Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to take this opportunity today to speak to Bill C-32 to replace the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.
This is an important bill, as my colleague, the Minister of the Environment, pointed out, because it changes the approach to environmental protection in Canada from one of reacting to one of preventing pollution and damage to the environment.
When we look at the overall evolution of the environment, it becomes obvious that we must change our way of looking at things and start with pollution prevention rather than waiting for damage to occur and then reacting.
In the 1960s and 1970s, Canadians throughout the country began demonstrating a growing interest in the environment. They began to become worried about the present, as well as the potential or future, effects of pollution on their environment and their health.
As a result, governments adopted relatively effective and rational strategies for the time, generally in the form of regulations to control pollutants after they had been created, but before they were released into the environment.
In addition, businesses improved their operating methods, based on the technologies then available. Basically, our philosophy of environmental management consisted in allowing pollutants to be created and trying to control them as best we could thereafter.
Therefore, from a historical perspective pollution control has been the main approach to environmental protection. It is true that by limiting the release of pollutants into the environment we have made a significant contribution to environmental protection.
As the Minister of the Environment told us in her speech, we have acted on some of the most dangerous toxins: PCBs, benzine, dioxins and furans.
We now know that more needs to be done. We are now much more aware of the impacts on human health and on the environment caused by every small amounts of substances that are toxic, that accumulate in the tissues of plants and animals and persist in the environment for very long periods of time.
For these reasons we have to shift our approach from pollution control to pollution prevention. The Liberal Party's first red book summarized the challenge facing Canada in precise terms. It stated:
In the past, environmental policy has focused on managing and controlling the release of pollutants entering the environment. This approach has had only limited success. Canada needs a new approach that focuses on preventing pollution at source—
A Liberal government will use the upcoming five-year review of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act to make pollution prevention a national goal—
Bill C-32 does exactly this and incorporates pollution prevention as one of its guiding principles.
Naturally, so that all stakeholders are aware of the rules of the game, we must provide a clear and accurate definition of pollution prevention. The bill gives the following definition of prevention, arrived at after a variety of stakeholders were consulted. The proposed definition is as follows:
The use of processes, practices, materials, products or energy that avoid or minimize the creation of pollutants and waste and reduce the overall risk to the environment or human health.
This could not be clearer.
Therefore, pollution prevention requires a totally different approach from environmental protection. It implies on-site reuse and recycling of materials, changes to existing equipment and employee training. It calls for a complete overhaul of our way of designing and operating our manufacturing plants, our oil refineries, our mines, our farms, our parks, everything.
Planning is at the heart of the pollution prevention approach. Under Bill C-32, a person can be required to prepare a pollution prevention plan concerning toxic substances. Pollution prevention on a voluntary basis in many other areas is also encouraged.
While they are preparing these prevention plans, managers can determine ways to avoid creating pollutants and waste or to reduce them to a minimum. They can also find ways to save energy and water and to use raw materials more efficiently. The preparation of pollution prevention plans provides the businesses with the flexibility they need to develop pollution prevention approaches based both on their needs and on environmental goals.
Bill C-32 supports pollution prevention planning by providing to establish a national pollution prevention information clearing house.
I am pleased that the government has already moved to establish the Internet based Canadian pollution prevention information clearing house to showcase environmental success stories and to demonstrate the economic benefit that can be achieved through the adoption of pollution prevention.
We want to increasingly encourage Canadian companies to take the initiative. Bill C-32 creates awards to celebrate achievements toward pollution prevention.
I think we agree that we ought to celebrate all that we achieve throughout the years.
To attract progress on the success of pollution prevention initiatives this bill includes information gathering powers that require industry to report on pollution prevention activities.
I support this bill, because it will help all of Canada to implement a pollution prevention plan that will be good for our environment, as well as for our international endeavours and our international trade.
As Albert Einstein used to say, an intelligent man solves problems, a wise man avoids them. I think that, based on pollution prevention principles, our future Environmental Protection Act, as renewed and revised in this bill, will rank among our wiser pieces of legislation.