Linda Duncan

[The Environment, October 17th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, based on the feedback members are receiving on the emergency debate on the IPCC report, it is clear that strong support exists for deeper action by the government. Canadians are calling for concrete action to address climate change, including deeper greenhouse gas reduction targets to match our Paris commitments. Canadians want deeper cuts to methane, support for worker transition funds, an end to perverse fossil fuel subsidies and restoration of eco-energy retrofits.

Is the government going to act?

[Canada Labour Code, October 16th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the hon member always gives a thoughtful speech and always extends kindnesses to other members in this place who contribute to the work of the government. I also wish to commend him and the members of the committee who did the review of this policy. Based on what the member has shared with us, I think that Canada is showing that we can conduct ourselves in these kinds of reviews perhaps better than what we have seen south of the border.

I would like to raise with the member the same question that I put to one of his colleagues. I had the opportunity in the 1980s and 1990s to work with the federal governments of the day on enforcement compliance policies, particularly in the area of environmental law and agriculture. I learned from those experiences, as well as when I worked in the Yukon and overseas, that an important thing when bringing forward legislation is to also think about how to ensure compliance with the legislation. I understand there will be a review after five years.

I wonder if the member could speak to two concerns I have. I am less concerned with the behaviour in the House of Commons because there is great interest in protecting our civil service at the federal level. What I am deeply concerned about are the federally regulated entities. Of course, the federal government owns the pipeline so that entity presumably will be bound by these conditions as well.

Could the member speak to whether he thinks it is a good idea to be collecting some data or information so that we have an evidence-based decision on that five-year review and to use that information toward potentially tabling an enforcement and compliance policy for how we will actually deliver on the undertakings in this legislation?

[Canada Labour Code, October 16th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, while the government has been commended on moving forward with stronger laws for the protection of workers in federal areas of employment, one of the issues that has been raised is that a good number of the workers are covered by collective agreements and others are not.

Could my colleague speak to whether he thinks that may be an issue, or does he have any experience with whether the rights under both may interfere with each other or is it important that the federal legislation also take that into account and figure out a way to resolve any overlaps or differences in those two processes?

[Canada Labour Code, October 16th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I often think that we over here are forgotten.

I have a question for the member who has obviously been very thoughtful on this bill and in his previous experience. I note that this bill will also apply to federally regulated workplaces, including banks, telecommunications and transport. Of course, that would include rail and airlines.

I wonder if the member could speak to this issue. It is one thing to pass a law; it is another thing to have a strategy for compliance. I am wondering what actions are going to be taken by the government to ensure that these federally regulated workplaces actually comply with this law and, in fact, give the remedies that will be available under the legislation, ensuring that all employees working in those work situations will have the full protection of this law.

[The Environment, October 15th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think those measures are any more dramatic than what we are going to face if we do not take them. In looking at the economy, the most important thing for the government to do is to finally take action on a just transition.

My province alone relies heavily on oil and gas. It also relies on agriculture that is being impacted by climate change. Our national economy depends on fossil fuels, but workers are calling for the federal government to take action and invest heavily in retraining so they can get jobs in the transition. There are many who work in the oil and gas sector and in coal-fired power who have the skills and could work in the renewables sector. There are many technical schools across Canada that have waiting lists for younger and older workers to be upgraded.

When is the government finally going to step up to the plate and invest hundreds of millions of dollars in a just transition?

[The Environment, October 15th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her dedication to this cause.

This gives me a chance to share something I had hoped to share and hope to be coming forward with something on in the House soon. Quite some time ago, the United Kingdom tabled and passed legislation setting binding targets for the reduction of greenhouse gases. That legislation requires it to review its targets every five years and it has established a separate environment commission, headed, by the way, by a former Edmontonian, that gives independent advice on how best to meet those targets. Then it audits the government's action and makes the results public.

Going into the next COP, I highly recommend that the government tables that exact legislation, as my party has done several times over.

[The Environment, October 15th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, despite the fact I am feeling very under the weather, which seems to be an appropriate saying for tonight, I had to be here to participate in this. I want to thank my colleagues, colleagues across the way and the member for the Green Party for calling this debate.

This matter of urgency did not happen simply because the IPCC told us to wake up, that we were already at the 1.5°C mark. The urgency was identified a long time ago. I happen to hold a very thick report issued by the Department of National Resources 23 years ago, calling for expedited action on climate change. That report was edited by an agricultural expert. There is a major chapter in that report about the impacts that were already being felt in Canadian agriculture then because of climate change.

This is a crisis that touches every corner of the country. Our colleagues in the Conservative Party represent a lot of farmers, and they should wake up and realize the impacts their farmers are facing.

In my province, we have faced unprecedented terrible weather this fall. We have not had a fall. We had a bumper crop, and so many of those crops have been downgraded in value because of early terrible weather, namely early snow and terrible rains. Those who rely on the construction industry, landscaping and nurseries have been devastated. This represents two months of incomes and this is just the beginning.

Those are what we might call “minor” impacts to small businesspeople, but the impacts are being felt across the globe. We simply need to look at our neighbours to the south in this continent to understand the devastation that has been wreaked upon us. We do not need the IPCC scientists, but we certainly need to heed them.

Many times over, Canada committed to Kyoto and the 2020 targets, which have passed by. The Harper government pulled out of the Kyoto targets and the Liberals have simply brushed away the 2020 targets, which the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development has decried. Are we simply going to brush away the 2030 targets? If we do not get serious, we are in serious trouble not only with respect to meeting our commitments in Paris, but even in meeting the reprehensibly low Harper government targets, which, amazingly, remain the targets of the Liberal government. It is time to get serious.

A question was asked about what other country we can give as an example. One of our trading partners, the United Kingdom, achieved 23% greenhouse gas reductions from 1999 levels by 2012, and it is on track for a 35% reduction of 1999 levels by 2020. We are not even basing our reductions on 1999 anymore. We have moved forward to the Harper target of the 2000s.

While the Liberals have supported this call for an emergency debate, sadly their commitments fall far short of responding to the urgent need for action.

It is really important for us to keep in mind, and particularly so given the comments from our colleagues in the Conservative Party, that the federal government does have powers to act on climate change. Yes, it is a good idea to also work in co-operation with the provinces and territories and with first nations, but the federal government has a duty to move when the provinces and territories are not moving. Recent elections in Canada have put a greater onus on the federal government, but it is the federal government that committed to the Paris targets, and it should therefore be the government held accountable.

What are the two key powers? The really important one is the spending power. The federal government collects dollars from Canadian taxpayers, and it decides how it is going to spend those dollars. Regrettably, despite commitments by the Harper regime and the Liberals of the day, the government has still not removed the perverse subsidies for fossil fuels. That would be a start. The investments in renewables and in energy efficiency in no way match those supporting the fossil fuel industry. If we are talking about making a shift toward a cleaner economy, that would be a simple first step.

Could the government please shift from pilot projects to significant federal investments for the deployment of renewable energy? We have had enough pilot projects. We have so many proven technologies, developed in this country and elsewhere, that can be deployed. Our communities need federal support to deploy those energy sources.

We need help in costing the smart grids and the interprovincial grids. There is a lot of talk about Manitoba Hydro being fed into Saskatchewan so that the latter can get off coal sooner, of Quebec hydro going into Ontario and lots of talk of BC Hydro going into Alberta. It would be nice if B.C. would give us a good price. However, the federal government could certainly help.

If we look at Bill C-69, a lot of the discussion during the expert panel was that it was unlikely that the National Energy Board, soon to become the new Canadian energy regulator, would actually deal with a lot of fossil fuel projects except for interprovincial grids. Therefore, the government needs to gearing up and talking about that and having a big dialogue about how it can help to expedite these improved grids.

The government needs to disburse the pan-Canadian funds now. We raised this three years ago. It has set aside this $1.5 billion dollars and some, and then sat on it, supposedly waiting for the provinces and territories to decide what they needed to do. My premier, Premier Notley, said to send it now. Thank heavens the province finally put in place an energy efficiency program and it was grateful for the infusion of dollars. If there were any way to get more people on side to understand that we need to put a price on carbon, we also need to help those who need a leg up to retrofit or build in cleaner ways. How about a little balancing?

Recently, dollars were given to the Northwest Territories. I have talked to my friends and colleagues there, and they are saying that it is merely symbolic. Imagine what it costs to build energy-efficient housing and buildings in the Northwest Territories, let alone Yukon and Nunavut. There are a lot of people interested, such as small energy companies, in deploying clean technology and building energy efficiency. Let us move forward our national building code. For heaven's sake, we learned at committee that it is not going to be in place until 2030. We need to have our housing and buildings built to a higher standard right now.

The transportation sector is on par with the fossil fuel industry in emitting GHGs, so we do not just need a major infusion of dollars, but to make sure that the federal government uses its regulatory powers and sticks with those stricter standards for large vehicles and, frankly, for trucks and SUVs.

The Harper government promised that it would use its regulatory power. In 10 years, it never issued a regulation on fossil fuels. I am sorry, but we cannot listen to what it did. It is more a case of what it did not do.

As I mentioned, the fixation seems to be on whether we should have a carbon tax and how much it should cost. Why are we not talking about the whole bundle of measures that need to happen in tandem with the carbon tax? There is no way that Canadians are going to look at a $50 a tonne carbon tax, let alone a $150 a tonne tax, which is projected to be necessary to stay at 1.5°C, unless there are measures in place to help them get there. In particular, I refer to those who cannot afford to do it, such as small business a lot of homeowners and apartment dwellers. A lot of people who have small businesses are renting from other people who own those buildings. They need support to lower their power bills.

We absolutely need the federal government to issue stronger regulations for controlling methane. Forty per cent is just not good enough. I encourage everyone in this place to take in one of those technical briefings that show that we can reduce far more methane if we require, as the technology exists. However, we need to require the monitoring of methane in tandem with the initial regulations. We can reduce our climate impacts in a large way if we get those industries to reduce their methane faster.

Also, I am concerned about the standards to be set for gas power. People need to be aware that the conversions from coal to gas are going to be much weaker than for new gas plants. Gas plants also emit a lot of greenhouse gases. Where is our timeline? What is the timeline for simply moving to cleaner sources of energy?

We need to be scaling up the investments in northern diesel. It is costing the northern governments hundreds of millions of dollars to transport that diesel to the communities and it is polluting those communities.

In terms of coal shutdown, where is the federal budget for a just transition for those working in the coal fire power sector? To its credit, a year ago Alberta committed $40 million to help retrain and support workers in that sector. All the government has done is to consult. It does not expect to even have a report until the end of this year. We need a major infusion of federal dollars to support both oil and gas, not just coal workers, and to shift to renewables.

[Department of Health Act, September 28th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, in Bill C-326, the member for Lac-Saint-Louis proposes a number of measures related to empowering the federal Minister of Health, under the Department of Health Act, to investigate and report on the need to update regulation of toxins in drinking water.

I want to say again that I am aware of the long-standing interest of this member in calling for greater action to protect Canadian water quality, including safe drinking water, and I commend him for this dedication. I also wish to echo the calls by the MP for Sarnia—Lambton for the comments she has made on the concerns about the continuing boil water advisories in our indigenous communities.

However, the member for Lac-Saint-Louis' specific reforms appear at odds with, and may actually conflict with, recommendations made by the parliamentary committee on environment and sustainable development in a number of reports tabled in this place in 2007, 2008 and as recently as 2017, which have still not been acted upon.

Certainly, repeated calls have been made for greater action at the federal level to protect water quality, in particular from contamination from harmful toxins. Strengthened measures have been demanded by parliamentarians, government officials, scientists, physicians, lawyers, environmental advocates and our own commissioner of the environment and sustainable development.

Indeed, during our committee study of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, we heard testimony that Canadian drinking water standards often lag behind international benchmarks. CEPA, or the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, is the federal law that has been in force since 1988 for regulating toxic substances, including those that may be found in drinking water or potential drinking water sources. It is also important to note that it is this law that extends powers to both the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and the Minister of Health for the control of toxins.

Following an extensive study that heard testimony from government officials, the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development, industry, scientists, legal experts and environmental advocates, the committee tabled a report calling for substantive reforms to this law to ensure improved control of toxins, including in water.

Bill C-326 proposes that the Minister of Health be empowered to review drinking water standards to ensure consistency with standards imposed by other OECD nations. Our committee was advised that in some instances, Canada has in place the lowest standards among OECD nations for 27 toxic substances. While the committee recognized the need for the reforms, they do not appear to coincide with those the member recommends under Bill C-326.

In fact, the committee recommended amending CEPA to require a mandatory assessment of any substance where an OECD country has placed restrictions on it and more. It also called for action where there was an increased use of that substance or any new scientific findings came to the attention of the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. The committee recommended that CEPA be made the principal statute to regulate any products containing toxic substances, not the Department of Health Act.

The parliamentary committee did recognize the need to enhance the powers of the Minister of Health in recommending controls on a toxin where it may pose risks to health. However, it was noted that the law must require dual reviews by both the health and environment ministers to ensure that risks to both health and environment are assessed.

A recommendation was also made to ensure that any assessment consider risks to vulnerable populations. The committee went a step further than Bill C-326, recommending automatic listing of any substance once it is determined to be toxic, not simply that it be reported to Parliament. It called for immediate action where there is information that a substance may be harming human health or the environment. However, we still await action by the government on these languishing critical calls for reform to protect our environment and human health.

Finally, many have called for the current national guidelines for Canadian drinking water to be made binding in law, as is the case in many other western nations. Further, they have called for communities, including indigenous communities, to be granted the right to participate in risk assessments and the setting of standards. This would be consistent with Canada's having recognized, at the UN conference on sustainable development in 2012, the right to water. Such calls have been made for decades by Ecojustice, the Forum for Leadership on Water, the Centre for Indigenous Environmental Resources, the David Suzuki Foundation blue dot campaign and indigenous leaders.

Should Bill C-326 be passed, it will be important that the proposals be considered in tandem with the recommendations by the parliamentary committee.

I call on the government to table amendments to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act this year. That would enable them to be debated and implemented as expeditiously as possible to ensure the protection of Canadians.

As my colleague from the Conservative Party noted, yes, the government is showing a greater commitment to removing boil water advisories in aboriginal communities, but no community in 2018 should be suffering under a boil water advisory. Yes, there may be certain gizmos that can be attached to taps, but frankly, many of these communities do not even have water from taps and have to go to a well.

A number of years ago, I wrote a handbook for indigenous communities to ensure that they had protections for their safe drinking water, because there was a law proposed by the Conservative government to regulate safe drinking water in indigenous communities. Regrettably, essentially what that law did was simply transfer liability to indigenous communities.

It is absolutely critical that the resources be given to our indigenous and rural communities so that they can, in fact, be granted the same opportunity many of us have to simply turn on the tap and have clean, fresh water. I have had the privilege of working overseas in a number of countries, such as Bangladesh and Indonesia, and on those occasions, it was not necessarily safe to drink the water from the taps, so I recognize in a very small way what is being suffered in many of the communities.

I again commend the member for his attention to this issue and the initiative he is taking, but I would encourage the government and the committee, when considering this bill, to look at it in the context of the report done by the parliamentary committee.

[Department of Health Act, September 28th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Lac-Saint-Louis for his lifelong dedication to greater government action to protect our water, including safe drinking water. I am well aware that this has been a long-standing interest of his.

The parliamentary committee on environment and sustainable development, in March 2016, was directed by this place to undertake a review of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, which is the law that regulates toxins in our water, land and air. The committee submitted a report to this place in June 2017, more than a year ago. We are hearing from the government that it does not intend to bring forward any response to those 87 recommendations to regulate toxins in our water until after the next election.

I wonder if the member shares our concern that this action needs to be taken in a timely manner to make sure that our drinking water is safe.

[Multilateral Instrument in Respect of Tax Conventions Act, September 28th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to work with my colleague. I have previously worked with him on committees.

It is important that, as a member of the OECD , we take seriously the work that is done in that forum. For example, the OECD recently did a report on all the countries living up to their commitment to deliver 0.7% of their GNI on international assistance, and chastised Canada for delivering just a third of that. Also, there have been calls for Canada to make sure that our standards for controlling toxins are on par with other OECD nations.

Clearly, the work of the OECD is important, but I wonder if the member could speak to this issue. A number of concerns have been raised that, yes, it is good that we will be modernizing the mechanism whereby we enter into these agreements, but will it not also be important to be revisiting some of the tax treaties we have with some nations, which simply could end up with corporations in Canada not paying their fair share of taxes in Canada?