Questions and responses 41st Parliament, 2nd session October 16, 2013, to August 2, 2015

With regard to government spending in the municipality of Burnaby, British Columbia: what was the total amount of government funding, from fiscal year 2011-2012 up to and including the current fiscal year, broken down by (i) the date the funds were received in the riding, (ii) the dollar amount of the expenditure, (iii) the program through which the funding was allocated, (iv) the department responsible, (v) the designated recipient?

With regard to federal support for provincial-territorial-municipal infrastructure, for each of fiscal year 2014-2015 and the current fiscal year to date: for each of the Community Improvement Fund, the New Building Canada Fund’s (NBCF) National Infrastructure Component, the NBCF’s Provincial Territorial Infrastructure Component, the P3 Canada Fund, the Building Canada Fund (BCF) Major Infrastructure Component, and the BCF Communities Component, (a) how much has been spent; (b) how many projects were under construction in each province and territory; (c) how many projects received funding in each province and territory; and (d) how much of each province and territory’s allocation remained unspent?

With regard to federal government employees in Nova Scotia: for each year from 2005 to 2013 inclusively, broken down by department, how many government employees worked in (i) Cape Breton Regional Municipality, (ii) Victoria County, (iii) Inverness County, (iv) Richmond County?

With respect to the expiration of federal housing operating agreements: (a) how many agreements expired, broken down by year, since 2014; (b) what are the details of the agreements identified in (a), including (i) name or title of the agreement, (ii) how many units were affected, (iii) what was the date of expiry, (iv) in which municipality, province, territory, Aboriginal community, or other jurisdiction were they located; (c) how many agreements are set to expire by December 31, 2015; and (d) what are the details of the agreements identified in (c), including (i) name or title of the agreement, (ii) how many units will be affected, (iii) in which municipality, province, territory, Aboriginal community, or other jurisdiction are they located?

With regard to rail safety in Canada: (a) for the period of 2006-2012, which railways were permitted to operate with a single operator; (b) for the period of 2006-2012, which railways had permission to leave trains unattended for limited periods of time on main lines, with or without an idling locomotive; (c) for the period of 2006-2012, which railways had permission to leave trains unattended for limited periods of time on side lines, with or without an idling locomotive; (d) with regard to the railways in (b) and (c), under what specific conditions could the trains be left unattended; (e) what legislative or regulatory framework governs local emergency preparedness plans in the event of a rail accident; (f) with respect to the plans in (e), (i) who is responsible for creating and executing such plans, (ii) by whom are they audited, (iii) how often are they audited, (iv) against what criteria are they audited; (g) by whom and how often are municipalities through which freight trains pass provided with regular reports on (i) the state of local emergency preparedness in the event of a rail accident, (ii) the state and maintenance record of the railway lines within their borders, (iii) the materials, hazardous or not, that are transported through their jurisdiction; (h) if reports referred to in (g) are not provided, why not; (i) how many DOT-111 railway tank cars and DOD-112 tank cars are in use in Canada, for each year since 2006; (j) for each year since 2006, how many rolling-stock and track-safety inspectors were employed at Transport Canada, broken down by (i) province of work, (ii) oversight responsibility; (k) for each year since 2006, how many rolling-stock and track-safety inspectors employed by Transport Canada were responsible for inspections in (i) the Greater Montreal Area, (ii) the municipality of Pointe-Claire, (iii) the municipality of Beaconsfield, (iv) the municipality of Baie d’Urfé, (v) the municipality of Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue; (l) how frequently are railway tracks inspected in (i) populated areas, (ii) unpopulated ones; (m) since 2006, when have the rail tracks between downtown Montreal and the City of Vaudreuil-Dorion been inspected; (n) does Transport Canada have a system of evaluation in place, based on the results of inspections by its inspectors, that ranks the operational state of different sections of railway tracks; (o) with regard to the system in (n), if it exists, does this system or database correlate with allowable train speeds on each section of track and with which company owns each section; (p) for each year since 2006, how many freight train derailments, minor and major, have taken place in Canada, broken down by province; (q) with respect to the derailments in (p), how many took place on (i) a horizontal track, (ii) a sloping track, (iii) curved track, (iv) straight track; (r) for each year since 2006, how many cases of runaway freight trains have been reported in Canada, broken down by province; (s) for each year since 2006, how many train accidents, derailments or other, involving hazardous materials have there been; (t) how are the contents of rail cargo verified by the government or its agencies to determine if the contents conform to the contents labels/markings on the individual rail cars; (u) what is the process by which environmental risks of the transport by rail of oil and gas or other hazardous materials are assessed; (v) what quantity and type of goods are shipped annually by Canadian National and Canadian Pacific on lines that run through Montreal’s West Island in each of the last 5 years; (w) what are the allowable speeds for freight trains travelling different rail segments in the southwestern corridor of the island of Montreal from downtown Montreal to the city of Vaudreuil-Dorion; (x) with regard to the speed limits in (w), how is adherence to these limits monitored by Transport Canada; (y) with respect to the slowing of rail speed due to poor track conditions, how does Transport Canada verify that rail operators are implementing reduced speeds; (z) what is the slowest speed at which a rail operator will be allowed to operate its trains over a portion of track experiencing poor conditions before all traffic must be halted due to the poor track condition; and (aa) subsequent to the fatal accident in Lac-Mégantic, what plans are in place for reducing the speeds of freight trains passing through Canadian municipalities?

With regard to the New Building Canada Fund (NBCF), between 2013-2014 and the current fiscal year: (a) broken down by date of application, individual project, province, and municipality, what is the total number of applications submitted under each of the following components of the NBCF, (i) the National Infrastructure Component, (ii) the Provincial Territorial Infrastructure Component – National and Regional Projects (PTIC-NRP), (iii) the Provincial Territorial Infrastructure Component – Small Communities Fund (PTIC-SCF); (b) broken down by date of application, individual project, province, and municipality, what is the total amount of money requested under each component identified in (a); (c) broken down by date of application, individual project, province, and municipality, what are all the approved projects and the total amount of funding allocated under each component identified in (a); (d) broken down by date of application, individual project, province, and municipality, what is the total number of applications submitted for (i) public transit infrastructure projects, (ii) highway, bridge, and major road infrastructure projects, (iii) inter-city and regional rail infrastructure projects, (iv) disaster mitigation infrastructure projects, (v) port, maritime shipping, and marine infrastructure projects, (vi) airport, helipad, and aviation infrastructure projects, (vii) information technology infrastructure projects, (viii) wastewater management and sewage infrastructure projects; (e) which provinces have submitted applications to Infrastructure Canada under (i) PTIC–NRP, (ii) PTIC-SCF; (f) which provinces have yet to open the process for municipal applications under PTIC-NRP; and (g) will delays in processing applications under PTIC-NRP cause any municipalities to miss the 2015 construction season and, if so, which municipalities will be affected?

With regard to federal taxes, revenues, expenses and transfers in the calendar year 2012 for the cities of Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary and Edmonton: (a) which taxes, fees and other revenue types did the federal government collect or had other entities collect on its behalf, broken down by (i) type, (ii) dollar amount, (iii) originator (including, but not limited to, individual citizens, companies, etc.), (iv) collecting or facilitating entity or level of government, for each of the aforementioned cities; and (b) which types of investments, payouts, transfers and other outgoing payments did the federal government make to each of the aforementioned cities broken down by (i) type, (ii) dollar amount, (iii) facilitating entity or level of government, (iv) frequency of transaction (one-time, recurring), (v) receiving entity of level of government?

With regard to changes to the Large Business Audit Program, whereby audits may be performed by Canada Revenue Agency offices in cities other than the location of the business audited: what has been the effect of these changes for audits conducted after the change compared to those conducted before, particularly in terms of penalties, fines, and revenue collected per audit?

With regard to Infrastructure Canada, from fiscal year 2011-2012 to the present, broken down by fiscal year: what is the total amount allocated within the British Columbian municipalities of (i) New Westminster, (ii) Coquitlam, (iii) Port Moody?

With regard to the January 2014 final report to the government on the noise disturbance commonly referred to as the Windsor Hum: (a) what measures has the government undertaken to address this problem; and (b) are there future plans to work towards mitigating this issue?