That's perhaps an unanswerable question. When you get into international waters, it's covered by international law and the law of the sea. When you get within the 200-mile limit or the 12-mile limit of Canada, the law then changes. However, again, working under cabotage, the crew members on board the ship are, for all intents and purposes, Canadian crew.
The vessel itself is covered by a temporary waiver. They still have to comply with the flag state, if flag state law exists. Then they are covered by IMO conventions that are enforced through port state control within Canada, if they have the resources to actually go down and inspect every vessel and enforce them. Transport Canada does a fantastic job, but remember, Transport Canada has been broke for about 12 years, so they're working with what they have.
Again, the system that is in place now is the one that is best placed to inspect the vessels and to enforce the legislation and the IMO and ILO conventions.