A new report released Wednesday chronicles the changes made to Canada’s environmental laws under the federal Conservatives since they formed government in 2011.

The report, released by West Coast Environmental Law and the Quebec Environmental Law Centre, highlights “the repeal or amendment of most of Canada’s foundational environmental laws since 2011” and suggests many of the changes were a “gift to industry.”

“The record suggests that industry lobbied hard for removing environmental protections that it believed were impeding business,” the report states.

Major changes include the weakening of the Navigable Waters Protection Act, which removed 99 per cent of Canada’s lakes and rivers from protection, as well as changes to the Fisheries Act and the Species at Risk Act.

Weakening of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act means approximately 90 per cent of major industry projects that would have undergone a federal review no longer will, according to the report.

Karine Peloffy, director general of the Quebec Environmental Law Centre, said Canada’s environmental legislation is intrinsically tied into the fabric of the country’s democracy.

“Our waters, species, and our very democracy have been put at risk by changes made to our environmental laws since 2011,” Peloffy said.

“When these legal changes were first brought in, we could only speculate about the impacts they would have on Canadians and the environment. Unfortunately, our analysis indicates that our fears have been borne out on the ground.”

Summary of environmental law changes from Canada's Track Record on Environmental Laws 2011-2015.

The majority of the legal changes were pushed through via omnibus budget legislation, something the current Conservative government has employed more than any previous government.

The report refers to omnibus budget bill C-38 (voting record here) and C-45 (voting record here) as “two critical blows” to environmental law “in order to streamline approval processes for risky or controversial industrial activities.”

“Basically all of the main changes that were made to federal environmental laws in those two omnibus budget bills, C-38 and C-45, were made at the request of industry,” West Coast Environmental Law Association staff counsel Anna Johnston, author of the report, told DeSmog Canada.

“We have the evidence to show that.”

The report is accompanied by a comparison of federal party platforms as they relate to environmental law (see below).

Platform promises put forward by the NDP, the Green Party and the Liberal Party reflect the public’s concern about the way environmental laws have been altered in recent years.

Johnston said the result of weaker environmental laws is that the public is pushed out of the democratic process.

“I think there’s a lot in the three platforms about that — about including Aboriginal peoples, the public and other stakeholders groups — not just industry — in developing and ensuring the implementation of environmental laws.”

Changes made to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act limit public participation to “interested parties” — those who can demonstrate they are “directly affected” by a project or have relevant expertise that relates to the project.

As a result of this law, hundreds of British Columbians were barred from participating in the review process for the expansion of the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline, leading to a loss of public confidence in the process.

Johnston said that loss of confidence in process has led to significant social unrest in Canada.

“If you have a process that is a sham process the public is going to feel ripped off and eventually they are going to find a way to have their voices heard,” she said. “Which is why we see people getting arrested on Burnaby Mountain, forming protests up in Fort St. John against Site C, and the formation of Idle No More.”

Johnston said stronger environmental laws that carve out a space for public participation, on the other hand, help alleviate this kind of social distress.

“With meaningful participation, even if people don’t agree with the end results, they feel like they’ve had their concerns heard.” 

“I think that tends to reduce the amount of civil disobedience and the amount of proceedings brought to the courts. And I think it results in better assessments, because you have more information and evidence and testing of evidence,” Johnston said.  

Party platform comparisons from West Coast Environmental Law and the Quebec Environmental Law Centre can be seen below. Click on images for full report:

Image: Chris Yakimov via Flickr

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The Harper government followed the advice of industry associations when making controversial changes to the Fisheries Act in the 2012 omnibus budget bills, documents relased through access to information legislation reveal.

Gloria Galloway writes for the Globe and Mail that in 2010, "the High Park Group consulting firm was commissioned by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) to gather industry and business observations about the habitat protection provisions of the Fisheries Act."

The released documents show that phrasing regarding changes to fisheries protections "suggest that wording was offered by industry associations," according to Galloway.

Negative feedback from the 23 organizations consulted, including the Canadian Electricity Association (CEA), the Canadian Hydropower Association (CHA) and the Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce (SKCC), correlates with changes made to legislation protecting fish and their habitats.

For example, the consultant's report said that "CEA/CHA and SKCC call for modification of the act's definition of 'fishery' to clarify that it refers to 'commercial, recreational, subsistence or aboriginal use of fish as a resource."

One of the biggest changes made in Bill C-38 was, as Galloway points out, the removal of "broad protections that covered all fish habitats," narrowing the focus of the law to protect only fish "that are part of a commercial, recreational or aboriginal fisheries, or to fish that support such a fishery."

Incidentally, the High Park Group reportedly noted that there was a "lack of cogent and substantive documentation of industry positions on the issue" of concerns about the pre-2012 Fisheries Act, as well as a lack of evidence to back up claims including "that it was too unpredictable, that it caused considerable barriers to infrastructure investment, and that it increased regulatory costs and timelines."

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans didn't neglect to also consult with environmental groups about the Fisheries Act, having done so between 2006 and 2009. It appears feedback from environmental groups did not figure as heavily in the changes ultimately made.

In fact, another report released by the department under access to information said that environmental groups called the Fisheries Act "one of the strongest laws in Canada that can be used to protect our environment" and called for it to be strengthened and enforced.

Andrew Gage of West Coast Environmental Law, one of the environmental groups consulted by the DFO, said the Harper Conservatives are "a government listening only to industry concerns."

The DFO reportedly said in an e-mail that they're "still focusing on preserving fish habitat," but using a "common-sense approach that focuses on managing threats to Canada's recreational, commercial and aboriginal fisheries and the fish and fish habitat on which they depend."

Critics of the changes to the Fisheries Act include Green Party Leader Elizabeth May, who said the DFO created "a new definition for what a fishery is and completely [ignored] the comments from a wide consultation from people on the ground who are actually protecting the fishery."

This isn't the first time that the Harper government has proven its commitment to putting 'natural resources development' and industry interests ahead of environmental protection.

Other documents released through access to information requests have already revealed that the federal government solicited industry support for environmental reforms written into the Omnibus Budget Bill C-38. Additonal documents show the government made pipeline development a top priority for that bill, at the fossil fuel industry's request, and further colluded with the oil and gas industry when tweaking the bill's environmental legislation and industrial project review process.

Image Credit: Geoffrey Kehrig / Flickr

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Postmedia's Mike De Souza reported today on a newly released internal document from Environment Canada that shows the federal government was concerned with the preference of Canada's largest oil and gas lobby body, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), when crafting last year's 2012 Omnibus budget bill that overhauled or eliminated some of the nation's most significant environmental laws.

A briefing document drafted for Environment Canada's associate deputy minister, Andrea Lyon, in preparation for a CAPP gala event in Alberta noted the lobby group's preference for a legislative overhaul, rather than a formal piecemeal examination of environmental laws in Parliament.

As De Souza explains, "the briefing scenario…suggested that oil and gas companies didn't want a series of separate legislative changes, but rather an 'omnibus' approach."

In email correspondence obtained by DeSmog, De Souza asked CAPP to declare the organization's position on the legislative changes.

CAPP's vice president Janet Annesley responded with this statement, suggesting the lobby body "did not express any opinion" on the process:

De Souza responded to Annesley's claim by producing the internal Environment Canada document, asking her to respond to the federal government's suggestion CAPP had "issues" with a case-by-case review of existing environmental legislation:

After reviewing the released internal document, Annesley suggested CAPP did in fact advocate for a "holistic review of regulatory legislation" but said the association "cannot speak to the government's specific choice of words."

The internal Environment Canada document released to De Souza through access to information legislation shows the federal department noted "CAPP has raised issues with the 'one-off' reviews of specific legislation such as CEAA and SARA and would rather have a more strategic omnibus legislative approach."

In 2012, the Harper government forced through a more than 400-page omnibus budget bill that included sweeping changes to Canada's environmental laws, including weakening water and species protections, eliminating thousands of environmental reviews for large industrial projects and minimizing public participation in review hearings on these projects.

That the federal government took the oil and gas industry's wishes to heart is no surprise given a number of related internal documents also released by De Souza.

One such document shows the federal government assuring the oil and gas and pipeline industry their interests were "top-of-mind" when considering the omnibus overhaul. The federal government even went so far as to ask for industry support for the changes, acknowledging the altered legislation would be "very controversial."

Other documents show the government taking a very different approach when engaging with First Nations who were told any rumours regarding changes to environmental laws were merely "speculative."

Environment Minister Peter Kent suggested the changes are improvements, telling Postmedia, "human nature does not easily accommodate any change or the prospect of change…When change does happen, there are often very legitimate concerns that develop until in the fullness of time, the changes that are made fulfill the commitment and the promise of those who made the changes."

Greenpeace Canada's Keith Stewart said "omnibus budget bills are tools to avoid public debate. I can understand why Big Oil wanted to hide their proposals to gut Canada's environmental laws from public scrutiny, but the government never should have taken that advice."

"A year later, we find out that the oil and gas industry not only got to dictate changes to Canada's environmental laws, but also the secretive way in which those changes were enacted," he told Postmedia.

Greenpeace Canada recently published an internal document that showed many of the changes brought about in the omnibus budget bill were explicitly requested by the oil and gas industry lobby.

The oil and gas industry went so far as to identify the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, the Species at Risk Act, the National Energy Board Act, the Migratory Birds Convention Act, and the Navigable Waters Protection Act as 'prohibitive' to industry pursuits.

Changes to the regulatory regime, stated several major oil, gas and pipeline lobby groups and companies in a letter to Ministers Peter Kent and Joe Oliver, needed to happen for the sake of both "economic growth and environmental performance."

Between 2008 and 2012, the federal government met with industry groups 463 percent more than environmental organizations, according to a report on lobbying records released by the Polaris Institute.

"Regulatory reform," the industry letter read, "was one of the principe challenges identified" by the energy industry, "and has been an ongoing priority for the sector as a whole."  

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