Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-65, the Canada Endangered Species Protection Act.
Although there were a few federal laws allowing the federal government to intervene in order to protect these species, there was no federal legislation directly devoted to protecting endangered species. This was not the case in Quebec, which has had its own law since 1989, or in other provinces such as Ontario, Manitoba and New Brunswick, however.
In 1978, a body was created which brought together certain organizations such as government agencies, the provinces, certain territories, four federal bodies, and three national conservation organizations.
Before this bill was tabled, the Minister of the Environment brought his provincial counterparts together in Charlottetown to
draft this bill. We are often told that there was an agreement in principle but, four weeks later, this agreement in principle was obtained without the bill, or the texts per se, being tabled and we know there was an enormous difference.
The Quebec Minister, David Cliche, made the following statement on November 26, 1996: "The federal minister has just tabled a bill in the House which worries the province of Quebec considerably. I must place this in its context, for it shows the difficulties of federal-provincial relations. I recently defended the interests of Quebec in relation to the environment and wildlife, while representing Quebec at Charlottetown. We reached agreement, and even signed a document to the effect, as I have already said, that if the federal government tabled legislation for the protection of endangered species under federal jurisdiction, it ought to respect the jurisdictions of the provinces, and in particular of the territories".
Mr. Cliche went on to say: "We thought we had reached agreement with Ottawa on the following principle, a simple one besides, and this is where all of the problem lies in this bill, I believe: If we agree that a species is endangered, it is up to the level of government with jurisdiction over the territory and the habitat of that animal to ensure that it is properly protected in its natural habitat".
Once again, we have before us a bill that I might describe, in a nutshell, as an attempt by the federal government to use the convention on biological diversity to justify encroaching on a provincial jurisdiction and centralizing powers at the federal level. But as we can see, that is not the case. They are trying to enact a law that goes against existing provincial legislation. Again, in yet another area, we will end up being governed by two acts, which will just create more enforcement problems.
What major problems are we looking at? There are four of them. First, we submit that Bill C-65 is a direct threat to provincial jurisdiction. This is the fundamental problem with this bill. The government is interfering in an area of provincial jurisdiction and, with this bill, tries to tell the provinces what they should do from now on.
As I said a moment ago, under the pretence of attempting to comply with the terms of the international convention on biological diversity, the Liberal government is trying to interfere in provincial areas of responsibility. That is the first problem with this bill.
Second, Bill C-65 ignores the distribution of powers provided for in the Constitution-I will come back to this in a moment-and the usual interpretation of this provision, because it is based on a much broader definition of territory and overlooks the fact that, under the Constitution, the federal government and the provinces share responsibility for certain species.
The third major problem is that Bill C-65 gives the Minister of the Environment broad discretionary powers to decide, among
other things, who will be appointed to the COSEWIC. We will recall that this is the committee established in 1978, whose work was done on a voluntary basis. With this bill, the members of this committee will not only be selected by the minister but they will also be paid.
Finally, the fourth major problem is that Bill C-65 excludes provincial authorities from the designation and recovery of threatened and endangered species. This attitude directly contradicts what was said by the Liberals, more specifically in statements by the Minister of the Environment and the Prime Minister and in the throne speech, which were all about harmonization and partnership.
If we look at the Constitution, the protection of species and their habitat is not included in the division of powers under the Constitution Act, 1867, which is to be expected. It is not clearly defined.
However, under this act, the provinces have jurisdiction over the management of public lands belonging to the province, in section 92 on property and civil rights,and over all matters of a merely local or private nature. These powers are sufficiently broad to enable the provinces to pass legislation on plants and wildlife, both on provincial public land and private land.
In other words, we see that although the Constitution Act, 1867, does not clearly define these responsibilities, the provinces have as much jurisdiction over land as the federal government. Today, the government wants to pass legislation that would practically eliminate provincial responsibility and establish federal responsibility once and for all, as we have seen in so many other instances. In fact, we have the same problem with respect to duplication and overlap.
In concluding, I want to say, as I said earlier, that the members of this committee, which has been existence since 1978, at the time worked on a volunteer basis. They will now be paid, which will be an additional expense. Furthermore, they will be selected by the minister.