Environment committee  Maybe Mr. Lee would be better positioned to speak to this, but I can tell you that Ontario municipalities alone spend $150 million on the blue box program. That is to try to deal with the recycling of materials, including plastics, which, as he pointed out, often contaminate othe

Environment committee  Through you, Mr. Chair, the federal government needs to ensure that Canada's economy will be up to supporting workers in the green transition. For what that means in concrete terms, Environmental Defence has worked with economist Jim Stanford on a report that I'm happy to share w

Environment committee  I'm not sure Canada can really boast of having better environmental protections than many countries out there. We've not been a leader on climate change. We're not a leader on plastics. The Alberta government has just handed more than $400 million to a virgin plastics producer th

Environment committee  I think you won't be surprising, shocking or scaring any Canadian when you tell them that plastic is toxic to the environment. They've been telling us that; they've been telling pollsters that, and they've been telling politicians that. It is the most evident thing that we can sa

Environment committee  Thank you for your question. I will answer it in English. It's a little easier after all the research I've done in English. We've heard a lot in this study about potential job losses, and we've heard some today about potential job losses related to the bans on single-use plasti

Environment committee  Unfortunately, Canadian public coffers are paying subsidies both for the production of plastics and also for these untested and, frankly, not environmentally sustainable processes to try to deal with plastics at the end of life, usually through some manner of burning them or ther

Environment committee  Obviously, governments can help support the transition to the kind of circular economy infrastructure that's going to be needed, but we believe producers should be responsible. We agree with the assessment by the region of Peel that producers should be primarily responsible for m

Environment committee  Thank you very much, and thanks to the committee for the invitation. Environmental Defence is a Canadian environmental charity. We work on a number of federal and provincial environmental issues, including protecting Canada's fresh water, fighting climate change, urging sustaina