Mr. Speaker, I, too, rise in the House to speak in support of Bill C-16, but with serious reservations. I look forward to the opportunity to review the bill with the appropriate officials in committee so some of those reservations might be addressed and so I can fully support the bill.
I worked in the field of environmental enforcement for 35 years and had the opportunity to be the first chief of enforcement for Environment Canada. As a result of that work, I count as some of my best friends and most revered colleagues the former chiefs of investigation for each of the regions of Environment Canada, who deserve to be lauded as heroes of the planet. They often go unheralded in our move to protect the environment.
When I taught at Dalhousie Law School, I simultaneously did my master of law. The topic of it, which I would like to donate to the library for everybody's use, was “Effective Environmental Enforcement: the Missing Link to Sustainable Development”. What does that mean? It essentially means there is no point of having laws and policies in place unless there is the political will of the government to actually abide by and enforce those laws and policies. The bill is supposed to be about that.
The bill provides for a much welcomed array of expanded tools for enforcement officers, long overdue tools, many of which I recommended to the Government of Canada in 1988. I applaud the government for finally bringing forward this massive bill of almost 200 pages, which is a compendium of amendments of eight bills and the addition of a new bill. However, I have some serious reservations on some of the provisions and the rationale for why those changes are being made, which I wish to address.
When the original Canadian Environmental Protection Act, or CEPA as it is called in short form, was first tabled by the then Hon. Tom McMillan, minister of the environment, he took very profound action and that set a change in environmental enforcement right across this country.
When Minister McMillan tabled the first CEPA, he also tabled in the House an enforcement and compliance policy. This was an historic step. When the minister tabled that policy, he stated to the House:
As strong as the Act is, it is not good enough to have only a sound piece of legislation; it must be enforced. To that end, I am releasing today, as a companion to the legislation itself, an Enforcement and Compliance Policy designed to prevent pollution, to encourage co-operation and to deal harshly with those who would violate the Act.
That simple action of the minister tabling the policy in the House set in motion a change across the country and necessitated all provincial jurisdictions and all provincial departments of the environment to do the same. In order for the provinces to claim equivalency under CEPA, which would mean that they could enforce their laws instead of the federal law, they also had to put in place an equivalent enforcement and compliance policy.
What did that do for Canadians, what did that do for Canadian industry and what did that do for enforcement officers? It basically made a clear statement saying: first, they were obligated to obey environmental law; and, second, if they violated this environmental law, then a number of things could happen. It set forth very clearly what the various enforcement measures were available in the legislation and in addition to the legislation so any violator would know what to anticipate. It also set out clearly the criteria for when each of those measures would be used.
There is one thing that I find missing, very sadly, in the hon. minister's tabling of this legislation. Even though it may include a lot of important measures, he has provided the House absolutely no clarity on how those various new tools will be used. When are we going to go to court? When are we going to use administrative penalties? When are we going to recommend that permits be withdrawn? I encourage the minister to come back to the House, before we finally deal with this bill, and bring forward a strategic document. What guidance will be provided to his officials and how they will exercise the various new powers under that law?
In general, I am rising in support of Bill C-16. There is no one more important in Canada right now for the protection of our environment than our enforcement officers. They are often forgotten and they are often at the bottom of the list for additional funds and tools. It is long overdue that they be lauded for the role they play in protecting the health of Canadians and the environment. I rise in the House as well to commend and honour them and the good work they have done for Canadians.
I have some reservations and I look forward to the opportunity in committee, as I have mentioned to my fellow members of the parliamentary committee, to bring forth the appropriate officials from the Department of the Environment, from Parks Canada, and from the Department of Justice, as well as independent environmental enforcement experts, to talk to us about what the implications are of the various measures in the bill, so that we can fully understand the bill before us.
If we deem it appropriate, we can rise and support the bill and it can be expeditiously put forward and made available to the enforcement officers.
First, as did the hon. member from the Bloc who spoke earlier, I want to speak to the irony of the minister tabling this bill claiming commitment to the enforcement of federal environmental laws.
The irony is that the government has issued a full frontal attack on environmental protection ever since it came to power. There are still no enforceable regulations for greenhouse gases or for the countless toxins or pollutants awaiting regulation under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act or the federal Fisheries Act. Therefore, while it is nice to have these enforcement powers, there is not much to enforce.
The government has opposed Kyoto as a socialist plot. When will it come forward with binding regulations, as my colleague said previously, so that the enforcement officers can actually inspect, validate and enforce those laws, even if they are emissions trading rules?
In the fall 2008 Speech from the Throne, the government brought forward basically the same principles it put forward in its Turning the Corner report. Those principles were that environmental laws are simply red tape.
We witnessed just last week the action by the Minister of the Environment to unilaterally change significant regulations that have been in place following in-depth consultation with regulated industry, members of the public, and provincial and territorial governments, to unilaterally amend regulations without even providing a Canada Gazette notice in advance, essentially violating its own regulation-making power.
This removal of red tape is going to have a profound effect on the people who live downwind or downstream of these projects that the government is fast-tracking without any environmental impact assessment.
The concerns have been raised over and over in the House. The sad thing is that just when we finally get some strong environmental laws in place, including the Navigable Waters Protection Act, which has been in place for many decades, the federal Fisheries Act, which has been updated over time, and the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, the government moves forward and simply erases most of the laws that are in place to protect the public. Essentially the government is saying it has no interest in enforcing those important measures. Where is the real commitment of the federal government to enforce environmental law?
In its own Turning the Corner report, in its throne speech and in its budget, which has passed, there is absolutely no mention of support for clean energy or renewable power in its proposals for clean electricity. So where are the strong measures that in fact we will put in place to protect people's health and environment?
The 2009 budget was an assault on environmental protection, an assault on renewable power, an assault on scientific research, which was very critical to determining environmental cases, and an assault on the precautionary principle, which is exactly what the Navigable Waters Protection Act is all about and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
What is even more important is that in bringing forward those measures, those changes to our critical environmental laws without providing the opportunity for advance notice and comment by either regulated industry or the public, the very government that says it is getting serious about environment enforcement has abrogated international agreements.
It has abrogated the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation. That is the sidebar agreement to NAFTA, between Canada, the United States and Mexico. Provisions of that agreement require, under article 2, that the government has committed not to downgrade any environmental law for an economic benefit.
In article 3, the government commits to advance notice and comment to any concerned party on any proposed environmental policy.
So the government, by doing that action without even gazetting its regulation, by passing it without any opportunity of advance notice or comment, has also abrogated an international agreement with the United States of America, which it claims to be in co-operation with.
What is in the bill? There are a number of good measures in the bill, and there are also a number of significant measures that are not in the bill. I took the time to look at previous reports of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, which of course includes members from all parties.
The report from 1998 is very instructive. It provided almost 30 recommendations to improve the environmental enforcement system in Canada. There is something very profound and different about that particular parliamentary committee review. For the first time in history they actually brought in the regionally based enforcement officers to testify and to talk about what the real barriers were to effective enforcement of environmental law. Those recommendations are very instructive and I encourage members to reference that report by the parliamentary committee.
Some of those recommendations, to the credit of the government, have been acted on, some long overdue. The government has expanded the powers of enforcement officers, which is very appreciated by them. There is partial response to the recommendation to publish all enforcement data and to table that information in the House.
Provinces such as British Columbia have been doing that for quite some time. It regularly reports to the public online and provides written reports and tabling in the House so that all can know who is violating the law and what kind of action the government has been taking.
Unfortunately the government has chosen to implement only a very small part of that recommendation—the recommendation, by the way, that has been endorsed by many of the 100 member countries of the International Network for Environmental Compliance and Enforcement, which Canada participates in.
The government has agreed to table with the public and inform them of parties who are convicted. That is not really a great measure, because anyone can find out who is convicted, by looking at the court proceedings.
The measures it has not included are all violations, all warnings issued, all orders issued, all tickets issued, all agreements and all charges. Those are matters that the committee recommended and has not had action taken on.
The government has strengthened penalties, although there is no rationale for the minimum and maximum penalties, and I look forward to that description being provided in committee. I have yet to see the government table any kind of specific rationale from any kind of independent authority, or even its own government, explaining why it is that we have to shanghai the courts' powers to tell them what the minimum penalty and maximum penalty might be.
The maximum penalty has been increased to $6 million, but who is to say that is sufficient if an entire watershed is destroyed, or perhaps in a situation such as the Valdez, if that should occur in the Arctic? Where the entire food source of people in the Arctic or their ability to continue activities would be completely annihilated, it could be more in the order of billions of dollars lost. So I look forward to elaboration of that in committee and later in the House.
There is a broader array of enforcement tools, and orders are a welcome tool. However, the suspension of licences and permits is a complete mystery to me, because that is generally understood as being a provincial-level power. Perhaps that is what the Liberal critic was speaking to, that his party questions some of the constitutionality of the measures. I suppose the minister and the officials will come and defend that in committee.
The one really critical issue is fettering the discretion of the court. One of the measures in the bill actually fetters the discretion of the court. The court currently in the law has the power when it convicts a party to order that the convicted party actually compensate an affected community, or to actually award moneys to people who have been working to protect the environment and can further that cause. Regrettably, the government has decided that the court may only recommend to the minister those people it may compensate, which introduces some level of ministerial and political interference. It is basically recognized in the environmental enforcement profession as a completely inappropriate interference in the discretion of officers in enforcement. I look forward to the rationale for that provision.
What is not in the bill? A number of critical federal environmental laws are not mentioned, for some reason. The government has decided to consolidate and improve and provide a broader array of powers to a number of acts, but not the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, not the federal Fisheries Act, not the endangered species legislation, and not the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act. It is a mystery to me why on earth those acts are not included. In particular, the federal Fisheries Act is known to be the strongest federal law in existence for the protection of the environment. I look forward to an explanation as to why that is not included.
Among the significant enforcement measures not included as well is a provision that is in the federal Fisheries Act, and that is the right of anyone who initiates a private prosecution or brings forward the charges to receive half of any penalty imposed.
The parliamentary committee had actually recommended that as far back as 1998. I look forward to an explanation as to why they did not carry forward that long overdue amendment.
Again, where is the compliance enforcement policy for all these acts that are included in the bill? We need to understand how these new, innovative tools will be used, in particular the proposed new Environmental Violations Administrative Monetary Penalties Act, which has never been used. There is actually no explanation of how that will work in the array of tools.
Where are the long-promised strengthened standards and regulations for air pollutants, toxins and greenhouse gases? Without having regulations in place, frankly there is nothing to enforce. While the Canadian Environmental Protection Act has been on the books now for almost three decades, very little action has been taken by any of the governments in power to actually promulgate the regulations so we have binding standards that can be enforced.
Where, finally, is the tool to require an assessment of the efficacy of the array of tools? The Government of Canada has participated for the last 15 years in the coming together of the International Network for Environmental Compliance and Enforcement. One of the most important discussions that the enforcement agencies across the world have discussed is the need for clear indicators of effective enforcement action.
Article 5 of the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation under NAFTA obligates Canada to effectively enforce its environmental laws. It has yet to come forward with the clear criteria so that Canadians can determine whether we are effectively enforcing the environmental laws.
Those are essentially the comments I wish to make. I laud the government for bringing forward these improved measures, but I have also raised a number of serious questions that I look forward to having addressed either by the minister in the House on future readings of the bill or in committee.
