Finance Minister Jim Flaherty (Whitby-Oshawa, Ont.) tabled his $255-billion budget last Thursday showing spending will be reduced by $5.2-billion over the next three years.
In addition to “streamlining” the environmental review process, the federal government will also make significant reductions to the budgets of two departments with central roles in regulating the environmental impacts of large-scale industrial projects.
Environment Canada’s budget will be reduced by $88-million over the next three years, while the Department of Fisheries and Oceans will see its budget cut by $79-million over the same time period. The National Round Table on the Environment, and the Economy, which was a source of comprehensive environmental analysis and gave advice to the government, will be eliminated. The NRTEE’s budget was $5.2-million.
“While the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy filled an important need in the past, a mature and expanded community of environmental policy stakeholders has demonstrated the capacity to provide analysis and policy advice for the government of Canada,” the budget document states. “As a result, the government will introduce legislation to eliminate the NRTEE. Environment Canada will continue to offer effective programs to protect Canada’s natural environment.”
Liberal House leader Marc Garneau (Westmount-Ville Marie, Que.) said that it was “disturbing” to see the NRTEE eliminated.
Mr. Flaherty told the House in his budget speech that the government would “implement responsible resource development and smart regulation for major economic projects, respecting provincial jurisdiction and maintaining the highest standards of environmental protection.”
Environmental advocates are raising alarms over numerous measures that will limit public consultation and scientific data on industrial development.
When it comes to administering the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act (CEAA), environmental assessments will be conducted according to defined timelines: 24 months for panel reviews, 18 months for National Energy Board hearings, and 12 months for environmental assessments. Other reforms to the legislation, which has guided industrial project development for the past 20 years, include the substitution of provincial environmental assessments for federal reviews and the streamlining of aboriginal consultation.
The reforms echo recommendations made by the House Environment and Sustainable Development Committee following its recent statutory review of CEAA.
Conservative MP Michelle Rempel (Calgary Centre North, Alta.), who sits on the committee and serves as Parliamentary secretary to Environment Minister Peter Kent (Thornhill, Ont.), defended the committee’s recommendations prior to the budget’s release.
“The report expressly acknowledges that our government take its duty to consult very seriously, and that’s embedded right in the report,” Ms. Rempel told The Hill Times, responding to the allegation that the committee’s statutory review had been rigged to deliver a report that favoured industry at the expense of the environment.
University of Alberta ecologist David Schindler, a leading expert on the environmental impact of Alberta’s oilsands, said that the funding cuts are one of many steps that the federal government has taken to limit the enforcement of environmental regulations.
“They could just put in some slippery statement that they’re going to ‘streamline these acts’ and pass the budget because they have a majority and then do all of the dirty work under the table,” said Mr. Schindler, who advised the federal government on the oil sands monitoring program that it unveiled last summer.
Mr. Schindler, who spoke with The Hill Times one day prior to the budget’s official release, expected that the government would make drastic cuts to environmental research and regulation. He added that while he stands by the design of the oil sands monitoring program, it cannot collect the necessary data without proper funding.
“They’ve been cutting budgets to the point that some people can’t afford gas to get in their vehicles and get to an area that needs to be inspected,” he said of federal agencies operating in Alberta. “There’s a million tricks they can pull.”
In addition to regulatory reforms and budget cuts, Budget 2012 also amends the Canadian Revenue Agency Act to prevent registered charities from engaging in political activities and working against the “national interest.” The changes follow a recent Senate inquiry spearheaded by Conservative Senator Nicole Eaton on foreign donations to Canadian charities being used for political activism, particularly environmental activism aimed at opposing projects such as the Keystone XL and Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline projects.
“This bunch of hyperbolic extremists has decided that it’s somehow illegitimate or nefarious for Canadian-based environmental groups to accept contributions from conservation-minded donors in the U.S,” said Green Party Leader Elizabeth May (Saanich-Gulf Islands, B.C.), who likened reading the media’s coverage of the budget to reading Soviet-era newspaper Pravda. “I can’t get over how muted the reaction is from others.”
Bill Wareham, who serves as a senior conservation specialist with the David Suzuki Foundation, said the new restrictions on charities were vague and open to interpretation.
“There’s some subtle messaging about interpreting whether NGOs and non-profits are misleading the public,” Mr. Wareham observed. “We’re a bit fearful that they are going to put a higher level of scrutiny on environmental groups and there’s going to be some adjudication of charities.”
Mining Watch coordinator Jamie Kneen, who provided testimony to the House Environment Committee’s statutory review of CEAA, said that the government’s latest restrictions on civil society may only serve to agitate the public.
“If the policy discussions are no longer open to the public then the voices outside just get louder. The government may not have calculated what effect this will have on industrial development,” Mr. Kneen said. “The irony is that we’ve spent years trying to build an environmental assessment process and other sorts of environmental protection in a way that they actually will respond to the public and address their concerns. If they don’t, then the public will take its concerns to the courts, the streets, whatever avenue will allow them to be heard.”
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: CHRIS PLECASH
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