44th Parl. 1st Sess.
April 18, 2024 10:00AM
- Apr/18/24 10:16:03 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I rise to present a petition on behalf of the residents of Humber River—Black Creek, as Transport Canada must address the ongoing aircraft-induced noise pollution by exercising its authority and implementing necessary actions in the Humber River—Black Creek community. They firmly believe that environmental responsibility extends to addressing both air pollution and the adverse effects of noise on their well-being.
Therefore, the undersigned residents of the Humber River—Black Creek community call upon the Government of Canada to promptly assess nighttime noise pollution caused by aircraft activities in their community; collaborate with Nav Canada to develop effective mitigation strategies, considering curfews and other noise reduction measures; establish and enforce noise level regulations, ensuring emissions remain with acceptable limits; conduct regular monitoring to ensure compliance with regulations; and engage in transparent communication with the Humber River—Black Creek community.
I should add that this is not an issue simply for the residents of Humber River—Black Creek; we have these kinds of issues throughout Canada.
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Madam Speaker, Bill C‑380 raises some worrisome doubts about the Conservative Party's position on a policy objective that is in the common interest and that is accepted by all departments of the environment in every province and territory, including Quebec.
This bill once again embodies the official opposition's denial of environmental issues, but especially its denial of everything that years of scientific work and research have analyzed and confirmed, namely four things. First, plastic pollution is a major environmental and health problem. Second, it is the result of the widespread use of plastic, especially for manufacturing single-use products. Third, whether it is in the form of visible waste, microplastics or nanoplastics, this pollution harms our ecosystems as well as biodiversity. It can also have adverse effects on health, particularly when it goes up the food chain and ends up in our food. Fourth, plastic pollution is present along our shorelines and in our surface waters, sediment, soil, groundwater, indoor and outdoor air, drinking water and food.
The author of the bill, the member for Saskatoon—University, makes a bold statement by claiming, and I am paraphrasing, that the management of plastic manufactured products has no positive impact on environmental protection and public health. This is patently false. I would almost describe this statement as abhorrent. No specialized scientific organization recognized in this field of research shares this position, not one. We might reasonably wonder whether the Conservatives have ever read a scientific study on this. To be clear, I am talking about independent studies carried out somewhere other than the labs at Dow Chemical or Imperial Oil.
Before I address another angle, I would like to clarify something right away, because members of the official opposition might try to say that the Bloc Québécois is not defending provincial jurisdictions. What Bill C‑380 seeks to do is invoke the alleged unconstitutionality of the Single-use Plastics Prohibition Regulations made under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.
We all know that the federal government is appealing the Federal Court's decision to overturn the government's order on plastics, which the court found to be unconstitutional. The Bloc Québécois agrees with the government's approach for one simple reason, that is, because the Federal Court's decision was wrong, period. If an environmental policy were unconstitutional, of course the Bloc Québécois would immediately demand that the Government of Canada review that policy and respect the environmental sovereignty of Quebec and the provinces.
As a reminder, the Supreme Court already ruled in favour of the provisions of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act that prohibit “specific acts for the purpose of preventing pollution or, to put it in other terms, causing the entry into the environment of certain toxic substances”.
However, the Conservatives do not see the difference between reviewing a policy and completely abandoning a legitimate policy objective. Bill C‑380 proposes to completely eliminate the main regulatory measure that allows the government to act on the issue of single-use plastics.
It comes as no surprise to the Bloc Québécois that the official opposition is once again acting as the political valet of the oil and petrochemical lobby. I am saying that because Dow Chemical, Imperial Oil and Nova Chemicals are the ones that led the legal challenge against the regulations.
I am sorry, but no good will come of rejecting science, denying the evidence and filling the legislative agenda with the concerns of companies that want the status quo or, even worse, full deregulation.
Let us look back on what the government has done. In 2019, it made an ambitious announcement about banning the use of some single-use plastics. In October 2020, it announced its intention to impose standards to make plastic manufacturers accountable when it comes to the collection and recycling of plastic waste. Then, the environment minister at the time, the current Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, announced, with great fanfare, the goal of achieving zero plastic waste by 2030. That was a good intention, an honourable desire, but it was just an announcement, nothing more.
The government had promised to bring this regulation into force as early as 2021. However, as has been the case with other issues where the government has lacked ambition and not taken action, they blamed the pandemic, that old scapegoat. That said, the government did not lack ambition or action during the pandemic when it came to prioritizing the interests of the fossil fuel sector. It subsidized oil companies in the name of fighting climate change, granted new multibillion-dollar loans for Trans Mountain and authorized exploratory offshore drilling without impact assessments and in marine refuges it had created itself, to name just a few.
Today, the restrictions in force are very incomplete. They cover only six of the hundreds of items in the economy. As far as exports are concerned, no ban on manufacturing or sales will be in force before December 20, 2025, in other words, after the government's current term of office. In our opinion, this is already a rather half-hearted regulation, and I sometimes doubt that it will be enforced. Liberal policies are certainly not up to the task of providing solutions to the growing and worrying problems of plastic pollution, but the Conservative stance on this global issue is damning in its denial of what is basically obvious—namely, that the use of plastics, and consequently its waste, has reached dizzying, even stratospheric heights.
According to every credible and independent source, items made of plastic were considered a toxic substance under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act precisely because the scientific literature proved it. As far as the temptation to talk about recycling is concerned, I would remind the House that the data from 2016 show that Canada recycles only 9% of plastic waste, that 86% ends up in landfills, that 4% is incinerated and that 1% end up in nature. There is no circular economy here.
Recognizing the problem may lead us part-way to the solution. However, let us be clear: the challenge before us is first to recognize that we must act predictably and firmly and then oppose any hint of deregulation with respect to the existing framework. Reusing, remanufacturing, repairing, prioritizing the use of renewable energy in the process of using the material: these priorities alone would guide us to healthy public policies on plastics.
Thanks to the expertise of Recyc‑Québec and its recycling facilities, Quebec is already engaged in a process aimed at moving away from the linear extractivist economic model that the Conservatives hold dear and that also seems to suit the government just fine. Recyc‑Québec has made the circular economy its priority. In Quebec, we value the principle of extended producer responsibility, under which the responsibility for managing end-of-life products lies with the companies that produce them.
I will close by quoting Michael Burt, vice-president and global director of climate and energy policy at Dow Canada, in an appearance before the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development on the issue of single-use plastics. I talked about Dow Canada's expertise in industrial chemistry and engineering, and I said that there was no doubt that Dow Canada could contribute to advancing the circular economy or developing something innovative. When I asked him if he intended to transition away from virgin resin production, he slowly leaned towards the microphone, maintained eye contact with me and, without hesitation, replied no. He also said, “The reality is that the world doesn't have a plastic problem, but it definitely has a plastic-waste problem. ...The reality is that, from an investment standpoint, Dow Canada is a profitable company.” I think his remarks were clear.
How can the production of plastics possibly be separated from their existence as waste? Mr. Burt's statement speaks volumes, does it not? One thing is certain. By introducing Bill C‑380, the official opposition wins the prize for being this major lobby group's legislative representative.
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- Apr/18/24 6:09:19 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to stand up and speak to this bill. I have to admit it is a little disheartening to hear how the mover of this motion started his speech this evening. However, it is also not surprising from a party that continues to deny that there are environmental issues that need to be addressed in a timely manner in order to protect our futures and the future generations to come.
We heard the member speak about paper straws, make jokes about the sogginess of them and ask who really liked paper straws. I understand they are inconvenient, but my goodness, let us talk about the issue at hand here. The issue at hand is that we have plastic pollution that is destroying our marine ecosystems and is destroying the health and well-being of people across the country.
The real problem is around plastics that are polluting our planet and being ingested through marine ecosystems. It goes into the entire ecosystem and then into us, creating health implications. Instead of talking about the real issues at hand, the member was deflecting and talking about soggy straws.
I think this is exactly what is to be expected from my colleagues in the Conservative Party: a consistent deflection from the issues at hand. The member even went so far as to say that banning plastics is bad for health, bad for pocketbooks and bad for the environment. I am floored to hear this.
An hon. member: Oh, oh!
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- Apr/18/24 6:11:47 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, instead of what was shared in the prior member's speech, we know that regulating plastics is essential to addressing the harms of plastic, especially of single-use plastics, that are caused to our ecosystem, human health, the environment and even our climate. This is what we should be talking about.
We know that plastics are polluting our oceans at a fast rate. The impacts are horrific. As the critic for fisheries and oceans, and a West Coaster, previously an East Coaster, but now on Vancouver Island, I know that, in Canada, we are seeing the impacts of plastic pollution in so many ways.
One such example that comes to mind is from when I was first elected and we had the Zim Kingston freighter spill along the coast of Vancouver Island. I believe there were over 100 containers spilled, and only four of those containers were recovered. The rest were left to sink along the shores of Vancouver Island. In these containers were a variety of items, many of them plastic.
A year after the spill, there was a story by the CBC, entitled “From urinal mats to unicorns, cargo from major container spill is still washing up on B.C. shores”. I will ask members to imagine walking down the shoreline of our beautiful coastal Vancouver Island and there are these pink inflatable unicorns washing up on the shore. I do not know if everybody here has had an opportunity to visit our beautiful coastline, but most certainly, pink plastic unicorns are not a part of our natural marine ecosystem. It is quite the opposite. There is a tremendous negative impact to our environment when these plastic unicorns and urinal mats break down into microplastics and get into our marine life. The exact seafood we are eating is full of microplastics, and the cycle continues.
We need to be addressing this plastic pollution in all ways. One being that, if marine cargo spills continue to happen, there needs to be a strategy in place to make sure we are integrating local knowledge to put a response plan in place immediately. I hope we will see some of these things from the Liberal government in due time.
With that, I would like to speak about a new disease that has been found. There is an article by the National Audubon Society, a non-profit environmental organization dedicated to the conservation of birds and their habitats, entitled “Plastic Pollution Is So Pervasive That It’s Causing a New Disease in Seabirds”. This new disease is “marked by severe stomach damage from eating little bits of plastic”. The damage is tremendous to these birds that are ingesting these plastics. It is scraping their organs, causing “several knock-on health effects”. It makes the birds “feel less hungry.” There is also “less room for nutrients.” It is scarring their stomachs, creating less flexibility, “so birds are able to transport less fish back to the nest.” The article explains how the “damaged organ creates less digestive acid to process food and protect against parasites.”
With that, I would like to point out that the impacts of the plastic pollution disproportionately impact many indigenous communities across Canada. A constituent in my riding, from whom I have not received permission to talk about this, but I know he will be very excited for me to do so because he talks about it at all times, has been very focused on gathering and providing detailed information around the location of city dumps and how close in proximity they are, consistently, to first nations. We know these dumps are places where plastics are brought.
I would like to finish by saying that constituents in my riding are reaching out, asking for the Minister of Environment to deal with plastic pollution, and are calling on him to take action on plastics in Canada to address the adverse human health outcomes linked with chemicals of concern in the cradle-to-grave cycle of plastics. This includes a few points: a just and equitable treaty, and national policies that respect human rights; limit global production of plastics; eliminate unnecessary plastic products; prioritize the prohibition of hazardous chemicals of concern; prioritize immediate action to address people vulnerable to exposure; and ensure that business respects the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment.
Despite the Conservatives' attempt to ensure that our planet is burning, that our planet is polluted and that people are not provided with strong solutions to move forward, I would ask that we take the actions necessary to put an end to plastic pollution.
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