Transport committee  For the noise, that's a consultative committee. It's not part of the management of those airports. Some of the airports you named aren't necessarily part of the national airport system. They wouldn't have that particular requirement, so there is no obligation on their part. I can

Transport committee  You mean where there's a requirement to have one?

Transport committee  The airport's responsibility is to engage all the stakeholders, which are typically the municipalities and anybody affected around the airport. There's usually a citizen component to that. Nav Canada is usually part of it. Transport Canada participates on the larger airports. Cer

Public Accounts committee  I'm not sure I have the specific numbers. I would like to clarify that the comments made by the Auditor General were appropriate in the sense that we were not managing it well. A lot of work that has gone on, particularly in the last year, was to put in place a consistent appro

Public Accounts committee  I think the example is a very good one. The emphasis is on being proactive. In the past the systems were reactive: operators would react to a problem, and we would also react to that. When it came to our level, our expectation is they're proactive in managing safety along the li

Public Accounts committee  Where it's already been applied in the sectors, we've had feedback. The companies recognize that it's good for business as well as good for safety. Things like workers' compensation have had relief from payments for a couple of years because their workplace safety has gone up.

Public Accounts committee  The comment I'd offer is that the organization is 1,400 people altogether. With a natural turnover rate, it ends up giving you a significant number. In one area, during the course of 12 months we recruited 36 people and we lost 37, so there is active recruitment going on. The bab

Public Accounts committee  We've developed a surveillance plan that looks at the intervals and also the right tools to use. Maybe you don't need a major activity, such as an assessment, a program validation inspection, or a process inspection for the very simple operations. The five-year plan we've put in

Public Accounts committee  We've found that in dealing with the companies and looking at the systems and talking to staff, we've learned a lot more about the culture of the company. This has given us insight into that proactive piece, as opposed to focusing purely on the compliance piece, which was the pas

Public Accounts committee  That's a work in progress. Certainly looking at the surveillance program is the focus of the quality assurance we're introducing this year to see how well people are using it, and then the results. We're focused on the first two pieces at the moment, but certainly we have a lot o

Public Accounts committee  We were certainly at the forefront in introducing the concept. We slowed things down a bit in 2009, as a conscious decision, to make sure that we were ready for the initiatives that Mr. McDonald just described, but we're doing a lot of work with those other authorities. They're l

Public Accounts committee  In areas where we haven't regulated SMS to date, we find companies that are already doing it, particularly those in Canada. There's a lot of work in the energy sector. You can't get a contract in the energy sector unless you have an SMS in place, irrespective of our regulations;

Public Accounts committee  I think the energy sector is one of the leads, and worldwide you will find the same thing, so for Canadian companies working on contracts in other parts of the world, exactly the same requirements are in place. More and more businesses.... The medical industry is moving into that

Public Accounts committee  There was a mention in the introductory remarks today about some of the work we're doing in the enforcement area. That's precisely to make sure that our enforcement tools are properly aligned with our inspection tools so that when we see a risk, we will have consistency across th

Public Accounts committee  The statistics are not showing any different trend this year. The accident rate is low. Even a couple of accidents late in the year can make a difference to that number, but at the moment we're not seeing any significant change this year compared with last year.