No need for every toxic chemical to have a pollution plan, Ottawa says
No need for every toxic chemical to have a pollution plan, Ottawa says
Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Canada speaks to reporters at the COP15 UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, Dec. 18, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes
OTTAWA -
The federal government is playing a dangerous game by refusing to force any company that makes or uses toxic chemicals to have a plan in place to prevent them from getting into the environment, a lawyer for the Canadian Environmental Law Association said Monday.
Joseph Castrilli said it was profoundly disappointing that Liberal and Conservative MPs voted on Monday against amending the Canadian Environmental Protection Act to make pollution prevention plans mandatory for all chemicals listed as toxic under the act.
"Do you want to live a healthy life?" he asked. "Do you want to drink water that isn't contaminated, breathe air that's not polluted or walk in fields that are not otherwise strewn within the residues of airborne hazardous substances? Then you need to take this statute seriously."
The Canadian Environmental Protection Act, or CEPA, governs how toxic chemicals are identified and managed in Canada. It is in the midst of its first update in two decades, following a mandatory review that took place in 2016 and 2017.
A bill to update the act is currently before the House of Commons environment committee, which is now considering amendments to the bill.
On Monday, the committee discussed an amendment from Green Party Leader Elizabeth May to make pollution prevention plans mandatory for all toxic substances.
There are more than 150 substances now listed as toxic under CEPA, but the legislation gives the minister discretion over whether to order a pollution prevention plan for each one.
Such an order would mean any company that manufactures or uses one of the substances would have to show how it intends to keep that substance from getting into the environment.
May, following advice from the Canadian Environmental Law Association that now dates back more than 20 years, tried to change the wording so such plans would be required in every case.
The government said no, and with Conservatives in agreement, voted down May's amendment.
John Moffet, an assistant deputy minister at Environment Canada, told the committee a pollution prevention plan is only one option to lower the risk posed by chemicals deemed to be toxic to people or the environment.
"I don't think we have any objections to the stated goal of promoting pollution prevention," Moffet said.
He said CEPA also allows the government to regulate a substance including banning it outright, "which is the most effective and powerful way to achieve pollution prevention."
He said forcing pollution prevention plans for every substance would be an "unnecessary imposition" when there are "other more stringent and immediately effective measures" available.
May said her amendment allowed some discretion for the minister to use alternatives to a pollution prevention plan, including prohibitions, as long as he explains why.
NDP MP Laurel Collins said the government's resistance is surprising.
She said the government could even include an outright ban as part of a pollution prevention plan, but by refusing to make sure every substance has a plan in place, some are falling through the cracks.
"It's seriously alarming," she said.
The Canadian Environmental Law Association said only one-sixth of the substances listed as toxic under the act have a pollution prevention plan.
Toxic spills and disposals must be reported to the federal government. The association analyzed the reports on 32 cancer-causing toxic substances, including arsenic, benzene, lead, asbestos and mercury. It found companies have done a good job reducing the amount of toxic substances leaking into the air.
In 2006, 6.2 million kilograms of those substances were reported as airborne emissions, a number that fell to 3.8 million kilograms in 2020.
But when it comes to land spills and disposals, the story is the opposite. In 2006, 110 million kilograms of those 32 substances were purposely or accidentally released into land. In 2020, that grew to 154 million kilograms
One Canadian Environmental Law Association report called the government's lack of effort to make pollution prevention mandatory akin to "playing chemical whack-a-mole with some of the most dangerous substances on earth."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 30, 2023.
U.S President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have announced updates on a number of cross-border issues, after a day of meetings on Parliament Hill.
More than 130,000 people have signed an e-petition calling on Canada to give transgender and non-binary people fleeing harmful laws in their home countries the right to claim asylum, but that's already possible in this country. Advocates say the popularity of the proposal shows politicians that Canadians want the government to affirm its welcoming position.
The Public Order Emergency Commission has concluded that the federal government met the threshold for invoking the Emergencies Act to bring an end to the 'Freedom Convoy' protests and blockades.
The federal government is pledging to increase health funding to Canada's provinces and territories by $196.1 billion over the next 10 years, in a long-awaited deal aimed at addressing Canada's crumbling health-care systems with $46.2 billion in new funding.
Governor of the Bank of Canada Tiff Macklem says he thinks Canada is 'turning the corner' on inflation, but he isn't ruling out that the country could enter a 'mild recession.' In an English-language broadcast exclusive interview with CTV National News Ottawa Bureau Chief Joyce Napier, Macklem encouraged Canadians to prepare a 'buffer' to withstand 'tougher times.'
Joe Biden comes for a sleepover next week to make Canada the 18th country he has visited since being sworn in as U.S. president, quite the protocol slippage from that fading, if not forgotten, tradition of Canada being the first foreign presidential pitstop, writes Don Martin in a column for CTVNews.ca.
After weeks of refusing to look further into foreign election interference, Justin Trudeau surrendered to intense pressure and appointed a 'special rapporteur' to review China's actions. In his exclusive column for CTVNews.ca, Don Martin writes this 'startling change of heart' suggests the PMO is in panic mode and reflects badly on the prime minister's decision making.
The Trudeau tipping point is within sight. The moment when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau knows he has to quit for the good of the party or the Liberals realize they can't survive re-election with him at the helm is almost upon us, Don Martin writes in an exclusive column for CTVNews.ca.
Bombshell revelations that suggest Chinese agents actively, fraudulently and successfully manipulated Canada's electoral integrity in the last two federal elections cannot be dismissed with the standard Justin Trudeau nothing-to-see-here shrug, Don Martin writes in his exclusive opinion column for CTVNews.ca.
The chances Trudeau's health-care summit with the premiers will end with the blueprint to realistic long-term improvements are only marginally better than believing China’s balloon was simply collecting atmospheric temperatures, Don Martin writes in an exclusive column for CTVNews.ca, 'But it’s clearly time the 50-year-old dream of medicare as a Canadian birthright stopped being such a nightmare for so many patients.'
In the 2023 federal budget, the government is unveiling continued deficit spending targeted at Canadians' pocketbooks, public health care and the clean economy.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says clean energy and green technology spending may not have been the big-ticket items of the 2023 federal budget if it weren’t for the need to compete with infrastructure spending in the United States.
The increase in excise duties on all alcoholic products is being temporarily capped at two per cent starting next month instead of a planned 6.3 per cent increase.
In the wake of another deadly mass shooting in America, that saw children as young as nine years old shot and killed, the gun control debate is going nowhere, writes CTV News political analyst Eric Ham.
A new study published by Canadian researchers suggests that kindergarten-age children would rather be taught by a competent robot than an incompetent human.
Stonehenge's purpose has long been a mystery, with some researchers proposing that it may have been an ancient solar calendar. But now, new analysis suggests the calendar theory is unsubstantiated.
The federal budget proposes an across-the-board three per cent spending cut for all departments and agencies, a belt-tightening move after years of massive growth in the federal public service.
Another American community is reeling after a shooter killed three 9-year-olds and three adults at a private Christian elementary school in Nashville. These are the three children and three adults whose lives were taken by the shooter.
Montreal police say they have identified two more victims found in the rubble of a fire in Old Montreal 12 days ago. Charlie Lacroix and Walid Belkahla, both 18, are the sixth and seventh victims of the fire.
Rima Rifai thought her furnace had exploded Monday when the house across the street burst into a ball of fire, sending 10 people to hospital with serious injuries.
New Brunswickers suffering from a mystery neurological disorder are calling for an investigation into potential environmental causes of the health problems they've been living with for more than two years.
Authorities are asking witnesses to come forward after security at Simon Fraser University discovered the head of the school's Mahatma Gandhi bust had been removed.
An influx of asylum seekers into Canada via unofficial border crossings has prompted the federal government to relocate refugees from Quebec as far as Atlantic provinces, some more than 1,000 kilometres (621 miles) away, and hire a risk mitigation company to deal with the record surge.
The federal budget proposes an across-the-board three per cent spending cut for all departments and agencies, a belt-tightening move after years of massive growth in the federal public service.
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu late Tuesday said his country's intelligence agency Mossad helped Greece prevent a terrorist attack planned against at least one Jewish site in Athens.
Another American community is reeling after a shooter killed three 9-year-olds and three adults at a private Christian elementary school in Nashville. These are the three children and three adults whose lives were taken by the shooter.
Brazil's government on Tuesday reported the 700,000th death from COVID-19 in the South American nation, which has the second most victims of the virus after the United States.
Nashville police have released security camera footage of a suspected shooter entering the private Christian elementary school. The shooting claimed the lives of three children, all aged nine, and three adults.
A former Southern California man who convinced troubled girls as young as 12 to perform masochistic acts and urged one to become his sex slave was sentenced Tuesday to 27 years in U.S. federal prison.
At least 14 people from the African nation of Cameroon were rescued from waters in the eastern Caribbean early Tuesday after their boat capsized, but three people were dead and 13 others missing, authorities on Antigua said.
In the 2023 federal budget, the government is unveiling continued deficit spending targeted at Canadians' pocketbooks, public health care and the clean economy.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says clean energy and green technology spending may not have been the big-ticket items of the 2023 federal budget if it weren’t for the need to compete with infrastructure spending in the United States.
The federal budget proposes an across-the-board three per cent spending cut for all departments and agencies, a belt-tightening move after years of massive growth in the federal public service.
Canada violated the rights of hundreds of patients awaiting access to psilocybin-assisted psychotherapy when it rejected applications from health-care professionals to consume the restricted drug for training purposes, a lawyer for the workers argued in Federal Court on Tuesday.
A new study published by Canadian researchers suggests that kindergarten-age children would rather be taught by a competent robot than an incompetent human.
Tucked into the 2023 federal budget unveiled on Tuesday in Ottawa, the Liberals have announced plans to explore implementing a standard charging port across Canada, in an effort to save Canadians some money and reduce waste.
It's a surreal moment in an already surreal war: the grave but calming baritone of actor Mark Hamill, Luke Skywalker of 'Star Wars,' urging people to take cover whenever Russia unleashes another aerial bombardment on Ukraine.
Five-time Grammy Award winner Angelique Kidjo, Island Records founder Chris Blackwell and Estonian composer Arvo Part have won the 2023 Polar Music Prize, a Swedish music award.
Prince Harry returned to a London court Tuesday for a second day of hearings to see if the phone hacking lawsuit he brought with Elton John and other celebrities can withstand a challenge from the publisher of The Daily Mail.
Serious money is heading for Canadian industries looking to reduce emissions after the federal government unveiled its answer to the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act.
Flair Airlines said Monday it has reimbursed virtually all 1,900 passengers whose flights were cancelled after the seizure of four of the carrier's planes earlier this month, but some customers say they are owed more money.
It may seem improbable - even impossible to some - but each day for the last three years, a 71-year-old Toronto woman has laced up her shoes, put one foot in front of the other, and headed out for a run
Alex Jung found his way back to the water in 2018 and began instructing other trans swimmers. But, he says, it was a 'challenging pursuit' without a community. Now creating that sense of support is becoming more mainstream at local fitness centres.
The brother of the late New England Patriots player Aaron Hernandez is facing criminal and motor vehicle charges in Connecticut, accused of throwing a brick onto the ESPN headquarters campus and eluding police during brief pursuits in other towns.
Shohei Ohtani is among several players going into their final seasons before they are eligible for free agency. There is still time for signatures and press conferences before opening day, but history shows a new contract becomes less likely once the real games begin.
U.S. highway safety regulators have opened yet another investigation into problems with Teslas, this time tied to complaints that the seat belts may not hold people in a crash.
California lawmakers on Monday approved the nation's first penalty for price gouging at the pump, voting to give regulators the power to punish oil companies for profiting from the type of gas price spikes that plagued the nation's most populous state last summer.
Craig Pollock's latest project, Formula Equal, would be the first team in the sport that's 50 per cent men and 50 per cent women, he says, with that equal split applying across the whole organization -- from the cockpit to the engineers to the boardroom.
Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Canada speaks to reporters at the COP15 UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, Dec. 18, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes
