44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 24, 2022 11:00AM
- Oct/24/22 4:38:02 p.m.
- Watch
- Re: Bill S-5
Madam Speaker, my understanding of this bill is that it would put into place a provision that anybody could bring forth a concern about a toxic substance and an assessment on that substance would be developed within 24 months to determine whether that substance is toxic.
While I am not familiar with the statistics the member rambled off, that is the challenge of using facts and figures with that. Perhaps not everyone who is in the debate has access to those same statistics to debate it or discuss it. However, it is concerning. I believe she said that nine out of 10 Canadians are finding toxic substances within their blood or urine. That is something that needs to be studied at committee and discussed at that time.
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- Oct/24/22 4:39:02 p.m.
- Watch
- Re: Bill S-5
Madam Speaker, for my hon. colleague from Cariboo—Prince George, it is such a joy to hear such a thoughtful speech that really looked at Bill S-5 and what is wrong with it. I totally agree with the member that it is not adequate for the government to promise us a right to a healthy environment and then tell us it will take two years to figure out what that is. Let us hope we fix that.
With respect to the question on plastics, I want to put to the member that, in order to regulate plastics at all, the government is using the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, and I believe it is using it appropriately. The concept of CEPA toxic has been used for years, which is not the common-sense meaning of toxic.
When the government uses the power it derives through CEPA, it uses it in an overly restricted way, so it is only prepared right now to not really deal with the threat of ocean plastics. It is in very limited circumstances, and certainly not ever getting into the hospital use of single-use plastics. Looking at forks and straws is as far as it has gone. I offer that to the member as a comment to see if that gives him any reassurance.
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- Oct/24/22 5:33:55 p.m.
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- Re: Bill S-5
Madam Speaker, I would also like to congratulate the hon. member for Louis-Saint-Laurent on becoming the environmental spokesperson for his party, and for that reason I will listen with care to his answer to my question.
A recent study from Environmental Defence found that 30% of products in well-known dollar stores contained heavy metals, such as lead, and toxic chemicals. Studies have shown that nine out of 10 Canadians have been found to have endocrine-disrupting chemicals, which have been used widely in consumer products, in their bloodstream. Would the member support improvements to this bill to require the mandatory labelling of hazardous substances in consumer products so that Canadians know what dangers they are exposing themselves and their children to?
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- Oct/24/22 5:34:37 p.m.
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- Re: Bill S-5
Madam Speaker, first of all, we would like to see what the amendment is precisely. I am quite sure the member would do it correctly, and we will study it very seriously when he tables the amendment.
Obviously, when we talk about a toxic situation, we do not want to see people having access, freely, to some difficulty. There is a lot of debate on that, but first and foremost, we have to study it based on the scientific proof. The more scientific proof we have, the more research we do, the better we are. When we talk about the environment, there are great steps that we have moved forward on in the last decade and in the last century, and I really believe that, in Canada, we have the scientific people to achieve great things together.
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- Oct/24/22 6:19:19 p.m.
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- Re: Bill S-5
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for talking about how she is prepared to work with the opposition to try to make changes to the legislation as it goes to committee. That is a good sign.
We see in the legislation the scheduling of toxic products. It talks about how to put products onto schedule 1 or schedule 2, but what it does not talk about is how we take them off when scientists find out that a product is no longer toxic.
Would the member be prepared to move forward with putting in legislation that would change that to allow steps to be put in place to make certain that toxic products that are no longer considered toxic can actually be removed?
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