Transport Committee on Feb. 10th, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to the fourth meeting of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. Today's meeting is in hybrid format, pursuant to order made by the House on Thursday, November 25, 2021. Members of the committee may participate in person or via the Zoom application.

I will take this opportunity to remind all participants and observers of this meeting that taking screen shots or photos of your screen is not permitted.

Given the ongoing pandemic situation, and in light of the recommendations from public health authorities as well as the directive of the Board of Internal Economy on January 28, 2022, to remain healthy and safe, the following is recommended for all those attending the meeting in person.

Anyone with symptoms should participate by Zoom and not attend the meeting in person. Everyone must maintain two-metre physical distancing whether seated or standing. Everyone must wear a non-medical mask when circulating in the room. It is recommended, in the strongest possible terms, that members wear their masks at all times, including when seated. Non-medical masks, which provide better clarity over cloth masks, are available in the room. Everyone present must maintain proper hand hygiene by using the hand sanitizer at the room entrance. Committee rooms are cleaned before and after each meeting. To maintain this, everyone is encouraged to clean surfaces such as the desk, chair and microphone with the provided disinfectant wipes when vacating or taking a seat.

As the chair, I will be enforcing these measures for the duration of the meeting, and I thank members in advance for their co-operation.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Monday, January 31, 2022, the committee is meeting to study railway safety.

We have two panels today.

Witnesses appearing in the first panel are from the Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board. We have Kathleen Fox, the chair, as well as André Lapointe, chief operating officer.

For the second panel, we have from the City of Calgary, Gian-Carlo Carra, city councillor; Chris J. Apps, director of the Kitselas Lands and Resources Department, Kitselas First Nation; and representing the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference, we have Lyndon Isaak, president.

As I said, the committee will be continuing its study of railway safety and the impacts of rail operations on neighbouring communities and properties. Members have agreed that witnesses be given five minutes for their opening statements and, wherever possible, that witnesses provide the committee with their opening statements 72 hours in advance.

Ms. Fox and Monsieur Lapointe, welcome to the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.

We will now begin by turning over the floor to you for your opening remarks.

[Kathleen Fox, Chair, Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board]

Mr. Chair, members of the committee, good afternoon.

Thank you for inviting the Transportation Safety Board of Canada, or TSB, to discuss the important topic of rail safety.

As you know, our mandate and sole purpose is to advance transportation safety in the air, marine, pipeline and rail modes that are under federal jurisdiction by conducting independent investigations; identifying safety deficiencies, causes and contributing factors; making recommendations; and publishing our reports.

The TSB is independent, and operates at arm’s length from other government departments and agencies. We report to Parliament through the President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada. This lets us be impartial, free from any real or perceived external influence.

It is also important to clarify what the TSB does not do. We do not assign fault, nor do we determine civil or criminal liability.

Rail safety continues to be top of mind for the TSB. I’d like to start by sharing some rail safety statistics. According to the TSB's annual report in 2020, 1,192 rail occurrences were reported to the TSB, including 965 accidents and 227 incidents. Of these, the 965 accidents represent a 23% decrease from 2019 and an 11% decrease from the 10-year average.

The main-track accident rate in 2020 was 2.7 accidents per million main-track train miles, down from 3.3 in 2019 but above the 10-year average of 2.4. A total of 59 rail fatalities were reported. Two of these involved railway employees; 39 were trespasser fatalities and 18 were crossing accident fatalities.

Regarding railway crossings, we recently launched an in-depth safety investigation to examine factors contributing to an observed increase in the rate of accidents involving motor vehicles, specifically during the winter months.

We will issue our preliminary 2021 statistics shortly and would be pleased to table these data with the committee when available. I will mention that, sometimes, previous years' stats change as a result of re-categorization or re-examination, so there may be some differences from the numbers I gave you today.

We are in the process of updating progress on the TSB’s Watchlist 2020, which outlines the key issues that need to be addressed to make Canada’s transportation system even safer. The current list includes two rail-specific issues: following signal indications, wherein train crews do not consistently recognize and follow railway signals, which poses a risk of train collisions or derailments; and uncontrolled movements, which can create high-risk situations with catastrophic consequences, particularly if they involve dangerous goods, as was seen in Lac-Mégantic. In 2020, there were 50 occurrences involving an uncontrolled movement of rolling stock, down from 2019, when there were 78 such occurrences.

Other watch-list issues affecting rail safety include the multimodal issues of fatigue management in freight train operations, safety management and regulatory surveillance. While safety management systems have been required for federally regulated railways since 2001, our investigations have identified numerous shortcomings, where hazards were not identified and effective risk mitigation measures were not taken. Furthermore, Transport Canada’s follow-up and intervention are not always effective at identifying and changing unsafe railway operating practices.

Since we were created in 1990, the board has issued 149 recommendations to regulators and the rail industry. As of September 30, 2021, 91.3% of the responses to these rail recommendations have received the board’s highest rating of “fully satisfactory”.

However—and I want to emphasize this—there is still much that can be done to improve rail safety, especially with respect to the issues that underpin our watch-list. The oldest active outstanding rail recommendation dates back to 2013, and we're just starting the annual reassessment process of progress made on outstanding recommendations. We will provide an update in our annual report to Parliament, and the results will help to inform TSB’s Watchlist 2022.

Another source of input to inform the next Watchlist involves our consultations with industry stakeholders where we discuss the progress that has been made on existing issues and seek their insight on emerging issues.

We have largely completed our consultations with the air and marine sectors last fall and will be meeting with rail industry stakeholders in the coming months.

Thank you very much. We are ready to answer your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Ms. Fox.

I've just heard from the translators that there's a bit of popping coming from your microphone. I'm wondering if you could move your microphone either up or down, so that it's not directly in front of your mouth. Thank you very much. I'm sure that will be greatly appreciated.

For the first round of questioning, we will turn it over to Ms. Gladu for six minutes.

Colleagues, to help ensure that we are keeping on time, I have borrowed from my colleague Mr. Badawey: I have a yellow flag to wave if you have one minute left, and a red flag if your time is up.

Ms. Gladu, I turn the floor over to you.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you to our witnesses for being here today and for the work they do to try to improve rail safety here in Canada.

I want to start by looking at some of the incidents that have happened. I looked at the incident reports. Sometimes investigations are required. I see that 21 investigations have been done since 2019 for a number of incidents, for which there are no reports yet. One of these was an employee fatality, and there were 11 derailments, 11 rail crossing incidents, five collisions and three others.

Can you explain why there is no report for these things? It has been, in some cases, two years since the incident.

[Kathleen Fox]

I don't know if the particular incidents to which the member is referring are incidents or accidents, because we define occurrences as one or the other.

As I said, we have, from the stats, almost 1,200 occurrence reports per year. We can't and don't investigate all of them. We have a policy on occurrence classification, which determines what level of investigation we will do for each one.

The year 2019 was particularly busy, and we have the highest number of major rail investigations under way. We don't control our workload. We have finite resources, so when we have a large number of occurrences that we want to investigate, we need to spread ourselves across those, and that sometimes affects the time required. I can tell you that we are pushing these through and we expect to release those for which we are doing full investigations in the coming days, weeks and months.

I would also add that for all of those occurrences, whether or not we complete a full investigation with a public report, we assess every one. We record the data and we use that for statistical analysis and to inform future investigations.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

I see that the recommendations that come out of there are supposed to inform the government's next annual plan.

Where do you get your resourcing from? Is it from the federal government?

[Kathleen Fox]

If we talk about our investigators, our personnel, they come from a variety of backgrounds. Many come from industry.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

What I'm asking about is the government funding. I'm trying to figure out why there are not enough of them to get the work done.

[Kathleen Fox]

I misunderstood the question.

Our budget comes from Parliament, but perhaps Monsieur Lapointe can add to the issue about resourcing.

[André Lapointe, Chief Operating Officer, Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board]

Certainly.

As Ms. Fox noted, we are a small organization. We have about 230 employees. We have deep expertise across our different investigation branches. The teams we have are relatively small, and we have regular rotation and employees leaving for retirement.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

You could probably use more resources to catch up on these things.

[André Lapointe]

We did have an injection of $2.9 million in 2018-19 to shore up our budget.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

I have only a limited amount of time, so let me switch gears and go to my next question, which is about rail crossings.

This one is of interest to me, because I see that the government put in $11 million. It recognized that improving the safety at rail crossings was important, but what's happened in ridings like mine is that you have a population of 2,000 in this little hamlet, and there are seven rail crossings. The government has given $27,000 per rail crossing, but the cost of fixing one is really more like $350,000, so it's not happening and they're not making enough progress.

Do you have recommendations on rail crossings that you feel the government has not moved along on well enough?

[Kathleen Fox]

We don't have any current outstanding recommendations related to crossings per se. We did have in the past. In fact, crossing safety was on our watch-list up until about 2014.

It was in 2014 that the federal government implemented new grade crossings regulations and grade crossings standards, which were to be phased in over a period of time. I've recently learned that the phasing has been extended or pushed further to the right.

Railway crossing safety is an interesting issue, because it's multiple jurisdictions. On the one hand, the road authority has a role to play with respect to the crossing. The railway operator has a role to play. Cost sharing can be sometimes a challenge, I'm sure, especially in some of the smaller communities, to upgrade these crossings.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Definitely.

What about the watch-list? How does something get on the watch-list?

[Kathleen Fox]

The watch-list was initiated in 2010, because we had a number of long-standing outstanding recommendations that were not being acted on. We felt it was a way to attract attention and get further traction for change. It has been successful in that sense.

Basically it's a combination of our data, our ongoing investigations and our outstanding recommendations that drives what goes on the watch-list. We renew it every two years.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Good.

If you had advice for this committee, what do you think the federal government should be doing to promote rail safety that they're not doing?

[Kathleen Fox]

Mr. Chair, we've laid out our desires in terms of what we'd like to see the emphasis on for rail safety, and that's on our watch-list with the five issues that I mentioned at the committee today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Ms. Gladu.

The next six-minute round is for Mr. Badawey.

Mr. Badawey, the floor is yours.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thanks for coming out today, folks. It's great to have you out.

I guess my questions are going to be with respect to rail safety but also the impacts on the surrounding communities, based not only on safety but also on the lifestyle of communities. I'm not sure if that is your jurisdiction, but you can answer that as I ask the questions.

In its 2016 report, entitled “An Update on Rail Safety”, this committee recommended that rail companies be required to “provide real time knowledge of dangerous goods...via cellular or Internet services” to first responders as well as the community at large, and that they develop alternate methods of providing this knowledge in “communities outside of cellular range”.

My first question is this: To your knowledge, what access do first responders have to real-time knowledge of dangerous goods being transported by rail in their respective communities?

[Kathleen Fox]

I can give a partial answer. We can perhaps provide some more data if required.

Each railway is required to have an emergency response assistance plan. They share aggregate numbers upon request with the communities through which they go. It's my understanding that first responders can have immediate access to whatever is being carried on a particular train involved in a particular occurrence.

Transport Canada may be in a better position to provide details, or the railway companies that I believe are going to be meeting with you in a couple of weeks.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

My second question is with respect to the crossings themselves.

In one area of my riding, in the city of Thorold—in Port Robinson to be exact, which is part of the city of Thorold—there is a crossing that at times gets blocked for 20 to 25 minutes, sometimes 30 minutes. It is the only access into the community for first responders and for individuals getting to their families.

What processes or protocols do you see fit, on behalf of your organization, to ensure that these crossings are clear when first responders have to cross them?

[Kathleen Fox]

Mr. Chair, again, this is perhaps a question for Transport Canada.

There are rules in place with respect to how long a train can occupy a crossing in other than exceptional circumstances. In fact, this is an issue we're looking at in an ongoing investigation at a crossing in Ontario. I can't go into the details because the investigation is ongoing, but we're certainly aware of the issues it causes, and we're looking at that in terms of our current investigations.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Mr. Chairman, in the 2016 report, “An Update on Rail Safety”, this committee recommended “That advance notice and opportunity for consultation with municipalities be provided on rules and any exceptions to rules.” In its response, the Government of Canada indicated that a mechanism to that effect would be introduced by Transport Canada.

These are questions for those who are giving testimony. One, to your knowledge, has such a mechanism been introduced by Transport Canada? Two, to your knowledge, has Transport Canada consulted with municipalities in developing such a mechanism? Three, what is the typical involvement of municipalities in the development of change to Transport Canada rules regarding rail safety?

[Kathleen Fox]

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, but I'm not able to answer any of those questions.