Natural Resources committee  I was fired before I know what happened to them in that area. They never asked for a final licence when I was there. They were still in the commissioning phase but having problems, in terms of that.

Natural Resources committee  I heard Mr. Waddington's presentation, and certainly he was in the AECL advisory group at that time so he would have some sense of that. From the viewpoint of the commission, Mr. Waddington was absolutely correct: there were lots of options being looked at, and the commission wo

Natural Resources committee  No, not at all.

Natural Resources committee  I think all the survey data, and the data not only in Canada but everywhere else, would say that yes, they can't survive without it. One of the operators calls it “the licence from the public”. Don't worry about the licence from the regulator; if you don't have the licence from t

Natural Resources committee  I can only speak about the time that I was the regulator. One of the biggest challenges we had was to get both AECL and the government to understand that AECL was just another licensee and should be treated as such. They had to meet all the requirements. They didn't get any speci

Natural Resources committee  I have no survey data on the confidence of Canadians. I will say to you that I was absolutely blown away by the support I got from thousands of Canadians from all over Canada. For the majority of the licensees, it was important to have a strong, independent regulator that their c

Natural Resources committee  Yes. When my renewal came up in 2000, it was clear that AECL had tried to influence matters so that I wouldn't be renewed. I confronted the president at the time and asked what was going on. He said they didn't think I was friendly enough to them. As it turned out, the minister o

Natural Resources committee  I think the thrust of the MAPLE 1 and 2 really made sense in that you had a dedicated set of reactors. One could back up the second reactor set. The vision was that it be owned by the private sector, and you would have a clear idea of how much it cost to produce them. I think tha

Natural Resources committee  That's an interesting question, actually. I think they're cognizant of what they could contribute. Are they very interested in transparency and trying to get people on their side? To a certain extent, yes, but in terms of a complete, full-court press in terms of being interested

Natural Resources committee  My answer will be a bit different. I think we actually don't know how big a hole there is going to be when the NRU is closed down as a research reactor. My view was that when we lost the position of chief science advisor--Arthur Carty had occupied that spot--we really lost the ab

Natural Resources committee  Clearly it's the government's decision. I think the act, by the way, is going to have to come back to Parliament to be looked at with regard to the future of AECL. But clearly it's the government's prerogative what they wish to do in terms of suggesting changes to Parliament. Sp

Natural Resources committee  This happened just in the last couple of years when it came to the point of commissioning. Clearly, AECL had significant issues before that, but really, they were issues to do with what we considered to be a poor quality of management--this is all recorded in the CNSC proceedings

Natural Resources committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the question. First of all, if there was any tiny bit of a silver lining I felt when I got fired, it was that perhaps people were going to pay attention to this issue and would not ignore the issue anymore. I say that because it was really clear at

Natural Resources committee  Good afternoon. Mr. Chair and members , I would like to thank you for inviting me to appear before your committee today. My name is Linda Keen. I am appearing as a private citizen today. I would like to give a little bit of background, for those people who haven't met me and