Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to say a few words about Bill C-32, the legislation to renew the Canadian Environmental Protection Act or CEPA as it is commonly known.
I will focus my remarks on the critical issue of enforcement of the law. Effective enforcement of our environmental laws is something that Canadians have a right to expect. It has been a matter of interest to many members of the House and of the Standing Committee on the Environment and Sustainable Development.
Bill C-32 represents a significant step forward because of the new enforcement tools it will provide. This will translate into improved enforcement and better protection of our environment and our health. CEPA is the cornerstone of federal environmental protection legislation. It allows the government to set tough but fair standards for the benefit of all Canadians to protect our environment and our health.
Through its regulations CEPA sets rules that must be obeyed. The enforcement provisions of Bill C-32 will provide the powers to ensure these rules are indeed obeyed. It provides authority to conduct inspections that are the backbone of our enforcement efforts.
Inspections serve several functions. First, they help to create an enforcement presence, evidence of the government's commitment to ensuring compliance by regulatees. Second, they can identify specific environmental problems. Third, they serve to identify non-compliance for further investigation.
Bill C-32 expands investigative powers in CEPA to make sure that our enforcement officers can enter and inspect any place where there might logically be substances or activities regulated under CEPA. Enforcement officers will now be able to seek inspection warrants from the courts when they are refused entry at a commercial site or when they arrive and find that the premises are locked or abandoned.
Another significant improvement in the bill is the changes that will provide peace officer status to CEPA enforcement officers. These new powers will greatly improve their ability to detect environmental crimes. It means, among other things, that CEPA enforcement officers will be able to seek warrants to conduct video surveillance or intercept private communications.
Other peace officer powers, such as the authority to serve court summonses, issue notices to appear in court and seek search warrants by telephone, will allow enforcement officers to do their job more quickly and efficiently, especially when they are ensuring compliance in remote areas.
Bill C-32 not only introduces innovations during the inspection and investigation phase. It also introduces changes for dealing with situations where CEPA has been violated. Once there has been a violation of an environmental protection law, our goal is to return the violator to compliance as quickly as possible, without further recurrence of the violation.
Traditionally we have relied on criminal courts to order violators into compliance once they have been convicted of an offence. Current thinking has led governments in Canada and elsewhere to supplement this process with other statutory tools designed to ensure compliance without burdening the courts with lengthy trials.
Two of the most important additions to CEPA in this area are environmental protection compliance orders and environmental protection alternative measures. Environmental protection compliance orders work like injunctions. They allow an enforcement officer to order a person to stop violating the law or to follow the requirements of the law where the enforcement officer has reasonable grounds to believe that there is a violation.
In keeping with the principles of justice, there are limitations to the use of this power by an inspector. The steps laid out in the order must be reasonable. They must be consistent with protection of the environment and public safety.
The maximum period that a compliance order can be in effect is 180 days. Nevertheless, environmental protection compliance orders are very powerful tools. To ensure that they are used fairly, a person who is the subject of an order can appeal the order by asking for a review of that order by an independent review officer.
The other major new type of enforcement tool is the environmental protection alternative measures, or EPAMs. Alternative measures are not new in Canadian law. They already are present in the Criminal Code as well as the Young Offenders Act.
Environmental protection alternative measures are essentially negotiated settlements to criminal charges. They are negotiated between the accused and the Attorney General of Canada. Bill C-32 sets out strict conditions surrounding the negotiation of such alternative measures including that the measures can only be negotiated after charges are laid in the court. The accused therefore knows that the government has thoroughly investigated the violation and has evidence to support these charges.
Negotiation of EPAMs is voluntary, both for the attorney general and the accused. The attorney general can choose not to offer negotiated EPAMs after taking into account the seriousness of the violation, damage to the environment and efforts made to correct the damage, the compliance history of the accused with CEPA and so on.
As well the accused must freely consent to negotiate an EPAM after being advised of their right to be represented by legal counsel. They must also accept the responsibility for their offence.
EPAMs are not backroom deals. They are negotiated after the charges are made public and the agreements themselves are filed in the court and they too are public documents. If the accused does not live up to the terms of the EPAM, the original charges can be reactivated. On the other hand, if the terms of the EPAM are fulfilled and the accused is again in compliance with the law, the charges can be suspended or withdrawn entirely. There is no recorded conviction; there is no criminal record and there is compliance.
Bill C-32 also provides new guidance for the courts when sentencing convicted offenders. The bill includes sentencing criteria that take into account such things as the cost to remedy the damage done to the environment. The maximum under CEPA continues to be a fine of $1 million a day or up to five years imprisonment. A court can also levy a fine equal to any profits earned as a result of the offence.
Bill C-32 takes an innovative and progressive approach toward enforcement. It greatly extends the powers of enforcement officers so they can ensure compliance with the law. Overall, Bill C-32 strengthens CEPA so that we will be able to better protect both the environment and the health of Canadians.