ENVI Committee Report

A.

Measuring success: pollution prevention

1.      What are the goals of CEPA and how are they measured?

2.      How can Canadians be best informed about the state of the environment?

3.      How can monitoring of exposure to toxic substances be improved?

B.

International activities

1.      What are other jurisdictions doing with respect to the management of toxic substances and what lessons could be learned for the Canadian context?

C.

Assessment of substances

1.      Should the Act be changed to accommodate the different inherent toxicities and uses of chemicals?

o        use of the word “toxic”

o        chemicals under the Food and Drug Act

o        carbon dioxide

2.      How should the Government manage substances highlighted in the screening of the Domestic Substances List?

3.      What aspects of the Act and its implementation can be changed to reduce the time required for assessments?

4.      How should assessments take into account vulnerable populations and ecosystems?

5.      Should the Act enable other jurisdictions’ risk assessments to be recognized?

6.      How should the precautionary principle be applied to assessing substances?

7.      What information should the government require of industry and who should assess the information?

8.      What level of public disclosure should there be regarding data and its analysis?

9.      Where should the burden of proof lie?

D.

Managing substances

1.      What are the appropriate tools to apply to substances that pose various risks to the environment and human health?

2.      What aspects of the Act and its implementation can be changed to reduce the time required to put in place management tools once a substance has been assessed?

3.      What does Virtual Elimination mean (including limits of quantification) and how could it be put into practice?

4.      How should the precautionary principle be applied to managing substances?

5.      Does enforcement of the Act need to be improved?

6.      Do the Public Participation (civil suits) aspects need to be improved?

E.

Cooperation with the provinces, territories and aboriginal peoples

1.      What is the role of the National Advisory Committee, particularly in relation to the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment, and how can it be improved?

2.      How can aboriginal points of view be better integrated into decision making?

3.      What is the role of Equivalency Agreements and how can they be used most effectively?

F.

Interdepartmental cooperation and legislative overlap

1.      Are the roles of different departments sufficiently well identified to ensure that the department with the right expertise and capacity is performing the correct tasks?

2.      Is there sufficient legislative clarity within CEPA and between CEPA and other federal Acts related to the management of toxic substances to ensure efficient control of toxic substances at the federal level?