgency to work in September comes from if we are already late.

Can we have an idea of the time that we want to spend on Bill C-49, to see if we have time to cover all the topics? I know that the first come, first serve game works, but there is also a motion coming up that proposes that the minister be asked to split the bill so that we can quickly study what is urgent and take the time we need to study the rest of the bill.

If I have to vote on those motions in the order in which they are moved, because I do not have the information I need and the ruling has not been made to ask the minister to divide his bill so that we can deal with what is most urgent and study the rest afterwards, I will unfortunately have to take issue with that. However, that's not because I don't want to work in September.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Mr. Badawey.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Those are great questions, Mr. Aubin, and I think they're valid. Of course, with the motions we have coming up after this motion, we can deal with some of those issues, such as the possibility of splitting up the bill.

The one thing I want to make very clear is that the bill is deliberate, with respect to a lot of what we've been hearing. It started with the review of the Canada Transportation Act. It's basically amending the Canada Transportation Act based on a lot of what that report actually highlighted, what it looked at it, what it did for, I guess—and correct me if I'm wrong—close to two years of discussions that Mr. Emerson had. The minister took time this year to travel around and talk to the very same people. This legislation reflects what those thoughts were; hence the reason the bill touches a lot of areas.

As I mentioned, although I had a tough time pronouncing the word—I should have said it in French—I think a big part of this is the thoughts of the market; I'll use that word. Rail companies in particular objected to the rates not being determined on a commercial basis and argued that this would disincentivize their abilities. That's a key part as well.

It goes beyond just the obvious, then; it goes into other areas that the review of the Canada Transportation Act in fact identified. This is not new. It is something that has been looked at for quite some time in the past two to three years. We're just bringing it to a head now. We're getting it done.

Yes, it is a big bill. I get that, but I think the size of the bill is simply reflective of the work that needs to be completed based on the review of the Canada Transportation Act and now, moving forward, to amend the Canada Transportation Act.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Before I go to Ms. Block, just to try to answer your question, Mr. Aubin, it's my understanding, based on an overview of the witnesses who would probably want to speak to Bill C-49, the committee would have to spend an estimated 23 hours on this however we choose to roll it out—and they're all amendments to the current Transportation Act.

So I'll go now to Ms. Block, and then to Mr. Berthold.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and perhaps it would have been helpful to deal with our motions before we dealt with Mr. Badawey's just because the questions that Mr. Aubin might have been answered first.

There are two observations I would make. While I do somewhat appreciate.... In response to what I'm hearing from Mr. Badawey, creating this sense of urgency to meet outside of the session to deal with Bill C-49, I think it should be stated that the fact of the matter is producers are already negotiating their contracts for this year. They're doing that. So if we meet in September, that isn't going to impact the contracts they're negotiating today.

I think the second thing to recognize is that the time frame that we're establishing to do this study is probably coming at the busiest time for some of the producers whom we might want to invite to be witnesses for our study. I'm sure you're aware that harvest happens in August and September and into October, and sometimes into November.

So I think that sense of urgency being created now should have been there a few months ago. I agree totally with my colleague that what we are dealing with here is an omnibus bill. It's addressing numerous modes of transportation, and I can tell you that since Bill C-49 was introduced in the House not quite two weeks ago—maybe it will be two weeks tomorrow—my schedule has been challenged to accommodate the requests I'm receiving from numerous stakeholders who want to discuss this bill. What I'm hearing from them is that the devil is in the detail, as always, and that these are complex sectors and they need time to take a look at this legislation to determine exactly what their positions will be coming out of that review.

Moreover, I think we have to talk about the timing of this bill. As I indicated at our last meeting, we, the members of the official opposition, have been highlighting the need to address these measures for quite some time. In this regard, let's take a look at the facts of some of the things Mr. Badawey has presented. Yes, this is coming out of the review of the CTA. That began under our government, as you pointed out, with a couple of years of review by the Emerson panel. The minister was given that report on Christmas Eve of 2015. We undertook a study of it in September 2016. Before we undertook the study, the extension had already been granted, I think, at a request of this committee. We undertook a study recognizing that we were going to be bumping up against a deadline of August 1, 2017.

So now here we are. We are bumping up against that deadline in spite of all of the efforts we've made to create a sense of urgency to deal with it and to do the study as a committee and get the recommendations before the minister long before this sunsetting was to take place. However, the minister chose to wait until six weeks before the session ends to introduce his omnibus bill. Given the assertion made by the House leader that Bill C-49 is a priority, I think some of the responsibility for this has to land at that individual's feet, for not getting this onto the agenda a little sooner, although she has said it is a priority.

In light of Mr. Badawey's suggestion that the committee extend our sittings by coming to Ottawa during the summer recess, I think splitting Bill C-49 to review the measures that address the sunsetting measure seems like an appropriate undertaking. I think if we were to have that conversation, we would better know what kind of time we have to allocate outside of the meetings that are already scheduled to the end of this session, and however many days we might feel need to be added at the beginning of the next session.

Those conversations need to happen, but as far as creating a sense of urgency now goes, I think it's a little late for that. We need to do justice to this piece of legislation and not try to rush through it.

I certainly support the notion of breaking it out so that we can deal with the measures you have highlighted in your own motion.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Mr. Berthold.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I will not expand on everything my colleague said. I fully agree with what she is saying about the urgent need to begin studying Bill C-49. I think there is indeed urgency, but it is as if we were going to put out a fire and realized that we had to buy a fire truck. We could have bought the fire truck earlier.

What are we going to do in a situation like that? We are not going to wait for the fire to go out before we buy a fire truck; we find another fire truck.

This other fire truck is my colleague's motion to split Bill C-49 to deal with the measures for grain farmers out west as quickly as possible. We do not have to wait until September. We can do it while the farmers are available.

I really wanted to share my concern about that with my colleagues on the committee. We are going to study this important bill during the busiest time for grain farmers. It will be very difficult to get witnesses like that to appear. Those days would cost them a great deal. They cannot really miss a day and leave their grain to meet with the committee in Ottawa. It may well be very complicated. We should be sensitive to that. It is not a policy issue.

So, if necessary, let's move up this study to the summer, I have no objection. However, we must consider the fact that witnesses may not be available.

If we manage to split Bill C-49 quickly, it will probably not take that long. We could study that issue quickly. That would be for the benefit of those for whom we work. If we had to study Bill C-49 in its entirety solely to deal with the urgent case of grain farmers, I think we would be making a big mistake.

Let me give you an example. The government has just announced that a committee is being created to review the Railway Safety Act. This very day, some people are meeting with government officials. Representatives from FCM are here. Pauline Quinlan, Mayor of Bromont, has been appointed by your government to this committee, which is undertaking some very serious work. However, Bill C-49 already contains measures that will amend the Railway Safety Act, particularly in terms of cameras being installed in locomotives. That has implications. I think it is important to wait for this review committee to finish its work.

I do not want to talk about this for too long. I just wanted to support my colleague's comments.

I want to salute my colleague Mr. Iacono, who apparently missed me very much during the first hour of this meeting, since he pointed out my absence. When I heard that, I rushed off to the committee meeting so that he could enjoy my presence, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Monsieur Aubin.

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

Thank you, Madam Chair.

For the sake of consistency, I would like to say this. You gave me an idea of what the study of Bill C-49 might entail in scope. You mentioned 23 hours. You probably relied on your experience, since we have not even sent our list of witnesses. However, we know that there will be a certain number of witnesses. In my opinion, 23 hours is the equivalent of roughly four weeks of meetings. That does not even allow us to meet the objective of starting earlier to get this study done before the work resumes.

I feel that everyone is tugging on the blanket and I see no consistency. We are ignoring the only real emergency. So I can hardly support the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

All right, we have Mr. Badawey's motion on the floor. We should have a vote on the motion now. It's appropriate.

(Motion agreed to)

Next in committee business we have a variety of things that we can do now. We have several other motions that we have to deal with.

Would you like to move it?

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I would like to move my motion that I put on the order paper on Tuesday, so I know we have it.

It's the one I read it out earlier today, so I won't read it again. I know it's been circulated to all the members.

In introducing and speaking to my motion, I made a lot of the comments I wanted to. I'll just reiterate that I introduced this motion for two reasons: the first being that we are dealing with an omnibus bill addressing a number of issues within numerous modes of transportation. The second would be that the members opposite, the government members, wanted to see us expedite the study of this bill, which I think demonstrated the need to address certain measures in the bill in a more timely way than others perhaps. That led me to ask at the last meeting if the members would be willing to break out the part of Bill C-49 that addresses the measures that are due as a result of the sunsetting of Bill C-30. As I was not able to get an answer then because of time constraints, I introduced the motion.

I want to respect and believe in my colleagues' desire to provide clarity and certainty to our producers. As I've pointed out, I don't think the time frame he's outlined within his motion will make any difference. That window has closed. I think the only way to redeem it is to break out this section of Bill C-49 and do a study as expeditiously as possible.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Does anyone want to speak to Ms. Block's motion? I'm not seeing any hands go up.

(Motion negatived)

We have a few minutes now, and we could talk about committee business for next week. I was hoping we could meet as the official subcommittee at some point next week. I think our clerk is going to see if that's possible.

At the moment, the following items before us are outstanding. There is the draft report on the infrastructure study that we did. We could review that. Mr. Bratina's motion is also outstanding; we have to put an hour of discussion toward it as well. These are suggestions of things that we could be doing next week, next Tuesday, or we can have a committee business session with the entire committee if that's what the committee would prefer.

Ms. Block.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

If we would like to take an hour to deal with Mr. Bratina's motion, it would probably be appropriate to get that done in this session. If you wanted to take the second hour of one of our committee meetings to meet as a subcommittee, if that would help with the scheduling for the members who are sitting on the subcommittee, that would make good sense to me.

I'm reluctant to get into too many other things when we're trying to put our time and attention to the aviation safety study. I don't know the time frame for the infrastructure study or report, but to remain focused it may be better not to take on too many different things now at the end of the session.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I think we're just trying to clean up a bit. We do have this draft report that the analysts have put together, which we have yet to review or figure out if we're going forward.

I have one question before I go to Mr. Badawey. In the second hour on Tuesday, is there anything you would like us to review on the first draft of the aviation report? Would it help you if we saved that second hour on Tuesday?

[Alexandre Lavoie, Committee Researcher]

I will not have the first draft, but if I had the recommendations, I could come back with an estimate of the time. I will be able to estimate the number of pages and we can have a short discussion, and maybe you could decide then when you wanted to get it. That would instruct me if I have to be very short, or....

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I think we should make sure we allocate a bit of time for that discussion within that second hour.

Mr. Badawey.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I'm going to go into another issue, Madam Chair.

I appreciate the comments by Ms. Block because this is the transport, infrastructure and communities committee and we have a pretty big mandate with these three files, especially with respect to Minister Garneau's announcement of transportation 2030, and everything that falls under that. We're looking at focusing on that now, with the earlier motion that passed and, of course, bringing forward Bill C-49 as part of that discipline in bringing forward the minister's vision.

The second isMinister Sohi's vision with respect to infrastructure. It's nice that we all come from somewhat the same background. We've all dealt with infrastructure as former mayors, councillors, and municipal representatives, and we do understand how saddled municipalities are with respect to infrastructure; but most importantly, we know how to do infrastructure right, to make those proper investments so that they're sustainable.

This weekend, for example, we have the Federation of Canadian Municipalities in town. I've already started to speak to a lot of the mayors from big and small cities in the past day or so. One of the messages I'm getting loud and clear, Madam Chair, is their appreciation for not only Minister Sohi's budgetary commitments, at $180 billion, but also for the comment he made in the House most recently when he committed to having a sustainable infrastructure funding envelope for municipalities. That is big news for municipalities, since, Madam Chair, you were one of the authors of the new deal for Canada's cities back in 2004, I believe, with the gas tax.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Yes.