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 uncharted 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.