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I call this meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting number 95 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.
Pursuant to the order of reference of Tuesday, September 26, 2023, the committee is meeting to resume clause-by-clause consideration of Bill .
Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely by using the Zoom application.
Colleagues, to help us once again with the clause-by-clause consideration of Bill , I'd like to welcome back our witnesses.
Joining us once again from the Department of Transport, we have Sonya Read, director general, marine policy; Heather Moriarty, director, ports policy; Rachel Heft, manager and senior counsel, transport and infrastructure legal services; and Amy Kaufman, counsel.
Also, once again, we have our legislative clerk, Monsieur Philippe Méla. Welcome back.
Colleagues, we left off with new BQ-5.
I see a hand raised by Ms. Zarrillo.
Ms. Zarrillo, if you would like to get us started on that discussion, by all means, the floor is yours.
To quote Mr. Badawey, isn't this what's already being done? I think that's the point we've been trying to make now for several meetings. It's that the government has made this commitment to phase out thermal coal by 2030, however you want to define that, whether January 1 or December 31, 2030. I note the new date now.
Again, the concern continues to be that by putting an amendment.... Also, we just heard that Transport Canada doesn't have the authority or isn't the right government department to ensure that workers are protected, etc., which is why, I think, we've been arguing that this Bill is not the right piece of legislation to try to shoehorn this prohibition into.
This work is being done. The negotiations are taking place. The consultations are taking place among the affected groups to ensure that there is a transition plan and that they are working with Environment Canada and the natural resources department to develop plans that will respect contracts, respect workers, respect international contracts and law and trade agreements and all the things we've raised in the last number of meetings.
This subamendment talks about “(1.4) if no regulations are made under subsection (1.1) within 48 months”. It's essentially saying that the Governor in Council, the cabinet, must do it. If they don't, there's this accountability function. If they don't do this within four years, we're now advancing the transition by a number of years. If this law comes into force in 2024, which we assume it will, by 2028, according to this amendment, there must be regulations in place or the cabinet or the government of the day will have to table in the House and the Senate the reasons that they have not got the job done, so we're talking now about 2028 being this accelerated transition phase again.
Then going back to (1.3), it says it must be done by 2030. With this prohibition tacked onto this bill, as I read it, we are talking about any time between royal assent and 2030, with a slap on the wrist, a public humiliation or an explanation before the House and Senate as to why it hasn't already been banned. Once again, we are talking about accelerating the phase-out by a number of years with this amendment. It doesn't force the government to do it within 48 months, but it does create an incentive to accelerate it faster than had been laid out by the government.
I think it's a nice try to try to let the workers know that they will be consulted, which is part of the regulatory process already, so I would say that this is redundant in parts and certainly doesn't provide the protection that workers are actually looking for, which is that they will be given the time frame that has been promised to them to make that transition from thermal coal. In the case of Westshore Terminals, as we've talked about, it's to potash.
My first concern is that this subamendment is pushing this forward and accelerating it by a significant percentage. Going from six or seven years to four is not insignificant.
The second point is that there appear to be several other amendments that are going to deal with the first part of this. I'm not sure how to handle this, Mr. Chair, and how it works when an individual who has proposed an amendment that is now being subamended has now proposed more amendments.
Perhaps Mr. Barsalou-Duval can chat about his plan here. It appears as though we're now subamending an amendment that itself may be withdrawn or amended. By the end of this, I think we're going to really have to pause for a moment and get a very clear picture of what we're actually considering at this point, given the flurry of back-and-forth that it appears will happen on this section.
We continue to believe that the amendment and the subamendment are unnecessary and that this work is already under way. We've been told it's under way by both the union and the company. I have no reason to doubt them on that.
We are now into I don't know how many meetings in discussing this. I think it's misplaced to try to insert this ban into a transport bill when it should be dealt with by Environment and Climate Change Canada or NRCan.
So far, we've had a lot of discussion about amendment BQ‑5. Much has been said, and I don't intend to add any more. However, I would like to commend the NDP, who have put forward a subamendment with the aim of achieving the maximum compromise possible, in order to gain the agreement of many members of the committee. I would therefore like to salute this approach.
What I see is that amendment BQ‑5 is weakened. Personally, I consider it urgent to deal with the coal issue. In my opinion, the 2030 deadline mentioned in the roadmap is too late. Nevertheless, we must ensure that the government keeps its promises. I'm fully convinced of the relevance of amendment BQ‑5, as originally tabled, and of the modified version, if any. It's better than nothing at all. As long as it remains a promise, it won't be enough. At least, if it's enshrined in law, it will have a little more force. It will be a step in the right direction.
As for the subsequent amendments that have been submitted to the committee, these are not subamendments, but amendments, and they will have to be debated. In my opinion, unless our legislative clerk says otherwise, the committee will be able to debate them at the appropriate time. I'm realistic about the outcome, but I think everyone wants to move the bill forward. We need a better framework, and it will be essential, it seems to me. We need to be sure that other measures will eventually be taken. It remains to be seen what the opinion of the committee members is on these amendments.
Right now, we need to discuss Mr. Bachrach's amendment, which was introduced by Ms. Zarrillo. It's time we discussed it so that we can finish studying Bill . That said, for my part, I still see this as a weakening of amendment BQ‑5.
I don't intend to drag out the discussion on the subject forever, but I wanted to mention that it would be better to keep the original version, in my opinion.
We've seen over the course of a number of meetings now this whole discussion, and various subamendments, and there have been a number of versions of new amendments today. I think, as we've said from the outset on Bill , that this bill is the wrong place for the intended policy being put forward in this amendment.
This is a bill that's about ports and about supply chains. We have here an effort to accomplish something that the Government of Canada has said it's already going to accomplish by the end of the decade. The players who are involved in that are already working towards it in an orderly fashion. We're proposing an abrupt change to that or an accelerated change to that. Pick any of the amendments or subamendments; I don't think any of them bring any clarity.
Mr. Badawey asked some good questions to the witnesses, who confirmed that a lot of this stuff is already taking place under other auspices. It's like we're changing the rules of the game in the seventh inning with 350 union jobs on the line at Westshore Terminals, ILWU jobs. We don't know the number at Prince Rupert. We don't know the number at the port of Thunder Bay. We have 400 workers in Hinton, Alberta, who are impacted by this. I learned over the weekend there are another 150 to 250 direct jobs in Edson, Alberta, that are impacted by this.
That's already a significant number of good, well-paying jobs in the Canadian economy. Those are the direct jobs, not the indirect jobs, for something that doesn't belong in this bill and that is already being pursued by Environment and Climate Change Canada.
We're saying we should stick to the rules of the game as they were set out. Let's work towards an orderly transition for 2030. Let's leave it at that.
Thank you.
I really appreciate the dialogue today, because I think that what I'm hearing is really almost a consensus. I know that there were some comments today that maybe this bill isn't the right place because this is already happening. If consultation with labour and consultation around fairness with workers is already happening, then this is the place to put it.
In another bill that I worked on that was on the Canada disability benefit, we extended a lot of trust to the Liberal government. We extended a lot of trust, but at the end of the day, we now can't seem to get the needle to move with the Canada disability benefit because it's not written in legislation.
I think this bill is a good place to put in some language around consultation and what needs to be involved in that consultation. There's been agreement by all parties that this is already happening, but we just want to have it on paper. I think that's good transparency. It's good use of legislation to make governments accountable.
It will be up to the government at any point. They can phase out any time they want to, from now to 2030. We just want to make sure that it's done in consultation with the labour groups.
I'd like to see this move ahead quickly as well, like others on this committee.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate it.
I just want to echo the comments from many of our colleagues here this afternoon. I very much agree with Mr. Badawey. I believe most of this work is already being done. When I look at proposed paragraph 120(3)(1.2), I have to ask the question: Doesn't the government already consult with the unions?
I'm quite sure that if we look at the last number of strikes at the port of Vancouver, of course we'll see that the government already consults with the unions. I don't know why we would infuse this legislation with something that's already happening. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
In all my conversations with the ILWU on the 350 jobs, and that's not talking about the jobs in Thunder Bay and Alberta and so on and so forth, not that those aren't important jobs.... I don't see why this subamendment is going to make a whole lot of impact going forward. I think the conversation needs to be about 2030 and ensuring that these folks with the good-paying jobs have security through until 2030. I think that's what needs to be the conversation. Accelerating the phase-out, I think, is an issue. I believe it to be an issue.
Let's get a plan to ensure that thermal coal is phased out by 2030, but let's not accelerate it. Let's ensure that folks can have some kind of job security going forward.
Mr. Chair, in my opinion and my opinion only, I believe most of this work either has been done or is being done as we speak. I don't think we need a subamendment to this effect.
Thank you, Chair.
Given the passage of amendment BQ‑5, as amended by the NDP, the new version is a weakened version of what was originally intended. The original intention was to ban the export and import of thermal coal from Canadian ports within four or five years at most, depending on when the regulations came into force. Now, according to the amended version of the BQ‑5 amendment, it appears that the government's promise to ban the export of thermal coal by 2030 at the latest will be maintained.
However, people have made certain points during the committee's recent meetings. This led me to reflect and propose amendment BQ‑5.1. Some people wanted to maintain the 2030 date to give people in the sector predictability and especially to keep jobs in the sector for as long as possible. I understand the idea behind that. However, I believe we will still have to eliminate the export of thermal coal eventually. That's what the government wants too, according to what's been indicated so far.
But if we wanted to eliminate coal exports, logically we wouldn't increase the volume. At the very least, we'd have to maintain current levels. Since this was included in our mandate in 2021 and was also added to the Liberal Party's election platform in 2021, the elimination of coal exports became predictable from 2021 onwards, in my opinion. Logically, we could therefore expect that, from 2021 onwards, we would have stopped launching new projects to increase exports or imports of thermal coal. It is for this reason that I propose amendment BQ‑5.1, which aims to limit these volumes so that they do not exceed those established in 2021 between now and the complete ban.
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The year 2021, like that election, was in the middle of a pandemic. I think we need to be careful that we aren't picking a number.... If we want to have a number that doesn't increase going forward, I think we have to respect what the volumes are since the pandemic ended.
Maybe I can ask the witnesses if they have current information. Do they know if the volumes for Westshore or the port of Vancouver in 2022 or 2023 increased, decreased or remained the same?
I believe I know the answer to that. I think they have increased their throughput since 2021, which is not unexpected. We saw unprecedented congestion and problems at the port of Vancouver that year, which caused them to be ranked near the bottom of the global performance indexes in terms of dwell times, wait times and port congestion. I think it's unfair to go back to a time that was not normal in terms of the business cycle.
Once again, we could get into the discussion about the impact on workers at the port. If their volumes for 2023 are significantly higher than they were in 2021, as was their right.... There's no reason why they wouldn't try to increase their volumes, despite the fact that a 2030 phase-out is in place.
To suddenly cap it at 2021 while telling them, as the committee has just voted, that we're accelerating the phase-out of thermal coal faster than what we said we were going to, is strike one against them. Then, by the way, while we are accelerating this phase-out, we're going to force them to reduce their throughput as well. We're going to hit them once, and then, while they're down, we're going to kick them.
I realize the ideological discussion that's happening here. Once again, you're impacting union workers. You're going to force layoffs if, through the royal assent to this, you have to go back to 2021, which will be three years in the rear-view mirror.
If we want to have that discussion about a maximum year over year, we should do it. I think picking 2021, which was an anomaly year in the middle of a global pandemic with a port slowdown and with parts of the port shut down, is once again being unfair to the workers and to a company that is not doing anything illegal. It is operating under the program that has been described to them by the government. There was no promise that there would be no increase in thermal coal exports between 2021 and 2030. There was a promise that by 2030 it would be over.
I realize that there's a desire here to signal some virtue or ensure that the government keeps its promises. Again, we're missing the target here and you're hitting the workers.
I don't know how to amend it. I think it's just unnecessary at this point. You already have your accelerated phase-out. That's what was just passed. You're using a transport bill, Bill , to accelerate a coal phase-out, which will impact workers right across the supply chain across the country. We spoke against that.
Now, to say that it's not just in Vancouver but also in Prince Rupert and Thunder Bay, and not only are you going to have an accelerated phase-out but you're also now going to have to go back to pandemic-level export numbers I think is unfair to the workers. It's wrong-headed. They're already going to be disadvantaged by the amendment that just passed.
The idea that we would further impede their ability to do business in the very short time frame that has now been given to them—business that they are working on with the government to come up with a program that allows them to comply with the government's regulations—I think is unfair. It's unfair to working families. We can't support it.
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I think when you deal with this sort of thing, your consequences pile up on you. The ability to get good data or clean data or information that is not somehow skewed I think is very difficult.
In 2020 and 2021 we were dealing with the pandemic. We've already talked about that. There were also labour disputes affecting Westshore and the ports in 2022 and 2023. Who knows what will happen? We have rail contracts coming up in the next number of months. All these things can have an impact. To pick a spot in time in a transport bill that is supposed to be about improving supply chain efficiency and dealing with port governance and railway safety and all the things that we were told this was about....
Now we're getting into the nitty-gritty of accelerating a commodity phase-out and preventing a company that is being phased out, or is having their primary business phased out, from continuing to operate until that phase-out occurs. We've told them when the end date is, and no one is disputing that, but now you're further stating that this is based on a date in the middle of a pandemic. If you picked another date, such as 2022, 2023 or 2024, I think you'd find problems with each of those years. There would be anomalies in each of those years.
Again, this seems to be a solution in search of a problem. You've already secured through a transport bill an accelerated phase-out. I just don't know how much more you want to make those workers pay by reducing their hours and reducing their work in advance of putting them out of work. That's what's going to happen to them, because the potash is not going to come online until the middle of the next decade in enough volumes to offset what's happening right now with thermal coal.
Again, I just think we can go around and around about the need for this. The phase-out is happening. It's happening sooner than was promised now, because of this amendment, but why do we have to pile on those workers again? I just think this is an ill-advised amendment that adds more uncertainty. It will result in immediate job losses, which we just talked about, to workers in the ports of Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Thunder Bay. I just don't know why we would do that to those workers.
I'd just like to inform committee members that, during our previous deliberations, we had the opportunity to talk about projects. In particular, we talked about a coal mine in Alberta, whose current production of greenhouse gases is equivalent to that of Quebec's entire automobile fleet, which is no mean feat. It was mentioned that the mine's directors intend to increase production by 50% in the coming years, and that they plan to continue extraction until 2049, which is really beyond the 2030 target set by the government.
The way I see it, this example, in itself, demonstrates the importance of imposing a cap. If we want to eventually eliminate the use of coal, we can't keep producing more and more of it, hence the idea of imposing a cap.
As I mentioned to the committee members, my idea is not to cap volumes and make sure they don't exceed 2021, 2022 or 2023 levels, it's to come to the adoption of the principle of a cap. I wanted to be constructive in my approach. So I'm open to proposals from my colleagues, but the need for a cap is pretty clear, given the information we have at the moment.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
The motion, just so everyone has it here, would amend Bill in clause 120 by adding after line 30 on page 77 the following:
(3) Section 62 of the Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (1):
(1.1) regulations made under paragraph (1)(b) must prohibit the deposit of raw sewage in waters under the jurisdiction of a port authority.
I think certainly Conservatives have had the desire to ban the dumping of raw sewage. Since we've now decided that we are going to use transport bills to advance other issues, I think it's only appropriate that now we talk about the dumping of raw sewage into Canadian waters, waters that are under the jurisdiction of the various port authorities.
Certainly we were very disappointed that one of the first acts of the former environment minister, , was to authorize the discharge of eight billion litres of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence Seaway, allowing government to bypass treatment plants and to simply discharge raw sewage, which is disgusting and which no doubt has a negative impact on that waterway.
In previous campaign platforms we've called for a ban on raw sewage being dumped into Canadian waters. It's something that is not good for the environment. It's not good for Canada's image. If we're going to use Bill to advance other agendas, I think we should also make sure that we ban raw sewage discharge in waters that are under the jurisdiction of the ports. I asked about this previously in passing. Obviously, a lot of territory falls under the jurisdiction of port authorities when it comes to their activities.
To the witnesses, what is the current amount of discharge of raw sewage in waters that are under the jurisdiction of port authorities? Does a port authority have the ability to prevent that sort of activity from happening? For instance, again, with the St. Lawrence Seaway, the Liberals permitted eight billion litres to be dumped into that active seaway, which, as we know, has a very diverse marine ecosystem. A huge number of residents, millions of residents, live in Montreal and downriver from where that raw sewage was dumped.
Is there anything the port authorities could do, if this amendment were passed, to prevent this sort of dumping of raw sewage from happening again?
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Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate it.
This is a conversation that's very near and dear to my heart. For full disclosure, years and years ago, when I took Dale Carnegie classes, that was the last the thing that I spoke about. It was with regard to the dumping of raw sewage. It was specifically in Vancouver. I wasn't smart enough at the time to realize that it happened in Montreal as well.
I come from a background of almost 30 years in the sewer industry. I'm very much aware of what this looks like. During my four short years as a Kingsville councillor, I also realized that sewer separation has happened across so many municipalities across this country.
I want to take it one step further if I could, Mr. Chair, and I do very much appreciate the remarks from Mr. Strahl and Mr. Badawey. They basically echo mine, but I want to take it a step further because I know we're talking about the dumping of raw sewage into the ports. I want to talk about the Great Lakes for a moment, and the vessels that come into the Great Lakes. I want to talk about the beaches that are, quite frankly, filled with used sanitary products. I know that because I walk the beaches.
Whether it's dumped from a vessel that came in from another country or whether it's dumped because of 10 inches of rain that came out of Detroit, it's still an issue. That effluent that is dumped into our Great Lakes is the same effluent that goes to the St. Lawrence River. There's only one passageway to the ocean. This is a very, very important topic of conversation.
I forget when it was, Mr. Chair, so I'm going to say two or three months ago. Pardon my ignorance for the timing. There were conversations around the orcas and the vessels perhaps suspending for 10 or 14 days off the coast of Vancouver because the orcas were, I believe, moving to the north. Well, if we're going to talk about the vessels, then we better be talking about raw sewage, because I'm sure the orcas are certainly are not overly excited about that either.
I don't know why we wouldn't continue this conversation. I certainly appreciate Ms. Zarrillo's comment that this should be a study. It could potentially be a study in and of its own. I do believe that it's prudent for us to at least have the conversation and bring this forward.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate it.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have to make this point. I wasn't going to, but I'm going to make it anyway. Ms. Murray mentioned the possibilities of challenges other than what had to happen in Montreal. The bottom line is that you have a choice: Either it's going to end up in everyone's basement or it's going to end up in the water, as was the case. They had a choice to make, based on the repairs they had to do and the time the repairs took. It's either going into your basement or it's going out. It's the lesser of the two evils. They're both unfortunate, but you have to pick the lesser of the two evils.
I wasn't going to support this because the regulations are in place already through ECCC and the DFO. The role that Transport Canada would otherwise play would be very minimal, if any. Then I started thinking about it a bit more. One of the things that we've tried to do with this government is take more of a whole-of-government approach versus working in silos, as has been the case in the past.
Mr. Strahl put an amendment forward that states that “regulations made under paragraph 1(b) must prohibit the deposit of raw sewage in waters under the jurisdiction of a port authority.” I want to concentrate on “regulations made under paragraph 1(b)”. The question that comes to mind is this: Besides the regulations that we have in place with both the DFO and the Department of the Environment, what would those be? What regulations more than what are already present should be put in place?
The second point that I want to make—and the point that's relevant to how I'm going to vote on this—is the point that those regulations, if any, that are outstanding to make the legislation better, in discussion between Transport Canada and the DFO and the Department of the Environment, are a positive move forward. We're going on 2024. If those regulations are a bit archaic and/or have to be updated, then I think it is productive that the ministries get together under a whole-of-government approach and deal with some issues that may still exist.
I do appreciate what Mr. Strahl is bringing forward: to find what that is. It's not necessarily through Transport Canada. It could be through the Department of the Environment. It could be through the DFO. I think, at the very least, the discussion should be had. Therefore, we will be supporting this amendment.
I would now like to move a motion I submitted to the committee in writing in both official languages on Friday:
That the committee undertake a study on Aircraft Rescue and Fire Fighting at Airports and Aerodromes (Canadian Aviation Regulations, Section 303) allocating a minimum of three meetings to this study to hear from witnesses that include the International Association of Firefighters, the Canadian Airports Council and other interested parties, and that the Committee report its findings to the House.
Mr. Chair, this motion comes out of the debate in the House regarding another motion that's before the House, motion 96, which was introduced by Liberal .
The purpose of the motion is to amend the current Canadian aviation regulations to adopt the International Civil Aviation Organization standards for airport rescue and firefighting. Specifically, the motion in the House is to give firefighters at Canada's major airports the mandate and resources necessary to reach the site of a fire or a mishap anywhere on an operational runway in three minutes or less, but it also specifies that a required function of firefighters be the rescue of passengers.
These changes are coming at the request of the International Association of Fire Fighters. The effect of the motion and the change proposed in it would be to increase firefighting requirements at airports so they can be met by professional firefighters.
There is some divergence of views on this issue. The IAFF has been obviously supportive of this, and for some of the major airports in our country, this will not be a major issue. They already have professional, full-time firefighters who can meet these standards and meet the definitions as laid out in the motion.
As we've been discussing here today as we're dealing with legislation, there are processes that are in place for changing regulations. These things are supposed to take a number of months and years and are supposed to hear from all sides of an issue—all interested stakeholders, all interested Canadians.
What we have heard in our discussions following the introduction of this motion, which again is up for debate very soon for its second hour, is that there are many smaller airports across the country that would be economically devastated if they were forced to change their operating model to adopt this very stringent requirement. They already do operate under the Canadian aviation regulations, which do allow for airports to have their own firefighting and rescue services, including allowing them to have airport operations staff who provide this rescue service, as opposed to having professional firefighters on call at the airport within three minutes of the middle of the furthest runway.
The costs on small airports or even mid-size international airports like Kelowna and Kamloops and Abbotsford in my province of British Columbia would number into the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars to make this change. We already know, because we've seen reports this week out of the Montreal Economic Institute indicating that the fees that are imposed on Canadian airlines and passed along to customers through higher ticket prices are already much higher than they are in the United States.
This proposal specifically calls for a charge to be added to every ticket for every passenger for every leg of their flights. That all adds up when you add all of the other charges that have been going up and up, including increased carbon taxes and increased costs for fuel. Those are all passed on to Canadian consumers.
We've seen, over the last number of years, that the number of incidents at Canadian airports is down. The number of incidents requiring a rescue is certainly down.
We think the best way to address this issue is to have this committee conduct more robust meetings, rather than simply having a debate that proposes a one-size-fits-all solution for all Canadian airports. That's the part of this that is the most troubling—the one-size-fits-all approach. We talked about that in discussing Bill , when we were talking about the different regulations applying in different ways to different ports.
We believe this motion, which has been introduced and debated for one hour and will soon be debated for a second hour, needs a more robust discussion. Should the Vancouver International Airport have the same regulations and costs applied to it as Kelowna, Kamloops, Abbotsford or many of the other, smaller airports across the country? Can they absorb that and still meet their mandates to balance their books? The answer in the past has been no.
We've heard examples of how taking away this flexibility to provide a rescue service.... No one is talking about reducing the firefighting regulations as they are—getting to the end or midpoint of a runway in a certain amount of time and providing the ability, for instance, to put out a fire on a plane that had an emergency landing. Those requirements are still there. They are currently in the smaller airports operated by a dual-purpose staff who can provide that service to Canadians and that assurance to Canadian travellers and those travelling into our country that they are safe and secure, that they aren't in any danger because of the current regulations.
We want to make sure there are discussions and that we hear from the CAOs of those airports about what the change would do to them, and from the larger airports, such as Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto, in order to determine what their current practices are and whether this would have an impact on them.
I think there needs to be an overall lens on this, as well as to the cost environment for Canadian passengers and airlines. As I said earlier, studies out in the last week are indicating the wide discrepancy. What happens when there is a wide discrepancy in costs is that Canadians start to look to.... There's leakage. There are jobs and opportunities lost for Canadian airports, airlines and workers, because Canadian passengers look to airports near the borders. They look for cheaper alternatives in Bellingham, Seattle, Montana and Buffalo. We've seen numerous cases of leakage in the tens of millions of dollars. This additional cost would have an impact on families, business travellers, etc.
I think we always want to make sure there aren't unintended consequences when we have motions like this coming before the House.
Again, there would be three meetings where we would hear from the firefighters. We're not saying that.... Perhaps they have the right approach; perhaps this is the way that things should go, but again, there should be an appropriate regulatory process.
When we were asking about what the timeline would be, for instance, to bring in regulations to ban thermal coal, we were told that it would be a three-year process and that there would be a robust discussion with affected workers, affected companies and affected industry, and that it wouldn't be done prior to those regulations coming into force. What we have here instead of that, in this motion that's in the House, is simply an imposition, calling on the government to impose new regulations without having gone through that regulatory process.
We promised we would bring this forward when we were debating this because we want to hear from firefighters, and we want to hear from airports and from airlines and from the workers who would be affected by this if this change were forced onto airports by a simple motion in the House of Commons.
We think there's a better way. We think that this issue is important and that it deserves more discussion, and the discussion should start here. We should hear from those parties and then, crucially, report back to the House. I think it is our right as members to ask for those hearings to happen, ask for that robust discussion to happen and then report back with the expectation that the government will hear from us, hear what we heard and come back with a response. Hopefully, there will then be a robust regulatory discussion and not simply the discussion happening for two hours in the House of Commons.
I note, Mr. Chair, that the bells are ringing in the chamber. I guess we have to suspend until that vote is over.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the clarification.
I did have the opportunity to look at section 303 of the Canadian Aviation Regulations during the bells and the vote. It is important to note that there are already stringent requirements there, including the requirement for personnel who are charged with airport firefighting to have specific training and to have specific equipment provided, right down to their personal protective equipment. All of that has to be provided and is specified by the regulations.
We're very clear that in those three meetings to hear from witnesses, we would want to hear both from firefighters....
I note that the union representing firefighters at the Montréal-Trudeau airport has indicated that they have strong opinions on this as well. They're not IAFF, but we'd certainly welcome them to come and be a part of this discussion.
There have been questions about their mandate in the past and about whether or not they can respond to incidents happening just outside the fence of the airport, etc. There was a tragic case in which they weren't allowed to respond, which I believe Mr. Barsalou-Duval brought up in this committee previously. There's a requirement to hear from individuals who have an interest in this, either from the airport management side or the firefighter protection side.
I noted that in the regulations, this applies to airports that have over 180,000 aircraft movements per year, so it's not every small airport. The Chilliwack municipal airport, for instance, would not be forced to upgrade its firefighting capacity, should motion 96 be passed and implemented, but others would. It's important to note that some of them would require new buildings, for instance, to house permanent firefighters to allow them to get to a runway in the prescribed time, as is envisioned in the motion. Others would require new, specialized equipment, which can run into the millions of dollars as well.
These are discussions that are worth having in a robust way. They should be had here at this committee. I think that we would welcome the opportunity to hear from interested parties in order to have that discussion. I'm open to discussion about whether three meetings are long enough or too much, and if we should expand the proposed witness list or whether or not we can make do with what we have here.
Given the debate in the House that's coming up again tomorrow, we wanted to move this motion. I look forward to hearing from colleagues what they think about whether three meetings are enough, whether parties should be invited and whether there are specific items that should be discussed at those meetings. I think this is a good start and a good opportunity for us to have the robust discussion that we need to have.
With that, Mr. Chair, I will turn it over to other members of the committee.
Amendment BQ‑6 proposes that Bill , in clause 122, be amended, in item (a), by replacing line 6 on page 78 with the following:
Amendment BQ 6 also proposes that Bill be amended in section 122, in item (b), by adding after line 28, on page 78, the following:
(6) For greater certainty, for the judicial review of an order made under subsection (1), the correctness standard applies to determine whether there was a risk of imminent harm to national security, national economic security or competition that constitutes a significant threat to the safety and security of persons, goods, ships or port facilities or the security of supply chains.
On page 78 of the bill, in section 107.1, it says that the minister has the power to make ministerial orders in certain specific cases. The specific cases are quite broad, and include national security, economic security, competition, and the security of persons, goods, ships, port facilities and supply chains. The scope for the use of ministerial orders is therefore very broad. What's more, in the bill, the article begins simply with “If the Minister is of the opinion that there is a risk of imminent harm [...].”
First, the amendment aims to remove the words “is of the opinion.” Second, we wish to add a sixth paragraph, according to which the use of such orders is expected to be made in an organized context and according to a standard. This ensures that the minister does not have unlimited discretionary power. I think that the use of such a power requires a tighter framework than what is proposed in Bill .
Obviously, I think this was a very contentious issue. We heard from many witnesses who were very concerned about the broad powers that were given to the minister, which were indicated in proposed subsection107.1(1). It says:
If the Minister is of the opinion that there is a risk of imminent harm to national security, national economic security or competition that constitutes a significant threat to the safety and security of persons, goods, ships or port facilities or the security of supply chains, the Minister may, by order, require a port authority or a person in charge of a port facility to take any measure, including corrective measures, or stop any activity that the Minister considers necessary to prevent that harm.
We heard, for instance, from labour. I go back to ILWU talking about the need to ensure that this wouldn't be abused, that the minister wouldn't deem that a work stoppage, a withdrawal of labour or a legal strike would be considered a significant threat to the security of the supply chain or to national economic security. This would not be the case. We heard that time and time again, from CUPE to ILWU to.... Numerous labour organizations were concerned about the broad impact that this section would have.
Obviously, when I go to the correctness standard versus providing greater accountability, I guess my question to the officials is this: Does this still allow the minister to make that determination? Is there anything preventing the minister from, for instance, declaring a legal strike at a port to be a risk to national economic security, for instance, or a risk to the security of supply chains?
Does this amendment address that sufficiently, or will there still be a way for a minister—future or current—to use or abuse that section to do what the unions were afraid of—to go outside, perhaps, what was intended? We don't draft laws based on good intentions. They have to be airtight. They have to be drafted in such a way that they are not open to abuse. I think we need to have the assurance that this type of amendment will prevent abuse by the minister.
I'd like to know what your opinion of that is. Does the current section 107.1 allow the minister to do those things that we were told were of a concern, especially to those who believed it could be used to undermine the collective bargaining process or a legal strike action?
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We don't have any examples of it being done in the recent past because this is a new order-making authority that didn't previously exist.
In terms of examples of where it would be used, it would be used in the context, as I noted, of a risk of imminent harm to national security and a significant threat to the safety and security of persons, goods, ships or port facilities or the security of the national supply chain.
In that event, pursuant to the ministerial order, the minister could order a corrective action to ensure that the harm did not occur. An example that we have considered would be if a terminal operator, in certain circumstances, was refusing to accept ships or cargo from a particular country of origin, and that refusal posed a significant threat to the safety or security of persons or to the national supply chain. In that event, the minister could, for example, order that terminal to accept ships from that country of origin.
That would be an example, but it would be in very rare circumstances. The threshold would be very high. In addition, the process for the issuing of the order would be subject to judicial review.
My colleague can provide more information with respect to the oversight of the ministerial order authority.
In response to that, I would simply say that when Mr. Strahl had the floor when the vote was called, I asked whether or not Mr. Strahl and all colleagues wanted to allow Mr. Strahl to continue speaking, and it was, in fact, all members, including Conservative members, who did not want to give unanimous consent to allow Mr. Strahl to keep speaking.
I can say that there were members who I looked at who very verbally, out loud, said that they would not give unanimous consent to continue speaking. There was no attempt whatsoever to stop Mr. Strahl from speaking.
When we came back and resumed after the vote, I turned the floor over to Mr. Badawey because I thought that Mr. Strahl had concluded. He said he hadn't. I did not disrespect Mr. Strahl. I said, “Mr. Strahl, my apologies; I give the floor back to you”, and I didn't even ask for any consent from colleagues, because I respected the fact that Mr. Strahl had the floor and that he wanted to continue speaking.
I think that my work thus far as chair has shown that I am fair and just. I don't know if Mr. Strahl would agree with that, but I think I was very respectful with him when we came back, and I turned the floor right back over to him without any argument. He continued as long as he wanted to speak until such time as he said that he no longer wanted the floor. The record will show that.
You do have the right to challenge the decision of the chair. I invite you to do so if you feel that the chair has, in some way, not followed the rules.
Before turning it back over to you to ask whether or not you do want to challenge the chair, I will state that, much to the frustration, I would say, of some committee members, I confer with the clerks as much as I possibly can to ensure that all of the decisions that I make as the chair of this committee do indeed follow the rules. That, once again, will be on public record.
I'll end there, Dr. Lewis, and I will ask whether or not you'd like to challenge the chair's decision to provide the floor to Mr. Badawey after what I believed to be the ending of Mr. Strahl's remarks on the matter. I'll turn the floor over to you to see whether or not you'd like to do that.
Thank you for the question.
As with any ministerial order power, it must be exercised by the minister. Therefore, the threshold that's indicated, which in this case is that “an imminent harm to national security, national economic security or competition that constitutes a significant threat to the safety and security of persons, goods, ships or port facilities or the security of supply chains” is the threshold that has to be met.
That's a determination that is made by the minister based on the facts available at the time and based on expert evidence if necessary, and it's made in accordance with the interpretation of the law at that time, given the facts that have arisen to require the potential use of the ministerial order power.
Once the ministerial order is issued, if any affected persons were to take issue with whether that threshold was met, for example, then on judicial review, a court would review whether the power was properly exercised by the minister. We've previously discussed the thresholds at which judicial review takes place, meaning these two thresholds are court-established standards of review: reasonableness and correctness.
On judicial review, a court looks at the minister's decision in light of the power in the act, and that would include the threshold and the facts available to the minister at the time the decision was made.
A “correct” decision is the only right answer in light of the law and the facts, and a court will find that the decision meets the correctness standard if the court would have made the exact same decision in the same circumstances, whereas a “reasonable” decision has to be logical in light of the law and the facts. A court will find that a decision is reasonable if the decision is one of a range of potential decisions that could have been taken under the circumstances, based on the law and the facts known at the time, even if there's potentially another reasonable decision that also might have been taken by the court.