Mr. Speaker, in this report stage debate, I will talk about only three areas that must be focused on at this time within Group No. 4.
Bill C-5, entitled an act respecting the protection of wildlife species at risk in Canada, states in its summary that:
The purposes of this enactment are to prevent Canadian indigenous species, subspecies and distinct populations of wildlife from becoming extirpated or extinct, to provide for the recovery of endangered or threatened species, to encourage the management of other species to prevent them from becoming at risk.
A series of motions in Group No. 4, Motions Nos. 6, 16, 17 and 20, deal with the national aboriginal committee. I will also talk about the creation of stewardship action plans and public consultation.
Our standing committee wished to create a national aboriginal council but the government instead wants to call it a committee. It is changing the words in these various classes which of course affects its power. The idea of an aboriginal committee itself is acceptable. Clearly in many places, especially in the north, natives have a close knowledge of the land and live off country food for their sustenance, so consultation with them is very appropriate, as it is with other stakeholders such as property owners and resource users.
The existence of this committee should not preclude wider consultation with others. Care must be taken to ensure that it does not become a special conduit for perhaps a race based political concern. The administration of the act must concern itself with the protection of endangered species in a sustainable socioeconomic manner. Special privileges and exemptions from the act's application should not be based just on being an aboriginal with status.
The name change from council to committee reverses the standing committee's work without justification. The government is showing its contempt for the work of the parliamentary committee and its own Liberal MPs when it makes retro changes to the normal legal process of a bill.
Motion No. 25 deals with the creation of stewardship action plans. Here the government is introducing such a far-reaching and noxious amendment to the standing committee's work that I think special note must be made of it. The standing committee required that stewardship action plans must include “a commitment to regularly examine tax treatments and subsidies and to eliminate disincentives”. The government wants to delete this language, but I think it is vital. It demonstrates that compensation is not just a cash payment but could involve other things like tax treatments, which are so vital to farmers and other property owners.
Further, while the government always wants to create incentives and programs and spend money, it must be forced to confront the realities of disincentives in the same situation, the reasons why people do not respond in the way that perhaps the ivory tower theorists and bureaucrats think they might.
The government also wants to delete the standing committee's requirement that stewardship action plans provide “technical and scientific support to persons engaged in stewardship activities”. Instead, it will “provide information relating to the technical and scientific support available to persons engaged in stewardship activities”. This is a small but significant difference. Instead of giving property owners real assistance by sharing data on the presence of endangered species or assistance in configuring their properties to protect sensitive habitat, the government can just maybe mail them a pamphlet. Thanks a lot, bureaucrat.
I will just talk a little bit about public consultation. Most of the remaining Group No. 4 amendments concern issues of notice and public consultation. There is a fundamental importance to making consultations as wide as possible, ensuring that consultations have a real impact on the administration of the act and are not just simply done for show, for knowledge creates the capacity to protect.
Initially the bill provided for a parliamentary review of the species at risk at five year intervals. The standing committee added the additional requirement that it be subsequently reviewed at five year intervals. Motion No. 130 from the government will remove the standing committee amendment. It does not think automatic five year reviews are really needed and instead would put the onus on parliament to put a review on the agenda should it deem it necessary at some point in the future. This is just plain wrong.
It is really contemptuous of the standing committee and removes an opportunity for greater accountability and public involvement. Mandatory reviews of legislation are important for ensuring that the act is working as intended and that creating an opportunity to make a change will not simply be left to the whim of the government House leader of the day to fit another political agenda. This is basic democratic accountability and ensures that legislation is kept evergreen.
I will conclude my comments by saying that the bill as it is before the House is really in a complete tangle. Things have just worked out this way and there is an underlying reason, which is that the Liberals cannot manage. They have no guiding vision or values to carry us into the 21st century. As this is the third bill, it is obvious to all that it is a failure. Maybe it is a case of three strikes and the government is out.
It is the sad legacy of this country that the Liberals cannot manage and they are hurting the country. The evidence of those statements that are rather far-reaching is certainly in the process of this bill.