Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  To be honest about it, I think most of that cost that I've just mentioned is probably required regardless. You need to do those kinds of studies. You need to do the work ahead of time. A big thing though is, if you take four years instead of let's say, two years—I'm talking about a large project—then you're probably incurring $30 million extra that you wouldn't have had to have in terms of process costs, plus you're accumulating a lot of interest.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  I'm going to avoid any political comparisons, but I will say that the Canadian hydro is spread out across Canada in virtually all jurisdictions.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  I think two years is sufficient in virtually all cases. I have had many friends and colleagues comment on that question. I think the critical thing you have to start with is that when you are doing a review of a major project and you have two years, you are not trying to do the studies that are required.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes. The clock doesn't work until you provide the information required. If you don't, you are asked for more. On your second question, having timelines is a good idea. We've had projects that have gone for four years—very clean, good projects. There was a lot of spinning of wheels, people changing jobs, and having to redo things.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  First of all, it's much higher than 90% in Quebec. Secondly, on the EA process, if you're developing a project worth $6 billion, there's probably $1 billion of interest in there. You're probably spending $300 million to $500 million on the environmental studies, consultations, and engineering required just to get through the whole process.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Movement to having a consolidation of aboriginal consultation in one place or one person makes a lot of sense. We do our projects, as is quite typical now across the country, in some form of partnership with the local aboriginal communities and we work quite closely with them. We hear continual complaints about consultation overload, confusion, or they deal with people who really don't know how to do consultation properly.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes, they will help that

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes. We've had projects—for instance, the Wuskwatim project, which is actually just under construction—where we've had both federal and provincial processes. In both processes we were asked much the same questions, and had duplicative processes. One process could have done the job just as well.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  The way we understand it, now when we go ahead with new dams, there will be a greater requirement for them than there would have been in the past. We're not sure what's going to happen with existing dams. That will depend on the individual circumstances, I guess.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  There certainly can be an appearance of conflict at times. I think that question is a good one. Our experience is that the provincial fisheries people are the ones who are closer to what is happening to fish in their jurisdiction. In most provinces, if not all, it's the fisheries departments that are charged with the management of the fishing quotas—I'm talking about fresh water.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  I think when you're referring to my comment on enhancing, I was referring to the Species at Risk Act. The provision you're talking about is in the Fisheries Act. The comment we were making is that we see—and we had a lot of discussions in various forums, whether the species at risk advisory committee or other places—that there is now no good opportunity to encourage industry to focus on overall stewardship rather than just on the individual compliance mechanisms that are in SARA.

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Absolutely. There's a lot of opportunity there, and I think it's very positive. If you have the bigger utilities, whether crown or privately owned, with a number of hydro facilities, they're very familiar with it, and they do a lot of the research. Frankly, what's happened....

Subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Finance on Bill C-38 committee  Yes, this is a new provision that does affect us. There has been, in recent years, an increasing interest and determination by DFO on a policy front that fish passage is something it increasingly looks for, but it wasn't something for which it had the same legislative teeth, perhaps.