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Decentralized Democracy

Member of Parliament

Marilyn Gladu

  • Member of Parliament
  • Member of Parliament
  • Conservative
  • Sarnia—Lambton
  • Ontario
  • Voting Attendance: 68%
  • Expenses Last Quarter: $118,419.33

  • Government Page
Context: House Hansard - 302 - Apr/18/24
Ms. Marilyn Gladu (Sarnia—Lambton, CPC)
Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to address Bill C-380, a private member's bill from my friend and colleague, the member for Saskatoon—University, with the very important aim of repealing the government's irresponsible and senseless ban on single-use plastics. This debate tonight is not about plastic waste, although certainly there is more to be done there. This is about whether plastic manufactured products are toxic, because that is what the government did. It had them labelled “toxic” and it was ruled to be unconstitutional. In my speech today, I will first outline the history of the ban and its flawed premise, and then detail why it is ultimately unhelpful to the environment and talk about the harmful impacts on Canadians and Canadian industry. Finally, I will expand on the unintended and knock-on consequences of the ban, with a final appeal to the House for some common sense. Canadians are now unfortunately well versed in the effects of climate change. The Liberals, with a need to be seen to be taking action, decided to place the blame for climate change exclusively on Canadian consumers, making plastics the scapegoat with a particular spotlight on single-use plastics. In 2019, the Prime Minister announced bans on single-use plastics, and in May 2021, plastic manufactured items were added to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, or CEPA, to be designated as toxic. In June 2022, six categories of single-use plastics, or SUPs, were banned, with a timeline to prohibit manufacture and import for sale in Canada, prohibition on sale in Canada and prohibition on manufacturing, import and export sales. Unfortunately, quite in line with a government bent on destroying Canada's competitiveness and foreign direct investment, checkout bags, cutlery, straws, food service utensils, stir sticks, ring carriers and plastic straws packaged with drink containers were outlawed in one fell swoop. Yes, because banning the straws from juice boxes in the lunches of Canada's first graders will definitely beat climate change. No, it will not. First, this ban on single-use plastics is unfounded and a serious overreach. Plastic manufactured items, as I referred to, do not rightfully belong in the CEPA list as a toxic substance. CEPA is a federal criminal statute and the enabling mechanism that the federal government is applying wrongly to provide a legal basis for usurping provincial powers over waste management and the local plastics economy. Using CEPA, while unjustified, allows the federal government to take control of provincial waste management systems and centralizes all decisions related to what plastic products can be manufactured, imported, exported and distributed in Canada. CEPA is a chemical management tool for toxic substances. It was never intended to be an environmental management tool. This broadens the scope of the act, which was to list chemically harmful substances like mercury and lead as toxic. Therefore, listing the entire category of plastic manufactured items in schedule 1 of the CEPA without a chemical risk assessment testing for toxicity is a serious violation of the act. What is more is that it is not even plastic itself that is listed as toxic. It is plastic manufactured items, things like medical supplies and devices, protective equipment, food packaging, fridges and cars. All of these are made with plastic. Are they all toxic? No, they are not. I worked for 21 years as a chemical engineer in plastics. I designed many plastic products used in medical devices, medical supplies and food packaging. I was involved in the approval process to understand how we assess to make sure they do not have a negative medical impact. People here in the House every day are drinking orange juice from a plastic container. Is it toxic? No, it is not. They are eating their yogourt in the lobby from a plastic container. Is it toxic? No, it is not. They are going to the hospital, and in the hospital they use a single-use plastic for blood transfusions. Is it toxic? No, it is not. We are putting contact lenses in our eyes that are plastic. Is it toxic? No, it is not. We are giving babies formula in plastic bottles. Is it toxic? No, it is not. It is such a ridiculous argument to say that plastic is not toxic, but plastic manufactured items are. That is like me saying that the wool I am knitting with is not toxic, but the sweater I produce is. It is absolutely ridiculous. Even the minister himself said at the environment committee, “Plastics are not toxic in the normal sense of the word that people use pejoratively,” and that he does not think anybody says they are. Then why are they on the list? This is causing a huge issue in the industry, threatening jobs and the environment. As usual for the Liberals, their words and actions do not line up. Perhaps they think that by banning plastics and causing serious deleterious effects to Canadians and Canadian industry, they can fool voters into thinking they did something, but like most Liberal strategies, it is built on false premises. The Liberals want Canadians to believe that banning single-use plastics will assist with the reduction of plastic pollution and emissions production. However, the scale of plastic pollution is small, less than 1% of all litter in Canada, according to a report written by the Liberal government in 2020. Further, only 1% of Canada's plastic waste is disposed of improperly. Plastic pollution is not a pervasive problem in Canada. Moreover, alternatives to plastic actually produce more carbon emissions, not less. We know the government loves McKinsey and its consulting work, so I will quote from one of its reports, “The potential impact of reusable packaging”. Modelling done by McKinsey in 2023 indicates that there would be a 150% increase in emissions due to the higher share of fossil components in materials, transport and energy use to make the alternative products. What a good job fighting climate change. These so-called alternatives cost twice as much to make as well. Packaging accounts for 10% to 20% of a product's cost, and if the packaging now costs twice as much, as likewise estimated in that same McKinsey report, there will be a significant inflationary increase to consumers if the government introduces requirements related to use, recycled content and eliminating plastic from produce and meats. That is just what we need when Canadians cannot afford to eat and are going to homeless shelters and food banks in increasing numbers. As it is, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business estimates the added cost to the Canadian economy is $1.9 billion to produce these alternatives to the banned plastic packaging. We use plastic for a reason. It is vital to extend the shelf life of foods, especially fresh fruits and vegetables. These fresh fruits and vegetables, even pet food, will face a reduced shelf life and increased prices due to the federal regulations on plastic. The Canadian Produce Marketing Association estimates it will cost between $2.5 billion and $5 billion in costs for food losses, accompanying an estimated half million tonne increase in food losses. Rotting food increases methane emissions. At a time when so many Canadians are struggling and the food banks are seeing unprecedented usage, it is unconscionable. Worse still are the effects on the thousands of families who rely on those working in the plastic manufacturing industry. More than 99,000 people work in the Canadian plastics industry, which is estimated to be worth $35 billion. The ban will impact 13,000 to 20,000 direct jobs and as many as 26,000 to 40,000 indirect jobs. Together, that is up to 60,000 Canadians who will face further hardship at the hands of the Liberal-NDP government and its ideology. In my riding of Sarnia—Lambton, there are multiple plastics facilities that produce single-use plastics. In 2019, the federal Liberals decided they wanted Nova Chemicals to build a $3-billion plant in my riding instead of in Texas. They provided incentives and money to get it to build a single-use plastic production facility that would export plastics to the world. The very next month, they decided they were going to ban the products it is producing, and now they are planning to stop the export. They would shut that facility down, along with all the economic benefits. It is total hypocrisy on the part of the government. Are we really going to destroy the lives and livelihoods of 60,000 Canadians and their families while putting increased costs and inconveniences on Canadians for a detrimental environmental and economic outcome? There is no benefit to this, and it was an egregious error to enact the ban in the first place. Instead, efforts can be made to shore up recycling and recovery infrastructure to better manage plastic waste sources. These industries are willing to partner to address some of the issues that we know exist with plastics, like microbeads in the Great Lakes, for example. Let us work on those problems. Plastics are not toxic, and plastic-manufactured products are not toxic, so I implore the government to listen to reason and common sense.
1550 words
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