Mr. Speaker, I would like to start by saying I have a particular interest in this topic, because the riding of Anjou-Rivière-des-Prairies, which I have the privilege to represent in this House, happens to have one of the largest waste water treatment plants in Canada.
Officially opened on November 2, 1987, the Montreal Urban Community waste water treatment plant today has an average capacity of more than 23 cubic metres per second, so that between January 1, 1995 and October 15, and this is just an example, the plant processed about 578 million cubic metres of waste water. To give you a better idea of what is involved, this is the equivalent of the volume of the Olympic stadium.
And to give you some idea of the amount of sludge left after this process, imagine a line of 25 tonne trucks all the way from Montreal to Ottawa, in other words, it is a plant operating at full capacity.
I may add that to carry out these operations, the plant in my riding has a total budget of about $43 million, in fact slightly more, and employs a total of 290 people in treatment operations, maintenance, engineering, mechanical engineering and data processing, in other words, all the people who work in this plant. Generally speaking, waste water treatment plants have become indispensable in our modern cities.
That being said, the Bloc Quebecois takes the position that we support the principle of protecting the environment, but to us it is obvious that the environment is better protected when each government does what it is supposed to do.
That is why the amendment moved by the hon. member for Laurentides is so important, since if motion M-425 presented by the hon. member for Comox-Alberni were adopted in its present form, without any changes, this would give the Liberal government, the present government, further opportunities to do what it always has done, which is to invade jurisdictions that are not its responsibility. Basically, that is the reasoning behind the motion of the hon. member for Laurentides.
Motion M-425 before the House today asks this House to support the undertaking of a country-wide program of improving the treatment of municipal sewage to a minimum standard of at
least that of primary treatment facilities, in other words, facilities that will eliminate phosphorus deposits.
Currently, managing the environment is largely a municipal responsibility. Municipalities are responsible for supplying clean water, as we said previously, for sewage treatment and garbage collection and disposal.
Under the Constitution, and that is the crux of the matter, municipalities are administrative units that receive their powers from the provincial legislatures. Consequently, the federal government has no legitimate right to deal directly with municipalities.
Of course, in Quebec we are accustomed to seeing the federal government proceed in this way. I may recall that it was this kind of behaviour by the federal government that caused nearly half the population of Quebec, nearly 50 per cent, to vote yes on October 30, and it will certainly be a little more than 50 per cent next time.
Since this government has shown it has no intention of changing any of the bad habits we have been criticizing for the past 30 years, we can assume that, at the time of the next referendum on Quebec, more and more Quebecers will understand they have only two choices left: become a majority with full control over their destiny or remain a minority, with their interests subjugated to those of the majority to which they will not belong.
To say the least, it is disappointing, but nevertheless, quite incredible, that this motion is being proposed in this House by a member of the Reform Party. We all know our friends in the Reform Party claim to want to decentralize Canada. They see it as the likely solution to our political problems. It might not be constitutional decentralization, but a real decentralization of powers to the provinces. Obviously this bill invades provincial jurisdictions.
I find it unfortunate that the Reform Party is sponsoring this bill. This party, it must be remembered, initially set itself up as the alternative to the impasse Canada found itself in federally following the failure of the Meech Lake Accord and all that followed. The text of the motion before us, however, shows that the more things change, the more they stay the same. They are still talking about more centralization, as if nothing happened in Quebec.
As we know, and as the English language papers pointed out, our Prime Minister succeeded to some extent in lulling Canada into a bit of a stupor over what was actually happening in Quebec.
Events in Quebec woke people up somewhat. Now they are trying to pretend nothing happened and settle everyone down again, while they go on centralizing in Ottawa, as if nothing has changed.
By voting in favour of this motion without the necessary amendments-one of which has been proposed by my colleague for Laurentides-the federalist parties in this House will simply confirm to Quebec voters that the no side did not favour change, despite what they hoped and continue to hope.
That is why my colleague from Laurentides put forward an amendment to this motion that would give all provinces the right to opt out with full financial compensation, so that they themselves could spend the money on the environment and not on anything else.
This amendment would have two advantages among other things. First, from a constitutional point of view, it would allow all levels of government to exercise their powers properly in their respective areas of jurisdiction, contrary to what is now the case. I would like to remind you that the environment is not among the areas of jurisdiction explicitly assigned by the constitution. It has often been said that the environment was not on the agenda when the constitution was drafted, but still. This is a so-called ancillary power deriving from the areas of jurisdiction explicitly mentioned in the Canadian constitution.
Before the mid-1980s, the Quebec government, which has jurisdiction over local and territorial matters, played a key role in assuming most environmental responsibilities. As provided for in the constitution, the federal government was happy to get involved in areas complementary to its jurisdiction, and everything was just fine.
In 1985, the federal government started to become much more involved in environmental matters. It did so mostly by using its spending power and the new powers it had been granted by the courts. This has led to many cases of overlap and duplication. This situation has gotten worse since the election of the present Liberal government, which is trying to further centralize decision making in Ottawa.
If there is one thing that is perfectly clear about the bills that I have seen tabled in this House, it is that almost every bill introduced to amend other bills or to encroach on areas of jurisdiction that may previously not have been clearly defined gives ever more authority to the ministers.
At present, there is a great deal of duplication and overlap in federal and provincial environmental regulations. Therefore, private sector enterprises often have to spend time, energy and money on gathering information on a large number of programs, answering inquiries from both levels of government, attending numerous committee meetings, preparing for inspections that are often conducted by both levels, meeting requirements that are often different depending on the level of government involved, and the list goes on ad infinitum.
For instance, there are currently eight federal regulations overlapping existing Quebec regulations on the same subject. Yet, they keep wanting to make more regulations and centralizing more and more. Cases in point are the storage of PCB material regulations and pulp and paper effluent regulations.
There are also environmental benefits, since appropriate solutions to problems to be dealt with locally will be easier to find. You will no doubt agree, Mr. Speaker, that local authorities are in a better position than anyone else to find solutions suited to the particular circumstances of their respective communities. As far as the environment is concerned, government's ability to understand local problems and challenges depends on how far removed it is from the field. The further it is, the less it is able to find practical solutions likely to gain acceptance and generate co-operation within local communities. That is the spirit behind the amendment moved by my hon. colleague for Laurentides, which we support.