Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources
Issue 6 - Evidence - February 8, 2005
OTTAWA, Tuesday, February 8, 2005
The Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources, to which was referred Bill C- 7, to amend the Department of Canadian Heritage Act and the Parks Canada Agency Act, and to make amendments to other acts, met this day at 6:25 p.m.
Senator Tommy Banks (Chairman) in the Chair.
[English]
The Chairman: We are here for the purpose of examining Bill C-7. The minister is present. He is now unofficially, and will be made officially, responsible for Parks Canada, according to this bill.
Minister, would you like to begin with some opening remarks, explaining the bill? Most of us have done some homework on it, but we would like to hear from you before we go to questions.
The Honourable Stéphane Dion, Minister of the Environment: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This is a very technical bill.
[Translation]
I am here to speak about Bill C-7, An Act to amend the Department of Canadian Heritage Act and the Parks Canada Agency Act and to make related amendments to other Acts.
This bill gives legislative effect to the government reorganization that was announced in December 2003, as it affects Parks Canada, the Minister of Canadian Heritage and the Minister of the Environment.
In short, it carries out the legislative housekeeping required to recognize that control and supervision of the Parks Canada Agency were transferred, by Order in Council dated December 12, 2003, from the Minister of Canadian Heritage to the Minister of the Environment. As such, it deals with the machinery of government and does not contain any substantive policy provisions.
This transfer has maintained Parks Canada's organizational integrity so that it can carry out its roles and responsibilities for national parks, national marine conservation areas and national historic sites.
As Minister now responsible for the Parks Canada Agency, I am committed to ensuring that the Agency continues to fulfill its mandate to protect and present nationally significant examples of Canada's natural and cultural heritage.
[English]
Canada is blessed with exceptional natural and cultural treasures. We owe it to Canadians and to the rest of the world to protect them, and I will carry out my duty to do that. It is important for me, and I am pleased that the transfer is being done because I care very much about our parks and historic sites. It is not only a duty but a pleasure to be the minister responsible for them.
I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman. I respectfully encourage all members of the Senate to pass Bill C-7 and to support me in helping Parks Canada get on with the job.
I will be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
Senator Adams: Over a year ago, this committee dealt with Bill C-5, having to do with species at risk, most of them mammals. We now have this environmental bill before us. As the senator from Nunavut and as a member of the Fisheries Committee, I have a special interest in ensuring that passage of any bill will not affect the hunting rights of Aboriginal people.
As I understand it, Environment Canada will administer the Species at Risk Act. I want to assure our witnesses and the members of the committee that the people of Nunavut do not hunt any animal from a species that is at risk. However, the Nunavummiut have not been asked how they feel about Environment Canada taking over the Species at Risk Act. We want to be sure that they will follow the same procedures that were followed by Parks Canada.
Parks Canada has jurisdiction over many national parks that are close to Aboriginal communities. Will the Minister of Environment now have added responsibilities for the environment in Aboriginal areas? What will change or be improved with the passage of this bill?
Mr. Dion: Passage of Bill C-7 will not change anything other than to transfer an agency from one department to another department. If you are asking me if the existence of national parks helps Canada to cope with the problem of endangered species, the answer is yes. We have duties in every area in the territories, but the Crown has the additional duty to care for national park. We have expert biologists who look after that. To lose a species in the park is a humiliation. The people there do not want to see that.
I have been recently to Banff and Lake Louise. They have 60 grizzly bears there in the most beautiful parks in the world, and I think that the people of Parks Canada know each of those grizzlies by name. They care about each of them. When one dies, they want to know exactly how that happened. To them, they are like their children, albeit children that they care for from some distance. I had the pleasure of announcing trails for grizzlies. I hope it will be clear that the trails are not for tourists but for grizzlies. We must not mix the two trails.
If we had the same awareness of and commitment to the flora and fauna of our entire country as exists in Parks Canada, Canada would be in a very good situation to help these species.
Senator Adams: I am glad to hear you say that, Minister. Your assistant knows that there was some disagreement regarding Tuktut Nogait Park, which is located in the western Inuvialuit area. As you know, there is caribou migration through the park, and only Aboriginal hunters are allowed to shoot caribou in any national park. The borders of national parks are not easy to determine, and it may not be obvious to a hunter that he crossed over into a national park area. We want to be sure that in five or ten years Aboriginal hunting rights will not be affected by the passage of this bill and that we are still allowed to hunt caribou at all in those areas.
Mr. Dion: That will be the case.
The Chairman: As a supplementary to that, can anyone ever hunt in a national park?
Mr. Alan Latourelle, Chief Executive Officer, Parks Canada Agency: In terms of hunting in a national park, it is mostly Aboriginal hunting and it is to respect treaty rights or land claim agreements. The average Canadian cannot hunt in national parks.
The Chairman: Non-derogation and all those other things ensure that, where there are traditional hunting rights, notwithstanding that it is a park Aboriginal people have the right to hunt there?
Mr. Latourelle: That is correct in terms of all the parks established since 1982.
The Chairman: Senator Adams, does that answer your question?
Senator Adams: Yes, thank you.
The Chairman: You are right about those grizzlies, Minister. I know some park wardens. When a grizzly strays, becomes inured to human contact and becomes a problem because they do not understand that they are not supposed to be there because they may hurt someone or break into a camp, it is transported away two or three times. If it continues to come back, in order to save human life there is no choice but to kill the grizzly, and the wardens are very much affected by that. As you say, they regard them as their children.
Senator Milne: Mr. Dion, this is entirely a technical bill, and I do not have any problems with it whatsoever. You have been doing this job since you became the Minister of the Environment because the transfer predated you.
Mr. Dion: Exactly.
Senator Milne: We have been talking in this committee a great deal about how Canada will be able to meet our Kyoto agreements. One of the things that was mentioned in our report on Kyoto and in a letter to the Prime Minister was, since the environment is so closely connected with financial matters, how to get the Minister of Finance to sit as a permanent member on the Sustainability and Environment Committee of cabinet, and how to impress upon the Minister of Finance the importance of using the fiscal tools he has, which Canada has always been very reluctant to use. In order to meet our Kyoto objectives, I believe we will have to start using some of these fiscal tools. Are you thinking along that line and what are you intending to do about it?
Mr. Dion: I assume, since you are not asking a question about parks, it is because you support Bill C-7. In exchange I will answer your question.
Regarding the first point, the Minister of Finance is an ex officio member of every committee. He may attend any committee he chooses.
Senator Milne: I would like you to impress upon him the importance of this.
Mr. Dion: To me it is revolutionary that the Prime Minister decided that we would have this committee and that it would be chaired by the Minister of Industry. Also on the committee are the Ministers of Natural Resources, Fisheries, Health, Minister and Infrastructure. It is wonderful.
You asked about the Kyoto plan. As you know, we have had a plan since 2002.
Senator Milne: You do not have a plan yet.
Mr. Dion: Yes, we have had a plan since 2002, and we have done a lot. Much of what we have done cannot demonstrate results right away. For instance, we have now four times more capacity to produce ethanol. It will not decrease our megatons right away. We need to develop infrastructure to make it available at the pump. We are making progress, but it is not enough.
The Minister of Finance attended the House of Commons committee today. You may wish to invite him to appear here, too. When he was questioned about the plan, he said that the plan is good but not robust enough. He understands very well that we need to have a stronger plan. That is a commitment in the throne speech and, hopefully, we will be able to announce it to Canadians soon. At that time I would be pleased to come back to this committee to discuss the renewed plan that we will have.
Senator Milne: You said the Finance Minister says that it is not robust enough. Are they planning on making it more robust than is indicated in the leaked article that I read several weeks ago?
Mr. Dion: Do you really think I will comment about leaked documents, except to say that I am appalled that is happening. That should never happen. The plan will be commented upon and discussed when we have it. In the meantime, I cannot comment about documents that, to me, have no relevance.
Senator Milne: In the meantime, I am still free to say that we do not have a plan yet.
Mr. Dion: We have a plan. We have the 2002 plan which contains more than 140 measures. We are reviewing them in order to keep the ones that work, drop the ones that do not give the results we expected, and add new one that we think will give better results.
It is good to do that because addressing climate change is a new exercise for governments. Governments around the planet are learning how to do it. We are learning from each other and we realize that some approaches are better than others. With this in mind, it was written in the 2002 plan that it is a plan to be revisited, and it will be revisited in the coming weeks in a way that will galvanize Canadians. It will give Canadians the drive to fulfil by far the most demanding target of all the Kyoto countries.
Senator Milne: I wish you luck.
Senator Cochrane: Last week we heard from a gentleman by the name of Pierre Sadik from the Green Budget Coalition. We were discussing with him where he sees roadblocks, because he is not satisfied that the Kyoto Protocol is starting to result in improvements. He was asked to identify where he sees impediments to things that should be happening. He said that the roadblock to things happening is not the bureaucracy but the Minister's office and the top officials.
Mr. Dion: Was he commenting about climate change specifically?
Senator Cochrane: He was commenting about the Kyoto Protocol.
Mr. Dion: I was in France to meet my counterpart a couple of months ago. He told me that he was not sure that he would reach his Kyoto target, and I told him that his target is ten times less demanding than mine. We need to reduce by at least 240 megatons. Our economy is resource driven, and that will not change. Our economy is energy exporting, and that will not change.
In 1990, when the clock started, the oil was only in the sand in Alberta. The oil sands is now a booming industry that is creating a lot of emissions. Some countries are closer than us to their targets because they are de-industrializing. Those jobs and activities are going to countries that do not have the same technological capacity and that create a lot of emissions. Canada wants to reach our target, as demanding as it may be, but in a way that will also strengthen the economy and give long-term results.
It is all a challenge, but I am very confident that Canadians will be able to meet this challenge, as we have done with the ozone, acid rain and smog. We speak a lot about smog these days, but most of it is a result of an old practice that has returned, that is, people are using wood fires more than ever. However, emissions from vehicles have decreased by 90 per cent in the last decade in Canada.
We are making a lot of progress. With regard to climate change, we need to improve the plan we have now. It is understandable that the 2002 plan was not the perfect plan, because we need to learn how to deal with new phenomena.
I am very confident that when we release the enhanced plan we are working on, Mr. Pierre Sadik will be part of the solution and will see how we can work together with the industry, NGOs, the provinces and all citizens.
Senator Cochrane: I have heard recent news reports that the oil industries and other large industries are contemplating asking the government to pay for the Kyoto clean up from the royalties and taxes that they have to pay. What are your views on that?
Mr. Dion: They will have a target, as they have known for years. Their targets will be fair and achievable and will lead to innovative technology. They will acquire new markets as a result. At the end of the day, it will be good for the environment.
We know that sustainable environment drives innovation and technology. Countries that bring the environment and the economy together will be the most competitive in this new industrial revolution.
We are working on a way to request changes from industry, but in a way that will make industry more competitive in Canada.
Senator Cochrane: Will these changes come through the royalties and taxes that they pay to the federal government?
Mr. Dion: It will be through a target that we will have to achieve to decrease the intensity of gas emissions. We have had a lot of discussion with them about how that can be done.
The Chairman: We have ranged farther a field than originally we planned, but you seem, so far, willing. Some senators may have other questions about Bill C-7, as do I, but I would like to pursue the question that Senator Cochrane about the modified process that you are talking about. With respect to what are traditionally called the large industrial emitters, a long time ago we asked for and were given assurances by various ministers that when it comes to the measurement of either the intensity or the amount of those emissions and the success that the respective industries have in reducing them, efforts that they have made in the past will not be forgotten and that good guys will not be penalized by having to jump through a hoop that is made smaller by the fact that they have already been responsible. Will that continue to be the case? Will improvements that an industrial emitter has made in the past not fall off the paper when it comes to measuring what they have done?
Mr. Dion: Yes, certainly. We will find a way to take that into account, but at the end of the day we need to deliver a certain number of megatons, because otherwise we will not reach our Kyoto target. We will see what we can do with the ones who started first, but what is important is what they will achieve now. We appreciate what they have done, but it will not give them a free lunch with regard to what we need to achieve in the coming years.
The Chairman: Will their lunch cost less than the lunch of the guy who has not yet anything?
Mr. Dion: We are looking for a way to give each of them the capacity to reach their targets without penalizing their competitive capacity. However, the difficulty with the early movers is when you start to measure. If you start this year, you do not take into account what they have done the year before. One day you need to state the target and they must achieve it.
I have visited Europe to see how they did it there. The advice they gave me is to discuss the targets but, when the time comes to finally determine the targets, not to reopen negotiations because, if we do, we will go no where. The industry will deliver the solution if the target is reasonable. They may complain a bit, but once they know it is the target they will not want to tell their investors that they cannot reach it. They will find a way to achieve the targets.
We are very open to giving them a lot of flexibility in the means by which they can achieve them. They can do things in-house, that is, within their facilities. There is also the capacity for domestic offsets such as having more wind power plants or investing in initiatives that may help the country reach its target. They may trade, that is, they may have international offsets, as long as it is not hot air, as long as it is greening credits from Kyoto. Also, even though the Kyoto Protocol does not recognize it, we will look for ways to give them capacity to invest in technologies. They will have a panoply of possibilities to reach a reasonable but demanding target.
[Translation]
Senator Chaput: Mr. Minister, I must tell you how delighted I am that you are now in the Environment portfolio. When you accept responsibility for a department, you do so with passion and conviction and you certainly leave your mark.
My question concerns the Parks Canada Agency which now comes under your watch. This agency is responsible for our parks, our historic buildings and our national historic sites, all of which are a tribute to our heritage and to what Canada truly stands for as a nation.
Now that Environment Canada is responsible for Parks Canada, is the agency still subject to the provisions of the Official Languages Act? Will it continue to offer services in both official languages as was the case when it was under Heritage Canada's control?
Mr. Dion: Thank you very much for your question. As you know, at one point in time, in my previous portfolio, I took on responsibility for official languages. I will remain true to this cause and Parks Canada will serve as an example of an agency that respects official languages. If ever you hear anything to the contrary, I urge you to bring the case to my attention, because this issue is very important to me. I do believe Parks Canada has a good reputation, as far as complying with the Official Languages Act is concerned.
[English]
Senator Kenny: This bill proposes a government reorganization. In the process of the reorganization, was any consideration given to including Gatineau Park within the ambit of Parks Canada?
Mr. Dion: There is a legal technicality about Gatineau Park. Mr. Latourelle will explain.
Mr. Latourelle: The bill transfers responsibility for the agency as a whole to the Minister of the Environment. Gatineau Park falls under the National Capital Commission, a different organization, so Gatineau Park is still the responsibility of the National Capital Commission.
Senator Kenny: I understood that. That is not my question. I have been on this committee for 20 years and we have been following parks issues for 20 years.
If this bill passes, your new responsibilities will go right into downtown Ottawa. The Rideau Canal becomes part of your responsibilities. It runs right through the National Capital. The corner of Sussex and Daly almost became part of your responsibilities when we were trying to avoid having condominiums in the middle of the City of Ottawa.
Mr. Dion: I am trying to understand why it was not done, because I am aware of the request for Gatineau Park to be a national park. I received a note a few weeks ago which indicated that there is a problem of proximity with other parks.
Mr. Latourelle: I can speak from the Parks Canada perspective in terms of whether it would meet the requirement under National Parks Act to be a national park, although the responsibility to determine who is responsible for it clearly rests with the Prime Minister and not with the agency.
In the national parks system there are 39 natural regions. The objective in the system plan, which has been publicly endorsed, is to have one park for each of those 39 natural regions. The region that the Gatineau Park is in is fairly broad and already includes parks. From memory, I think it is la Mauricie National Park.
Senator Kenny: With due respect, I was not curious about Parks Canada's policy. Your policy does not apply to historic places; it does not apply to the Rideau Canal; but you still have them.
Mr. Minister, when the matter was considered at the political level, was there consideration of whether Parks Canada would be a better steward of Gatineau Park than the NCC, which is principally a development driven organization that is focussed on urban issues relating to the city?
Mr. Dion: Is there a sense that Gatineau Park is not well managed?
Senator Kenny: There is certainly a sense that it is a singularity and that Parks Canada, in spite of being inordinately under-funded and in spite of being the victim of any number of ministers creating new parks without new staff or new funding to manage them, has a much better reputation than the NCC. Many people would be much more comfortable with the knowledge that Gatineau Park was being managed with the same standards, objectives and approach that Parks Canada has.
Mr. Dion: I will review that again to see if I should put it at the top of the 2,000 priorities of national parks. I have received requests to create parks everywhere in Canada. Also, I have proof that the parks we have today are not as well funded as they should be. My welcome gift as Minister of the Environment was a strike in the national parks.
I will look at that again, senator, to see whether it makes sense to transfer the responsibility to Parks Canada, how much it would cost and what the benefits would be. We will look at that carefully.
Senator Kenny: With respect, with all your priorities, you do have a reputation of being good at multi-tasking.
Mr. Dion: I am, I hope.
Senator Kenny: In terms of what it would cost, the taxpayers are already paying now, so t is really a technical and not a substantive issue. We support the NCC and every activity that takes place in the park now. Knowing the NCC, they are probably spending much more per acre on Gatineau Park than Parks Canada is spending on the parks they have.
Mr. Dion: It would be a transfer.
Senator Spivak: Minister, as you can see, there is a lot of corporate memory here in terms of parks. The point with respect to Gatineau Park is that it is not protected. I have heard from local people here in Ottawa that there is some movement to make it a protected area, if not a national park. I am wondering if that might be a solution of some kind.
The point is that it is not protected and it should be. What is your reaction?
Mr. Dion: My answer is the same as to Senator Kenny. I will look at this again very carefully.
Senator Spivak: Thank you.
Senator Kenny: Mr. Chairman, I feel that I have inadvertently overlooked a Senate rule. I have to declare an interest. I do own property in the park.
The Chairman: It is very good of you to bring it up because, if it becomes a park, you will not own property in it.
Senator Kenny: That does not trouble me; but it occurred to me that I had not declared that interest and I would like the record to show that.
Mr. Dion: It will not change my determination.
The Chairman: It is on the record.
Senator Kenny: I am not alone, by the way. There are people down the road who have a place in the park too.
The Chairman: No doubt. I wish I did.
Senator Kenny: I am talking about 24 Sussex.
Senator Milne: Senator Kenny mentioned the budgetary problems with Parks Canada. This fact sheet that we received on Bill C-7 says that Parks Canada's organizational integrity has been maintained. However, it is more than just integrity that needs to be maintained; it is an increase in the amount of money to run the parks properly and bring them up to the standard where they really should be for all Canadians.
Do you anticipate some budgetary help? Have you asked for it?
Mr. Dion: I have made all the requests I thought would be helpful and we will see what happens in the budget.
Senator Milne: Keep your fingers crossed then.
Does the designation of a river as a heritage river come under Parks Canada as well?
Mr. Dion: Yes.
Senator Milne: Why is the Ottawa River not designated as a heritage river?
Mr. Latourelle: The heritage river system is a community-based approach. Local communities of interest get together and make a submission. The Minister of the Environment actually designates at the end, based on local submissions.
Senator Milne: With regard to the Ottawa River, I do not know who would organize something like that other than the City of Ottawa, but they deal with just a minor part of the Ottawa River. This was the transportation highway that opened up Canada. Our first international trade item was squared timbers floating down the Ottawa River. It is time that someone starts to think about designating the river on which the capital city of Canada is located as a heritage river.
Mr. Dion: We will take your suggestion.
The Chairman: Would the fact that it flows through the national capital make it sufficiently different so that the impetus for such a move could come from the government rather than the community?
Mr. Dion: I am not sure, but I am sure that if we show an interest, the community will show an interest too.
Senator Kenny: Could the minister describe what restrictions or changes there are when a river is declared to be a heritage river?
Mr. Latourelle: There are no significant changes. We ensure that there is a management plan that covers the area being designated. In terms of stopping certain activities, for example, that is looked at through the submission process to ensure that the river system has integrity.
Senator Kenny: What experience does the department have in dealing with rivers in which two provinces have shared jurisdiction for the environment and which serve as a border between them?
Mr. Latourelle: I am not aware of that situation, although may have occurred. We would be pleased to provide information on that to the committee.
The Chairman: I am not sure that there is any other river that is a border. There are interprovincial rivers, but I do not know if there is one that forms a border.
Senator Kenny: I suspect there are places where rivers form parts of borders.
Senator Angus: I want to revert to the subject that was raised earlier. In your response to the chairman you alluded briefly to the issue of credits. There are rumours that the original Kyoto targets may be beyond our grasp and therefore, with February 16 coming upon us very quickly, Canada is going to try to meet the targets by engaging in trade in environmental credits, particularly the big oil energy people. By spending money to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions in other jurisdictions, they will in effect be doing something good.
Will that actually happen? I do not fully understand how these credits would work. Could you give confirm that is the case. I believe you did say something about this subject at another committee this afternoon.
Mr. Dion: I do not rule out the possibility that we will use international credits. It is a matter of flexibility. However, we will never use false measures that would not help the planet to decrease greenhouse gas emissions. For instance, in 1990, Russia had a stable, although not great, economy. Thereafter, various political and economic changes decreased their productivity and they have many credits to buy and in order to reach our target, we may buy their credits. However, our plan will make it an impossibility for the government or Canadian companies to buy credits that would not have a positive effect on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.
If we bought credits from the Russians, they would use the money to rebuild their economy, because their plan is to double their GDP in 10 years, which is good, but if they do not change the structure of their economy, they will create a lot of greenhouse emissions and we will have not have solved anything by this transfer of credits. The plan will require that any trade of this kind must be for greening credits, recognized as such by the Europeans, who have a system now, and the World Bank, which is working on something too.
Senator Angus: Could you give one good concrete example of this?
Mr. Dion: For example, if a big landfill in the City of St. Petersburg is putting a lot of methane into the atmosphere and we go there and help them to deal with that problem, we gain greening credits. We are helping them; they are helping us.
I see economic advantages in that for the economy, too, because we want to be strong in these markets. We know that China will use coal. These one billion human beings will not have sufficient electricity only through wind power or other green power. They need coal, and they have enough coal for the next 750 years. They have told us that they will use coal regardless of what Kyoto may say. Imagine that the University of Regina in Saskatchewan invents an affordable process to make clean coal energy. Imagine what it would mean for Canada to be able to export that technology everywhere, including to China.
When you address coal, you address not only greenhouse gases but also mercury. The mercury we have in Canada is coming more and more from the Pacific Ocean, from India and China. If we take a good approach to these trading credits, it will be good for the economy as well as for the environment.
Senator Angus: Therefore, under the Canadian policy going forward it will be controlled.
Mr. Dion: That will not be the main part of our plan. The main part of our plan will be in Canada. If we trade, it will be with Canadian technology. It will be a demonstration of our capacity and it will help us to conquer new markets, and not only in the United States as it is now, although there are many things to do with the U.S. about climate change.
I was in California recently where I saw many companies, such as Ballard, doing great things with hydrogen. However, we know that we need to be stronger in Brazil, India, China and Russia, in all the emerging economies that in the future will be bigger than the G7 countries together.
Senator Kenny: Brazil is running on sugar cane to a large extent. Can you tell us what we might be doing there?
Mr. Dion: I have read their MOU in support of the clean environment mechanism, which is one mechanism that Kyoto offered. They want to trade with us on that. They have huge problems to solve. Many of their facilities pollute a great deal. They are not short of ideas on how we may help them. They have much more to do than we have. They would be pleased to have the transfer of technologies, which Kyoto offered. It is a way to do more than we do through CIDA, and also to make money.
Senator Kenny: We have historic and long-standing relations with that country.
Mr. Dion: We will improve them through the Kyoto mechanism if we use it properly. It will be one part of the plan.
I am sure that Mr. Wilfert can comment on the capacity to trade.
Mr. Bryon Wilfert, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment: Mr. Chairman, I am an expert on Asia, not on Brazil. With our clean water and clean air there is no question that Canadian technology is in great demand in Asia. We could make a minimum of $200 million fulfilling the needs of the Japanese, particularly in the areas of contaminated soil, because hey must have certificates to show that land is completely contamination free before they can sell it.
As the minister has indicated, it will be part of our robust agenda to ensure that the greening not only in Canada but around the world takes place with Canadian companies competing effectively in the area of green technology. That will also be part of the strategy.
One can practically walk on the rivers in Bangkok. There is no question that Asian states and other places need our technology. They are crying out for it. Because Canadians have the ability and because other countries like the approach that we take, there is great opportunity for us. As the minister has said, competitiveness and the environment are not mutually exclusive. They can, work very effectively together.
The Chairman: Thank you, Minister and Mr. Wilfert.
The committee adjourned.