Debates of March 25th, 2014

Energy Safety and Security Act

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is not correct to say that the liability limit is $12 billion in the United States, as its system is different from that of other countries. The operators' liability insurance is capped at $375 million. In the event of an accident resulting in damages exceeding the operators' liability insurance, all U.S. operators, 104 reactors, would also contribute up to $125 million for each reactor that they operate. That would make available a compensation pool of a maximum of $13 billion, should it be required.

I can say to the member that this type of pooling system would not be feasible in Canada, given that we have far fewer nuclear reactors. We have 19, as compared to 104 in the United States.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, to begin, I would like to congratulate my colleague on his new role. I hope that bringing new blood to cabinet might result in a new approach.

I would like to hear the minister's thoughts on one point. We know that many of the government bills stealthily confer additional discretionary powers on various ministers.

The same thing is being done with Bill C-22. In fact, the bill provides for ministerial discretion to reduce absolute liability levels to below $1 billion. The level is being increased from $75 million to $1 billion, so it seems like a tremendous step in the right direction. However, a few lines later, we note that the minister can make changes at his discretion.

What does the minister think of that measure, which allows him to rule unchecked?

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think the intention here is to modernize. This bill would reflect the realities both for the protection of Canadians and for the industry itself, and move Canada as a leader with other countries to a place, through international conventions, that would in fact modernize this. Therefore, any of the changes, specific or broadly speaking, reflected in this bill is an effort to make sure Canadians have the best protection available under the law and continue to respect the economic benefits of offshore activities and the nuclear sector.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister can tell us today what the actual cost to a nuclear power plant operator would be when the liability limit increases to $1 billion. Could he also give us an idea of what the phase-in period is for that?

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, under the proposed changes, before any offshore drilling or production activity can take place and during any activity, the proponent must provide evidence that it can actually cover the minimum $1 billion financial liability. The expectation is that the proof of financial resources would at least be equal to the absolute liability limit. Of course, there would be a range of options for proving financial resources, including cash on hand, credit bonds, fixed assets, and insurance. Also, the financial resource requirements would be an ongoing condition of a licence.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today as the newly appointed NDP critic for energy and natural resources to lead off our caucus' participation in the debate on Bill C-22, which has the less than pithy title of an act respecting Canada's offshore oil and gas operations, enacting the nuclear liability and compensation act, repealing the Nuclear Liability Act, and making consequential amendments to other acts.

I would be remiss if I did not say a few words first about my predecessor in this portfolio, the member for Burnaby—New Westminster. I owe him and his staff a huge debt of gratitude for their incredible work on the full range of files that fall under the rubric of energy and natural resources. I stand on their shoulders as we move forward on the important questions of resource management and energy security in our country. I wish the government House leader the best of luck in dealing with the member for Burnaby—New Westminster in his new capacity as NDP House leader.

The government House leader and I were elected at the same time, and I know we both fondly remember the MP for Burnaby—New Westminster's time as our trade critic. We will both remember his tenacious fight against the Panama free trade agreement, which he successfully prevented from being passed on a number of occasions. Without telling tales out of school, I can say he always reminded us in caucus meetings that the bill was a bill that we had to “go to the wall on”, even if it meant sitting past the regular adjournment dates of the House. In each of those instances, he had the full support of our caucus.

Now he is our House leader. I imagine there will be many more instances where he will exhort us to go to the wall. We will follow his lead as unconditionally now as we have in the past. I bet the government House leader is as excited as I am about that. Yikes, I can see him scurrying off now to draft more pre-emptive time allocation motions.

Oh well, those are strategic battles for the days ahead. For now, I am pleased to say that on Bill C-22, the government will have our support at second reading, so that at least we can get the bill to committee and pursue expanded liability there.

However, let me not get ahead of myself. I should first lay out, for those people who may be watching this debate on television today, what this bill is all about. As it stands now, if there is a significant oil spill or nuclear accident, the federal government could be left responsible for damages and cleanup costs in the billions of dollars because there are caps on the liability of reactor operators and companies operating offshore. Increasing those caps would reduce the federal government's exposure and therefore protect Canadian taxpayers. That is what Bill C-22 attempts to do.

It must be noted at the outset that we are only dealing here with costs to the government. The bill does nothing to address the prevention of spills or nuclear accidents, and therefore, both communities and the environment remain highly vulnerable in case of an accident.

Let us look instead at what the bill does address, beginning with the sections that deal with offshore oil and gas liability. Currently, the government and taxpayers are exposed to the financial downside of a catastrophic offshore oil spill by weak liability regimes that cap operator absolute liability at $40 million. Distinct liability regimes govern different aspects of oil and gas development, from pipelines, to rail transport, to offshore drilling. Each regime is in need of fundamental reform.

The oil spill liability reforms in Bill C-22 are limited only to the offshore industry. The government's proposed $1 billion cap for offshore drilling would apply to no-fault liability, while operators would continue to face unlimited liability should they be found to be at fault or negligent. Companies would also be required to demonstrate to the regulators their financial capacity to cover $1 billion in cleanup costs, should they become necessary. Additionally, the bill increases coverage for exploratory drilling operations offshore, production operations, the loading of tankers for transport, and undersea pipelines, such as a natural gas line from Sable Island to the mainland in Atlantic Canada.

However, here is one of the kickers in the bill. It provides for ministerial discretion to reduce absolute liability levels to below even the paltry legislated level of $1 billion. This discretionary provision could undercut the advantages of the legislated increase in the absolute liability limit contained in Bill C-22. It would leave the door wide open for the reduction of absolute liability levels for certain projects as a form of economic incentive for oil and gas development that the government wishes to encourage. Given the Conservative's poor track record in protecting Canada's public interest, this aspect causes us grave concern.

Before my colleagues across the way accuse me of fearmongering, let me just point out that many industry observers adopt the position that operators should face unlimited absolute financial liability for oil spills, as is the case in some other countries, including Norway and Greenland.

Let me just remind members that the offshore BP Gulf oil spill of 2010 is expected to cost as much as $42 billion for total cleanup. That is right. Given the liability limit of $1 billion, that spill alone would leave the government, and therefore taxpayers, on the hook for $41 billion.

Does the government really believe that Canadians should hold the risk for these private companies? If asked, I suspect it would respond with a resounding no.

As this bill proceeds through the legislative process, we might want to reflect on the fact that a German bank, for example, has completely stopped financing offshore oil projects in the Arctic. A spokesperson said:

The further you get into the icy regions, the more expensive everything gets and there are risks that are almost impossible to manage.

Remediation of any spills would cost a fortune.

In part, of course, that is because there is no oil spill response capacity to address a sizeable well blowout or a large scale spill in Arctic waters.

As Martin von Mirbach from the World Wildlife Fund put it:

...there is currently insufficient knowledge and inadequate technology and infrastructure to safely carry out drilling in Canadian Arctic waters. More time is required to address these gaps....

He concludes on a more optimistic note by suggesting that:

...this necessity can become a virtue if at the same time we collectively invest in the research, planning, infrastructure, and dialogue that are the key characteristics of responsible stewardship.

Truthfully, I am not holding my breath. I do not think there are very many Canadians who believe that responsible stewardship ever has been or will be a priority for the Conservative government, but I would love to be surprised. Regardless, the questions raised by Mr. von Mirbach must be explored further with both him and other stakeholders when Bill C-22 finally gets to committee. Not to follow up on those questions would be extremely irresponsible.

Let us leave that for the next stage of the legislative process. For now, let me move on to highlighting the nuclear liability piece of the bill. Here, the impetus for legislating a change lies in the fact that the existing liability limit of $75 million was created to support the industry in the 1950s. It is so low that international courts simply would not recognize it. Therefore, to boost foreign investment in nuclear power in Canada, a legislative change was needed. That process began in 2008, and this is now the fifth time that the Conservatives have brought in a bill to try to deal with its woefully inadequate liability scheme.

To its credit, this bill does propose to increase the maximum liability for operators of nuclear installations for damage resulting from a nuclear accident. It proposes to increase it by more than the earlier iterations of this bill. Whereas the Conservatives once thought that an increase from $75 million to $650 million per nuclear installation would suffice, Bill C-22 would raise it to $1 billion. That is certainly a step in the right direction, but even this limit seems shamefully low when we consider the consequences of a nuclear accident.

As Greenpeace bluntly points out:

...the current nuclear liability conventions are intended to protect the nuclear industry, and do not offer sufficient compensation to victims.

From the beginning of the use of nuclear power to produce electricity 60 years ago, the nuclear industry has been protected from paying the full cost of its failures.

Governments have created a system that protects the benefits of companies, while those who suffer from nuclear disasters end up paying the costs.

It is for precisely that reason that even the Fraser Institute, which no one would accuse of being a left wing think tank, is arguing for more draconian action. Joel Wood, senior research economist at the Fraser Institute, had this to say on nuclear liability gaps:

Increasing the cap only decreases the subsidy; it does not eliminate it. The government of Canada should proceed with legislation that removes the liability cap entirely rather than legislation that maintains it, or increases it to be harmonious with other jurisdictions.

In other words, both Greenpeace and the Fraser Institute agree that the bill before us today continues with the tradition of protecting corporations, rather than protecting Canadian citizens.

Let us look at the liability caps and evaluate them. It seems obvious that the total liability would not be able to cover a medium-sized accident, never mind a catastrophic one. A nuclear accident would cause billions of dollars in damage in personal injuries, death, and contamination of the surrounding areas.

The Japanese government is now saying that the cost of the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi plant will be over $250 billion.

According to the director of environmental governance for the Pembina Institute, a major accident at the Darlington, Ontario nuclear plant east of Toronto, near my riding of Hamilton Mountain, could cause damage in the range of an estimated $1 trillion. One billion dollars does not even come close to being adequate, and taxpayers will be on the hook for the difference. The U.S. on the other hand has a cap of $10 billion. Germany, which has experienced the fallout of the Chernobyl meltdown, has an unlimited amount. Many other countries are also moving in that direction of an unlimited amount of liability.

Does the government really believe that Canadian lives, properties, and communities are worth less than those of our U.S. and European counterparts? Judging by this legislation, one would think the answer is yes.

Perhaps more than anything else this legislation and the debate around it highlight the outrageous costs and potentially devastating risks of nuclear energy, particularly when we compare it to greener, more sustainable alternatives. For example, the Three Mile Island incident outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1979 was a relatively minor nuclear accident, but cost an estimated $975 million for the cleanup and investigation. To put the absolute enormity of these costs into context, for the cost of cleaning up Three Mile Island, 1,147,058 100-watt solar panels could have been bought and assembled.

The total subsidies for Canada's pseudo nuclear company, AECL, from 1952 to 2000 were approximately $16 billion. This money could be spent investigating safer methods of energy.

But the enormous costs do not just apply when things go bad. The planned construction of the Fermi 3 plant in Michigan will cost an estimated $10 billion U.S. and take approximately six years to complete. The price of wind power on the other hand is dropping fast and can even be had for as low as 11¢ per kilowatt hour right now. Imagine the cost savings to taxpayers and the lower electricity bills for seniors and hard-working families if we could shift to cheaper, safer, and more sustainable power. On top of the financial expenses, nuclear energy in general is extremely unsafe both for the environment and human life.

There can be no doubt that Canada needs a greener approach to power. In fact, statistics show that Canada ranks 11th in a poll measuring wind power capacity. If Canada expects to be seen as a leader in the world, we need to compete in the field of clean renewable energy.

That is a topic I would love to go on about at some length, but with only a few minutes more available to me here in this debate, I will return to the text of the bill before us today and highlight a few other changes the bill entails.

If the bill passes this time, Bill C-22 would allow Canada to ratify the convention it signed in December 2013 called the International Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage. That convention would establish nuclear civil liability treaty relations with the U.S., which is already a party to the convention. Important here is that this provides access to supplemental compensation from an international pool of up to $500 million, if that were ever needed by convention participants.

Domestically, the bill would expand the range of damages that could be claimed, and it would triple to 30 years the length of time a person can wait to make a claim for latent illnesses. While this is an improvement, it is clearly not enough.

The Chernobyl disaster is already more than 25 years in the past, and the other report on Chernobyl done by two British scientists in 2006 predicted there would be between 30,000 and 60,000 excess cancer deaths, while the International Physicians for Prevention of Nuclear Warfare estimates that more than 50,000 cases of thyroid cancer are still to be expected. Obviously, in light of this evidence, the 30-year statute of limitations is something that we on this side of the House would want to examine more closely in committee.

A few other points about Bill C-22 are also of note.

First, I would point to a provision that is missing entirely from this legislation. Bill C-22 does not cover any accidents outside of the nuclear plant setting. Oil and mining companies and medical facilities use radioactive materials as well, but they are not liable for any accidents related to their use or disposal. That is a gaping hole in this legislation, a hole that we must try to fill at committee. Either we are serious about protecting Canadians or we are not. I certainly know whose side I am on.

While I am on the topic of reviewing the bill in committee, let me remind my colleagues on the government side of the House that the Canadian Environmental Law Association had requested the federal government to undertake a meaningful public consultation on how the Nuclear Liability Act should be modernized to acknowledge lessons from the Fukushima disaster. Instead, Natural Resources Canada has been privately consulting Canadian nuclear operators on how to revise the NLA. This behind-closed-doors consultation with industry is completely unacceptable. The NLA transfers the financial risk for reactor operations from industry to Canadians. It is imperative, therefore, that Canadians be consulted.

The former minister of natural resources, who now serves as the Minister of Finance, did promise that there would be plenty of time for consultation with the public. He said:

Once a new bill is introduced, members of Parliament will have the opportunity to call witnesses before committee to provide comment and debate the legislation line-by-line.

I trust that the new Minister of Natural Resources will honour his colleague's commitment and will not cave in to his House leader's draconian predisposition to shut down all debate. But as always, the proof will be in the pudding, and I do not expect we will get a clear answer on that here today.

Returning to the bill itself, I do want to point out a few other provisions. The bill does set up a quasi-judicial claims tribunal, which, if needed, will handle damage claims in the event of an accident.

Second, the bill stipulates that only half of the $1 billion liability coverage for nuclear operators will have to be covered using traditional insurance. Operators will be allowed to put up other forms of financial security for the remaining $500 million.

Third, it is the Government of Canada that will provide some of the coverage for lower risk nuclear facilities, such as smaller research reactors.

Last, it bears pointing out that the bill mandates a review of liability amounts at least once every five years. While the five-year review is certainly an important safety valve giving Parliament the opportunity to re-evaluate the adequacy of the $1 billion liability limit down the road, I think it is important that we do our level best to get it right the first time. It is our job as legislators to protect the interests of Canadian.

Frankly, if the government is so convinced that nuclear power is a mature industry, then it is an industry that can and must pay for itself. Instead, the bill is just one more corporate handout by making taxpayers liable for nuclear risk. Taxpayers should not be on the hook for subsidies to nuclear energy over other renewable power sources. Other countries certainly seem to agree with me on that and have decided that their citizens deserve much higher protection in the event of a nuclear accident. Why will the Conservatives not offer Canadians that same protection?

I will wrap up by reiterating my bottom line on the bill. First, if the government truly believes in the polluter pays principle, then taxpayers should not hold the risk for these energy projects.

Second, if we measure risk correctly and assign liability, then industry will improve its safety practices, reducing the likelihood of catastrophic accidents.

Third, we have to study global best practices and ensure that the federal government puts Canadians first.

Fourth, the Canadian government should prepare a comprehensive assessment of the risks posed by nuclear power plant operations in Canada, and the opportunities for reducing that risk and the accompanying risk costs and risk reduction costs.

Fifth, we must engage publicly with a wide range of stakeholders to discuss risks and options to improve nuclear liability in Canada. We must have comprehensive public hearings on the bill.

Sixth, we must review the liability regime regularly moving forward to make sure that our laws are up to date. It is completely unacceptable that successive Conservative and Liberal governments have waited decades to address this. Canadians deserve so much better than that.

I would just conclude by saying that while the bill before us today talks about who will clean up after an accident, what Canadians really deserve is a government that puts their interests first. That means a government that understands that what we need is an offshore and nuclear liability regime that focuses on ensuring that these kinds of disasters never happen in the first place. That is real leadership and the kind of leadership Canadians can expect when they elect an NDP government in 2015.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Minister of Natural Resources and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's intervention. I am just wondering how realistic the New Democrats think their plan is to make liability limits unlimited. Have they actually looked into the impact their plan would have on families who rely on nuclear power for electricity?

For our part, we have done our research. Our legislation raises the limit to an amount that is fair and reasonable, and that protects Canadians in the event of an incident and protects ratepayers from exorbitant costs.

What would the costs be to consumers under the plan the NDP are proposing?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to see that the minister, uniquely on that side of the House, cares so passionately about workers in this country. He is quite right. There are 30,000 people who are currently employed in the nuclear industry, but my goodness, is it not the health and safety of those workers as well that is at stake here? Frankly, these 30,000 workers are taxpayers as well. So if the government essentially has to pick up all of the costs of a $1 billion nuclear accident, it is those 30,000 employees as well who will be on the hook for those costs.

I would suggest to the government that raising the liability limit is something we cannot afford not to do. We have to raise that limit precisely to protect taxpayers, to protect workers, to protect hardworking families in this country. For the minister to suggest that this cannot be done is clearly wrong in the face of the evidence, because countries like Germany, Japan, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Austria, and Switzerland have all done it. I think it is a false argument to suggest that all of those jurisdictions are doing it in a way that is harmful to employees.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on several occasions my colleague from the NDP alluded to the NDP's position on nuclear power. I am sure she would agree that nuclear power as a form of electricity generation and power going forward is going to be part of our energy mix for the foreseeable future. But I take it from her comments that the NDP is officially opposed to nuclear power. Some 60% of Ontario's power is now nuclear. California is expanding its examination of the use of nuclear for many other reasons.

I want to get a better sense of what the official NDP policy is with respect to nuclear power. If it is against nuclear power, how quickly would it phase it out in Canada?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I feel a bit bad that what I said in my speech was not clear to the member. I suggested quite clearly that we have to start focusing on renewable sources of energy, that we need to invest in green and clean technologies. That is the focus of our party and where we want to go with respect to energy generation. That is something that all members on all sides of House ought to be able to support, so I am sorry if the member misunderstood that part of my speech, but I would be delighted to talk to him in private about this again after we finish this debate.

[Jean Rousseau, NDP, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Hamilton Mountain on her excellent speech. Once again, she illustrated the Conservatives' poor management. They are shifting the burden to taxpayers, effectively making them pay more taxes and cover the cost of cleaning up messes made by proponents who want to develop nuclear energy and oil and gas resources.

The government could invest those hundreds of billions of dollars in supporting renewable energy, cleaning up the environment and creating well-paying jobs. Once again, the government is indirectly telling Canadians that they will have to foot the bill for messes made by multinationals developing Canadian resources. That is an unacceptable way to manage Canada. The NDP wants to manage the environment and energy sustainably.

I would like my colleague to comment further on companies' and proponents' responsibility to develop resources sustainably and reasonably without placing the burden on Canadians who have to put up with the government's shenanigans.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate my colleague's question and his passion for this issue. He is absolutely right: we ought to be debating in the House measures to enhance sustainable development in this country. One of the things that is woefully lacking in the bill is any language about the things that we need to do to prevent nuclear accidents and offshore oil accidents from happening in the first place. We are not talking about that in the House—not now, frankly, and never. We are simply talking about how much liability companies will have in the case of accidents. That is not a conversation that is in the best interests of Canadians if we do not put it into the fuller context of how we stop those accidents in the first place.

I want to commend my colleague for bringing that to the floor of the House and I look forward to his intervention on the bill, where I am sure he will elaborate further.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague whether she and her party continue to agree with her leader's comments when he said, “I want to be very clear. The NDP is opposed to any new nuclear infrastructure in Canada”.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first, let me say that I look forward to working with the parliamentary secretary on the natural resources committee. I am sure that we are going to have many lively debates in the House.

I have been a member in this House since 2006. One of the things I learned, probably within the first week of being in this House, was that the most foolish thing any MP could do is actually speak on behalf of his or her leader.

I suspect that there will be many opportunities when the parliamentary secretary could put that question directly to the member for Outremont. I look forward to hearing that exchange.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, to the member for Hamilton Mountain, when we start talking about liability, we can look at the fact that Japan has gone through an experience like no other country on earth, practically, when we look at the damage done there.

Our friends from the Liberal Party were asking questions about certain situations, but they left out the gas plants that were cancelled in a provincial election and the liability that suddenly hit Canadians in Ontario on their hydro bills because of that. There was no cap on liability, so the people are absorbing that cost. That is minuscule compared to the risks we would have. If we are capped at a billion dollars, it just does not make any sense.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, some would suggest, though, that the experience of Ontario with respect to the gas plants the member mentioned was hardly an accident. Rather, it was a very calculated, politically motivated cancellation of those plants. However, I certainly take his point.

Yes, he is absolutely right. Taxpayers are again on the hook, quite substantially, because of an action the Liberal government in Ontario took simply in an effort to try to save some seats. That, of course, will be an issue that will be at the forefront of the upcoming provincial election in Ontario, and I suspect that there will be a huge political price to pay by the Liberal government.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the problem I have with the narrative of the member opposite is not just the failure or the inability to take a clear position on the nuclear sector, particularly for Ontario. The tendency there is to shag the industry but say that we are standing up for the workers. They are against pipelines, but the multitudes of trades that are involved in working on them, well, they stand up for them.

You do not get to have that hypocrisy in the official opposition. When you come forward with a plan like you were suggesting in your lengthy speech today, it is about your notions of liability. We know how much our plan would cost the ratepayer. It would be approximately $2.00 per year.

The question is put to you, because money does not grow on trees. I know that is your forestry policy--

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Joe Comartin]

Order, please.

The minister has been here long enough to know that the questions are to be directed to the Chair rather than to a member directly.

The member for Hamilton Mountain has very little time left.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

That is all right, Mr. Speaker. I do not need very much time, because clearly the minister is confusing us with the Liberals. It was the Liberal leader who said that budgets balance themselves. I do not think I will be taking any lessons from him on that.

With respect to his suggestion that we are standing up for workers, I make no apologies for that either. In fact, the one thing the bill would do would be to say to the industry that this government will always be there to protect the interests of the Canadian nuclear industry at the expense of Canadian taxpayers.

We will stand up for hard-working families. We will stand up for taxpayers and make sure that they are not on the hook for accidents caused by an industry whose behaviour may put Canadians on the hook to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by congratulating my colleague on his recent appointment as Minister of Natural Resources. I know that he brings to it thoughtfulness and sincerity and that he will be a pleasure to work with.

This is an important bill, because it deals with important issues that are sometimes difficult for average working Canadians to understand. Therefore, it is important for us to keep it simple. In my remarks this morning, I am going to try to explain to Canadians why this is so very important in the architecture of energy for Canada going forward, a theme I am going to return to in a few moments.

First, we know that this bill would update the safety and security regimes for Canada's offshore and nuclear energy industries. How would it do that? It would expressly include the polluter pays principle, a notion perfected in the 1980s that is now increasingly finding implementation in Canada and around the world. It is the notion that the entity that generates the pollution is responsible for its cleanup and is responsible for liability as a result of the pollution. That is an important and positive thing to be including in the bill.

It would also increase liability limits to $1 billion, and it would do so without proof of fault or negligence, or as we say in the legal profession, strict liability. The polluter would be held strictly liable for whatever occurred on its watch with respect to pollution of that kind. That is a very big step for Canada to be taking and is one that we will be exploring, I know, in greater detail in committee.

Part 1 would amend the offshore petroleum regime. That is the exploitation of oil and gas in our waterways, off Canadian soil. It would try to enhance incident prevention, our response capacity to problems, and of course, liability and compensation. It would primarily update and strengthen the liability regime applicable to spills and debris in offshore areas. This is very important. This question of response capacity and incident prevention, we now know, is extraordinarily important. We have seen two recent examples in the last several decades that have, frankly, focused the minds of Canadians and citizens all over the world who have watched them.

One, of course, was the terrible tragedy of the Exxon Valdez, how that occurred, and the remedies that flowed from that major oil spill along the coast of Alaska, the effects of which are still being felt and the cleanup of which is still being executed. As our American friends like to say, there have been “learnings”, things we have learned from that tragedy that have led to improvements, such as the widespread use of double-hulled ships for oil and petroleum products.

The second, more recent incident was the terrible spill in the Gulf of Mexico at the BP wellhead. For Canadians who were watching or reading, this was so significant that we now know that with prosecutions, fines, settlements, and compensation, the costs for the Gulf of Mexico incident are now well over $42 billion and counting. This is a very significant amount of money for the corporation involved. There are long-term effects. There are long-term human effects, long-term economic effects, and I would argue, perhaps longer-term ecological effects. We are entering unchartered territory in many regards, because the science does not always exist to confirm just how long term that ecological damage is. Therefore, it is important for us to examine this question of response capacity and incident prevention in committee.

It does, however, raise the question of why the Conservative government has rushed through Beaufort Sea exploration licences. Why is it, in full knowledge of the fact that we do not have the technology to deal with a spill in the Beaufort, that the government has rushed these licences through? It has been forewarned both by industry and by third parties. It has been raised on the floor of this House and raised in committee repeatedly.

The Arctic Ocean is a very shallow ocean. It is also an extremely rough body of water, and there is no known booming system to contain an oil spill should it occur during this phase of exploration and, ultimately, during exploitation. I do not know why the government is allowing the licences to go forward. In fact, it was fast-tracking them several years ago, and now, several years later, it is trying to take corrective action to enhance response capacity. We will have to look at that at committee, particularly, as I say, since there is no known response capacity for a spill in those waters.

The second thing this bill would do, in part 2, is amend the nuclear regime, the way we oversee our nuclear energy sector. It would establish greater legal certainty and enhance liability and compensation in the event of a nuclear accident. Many speakers here have raised the spectre of a nuclear accident. Of course, this is very worrisome. Of course, this is something we need to learn from internationally. The bill would provide for the establishment, in certain circumstances, of an administrative tribunal to hear and decide claims. It would implement certain provisions of an international treaty, the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage.

Here I would like to stop and speak about this question of our nuclear regime in Canada and what has been happening around nuclear power in Canada over the last eight years, since the arrival of the Conservative government.

For about 57 years, Canada led the world, through Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, in the production of nuclear power capacity, the export of that capacity, and the physics underpinning that technology. It was a world leader, not only in the generation of power but also, linked to it, in the production of medical isotopes. This is extremely important going forward, and this bill would have a bearing.

There was a time when Canada supplied 65% of all the medical isotopes in the United States. It furnished our own medical isotopes here in Canada and exported widely around the world. Why is that so important? It is because medical experts tell us that the future of medicine is in what they call personalized medicine. Personalized medicine is going to require the significant, expanded use of nuclear medicine, without which we will not be able to take our medicine and our treatment as human beings to the next iteration, the next level. Isotope production is going to be critical for Canadians. It is also going to be critical for the rest of the world.

As China, India, and other parts of the world become more affluent, there is no doubt in our collective minds, I am sure, that those parts of the world are also going to require greater access to nuclear medicine. What has Canada done with that opportunity and that knowledge in front of it?

Several years ago, the Prime Minister's director of communications was involved in a well-orchestrated rollout with respect to the future of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. It was the same individual who now heads up Sun TV for Mr. Péladeau, the separatist owner of a major news network. As an aside, I would love to hear from the Sun journalists who for years have been attacking all sorts of different folks with respect to their views, but I have not seen a single commentary from these leaders of the Sun regime on the majority shareholder of their corporation.

We had that same person, the former director of communications, come out in the hall here and run down the asset, Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. I remember the words and I remember the day, because I was so absolutely stunned when he came out and said that Atomic Energy of Canada is a $12 billion sinkhole.

That was, of course, deliberate, because it is a Conservative strategy to run down a state-owned asset that they want to dispose of. Lo and behold, the vast majority of AECL was dumped in a fireside sale of $100 million to SNC-Lavalin in Montreal, thereby compromising Canada's future, in my view, with respect to nuclear power plants and with respect to producing medical isotopes and obtaining a certain share of that marketplace.

Today, as we speak, there are over 120 requests for proposals being considered worldwide for new nuclear power plant installations. That is the reality. Is Canada prepared? Is AECL actively bidding? Are we ready to conquer some of those markets?

I would say no, not when the Prime Minister's director of communications is dispatched to describe our state-owned nuclear energy company as a $12 billion sinkhole.

Furthermore, as I just put to my colleague from the NDP, in committee we will have to look at the energy mix going forward. We will have to look at how nuclear power will fit with renewable power and other forms of power, for example geothermal, which in my view is an energy source we have barely begun to tap, particularly in a northern Canadian context. It is highly economic to be using geothermal in our north, but we are not investing very much at all.

Here I would agree with my NDP colleague: we are not putting the needed resources into public research and development in our energy future, whatever that mix is going to be.

Finally, on the nuclear regime side, it is important for all members to understand that very unfortunately, given the global consumption of water, 70% of the world's fresh water is used today in agricultural production. It is the same statistic in the United States. As American northeastern cities drop in population and as the United States builds ever-larger cities in its dry southwest, we will see even more pressure on fresh water, which of course is giving rise to all kinds of new economic opportunities, unfortunately, in the desalination of water.

The only form of energy we know thus far that is economic in desalination is nuclear. Are we going to tell the world that it cannot have access to water? I do not think so, not given the pressures that we know are coming and knowing what we know now about climate change. We will come to the place of climate change in an energy discussion in a second.

It is very important for us to examine this question of the nuclear regime in a broader context. This is not just a technical amendment bill; it has to be examined in the context of both the Canadian situation and the international markets that I alluded to just a moment ago.

For example, we know that the liability cap in the nuclear sector is going to go from $75 million to $1 billion. That is a very significant jump. This brings Canada in line with the promises it made when we signed the international Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage in December 2013. In a sense, we are simply moving to ratify what we signed on an international level.

In the offshore oil and gas sector, the absolute liability for companies operating in the Atlantic offshore will increase from $30 million to $1 billion, and in the Arctic from $40 million to $1 billion. Operators will have to earmark $100 million specifically for spill response. That is a quantum, a number that I think deserves to be examined much more closely.

It is $100 million earmarked for spill response if, as I said earlier with respect to the Beaufort, that technology actually exists, which we know it does not in that context. It is $100 million when the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico is $42 billion and counting. I do not think that is a serious number.

On this question of satisfactory protection, we will have to hear from experts. It is linked, of course, to the insurability of some of these actions and whether or not there is insurance to be drawn down on top of the $100 million specifically earmarked.

There are other questions that have to be asked, as the proposed legislation raises several issues.

For example, would the bill make it far more expensive for offshore energy companies to operate off the Atlantic and Arctic coasts by raising their financial liability, by forcing them to have more money on hand, by increasing the funds they must have on hand for disaster response specifically? In that case, by how much would the cost be increased? What do the corporations have to say about that? I think it is important for us to hear the answer.

Is $1 billion adequate in the Arctic, where environmental conditions make spill response efforts very challenging? Is $1 billion realistic, as we rush through these exploration licences, as has been done by the government?

Here is another question. Why does the bill provide for ministerial discretion to reduce absolute liability levels to below the legislative level of $1 billion? Why would we do this? What would be the implications of this provision?

In fairness, there has been a trend since the Conservatives came to power eight years ago of vesting more and more power in ministers or in the cabinet. Nowhere has that been more egregious than in the case of decisions rendered by the impartial, arm's-length National Energy Board. Now, all of a sudden, as a result of the government's power grab, a decision rendered by a third party, outside-of-government group of experts with quasi-judicial processes and expert evidence is not good enough, because if it is not in line with the government's views or the Conservatives' priorities, they can undermine the entire process with a stroke of a pen. In fact, they can overrule the entire process. This is unusual, but it has been happening over and over for eight years in different sectors.

Here, again, we see it slipped into the bill. I think the government has to explain to Canadians why that is. Why would the minister have the power to say that it is not $1 billion but $229, or zero, or there is a delay in payment? What are the implications of this provision as we go forward with another concentration of power in a single minister?

We know that the bill is the culmination of many years of discussion with respect to operator liability that, objectively, started under the previous Liberal government. For that, I want to commend all of those departmental officials who have been involved in helping to craft the bill and who helped to lead those discussions and reconcile competing views. They should be congratulated for their hard work. We are only as good in this place as the work provided by those officials. In many respects, we stand on their shoulders.

The second thing the bill does is address recommendations to raise liability limits from the 2012 report of the Commissioner of Environment and Sustainable Development. Need I remind the House that this is another office created by the Liberal government?

There are some very positive changes in the bill. We look forward to seeing it get to committee. We are looking forward to hearing from the experts on many important questions.

Bill C-22 is a good building block in what I hope will become an adult conversation on Canada's energy future, because in eight years we have not had an adult conversation. We have been fixating on a single pipeline or some other construction project, as opposed to examining what our energy future looks like, what the mix looks like, the extent to which we are integrated in the North American context, and where we are going with greenhouse gases, a term I have not heard uttered here today. To talk about energy, which the bill addresses, without talking about greenhouse gases is irresponsible.

In closing, I am looking forward to seeing Bill C-22 in committee and getting more information and more evidence with a view to improve it.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Minister of Natural Resources and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his intervention. The discipline and rigour that he brings not only to his presentation but also to his questions with particular regard to some of the work I have done with him in the past are very much appreciated.

I share his concerns about the broader questions around energy, in particular about where the nuclear sector fits in. I too have been concerned. An example is the green pulp and paper transformation program to reduce the environmental footprint and significant costs of the pulp mill in Dryden, which went from 85% to 112%. Unfortunately, the priorities of the provincial government at that time, just a couple of years ago, did not provide for that extra energy, which, at no cost to the environment and at great benefit to the high ratepayers in northwestern Ontario, could have gone onto the grid line.

That is a subject for another discussion, but it does raise an important point when the member talks about the mix. I appreciate the consideration of water and nuclear medicine. Having just been the minister responsible for science and technology, I may take some opposition to his sense that good research is not being done in those areas.

The first concern I have is with the failure of the NDP to take a stand on the nuclear sector. The second is to understand, in the broader context, the important contributions it makes, in particular to nuclear medicine and isotopes. We are making some great strides in these areas in Thunder Bay.

I wonder if the member could comment broadly and perhaps more specifically on his concern about the cost structure under the scenario for liability that the NDP is proposing. Although he may have some exceptions and concerns around our liability regime, it is taking us one more important step forward toward a reasonable balance between liability and ratepayers.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is not within me to divine the thinking of the NDP in this area. I am not surprised that its members are not in a position to talk about the implications of unlimited liability. It is interesting to call for that and have an aspirational goal. When my kids were very young, while tucking them into bed I would tell them about the way the world ought to be, and in the morning I would get up and deal with the way the world is. The New Democrats do need to deal with the way the world is, although I do commend them for their aspirational views on unlimited liability. I would like to hear from the experts at committee what the ramifications and the distributive effects of this approach would be.

Going back to the energy mix that my colleague alluded to, it is fair to point out that in the last eight years most, if not all, of the fiscal incentives and programmatic expenditures that were in place to help us move to a greater renewable portfolio have all been eliminated. We have lost the renewable power production incentive and the wind power production incentive. We have eliminated the ecoENERGY program for people's homes, which was an attempt to encourage average citizens to retrofit the homes where they live to make a contribution to energy efficiency. This is unfortunate, because Canada should be retooling our economy to become the cleanest, most energy-efficient, most materials-efficient, and most water-efficient economy in the world. I think the minister ought to go back and take a look at some of those issues and cuts and look at reinstating them.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his excellent presentation today. I also want to take the opportunity to congratulate the new minister on his appointment. I am looking forward to working with him.

There are a number of issues with this bill that we have to study at the natural resources committee, of which I am the vice-chair. Among those is the question of what impact this bill would have on the operating costs of offshore energy companies operating off the Atlantic coast or in the Arctic.

In terms of the Arctic, my hon. colleague from Ottawa South spoke eloquently about the challenges there. There is the question of whether $1 billion is adequate in the Arctic, given the kinds of environmental concerns that a spill there could raise, such as the difficulties of a spill response, especially in deep water and under ice. Those are big concerns. Why the bill provides for ministerial discretion to reduce the liability limit below $1 billion is not clear to me.

I would ask my hon. colleague if he has any comments on these issues.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my first comment is how confident I am in my colleague from Halifax West, who will be stickhandling this debate at committee. He is going to be asking the very tough questions that he has just raised on the floor of the House. I am very confident, and his constituents and the House should be very confident, that he is going to be there, that he is going to make those contributions and elicite the important evidence and testimony that we need to improve the bill.

A theme that I picked up on earlier, which I commend to my colleague from Halifax West, is that when it comes to energy, much of the last two years has been fixated on a single pipeline. When the north-south pipeline issue is resolved, everyone will feel either happy or unhappy about the outcome. However, meanwhile we are not having an adult conversation about energy in Canada and energy in the United States. We are not having an adult conversation about Canada's, the United States' and Mexico's integrated North American energy market, especially as Mexico now looks to inculcate private investment in its energy holdings. That is an important question for Canada's energy future.

Instead of focusing on headline-grabbing comments around one particular pipeline, it is unfortunate that the House has not been seized with—as I have personally been calling for over eight years, and other voices have as well—having an adult conversation about what our energy future looks like and to what extent we could use fiscal incentives and disincentives to improve our performance.

How is this linked to our greenhouse gas reduction targets? We are not having a conversation about that here. Every time we do, the Prime Minister shuts it down, which frankly is irresponsible.

Therefore, I am happy that my colleague from Halifax West will be stickhandling this through committee. I have every confidence that he will be raising these tough questions.