Madam Speaker, the bill is not the be all and end all of the nuclear energy industry in Canada. All it does is correct a clause in the Nuclear Safety and Control Act that prevents debt financing in the nuclear power sector. Only the government has been involved in this up to this point and the amendment is to remedy that.
Lenders such as banks and other financial institutions are refusing to consider investing in the nuclear power sector due to a clause in the act, the clause which we are talking about today. The clause would make lenders liable in the case of a nuclear spill. The clause is not contained in other Canadian environmental legislation. That is an important point.
Subsection 46(3) currently says that anyone with an interest in contaminated land or facilities viable for environmental remediation and mortgage lenders and persons advancing funds and taking security on land are deemed to be persons of interest.
Those of us who have businesses, farms, et cetera things and who have had to go to the banks and financial institutions for money quickly realize that the banks and financial institutions do not take liability for the way we run our businesses or for the decisions we make in that sense. I understand that the member is strongly against the nuclear industry. That is fine. However I do not think this place or this bill is where we should solve that problem.
Normally Canadian law generally limits lender liability to the people who are in charge or in control of the secured assets. Investors regularly factor this into their liability. They put it into their agreements when they make them. Due to the unusual amount of liability that is contained in section 46(3), investors in the nuclear power sector are refusing to provide debt financing.
It is interesting that the government then has to become the investor. The way the amendment is presently written, the only the government can put money into this industry. That may be good or bad but I do not agree with the government financing this. At the same time, why should the Canadian public be liable? If the government puts money in and this section remains as is, the Canadian public then becomes liable for any problems that are found in these institutions.
The amendment simply limits the liability to owners, occupants or persons who have the management or control of these facilities. That is an appropriate.
We support the removal of government funding from the nuclear sector. However without this amendment, according to the current legislation, the only qualified investor foolish enough to be invest in that is the government. That leaves Canadians liable.
First, why would the member be satisfied with leaving the Canadian taxpayer liable for whatever charges that might arise from a situation that might occur within a nuclear power plant? Second, why does he feel that it is inappropriate to make the people who manage or control those facilities liable for problems within them, rather than throwing it back on to the government thus back on to the Canadian taxpayer?