Mr. Speaker, I am happy to speak to the motions in Group No. 6.
The NDP Motion No. 41 would require research in relation to pollution and children. Under the existing CEPA, whether it is reducing the amount of benzine, which is a known carcinogen in gasoline, or banning substances that harm the earth's ozone layer, the health and well-being of our children has always been a key consideration. The whole reason for Bill C-32 is to prevent pollution from substances that are harmful to the environment and human health, including our children.
The bill requires that the government look at the 23,000 substances that are currently in Canada. In the 1998 budget our government invested $40 million in toxic research. Children, as well as the elderly and aboriginal peoples, are most vulnerable to the threat of toxic substances. This research gave us answers on what needs to be done to protect those most vulnerable and all Canadians from the threat of toxic substances.
With these answers in hand, Bill C-32 and the $42 million earmarked in the 1999 budget for action on toxics will provide the means to better protect the environment and health of all Canadians.
Motions Nos. 36, 37 and 70 seek to link definitions in part 3 to areas that are accessible to pollution. We are not exactly sure what NDP Motion No. 36 is trying to accomplish. It seems to suggest that the definitions in part 3, fish and hormone disrupting substances, should apply in areas that are reasonably accessible to children. The NDP is trying to do the same to certain regulatory powers. This is unnecessary in our view.
Bill C-32 is a law of general application and it applies throughout Canada. It is a bill for all Canadians. The suggestion to add a definition of environmental pollutant is also confusing and we believe would limit the powers in part 3.
The government prefers to have research and information gathering powers to cover the all-inclusive concept of substance rather than the more narrow definition of environmental pollutant. We prefer Bill C-32 as it is rather than the narrowly defined powers suggested by the NDP and the Reform.
The Reform motion seeks to change the definition of hormone disrupting substances. While it was the government's intention to introduce a definition of hormone or endocrine disrupting substances at the committee stage, the government would prefer to let the committee's definition stand in its place. Our research community is actively pursuing research into endocrine disrupting substances and finding solutions to this growing concern.
The federal government is moving quickly to meet the requirements in Bill C-32 to conduct research. Hormone disrupting substances are a priority of the government's $40 million toxic substance research initiative.
Just last week the Ministers of Health and the Environment announced a series of projects under the first tranche of investment research dollars. Some $10.94 million was allocated to 81 projects across Canada to conduct research on toxic substances in five priority areas: persistent organic pollutants, specific forms of metals in the environment, endocrine disrupting chemicals, urban air quality and human exposure to airborne pollutants, and the cumulative effective of toxic substances.
Over 360 Canadian researchers will be participating in the various research studies. They will draw upon strong partnerships with government, industry, academia and non-governmental sectors. All provinces were covered in the announcement.
A University of Calgary study will investigate the adverse health effects on babies due to exposure to environmental chemicals in the mother's womb. The science management and technical review committees of the toxic substances research initiative reviewed many applications. They put forth much time and effort to review these applications and to move this process forward.
One of these announcements was the allocation of $2.16 million to 17 projects relating to endocrine disruption substances. They cover a wide range of issues concerning the effects on human health as well as the environmental impacts on the environment. Seven projects were given to Environment Canada, eight to universities across Canada, one to Health Canada and one to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.
The following are some of the projects: Michel Fournier, professor at the Institut Armand-Frappier, is investigating fetal organ thynic culture as organ assay for environmental endocrine disrupting substances, a $70,000 project; Robert Casper at the University of Toronto is looking into the adverse reproductive effect of exposure to dioxin-like endocrine disrupters, an $80,000 project; Donald Cole at McMaster University in Hamilton is looking into time of pregnancy, in vivo contaminant levels and biological mechanisms in premeps; Poh-Gek Forkhert at Queen's University in Kingston is looking into the reproductive toxicity induced by trichlorethylene in mice and humans; Scott Brown at Canada's own Environment Canada, National Water Research Institute located in Burlington, Ontario is looking into the effects of endocrine disrupters on seawater adaptability, growth and survival of salmon smolts.
There are other projects at the University of Calgary, at the University of Guelph and at the University of Toronto, all across this country. The government is putting its commitments to making sure that we are looking at preventing pollution, that we are putting together a strong regulatory framework and that we will have a bill that will see Canadians through into the next millennium making sure that we do things differently. We have learned the lessons from the past. The bill is necessary to make sure that we can implement those lessons and have a strong regulatory regime.
I urge all members of the House to support the bill and see its passage in the next couple of days.
