[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, September 21, 1995

.0908

[English]

The Clerk of the Committee: Honorable members, I see a quorum. In conformity with Standing Orders 106.(1) and 106.(2), your first item of business is to elect a chairperson. I am ready to receive motions to that effect.

Mr. Finlay (Oxford): I move, Mr. Chairman, that the chair be Mr. Charles Caccia, the deputy from Davenport.

The Clerk: It is moved by Mr. Finlay, seconded by Mr. Steckle, that Mr. Caccia be elected chair of this committee. Is it the pleasure of the committee to adopt the motion?

Motion agreed to

The Clerk: I declare Mr. Caccia duly elected chair of this committee and I invite him to take the chair.

.0913

The Chairman: Because of the advanced hour, I will keep my remarks to a minimum. We have a witness waiting in the audience and limited time available. I will simply say I thank you for your vote of confidence. I hope to deserve it. I hope also you will put me on the right road when I am wrong, as you have in the past.

I look forward to the schedule we have, which is rather intensive. We have a lot of work to do in the form of bills and in the form of committee investigations. We will have a good discussion on that last subject very, very soon - on the various options that are ahead of us. I would ask the clerk to distribute a draft paper we put together a couple of weeks ago on the various options open to us, so we can have a good discussion.

Without any further delay, then, I will thank you again, and I will now call for nominations for vice-chair.

[Translation]

Mr. Pomerleau (Anjou - Rivière-des-Prairies): I would like to move that Ms. Monique Guay be elected Vice-Chair of the committee.

[English]

Mr. Lincoln (Lachine - Lac-Saint-Louis): I would like to nominate Mrs. Kraft Sloan.

The Chairman: We have nominations for two positions. Are there any further nominations?

Mr. Forseth (New Westminster - Burnaby): Mr. Chairman, I'd like to nominate Keith Martin as vice-chair.

The Chairman: We have three nominations. Are there any further?

There being three nominations for two positions, we could proceed by a vote first of all on the nomination to the vice-chair position as proposed by the Bloc Québécois, for Mrs. Guay.

Mr. Martin (Esquimalt - Juan de Fuca): Point of order, Mr. Chairman. We'd like to have a recorded vote, please.

The Chairman: We'll have a recorded vote, as requested by Mr. Martin. I will call the vote again on the nomination of Mrs. Guay as vice-chair of the committee.

Motion agreed to: yeas 7; nays 2

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The Chairman: I declare Madam Guay duly elected as vice-chair of this committee.

We'll proceed with the next nomination, that of Mrs. Kraft Sloan. Is it the wish of this committee to proceed to vote by a show of hands?

Mr. Martin: Recorded vote.

The Chairman: We will proceed with a recorded vote.

Motion agreed to: yeas, 7; nays, 2

The Chairman: I declare Madam Kraft Sloan elected vice-chair of the committee.

Do you wish to proceed with the third nomination? We will proceed again by recorded vote.

The positions are filled, the clerk informs me. Therefore there is no necessity to proceed.

Mr. Martin: I'm sorry, Mr. Chairman. I couldn't -

The Chairman: The positions are filled by virtue of the two preceding electoral processes. Therefore there is no need to proceed.

Mr. Martin: I'd like that recorded, please.

The Chairman: There is no need to proceed, because there are no more vacant positions to fill.

I therefore declare the process of election completed. I congratulate both Madam Guay and Madam Kraft Sloan.

Félicitations.

We are going to proceed right way with our business of the day. We are meeting here to hear an unusually interesting guest.

[Translation]

Mr. Stuart L. Smith is the new Chairperson of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy. Here are some brief biographical notes.

Born in Montreal, Dr. Smith graduated from the Faculty of Medecine at McGill University and held the post of Professor of Psychiatry at McMaster University Medical School.

In 1975, he entered politics when he was elected to the Ontario legislature. He won the leadership of the Ontario Liberal Party in January 1976 and became leader of the Opposition a year later. In that position, he was a frequent spokesman for the environment as well as an advocate of research based industrial policies.

From 1982 to 1987, Dr. Smith was Chairman of the Science Council of Canada and in 1990-1991 he chaired the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada's commission of inquiry on Canadian university education.

Dr. Smith was then appointed president of Philip Utilities Management Corporation, Canada's biggest industrial recycling firm and one of North America's largest integrated waste management companies.

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Last June, I think he was appointed Chairman of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy and this is why we have invited him today. This is an excellent opportunity for us to exchange views on the economy and the environment.

Mr. Smith, would you please come to the table? If you want to bring along your colleague, that's fine. On behalf of the members of our committee, I welcome you.

Dr. Stuart L. Smith (Chairman, National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am very happy and honoured to be here today to share some points of view with this commettee.

I intend to speak English most of the time since it is easier for me to express myself in this language but I am prepared to answer in French any questions asked in this language.

[English]

So I would like to use the language in which I'm a little bit more at ease, if that's all right.

I have introduced Gene Nyberg, who is the acting executive director at the National Round Table.

If the committee members will permit, I would like to make a very brief opening statement, just to do two things.

The first is just to present my credentials to you as to why I felt it was a reasonable thing to accept the invitation, when it was brought to me, to serve as the chair of the Round Table. It's important that this committee consider those credentials and decide for itself on the suitability of people who take positions of this kind. As a former opposition leader myself, I've long been in favour of strengthening the role of committees, and I think it's a good thing to look at the people who are nominated to these positions.

After presenting my credentials to you, the second thing I want to do is to discuss with you some of the issues in determining what the direction for the National Round Table ought to be. I have some ideas, but I would be happy to be guided to some extent by members of the committee as to what direction a round table should take.

So those are the two things I'd like to present at the start, and then I hope we'll have a good exchange afterwards.

As to my own credentials, the chair has kindly read out the sort of official one-page biography. It leaves certain things out. For example, one of the main reasons why I went into politics back when I was a psychiatrist in Hamilton was to participate in the protection of a wetland in that area called Cootes Paradise. Ultimately I ended up appearing in front of environmental hearing boards on that wetland, and I think I was instrumental in forcing a much higher level of sewage treatment in that area so as to protect those particular wetlands.

I think most reporters, those who have memories long enough to remember the times when I was a politician in opposition, will tell you that my main issue was always the environment. I never had the honour, as two people in this room have had, of actually being Minister of the Environment. I was only in opposition, but I think we had a big effect, because we raised so much fuss about the misuse of landfill sites that the government was obliged to bring in a proper waybill system to keep track of all wastes that were being delivered to various kinds of disposal. That has made a very big difference in Ontario, and I know that many other parts of the country did the same thing.

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At the same time, I don't think I'm being immodest if I say we were responsible for creating the acid rain issue. My researcher at the time was somebody you'll meet shortly, Adèle Hurley. Some of you may already know her. She had just come from Pollution Probe. She and I, I think to the consternation of certain people, raised that acid rain issue and made it a very big issue in Ontario and in Canada.

In fact, way back when I first dipped my toe into the idea of doing something politically, I ran against a certain Pierre Trudeau for the nomination in Mount Royal. That was in 1965. I remember a debate against Mr. Trudeau in which I raised the issue of ``corrosive precipitation'', which I said was falling on Montreal as a result of the refineries in the east end, damaging statues and buildings in the city and so on.

So it goes back a long way.

Mr. Adams (Peterborough): Who won the nomination?

Dr. Smith: I'm afraid I withdrew before the actual vote occurred. That's a story for another committee, on another day.

Some of you will remember that in my last campaign I repeatedly raised the issue of using methanol as an extender for gasoline, the way they were using ethanol in the United States. I felt we could use waste wood resources and produce methanol. I opposed the building of the Darlington nuclear station because I believed it would be far more costly than people expected it would be. I did not oppose it on the basis of being anti-nuclear. I'm not anti-nuclear. I opposed it on the basis of what I predicted would be its capital cost. I was much more in favour of renewable energy.

I also proposed, as some of you will know - it's still being taught in some law schools - the first environmental bill of rights in Canada. As an opposition member I brought that in. It was defeated, but it became a model that kept recurring, and ultimately a different - nonetheless you can trace the history, trace the lineage - bill of rights has been adopted in Ontario now.

In 1982 I was appointed chair of the Science Council of Canada. That, as you know, before I got there was famous for being the body that propagated the idea of the conserver society. We continued some of that work under my leadership, although, as I say, I didn't start it. But we did do studies on agricultural soil, water resources, and aquaculture long before these became popular issues. I think if you look back you'll see we espoused the renewable side of the renewable resource industry.

After the Science Council I opened a business. Among the things I did, apart from the university education study that was mentioned, was that I was asked by the government of the day, which was a Conservative government, if I would take charge, in the energy options program, of the renewable alternative energy and conservation issues - demand, management, and conservation - which I did in that exercise across Canada. I think we had some interesting results.

The business I started was to do public-private partnerships in government laboratories. As fate would have it, the laboratory we eventually were able to do this with was in Environment Canada. It's known as the Wastewater Technology Centre. It's located at the Canada Centre for Inland Waters.

For the last four years my company has been the operator of that laboratory. For the last two years we've been very profitable, and unlike other government labs, we've actually expanded. We have 120 people there who have left the government and who are now working for our private sector company. We do all the work for government non-profit. Any profit we make is divided among the government, ourselves, and the employees, as an incentive. That has been a very successful model and has of course put us front and centre in the water and waste water business.

I discovered that Canada did not have any serious water companies to go around the world and improve water quality and use Canadian expertise, so I created such a company. It has now become part of the Philip Environmental organization.

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I am now senior vice-president of Philip Environmental, which is the largest industrial recycler in North America. It will do $750 million of business this year. It is based in Hamilton.

I'm president of Philip's Utilities, which is a water and waste water company. We now operate, in a public-private partnership, the water and waste water system of Hamilton - Wentworth, a region of about 500,000 people in Ontario.

So I'm in the environment business now, which is quite interesting, because I now operate the very plant that I had improved in order to save Cootes Paradise in the first place. So I'm now the operator of the same plant on which we insisted at one time.

Of course I have been a member of the National Round Table for the past year.

That is what I wanted to say with respect to my credentials. I hope that my interest in environmental matters has become very clear through that recording of history.

As to how to look at the mandate of the Round table, here I'm really open to more discussion with the members of the Round Table, with the staff, and certainly with members of this committee.

If you've taken any time to look at the legislation, then you will realize that there is a tension between the title of the organization and the mandate as it is written.

The title of the organization implies two things.

It is to be a round table. In other words, all points of view are to be expressed at that round table and treated with respect and dealt with in a civil manner. Everybody is at the same table - all the stakeholders, as it is said.

Similarly, if you continue with the title it says ``Round Table on the environment and the economy''. It implies, therefore, a cost-benefit analysis with respect to individual actions on the environment.

Now if you will look at the actual mandate as written in the next sections of the legislation, you will see that it speaks of sustainable development, of the promotion of sustainable development, and of promoting knowledge about it, a favourable view of it, and a general public awareness with respect to it.

If you read all the rest of it, this could just as easily be a council on sustainable development whose job is to promote the concept and encourage research and disseminate the findings of the research.

So, looking at this, I have taken the viewpoint, which I want to put out for discussion, that by emphasizing the title, by emphasizing the idea of a round table clash of ideas, seeking of consensus, and by emphasizing the need to look at individual actions about sustainable development from the viewpoint of cost-benefit analysis, we can accomplish the promotion of sustainable development in a better way than if we simply said, ``We're for sustainable development. Let's do a bunch of studies and publish them.''

So what I would like to do is to acknowledge that sustainable development, like any ideal concept, is easy to support in general terms. The devil is in the details. The problem comes when you actually have to decide whether or not to do this or that action to promote or improve the environment.

So what I would like to do is to focus our agenda at the Round Table on the specific actions, the specific policies, to try to reach consensus by taking advantage of the fact that around that table are people from all interest groups, and then to emphasize the areas in which consensus has been achieved.

Where consensus has not been achieved, usually it will be on a cost-benefit basis. Sometimes it will be because there's an actual argument as to whether a given action is good or bad for the environment, but more often it will be an issue of whether a given action produces a benefit that is sufficiently clear, sufficiently predictable, sufficiently certain, to justify a certain cost.

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What I would like to see is that people around this country will look to the National Round Table to find out the current state of consensus on all these actual action-oriented issues, so we will state objectively that we have agreement and consensus on this point, there is disagreement on this point, and here's the nature of the disagreement, here is what it consists of, here is an objective view of why there is this difference of opinion, and here is what knowledge may still be required in order to solve the problem. Maybe in some instances there's an irreconcilable situation that could never be resolved. If that's the case, we'll say so. More often it will be an argument about the state of knowledge.

I feel, therefore, if we can emphasize consensus building at the round table but not limit ourselves to consensus but report to Canadians why we lack consensus in certain areas and be as objective as possible - at least get agreement on the way we report it - then we could become for most people in Canada the place you go to to find out the background on any issue: why is there consensus, why isn't there consensus, what do we know about the issue, what don't we know about the issue. I think that would make us a valuable body, and for the small budget we have I think we could be valuable.

If we don't do something like that, if we merely state ourselves to be in favour of sustainable development, we join about two dozen non-governmental organizations that can say the same thing. I don't see that we justify the taxpayers' money by merely saying we're in favour of sustainable development, or promoting studies or giving grants. I really think having people at that Round Table from business, from labour, from the aboriginal groups, from the different regions, from the environmental groups, is such a valuable resource that to use it intelligently requires that we tell Canadians where we agree and where we disagree.

That's essentially my opening statement. It's not very complicated, but essentially what I'm saying is we can promote sustainable development best by illuminating the issues, by clarifying the issues, as we seek consensus. So we seek consensus as a method of illuminating the issues and we then utilize our position and our budget to draw people together and illuminate for Canadians where we agree, where we disagree, what needs to be known further before we can decide these issues objectively. I think that will promote sustainable development, and I think that's really what's holding us back at the moment: everybody's in favour of it, but nobody knows what to do next, because they're not sure of the costs and benefits.

[Translation]

As I said, it will be a pleasure for me to answer your questions in English or in French as you chose. Thank you.

[English]

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Smith.

[Translation]

We will begin with Mrs. Guay.

Mrs. Guay (Laurentides): Good morning, Mr. Smith. I would like to know exactly what is the role of the Round Table and in particular its relationship with the provinces. As there are federal and provincial jurisdictions, how do you communicate with them?

Dr. Smith: Officially, there is no relationship with the provinces. It is a pity but it is the nature of the Act. However, in our plenary meetings, usually there is an observer from the Canadian Council of the Environment Ministers. There is therefore a representative who follows all our plenary meetings. Of course, it is is not enough.

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It's not enough, but we do have something else: whenever a project comes up, provincial representatives are invited. When it is something to do with the oil industry, there are representatives from Alberta. When it is something to do with the East Coast Fisheries, there are representatives from Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. However, I would be very pleased if there were closer and more official ties between us.

I can assure you that I am fully cognizant of the fact that environment policies in this country come under two levels of government, and that input from the provinces is vital to any progress we wish to make. You asked if there are any official links. No, there aren't any.

Ms Guay: There aren't any, but could we not look to the Round Table to establish those links eventually, under your chairmanship of course? Would that not be desirable so as to take into account those policies already implemented at the provincial level by the various ministries of the Environment and avoid conflict with the provinces? This would enable us to find common solutions.

Dr. Smith: As you know, the Round Table is a federal organization; it was established by the federal government. I am not sure that the federal government can do any more than invite the provinces to take part in the Round Table. That is probably something I will be recommending once I am more comfortable in my role.

But I can assure you I have no intention of going ahead with projects without provincial participation. For instance, I am certain that, in the very near future, we will be setting up something on sustainable transportation, and we will certainly be working with the provinces in this regard. That initiative comes from the province of British Columbia, which will be holding a major convention called Globe '96. There will also be a meeting with various countries on the issue of transportation, and again we want to do something in that respect. The government of British Columbia will most certainly be involved in our study.

I will be recommending that there be more official links, but there is a limit to what the federal government can say. Ultimately, it is up to the provinces to decide whether or not they would want to take part in a major federal provincial organization, but there is no such organization at the present time.

Ms Guay: I would like to discuss Bill C-83, dealing with the commissioner of the Environment. Have you heard of it? I wonder if you are satisfied with this new position that will be created.

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How do you see the position of Commissioner of the Environment? Do you agree with this legislation?

Dr. Smith: We can try it and see. It will bring us something new because the position does not exist at the present time. It won't be an easy task, I'm sure. I wonder what the commissioner would be reporting on. He could report on what departments are doing and how they are going about their daily work. He could also report on laws and regulations that are enacted for Canadians, but that would be a bit more difficult. His situation would be similar to that of the Auditor General. What should he be dealing with in this comments? Should he be looking at issues such as waste or theft, or should he be dealing instead with policies, to see whether or not money is being spent on implementing policies that are not considered worthwhile? I believe it is not up to the Auditor General to comment on policy, and I think the same goes for the Commissioner of the Environment. It will be a bit difficult to carry out the responsibilities of this new position. I'm glad I wasn't named to that position. However, we have to find out bit by bit what we want or don't want to do. I don't think it would do any harm.

Ms Guay: I agree with you that it can't do any harm. But will it be effective? That has yet to be demonstrated. I agree that we can always try it out since it's been proposed. Just to complete -

The Chairman: This was a proposal made by the Official Opposition.

Ms Guay: That's what I just said, Mr. Chairman. We were the ones who proposed it. I just wanted to have the witness comment on that position, and he made his view quite clear.

Do you agree that every department should be able to set its own environmental policy? Could we not have a more comprehensive policy on the environment? At the present time, departments are being asked to do their homework and develop their own environmental policy. They are also being asked for suggestions. I wonder if you would care to comment.

Dr. Smith: The same thing applies here. The actions of each department must be examined by environmental auditing experts. We already have such experts. If you own a business, you can hire experts, for instance, to conduct environmental audits and tell you whether or not you are green enough. I believe that every department should have this type of service, the only question being whether the service would be provided from within government or from outside. Nevertheless, there are experts out there already. Your second question dealt with each department being able to set its own policy. I believe that everything we do has environmental repercussions, and I don't see how you can escape responsibility by going about it department by department. I don't see us setting up a major top notch body that would be responsible for everything to do with the environment. At the Round Table, we want to look at each department's plans and work with department on setting policy. Is the budget process green enough, for instance? Is there something that should be done with the Department of Natural Resources? We can look at these things together at the Round Table, and we can all share our views in order to help that department. We can also prepare reports dealing with that.

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But I can't imagine a superstructure to make decisions on all environmental issues. Thank you.

The Chairman: Ms. Kraft Sloan.

[English]

Mrs. Kraft Sloan (York - Simcoe): Thank you very much.

Congratulations on your new post. We have a lot of questions to ask you.

One of the things I would ask for some clarification on is what you mean by cost-benefit analysis. Could you go into a little more explanation on that?

Dr. Smith: It's my feeling that the reason the environment and the whole concept of sustainable development have slipped down the list of major issues in the public mind recently is that the economy has been so bad. I really don't think that's a very mysterious statement. I honestly believe that's true.

I think it's necessary, therefore, to regain the public's interest by demonstrating to the public that there are certain things we can agree on and certain other things where the difference has to do with values, has to do with whether a particular action taken is worth the cost. Sometimes it doesn't matter, because the action taken has to be taken or else there is a catastrophic consequence, in which case the cost is almost irrelevant. At other times there's really no cost, because you may have a short-term cost but in the long run you actually make money. We found that in the recycling industry, for example, we actually make more money by doing what's environmentally beneficial than we would have made by doing what was environmentally harmful.

But there are times when people will propose actions that are to the extremes. In other words, there are people who will say any action to support the environment must be taken irrespective of cost, and there are other extreme people who will say unless it's profitable the market must determine it and they don't want to hear about it. These extremes are not acceptable to Canadians, and they are not acceptable to those of us who are in favour of sustainable development.

But I do think if there's a specific action to be taken and there's a difference and consensus cannot be reached, it's incumbent on the people who cannot reach consensus to explain why they can't agree. Ultimately, I suspect in most instances it's going to be that the benefit is not worth the cost, in somebody's mind. I imagine that is what's going to happen. If we can put in front of Canadians the basis on which people are holding these views and let them examine for themselves whether or not this is the value they hold, this is the price they put on it, then I think we would be doing something valuable.

Now, there are some who disagree with that, who simply say you can't put a price on these things. But I would argue that you can't put a price on the concept of sustainable development, but on any given action people do put a price on it. It has to be looked at not just as a short-term price...but what's the price of not doing it? What's the price of neglect? You have to have a true cost-benefit analysis in the long term.

That's what I mean by cost-benefit analysis.

Mrs. Kraft Sloan: I guess we're still not getting at the question of values. You said it's in the details, it's in the values, it's in where you draw the line as to what is extreme or not extreme. I am glad you mentioned the idea of the cost of not cleaning up, because to me often when you look at a cost-benefit analysis it's ``okay, if we do this, what are we going to say versus what it's going to cost us'', but often the other side of the equation isn't carried out: ``if we don't do this, what is it going to cost us''. So that has to be factored in. It's very important, and I'm glad you mentioned that.

The other issue is consensus and leadership, which have to do with defining where the extremes are and understanding the set of values. Sometimes in a consensus-making process things are watered down and it has more to do with who has power around the table than a true consensus process. Sometimes you have to take leadership. I wonder if you can speak to your understanding of sustainable development in terms of the values you attach to it.

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Dr. Smith: There are two separate issues. If I were made the czar of sustainable development and asked simply to rule on things, then I would tend to come down, as I think I've proven throughout my career, on long-term environmental benefit versus short-term economic cost, because I think the long-term environmental benefit is far more important.

But that's not how I interpret my role. I interpret my role as being that of the chair of a table around which are sitting diverse interest groups - in other words, a multi-stakeholder approach - and I have to try to help them to reach a consensus. I can do that by making clear the fallacy of some arguments at both extremes and gaining the confidence of the people around the table that I'm a fair-minded arbiter and facilitator of discussion.

But at the end of the day in this job it's not my job to stand up and tell Canadians that those are the bad guys and these are the good ones. It's my job, I think, to tell Canadians: ``Here's where agreement was reached. Here's where agreement was not reached. And here, the best any of us can make out, is the argument advanced on this side and on that side. From that point on, you Canadians be the judge''.

If we do that well, then we will be supporting and promoting sustainable development in the best possible way we can. That's how I see my role.

Mrs. Kraft Sloan: I had another question, but Mr. Lincoln has to go to the House, so....

The Chairman: You weren't on the list, Mr. Lincoln. So far I have Mr. Forseth, Mr. Adams, Mr. Pomerleau, Mr. Finlay -

Mr. Lincoln: Didn't you get my name? Anyway, I have to go to the House now.

Mrs. Kraft Sloan: I'm sorry.

The Chairman: Oh, sorry. Mr. Lincoln went on the other list, but he would have come in after Mr. Forseth then.

Mr. Forseth, please.

I will insert Mr. Lincoln.

Mr. Forseth: Mr. Smith, your résumé or whatever it is says simply that you are president of Philip Utilities Management Corporation and senior vice-president of Philip Environmental Inc., Canada's biggest industrial recycling firm and one of North America's largest integrated waste management companies. It goes on to say that both Philip Utilities and Rockcliffe act as contracted operators of the Wastewater Technology Centre of Environment Canada and are active in domestic and international water and waste water treatment markets, and that you're also chairman of Ensyn Technologies Inc., a firm that converts biomass chemicals to inexpensive, non-polluting fuel liquids.

Perhaps to the uninformed it would say that's your background and those are your current enterprises and now you're going to lead the Round Table on the environment.

What are the elements there of potential conflict of interest? If you're going to be advising government and having an influence on the direction in which things are going, could that place you in a direct conflict where you could be a direct beneficiary of the policy you advocate? That's going to come up, so certainly you've thought about that. I'd like you to address it.

Dr. Smith: There's no question that if you are in any walk of life where environmental policy can have an effect on your income - and that is true of people in the environmental groups, as well as on the business side, or labour, or whatever - then you have to watch out for these kinds of conflicts.

I've been in situations such as this before, and I have a long history of being very careful about conflicts of interest and being careful never to get myself into any kind of difficult situation.

If, for example, we are going to talk about a tax on petroleum fuels, for example - let's say that that were to happen - then I have a company that is obviously going to benefit, because it owns 25% of Ensyn Technologies, which is one of the world's leading companies in the production of a liquid fuel alternative to petroleum for the production of power. I would obviously have to declare that conflict so everybody would know that. I would declare it at the round table and at any meeting in which I participated, and if it got to the point where I had to withdraw from such discussion, then I would certainly do so. I would also make sure any report issued on such a matter would carry with it the clear statement that the chair is in the business of alternative fuels and therefore declares it a conflict right from the start, and continues to declare such a conflict.

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The alternative to doing that, of course, and as I say, withdrawing from such discussions, is to declare myself ineligible from the job altogether. That I don't think would be reasonable, because if you look at the possibilities of people in this country who understand the business point of view, who are in favour of sustainable development, who understand the political side of it, who understand the civil service and how they operate, and so on, there are not so many people in the country who do. I really feel I have the credentials to do it.

So my intention, sir, is to make sure whenever there is a conflict I state it.

The same is true in the work I'm doing on water and waste water. There's potential for conflict there if, for example, the round table carries on a project, which it's now actually doing, looking at whether public-private partnerships are good for improving environmental technology. That hits directly where I am, because I'm probably the leading proponent of such public-private partnerships. I will have to declare a conflict and absent myself, now that I am chair of the Round Table.

My intention is to declare these conflicts at every point.

Mr. Forseth: You talked about the general direction of the Round Table and developing consensus to illuminate issues. That's somewhat of a shift or a general thrust of a direction you would like to go in. Perhaps you could enlighten us on what other vectors or forces may be wanting to go in a different direction. Could you identify what those are and what would be some kind of strategy to deal with them?

Dr. Smith: I would say the forces I've detected so far in my one year on the Round Table and my short time now as chair are as follows. There's a group, an opinion in the country, which basically says this body ought to be an advocacy body for the principles of sustainable development and ought to use its funding for promoting discussion, dissemination of ideas, research papers on the subject. Essentially it should be a bit like the Science Council used to be with science and technology.

I'm saying I want to promote sustainable development, but we'd be missing the whole point of having a round table, with all these stakeholders there, if they were just a board of directors to approve study projects, because it's boring, nobody wants to come to those meetings, the business people stay away from them. Furthermore, we don't need another body to be in favour of the environment. There are plenty of bodies in favour of the environment. We have to be the place people come to for objective analysis of the state of consensus. That's what I've decided.

There's another group of people who believe, yes, that is fine, you should be a round table, but all you should do is seek consensus. We should be satisfied we have people of diverse views together, talking to each other in a civil manner; that's already an improvement. We should announce consensus where we have it and otherwise we don't irritate anybody, we don't try to show there's still a lack of consensus, and we publish documents where we all agree.

My problem with that, as I said earlier, is you end up with the tyranny of the lowest common denominator, and then people are not really any better off in their understanding; the average Canadian sitting at home is no better off in his or her understanding except that they've heard there's been some kind of agreement up to a certain point. Often that papers over very big cracks that remain. What I'm saying is let's not paper them over; let's simply show Canadians what these cracks are, so they will think about them, debate them in schools, have television forums about them, and ultimately they'll make up their minds on what they want to do.

Mr. Forseth: Further to that, when you look at a general direction, what would be the specific new doors or new boundaries you'd like to see opened? Obviously you'll be publishing some reports. Let's talk about some of the specifics of how you actually get there, other than just publishing a glossy brochure that goes onto someone's shelf or issuing a press release and getting a couple of lines in the newspaper. From all the activity that happens in all these meetings, how do you get some end-product that actually does something? What are some of the ideas that you have there actually to deliver something that will have an impact?

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Dr. Smith: I've already started working on a communication strategy with our communications department to say: let's downplay the issuing of reports and let's play up the issuing of information about the consensus-building exercise; let's report on our activities as we're doing them, in the form of press releases, in the form of giving interviews to people; let's let people see what's going on, rather than waiting and issuing a complete report of some kind on a project.

We are changing our communication strategy quite drastically.

In fairness, I think I have to talk to the other members of the Round table, since we've had only one plenary meeting under my chairmanship and that was just recently. We'll be having a planning meeting shortly. I really should talk to the other members before I go into any more detail. But basically I want to get away from issuing these reports and I want to issue regular bulletins on the process we're going through, to bring Canadians into the multi-stakeholder approach and let them get a feel for what's happening there.

I think that will help, because when money is so scarce, I don't think we should waste $2 million or $3 million on a body such as ours if we're not providing something Canadians really need. I believe Canadians really do need a better understanding of where the issues are, what's the state of play in each of these issues. That's what I want to tell them.

Mr. Forseth: I really appreciate you talking about the cost-benefit analysis relating to the environment, but also cost-benefit analysis of the round table itself.

The Chairman: It would now be Mr. Lincoln's turn, according to the way hands were signalled, so I regret very much that it's not possible to proceed with him.

Next is Mr. Adams.

Mr. Adams: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am delighted to take Mr. Lincoln's place.

Stuart, it's a pleasure to see you. I was a bit shocked by how far back I could follow your activities.

You talk about consensus-building and sustainable development. In our caucus, one of the policy groups is called Resources, Oceans and Environment. It covers those ministries. One of its purposes is to develop some sort of consensus within our caucus about different views on the environment, different views on business - as you could imagine.

One of the approaches we have taken has been to try to find what we call concrete examples of sustainable development. So we tend to go to model forests, model farms, and things of that type. This gives us some sense that there are practical possibilities in the area of sustainable development.

My concern when I go, for example, to a model forest is that the lack of sustainability is actually outside of the forest itself. It's actually in the marketplace for the forest products and in the system that processes the lumber for that marketplace.

I wonder if, either now or as you develop the consensus in the Round Table, you could give us any direction as to practical, clear-cut, genuine examples of sustainable development that we, as politicians, can use to articulate to Canadians.

Dr. Smith: Of course I've just come into my position at the Round Table.

There's something called the Projet de société, which the round table did before I got there, which has issued a compendium of what municipalities and various groups around the country have done in the nature of promoting sustainable development, as sort of mini-instances of sustainability at a community level.

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In fact we're taking this step. We've offered to the organizers of that group that either they can have one more meeting of a national nature to further this activity and we'll contribute to that, or we will contribute to establishing a permanent database on exactly these kinds of individual instances of sustainability, which we think ought to be located at the International Institute for Sustainable Development in Winnipeg. We have offered to utilize a certain amount of our budget to help establish that database.

To ask me now if I can give you a specific example of sustainable development here...I really am not prepared to do that. But there is a book out on the subject, and we are going to try to make that the beginning of a regularly maintained database.

Mr. Adams: Thanks. I'll follow up on that. I appreciate it.

The Chairman: Mr. Lincoln, please.

Mr. Lincoln: Mr. Chairman, just as a point of information about the provincial and federal round tables, I would like to point out that the round tables were born out of our report on the environment and economy of 1987, which included a huge participation, including provincial participation. I was a provincial representative on it myself.

The Chairman: It was a report to the then minister of the environment of Quebec, who very modestly refuses to recognize that identity.

Mr. Lincoln: Anyway, that report really launched the round tables.

The idea was that there would be a national round table, provincial round tables, and also even local round tables. The whole idea was that there would be an integration of the whole system, one to the other. In fact, I think it can be said that there are thriving round tables in British Columbia, for instance, in Ontario, and even at the local level today.

Recently the idea was started, after UNCED, by Minister Charest, that there should be a joining up of all these bodies, a sort of estates general of the environment and economy. That is taking place from time to time already. There is a link-up between...or there should be. So I hope that will carry on somehow.

On the question of sustainable development, to follow up on what Mrs. Kraft Sloan brought up a little earlier about cost-benefit analysis, I would agree with you that if somehow it's not demonstrated to the Canadian public that cost plays a big factor as an incentive one way or another, it's very hard to make it happen. At the same time, I think you raised a very important issue: the long-term benefit versus the short-term cost. I think this is the crucial point. Wouldn't you agree that where the Round Table could be extremely useful would be to project in ways Canadians understand what the long-term cost or benefit is?

It seems to me, having worked on a long-term plan in Indonesia, where we are now projecting the impact cost-wise, ecologically, and socially of the impact of development on natural resources over 25 years, if we could show Canadians on one side what is a short-term benefit or loss economically, but moreover the same thing long term, then they would be fair. Because very little of it is done in Canada, if any, on a planning scale, do you see the Round Table playing a role in this area of trying to define what the long-term impact is?

Dr. Smith: Absolutely, Mr. Lincoln.

I guess I have to be careful what language I use, because when I speak of costs and benefits a lot of people assume I'm talking dollar signs on both ends. I'm not. I'm talking about the cost financially of action, the cost financially of inaction, the cost environmentally of action, and the cost environmentally of inaction; all of these both short term and long term. Any proper accounting has to take account of all of those.

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We know that there is no way to put into dollars and cents right now some of the environmental benefits or disbenefits, or harms, that all attempts to do full-price costing, which you have participated in and I have participated in, have so far come to nothing. It's very, very difficult to do. So you have to put it to Canadians in a form they themselves can see: this is what will happen to the environment; this is what the costs of cleaning it up will be if you decide to do it then; this is what benefits you would have got by starting the clean-up now; these are some of the economic benefits you would have received; these are the job benefits; and so on and so forth. We have to put it all in front of people.

After all, everybody says they are in favour of sustainable development. I haven't met a person who is opposed to sustainable development. Everybody says they're in favour of it, but when you sit down and you ask them, are you willing to stop polluting this river at this time, they say, well, listen, it's only a small amount of pollution, it's not going to do that much harm, if we do this we'll lose a hundred jobs, and so on and so forth. Ultimately that's what happens. You know that better than I. You were the minister for a long time.

What I'm saying is let's get all this on the table. Let's make sure everybody understands all those short-term and long-term benefits.

Interestingly enough, market forces are at play and they now also have to be calculated into the equation. You have green labelling occurring. You have people boycotting our products if they don't like certain of our actions. You have foreign countries boycotting Canadian lumber products, for example.

I was recently in southeast Asia, and the thing that's driving them toward environmental clean-up is ISO 14000. They're worried they won't be able to keep exporting their products if they don't meet certain international standards on the environment.

So the notion of trade driving environmental policy.... All that is there.

What I want to do is to make sure that at the end of the day Canadians understand why we were not able to agree on this particular action. We tried everything - we tried to agree - but ultimately, here are the positions, here's what they're saying, and here's our best analysis of what the real costs are in the short term, the real costs in the long term, the degree of uncertainty that exists on the subject, how much more scientific knowledge may be required in order to ascertain the truth in the matter. I think if we can put all that in, people will come to say if you want to know where things stand on this issue, if you want to know where everybody's position is and what the most objective analysis is, you'll go to the National Round Table, because they will have hammered it out and will present the up-to-date consensus. To me, that will promote sustainable development to the extent that Canadians truly want to have it.

I believe everybody wants sustainable development, but there's a tremendous difference in their view of what it means. As soon as you scratch the surface on a given issue, you see the difference right away.

When it comes to something relatively straightforward, such as a renewable resource, then you can count the number of fish and everybody says, oh, yes, it's not going to be sustainable at this rate; it's heading down. That's easy. But when it comes to more complicated things, such as CO2 in the atmosphere, or when it comes to issues of certain volatile hydrocarbons coming out of automobile exhausts, or whatever, when it comes to things such as whether there should or should not be a carbon tax, then Canadians are divided on the subject, and the average citizen doesn't know what to believe. The average citizen doesn't know how important it is. What's the danger? What will happen if we do it? What will happen if we don't do it? How drastic will the cost be? How drastic would it not be? They don't know this.

I think our role, because we'll be in a perfect position to have heard all the arguments and to have forced them into their purest form...I think we'll be in a great position to put that in front of Canadians.

Mr. Lincoln: I agree with what you are trying to do, and I hope I understand through what you mention that cost is also expressed in very broad terms, to include values, ecological damage, respect for neighbours who are suffering the consequences, and so forth.

In one area I was wondering if the Round Table could play almost a leading role. It's the area of using economic instruments. As you know, something has been started by Ministers Martin and Copps, and I think our chairman is going to be trying to sensitize the government into using economic instruments to lower subsidies. I'm thinking of industry. You're in a great position to promote this as well, to try to lessen the subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and so forth in favour of renewable energies, as one example.

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I wonder if you feel that the Round Table can play a big role in that area.

Dr. Smith: Subject to my declaring conflicts, as I told the hon. member, absolutely.

But remember that economic instruments, as you have mentioned, are of two kinds.

The elimination of hidden or overt subsidies that now exist, ferreting these out, is not always easy. Even finding out what they are and how they affect people's consuming behaviour is not always easy.

The other possibility is the introduction of specific subsidies or specific taxes. These are things that we think Canadians have to understand. I have no doubt that they'll be the source of furious discussion at the Round Table, but I believe that's a topic we should take up. At our planning meeting, that is one of the topics I have on the table for people.

I should mention with respect to the provincial round tables - and thank you, Mr. Lincoln, for telling me the history of that, I appreciate it, I didn't know the history - that the Ontario round table is about to be eliminated.

On the work we've been doing with other round tables, we have worked very closely with the Newfoundland round table on a study on the east coast fishery. We are certainly doing some work in B.C. with respect to their watershed program.

Madame Guay is no longer here, but her question was a very pertinent one, because the truth is that there isn't an overarching organization of all these round tables. If we meet with one another, then it's really just because of some initiative that we might take. It's not because there is anything built in. There's no institution to do that.

The Chairman: The report to which both Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Smith have referred is probably a first in Canadian records and probably the first in global records. It was a report to the then Minister of the Environment in Quebec, Clifford Lincoln, and it was arrived at in September 1987, just six months after the Brundtland report, Our Common Future. It is concise. It consists of some 52 or so recommendations. It is available in the library. It still makes excellent reading today in order to see what has been implemented and what remains to be done. It is a document that is admired and recognized abroad quite extensively because of its avant-garde nature at that time. So it is something of which we can be proud.

Mr. Pomerleau.

[Translation]

Mr. Pomerleau: Mr. Smith, thank you for being here today.

First, I would like to tell you that I am probably just as sorry as you are that you lost against Mr. Trudeau in Mont-Royal.

In general, I agree with the way in which you see your role. I think that you will be a good arbitrator at the Round Table.

My questions are very simple; they are very basic questions. Where is your organization located, how many people work with you and what is exactly your budget?

Dr. Smith: Twenty people work for the Round Table and we have a budget of $3.2 million. We are located here in Ottawa, on Nicholas Street.

Mr. Pomerleau: Thank you.

[English]

Mr. Finlay: It's a pleasure to welcome you, Stuart.

Being a bit older than Peter, I go back even further than he does. I think you're ideally suited. I certainly agree with your approach.

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However, I have two questions. One deals perhaps with values. You talked about the extremes. We recognize them. We can put Greenpeace on one extreme and we can put some of the witnesses we heard from in the environment committee on the other extreme, where ``environment'' seemed to be a foreign word and ``sustainable development'' didn't mean anything but sustaining their business in the best possible way. But the definition of sustainable development that Bill C-83 and the commissioner of the environment adopt - and hence that's the basis on which that person will operate - is really a value statement, I suggest. When we say we will deal with the environment and development to meet our own needs without compromising the needs of future generations, obviously that has a lot of value component.

I wonder how you would react to that comment of mine vis-à-vis being able to try to determine the costs, benefits, social costs, economic costs, long term, short term, etc. Where do you stand on that value in that definition?

Dr. Smith: Mr. Finlay, the problem with that definition is that it speaks of needs and compromising them. It makes the assumption that everything we've done to the environment till now has been because of our needs. If you're in Bangladesh or you're in China and somebody like me comes and tells you you should not burn a lot of coal because even though it's cheap it'll put a lot of pollutants into the air and CO2 into the atmosphere, they say, well, so what, the atmosphere is pretty big. We say yes, but we've already filled it up to the top, and if you put in any more, it's going to spill over. They say, yes, but you got rich doing that, and now you're telling us to stay poor; you're saying you're telling us we can't compromise the needs of future people; well, our need is to get some development here so our people live past adolescence and don't die in epidemics, and they have proper drinking water and so on and so forth; and we can't afford it if we have to pay twice as much for energy as you have to pay, or you ever had to pay in the past; you got the cheapest energy available; we want the cheapest energy available.

Now, that's an extreme case. But even in our own country.... You say, well, we're not going to compromise the needs of tomorrow. Take the Niagara fruit land. We obviously compromise that. They don't grow much fruit there any more, as you well know, compared with what they used to. On the other hand, it's very cheap to import fruit from other countries, which grow it a lot more easily and a lot more cheaply than we do, and we've used the land for other productive purposes, including even factories that employ people, and so on and so forth.

It's easy to say you're going to do it in a way that doesn't compromise tomorrow. But having said that, in the individual instance where you must make a decision about a specific piece of land - are you going to have a subdivision here, are you going to have a subway or a bus there - you still come down to the issue that we have to make decisions that in some ways compromise tomorrow and in other ways enhance tomorrow.

That's my difficulty. I have no difficulty with putting it into the definition that in general we want to leave a sustainable ecosystem for our children and our children's children, and if we don't do that, God, what are we doing here? We're basically murdering future generations. But when it comes down to the individual instance, you end up always having to argue the specifics of the case.

So I have nothing against the definition. I'm just saying we shouldn't imagine that it answers the questions, because is the existing degree of pollution, is our existing system, only meeting our needs, or is it meeting a lot of our wants? Similarly, do we have to leave for the next generation enough that they should have as much excess as we have enjoyed, or just enough that they can get by? When you ask those questions, suddenly the definition is torn to shreds, because at that point what is the definition saying to you - that they have to be as affluent as we are, or what? What are we really saying?

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That's the trouble. When you sit down and try to debate the definition of ``sustainable development'', you end up with very thorny, difficult issues.

I prefer to assume that all of us want to do as little damage to the environment as necessary. We want to make sure that we're leaving our children with something that in good conscience we can leave them, that they can have healthy lives. But to think you can pin that down in one sentence of what sustainable development means.... It just isn't easy to pin down.

That's my experience on this, John. I don't know if you'd agree with me, but any definition I've ever heard can be attacked if you want to attack it.

Mr. Finlay: I agree with you. That is the central dilemma.

Let me put one that might be an example. You've mentioned it. It is coal. I wrestle with the notion of sustainable development with respect to.... Let me put it in this way: it's much easier with forests, as Peter talked about, because they continually can be grown and regenerated. When you get to mining, minerals and fossil fuels, we know incontrovertibly that they will eventually run out if we keep using them. I'm not saying that we shouldn't use them, but sustainability there has to be much broader, does it not, in that we have to ask what energy source we are going to use when this one runs out - because we know that this one isn't sustainable.

Dr. Smith: A renewable resource is obvious. The question is, are you going still to have it there?

In the case of a non-renewable resource, there are two aspects to sustainability. One is, will it still be there? Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too, so obviously at some point it won't be there. Theoretically, a time must come when it won't be there.

But you have a second question, which is, can the biosphere accept the consequences of your utilizing all these non-renewable resources today? This is because to get at those resources you have to do certain things. You have to smelt metal. You have to burn oil. You have to take carbon that came from millions of years ago and put it into the atmosphere all at once. There is a serious question as to whether the sustainability has more to do with the ability of the ecosystem to accept that than with the fact that one day you might run out of coal.

You also have the question of to what extent you can depend on technology to find a substitute for some resource that might run out. If you run out of a relatively unimportant resource, then maybe there will be a technological substitute for it. You have to ask questions of the extent to which the price mechanism reflects the possibility that you're running out. If you high-grade ore and you use all the cheap metal at the beginning, then you have to pay more to get the more expensive metal later. But often with technology advances you can get it out just as cheaply, even though you couldn't have predicted that beforehand.

These are extremely complex.

I'm in favour of sustainable development as much as you are, but if you pin me to the wall and ask me to define it in one sentence, then it's very difficult to do. That's really all I'm trying to say.

The Chairman: Which proves that sustainable development by and large is a framework within which we have to learn how to operate.

Following what Mrs. Kraft Sloan, Mr. Lincoln, and now Mr. Finlay have put to you, I would like to add this.

It's all right for you to have decided to focus on the devil in the details - namely, in specific action - but I caution you about doing that too much, because there is danger in the methodology that you will require in doing that; namely, the use of cost-benefit analysis, as has already been raised.

If I try to apply the cost-benefit and take an issue of having a baby and apply the cost first from diapers to cradle, to milk bottles, to clothing as applied to the child, day care, child care, eventually education, toys - you name it. You have to stop at a certain age, 18 or 20, and you have then a detailed -

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An hon. member: That is going up.

Dr. Smith: Times have changed, let me tell you.

The Chairman: So we arrive at a certain cost, x.

Now, the benefits. Who can quantify the benefits of having a baby? This then brings in, as you and others already have raised, the importance of the long term, because when you engage in that exercise, in cost-benefit analysis, and use the long term, you arrive at conclusions that often, if not always, are diametrically opposite to the conclusion of the cost-benefit analysis in the short term.

Therefore, this chair, with its usual undiplomatic style, concludes that cost-benefit analysis is to be rejected with disdain if we are really concerned with the long term, because of its inherent incapacity to give us a precise measurement. We can certainly quantify the cost in the equation, but we cannot quantify the benefits. But it comes in very handy, particularly for those who are proposing the construction of a dam or the elimination of wetlands or the clearcutting of a forest or further catching of cod until the resource is gone, because they always look at the long term and they can make a damned effective, convincing argument.

I invite your comments.

Dr. Smith: I don't understand. It's not just a question of the short term versus the long term. I don't understand why the committee has fixated on the notion of quantifying. I said nothing of quantifying. I spoke of costs and benefits. I didn't speak of financial benefits or financial costs only; I spoke of environmental costs and benefits as well as financial costs and benefits. I'm trying to say that we have to value the financial costs against the environmental benefit. I did not necessarily say that you have to put a dollar sign on them. In fact, I don't believe that for a moment.

It's worth paying all that money to have children because of the value inherent, in non-financial terms, in having children. It's worth preserving the timber wolf not because we'll get so many dollars per wolf; it's because of the value of having that species available. We should save whales for the same reason, and so on, because of the kind of world we want to live in. But that's a benefit.

I don't have the slightest difficulty with the concept that we'll put in front of Canadians being that the benefit is that you'll still have whales; the cost is that you won't have this or that perfume. I'm quite prepared to put that. I'm not suggesting for a minute that it all has to come down to dollars and cents.

Your quarrel is not with me, Mr. Chairman; it is with people for whom a cost-benefit analysis must have as a bottom line, on both sides of the ledger, dollar signs. That's not what I'm saying for a moment. What I'm saying is that cost-benefit analysis has to have costs and benefits. Costs are sometimes in dollars and sometimes in feelings and sometimes in values. Similarly, on the other side costs are sometimes in dollars and sometimes in values and feelings, or whatever. That's what I'm trying to get across.

I don't understand why people are assuming that I'm talking about dollar signs on both sides. I most certainly am not. Very often it's values versus money, but it often comes down to values versus money.

You can't take the opposite extreme argument, that we're never allowed to look at the cost of anything, that any action on behalf of the environment should be taken irrespective of financial cost. The people will not accept that. If you want to save the timber wolf, then they may say, yes, they'll go to great lengths to do so. If there's a particular species of bacterium that you feel will be endangered if some particular road goes through somewhere, then most people are going to say, ``Put the road through''. It depends on what the costs and benefits are.

But you have to put to people, as clearly as possible, what is the nature of the loss if that particular bacterium is lost. What potential drugs might we have discovered by using that bacterium? How many important things are we going to miss as a result of that?

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But also, at the same time, do you want to live in a world where you've messed up the food chain, where there won't be birds to sing, and so on?

These are the kinds of questions the average Canadian knows better than any of us in this room. They're fully aware that the progress of technology, the growth of humanity, the use of machines, the building of houses, and the paving of land is having an effect on the environment. They all know that very well. Everybody regrets it but at the same time feels that, well, you know, we have to do it, and this is life, and that's the way it goes.

What we have to do is not say that we must stop all growth or stop all development. We have to say that there's a cost to what you do and you have to make clear what the cost is. But it's not just cost in dollars, and I hope I haven't misled the members into thinking that I'm one of those who want it all to come out in the bottom line.

I declared when I spoke to Mr. Lincoln that all our attempts to put it all on the bottom line - full-cost pricing, social costing, environmental costing, and all that kind of stuff - have failed. You cannot do it in that way. You must put on the bottom line things other than dollar signs.

The Chairman: I suppose that the rather tempestuous intervention on cost-benefit analysis was motivated by the belief that we need advocacy in the promotion of sustainable ways of behaving and acting, and that the search for and the assertion of sustainable ways are so difficult these days because, despite all the declarations, political and otherwise, the unsustainable behaviour is still prevailing, and that one would look at every institution and body, particularly yours, as a source of advocacy for the cause of sustainability.

Would you like to comment on that?

Dr. Smith: This is absolutely to the point. It's right on, and I'm delighted to be able to comment on such a perceptive comment.

I've asked myself whether the best role for the Round Table is to state unabashedly a pure advocacy role. You recognize, as I said at the outset, that our legislation, if you read it, calls pretty much for that. However, the title of the organization, the Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, leads to another possible approach; namely, the one I've put in front of members here.

I believe that, rather than being a pure advocacy group, just as we have been in the past, in which case you are limited to advocate only what the members of the Round Table are ready to agree upon.... You can't advocate beyond what they're ready to agree upon. Then you are left with lowest common denominator things to advocate.

I really believe we do a greater service to the cause of sustainable development if we go beyond the lowest common denominator and state: ``This we can agree on and advocate, and this we tell you are our differences that still remain and that you the Canadian people are going to have to get to know about, to understand, and to make decisions about''.

I think we do a greater service to sustainable development to go beyond what we are able to advocate as a round table.

There's an inherent tension between being a round table and being an advocacy group, and I'm trying to utilize that tension in a constructive manner, as opposed to setting a limit on what we're allowed to say.

That's what has happened in the past. I have been there for a year and I was ready to resign because I asked what is the use of papering over the cracks and making motherhood statements. That's of no value.

The Chairman: Do you feel that you are adequately equipped with the necessary instruments to proceed in your detailed work of focusing on specific action, as you mentioned before?

Dr. Smith: The answer is that I don't know yet. I feel confident that I can take a few very important topics and launch work on them, drawing in other resources from other groups, from different interest groups in society, from different sources of support. I'm confident that we can launch some projects of importance. I don't know yet if we have all the resources we require.

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The Chairman: Do you think that the baseline study on taxation programs and subsidies that are unsustainable, as promised in the red book, would be a substantial help to your work?

Dr. Smith: Of course it would be a tremendous help. In fact, we would like to participate to some extent in that kind of work. As I said earlier, we intend to work on economic instruments.

The Chairman: Do you plan to make representations to the Minister of Finance in order to get that baseline study off the ground?

Dr. Smith: I can't say that it has been my intention to this point, Mr. Chairman. But I will take your comment as a suggestion that we should examine precisely that and will raise the subject at our next plenary session.

The Chairman: Mr. Forseth.

Mr. Forseth: Sometimes the problem we talk about, especially for the broader public, is costs and benefits, and then the immediate language implication is dollar signs. Perhaps your round table could consider different language.

Maybe a start would be to look at outcomes, and then vectors. Vectors pull you in one direction or another. Some vectors may be neutral; some may be opposite others to which you want to go. Looking at inventories of vectors, and then giving them weightings as to where we're likely to go, how we emphasize, and then just talking about outcomes.... If you go in this way, then that's the kind of scenario and the outcome. Rather than trying always to have a two-sided cost and benefit, it may be multi-directional. So it's an analysis of vectors and talking about outcomes.

That's just a comment about the language issue. You meet it in costs and benefits, and then you get into the whole business of the short-term cost problem.

Dr. Smith: I appreciate particularly the notion that it shouldn't be two sides of the ledger, but rather that often it's multi-factorial.

I doubt whether the term ``vectors'' would be understood by the average Canadian, but I see what you're getting at. We have to draw scenarios that can be understood by people, but we have to get buy-in to these scenarios. So when we come up with a scenario, we go in this way or in that way, I've got to make sure that the people around the Round Table are buying into that. So if I can at least get the differences and the different projections understood by everybody, then probably it will bring people much closer to agreement to begin with, because as they have to stand behind putting publicly the basis for their objection to something, that's going to tend to bring them much closer to a median position.

Yes, I think you're right. Cost-benefit sounds too starkly like yes and no. But of course sometimes you have decisions to make. At that point you either make it or you don't. At that point you've got to say what happens in each direction. But most of the time it's multi-factorial. You're right.

Mrs. Payne (St. John's West): Dr. Smith, I also want to congratulate you on your appointment.

I would not want to let this opportunity go. I come from the east coast of Newfoundland. I'm the member for St. John's West. I would like to solicit your opinions, I suppose in hindsight now, on the devastation that has happened in our fishery. We're talking about costs and benefits there. We are now facing a very great need to be able to continue with the fishery in some way or another, while at the same time grappling with the difficulties we face because of the almost complete decline of the northern cod stocks. We are now looking at all of the other things, including the food chain, and what to do with that, and fighting need against what we should do in terms of sustainability.

I invite your comments on that.

Dr. Smith: In cooperation with the Newfoundland round table, essentially we've gone out and done a consultation with the people of the outports and the fisheries in Newfoundland and got their views as to what happened. We've backed that up with an analysis of whatever statistics have been available. We have asked for certain editing changes, and it's going back to the Newfoundland round table. If they approve of it, then it will be published, because it's a very interesting analysis of what happened there as seen through the eyes of the people who are actually participating.

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The obvious change in the sustainability of that fishery that occurred the moment you got into the factory trawlers, which should have signalled immediately to everybody where things were headed, is so striking. It's so tragic that it literally brought tears to the eyes of some of our people who read this and saw this and could see the numbers and ask why people couldn't react to that.

What is even more striking, of course, is that we think we're headed in the same direction on the west coast. In this instance, there's no argument. We don't have to get into discussions about whether we're talking about dollar signs, values, or whatever. There it's a renewable resource that is being treated in a manner that renders it non-renewable. That's point finale. That's it.

Canadians depended on somebody to blow the whistle on that, but it never happened. Whether you blame the politicians or the civil servants, it never happened.

We certainly have every intention of putting that story in front of Canadians and, by analogy, convincing them that it mustn't happen again.

But as I am telling you that it mustn't happen again, it's already happening. So what can I say to you?

You will find that report very touching when you see it.

Mrs. Payne: I hope that in fact the report that you will put in front of the Canadian public will be one that will say very strongly the things that you've just said to me in terms of the technology that's being used, because I think all of the people involved, certainly in the near-shore fishery in Newfoundland, realized a very long time ago that in fact the technology was mostly to blame.

Dr. Smith: There is another question too, which has to do with the way in which we think of the environment. We think of the ocean environment as being the fish, but of course it's not the fish. What we're doing to the ocean as an environment for fish is very interesting, as well.

I have been told recently by some people from Atlantic Canada that there are many nets at the bottom right now that continue to fish, that are still fishing even though they're no longer attached to boats. They're down there. They're still killing fish, and they are fouling the environment of the ocean.

We don't know very much about the ocean environment per se. There's a great need to know a lot more, not just about the state of the fish in the ocean, just counting them, but also about what's happening to the actual ocean environment. That's something about which I hope we can do something, as well.

But remember, we can't do everything at once. We have to pick and choose. We'll have to pick our shots, but that's an area that interests me personally.

Mr. Lincoln: I was very encouraged when you made your statement in reply to the chairman. I think it expresses very well what we all feel here. I feel very encouraged.

Following on my colleague Mrs. Payne about the fishery, perhaps this is the most striking example of all for Canadians. It's such a massive example. Amazingly enough, paradoxically enough, it impacts on the people in Newfoundland so directly.

But if you ask the average Canadian, they don't limit themselves directly to the fishery. They talk about it, and you would think that it would have a far greater consequence in the minds of all of us than it does. We think about it from day to day, but then we forget.

Perhaps I differ a bit with our chairman about views pointing to specific actions or projects. I believe in that. I think that if by any chance the round table could choose a model that exemplified what you were stating before -

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I'm going to give you a little example.

I was talking to Wassily Leontief, the economist who invented input and output economics. He's now nearly 90 years old, and he's a brilliant person. He was telling me that Henry Ford assigned him a job when he was in his twenties, and he was a well-known economist then. Ford said, ``I am producing these Ford cars. Can you dissect every part of it and tell me where I'm going wrong and what I should be producing in the long-term future?''

Leontief told me that, for instance, he took the seat of the cars, which was produced with cotton as a sort of element. He said he was studying the cotton industry in the south and finding out that, first, it relied on almost slavish labour and it relied on tobacco as a fertilizer. By the time he had finished just on the seats, he had found all these long-term ramifications. He told Henry Ford to get away from cotton.

So it went for every part of the car, and eventually he invented input and output economics.

It was due to him and one of the people who have followed him that we worked on a project in Indonesia with them and we chose as a model the impact of land on water. For instance, rice is sustaining just like fish is to Newfoundland. Java is the island where 60% of the population live, 100 million people. Java is four times more fertile than the other islands are. So this is where most of the rice is produced, and they sustain themselves on rice, they're self-sufficient. But every year they lose 30,000 hectares of rice to economic development. So they have to produce it on another island, where they need 120,000 hectares. Then they are training the people in doing the work. The tradition is in Java. Even after they have trained the people, even if they have farmed the 120,000 hectares and produced the rice, they have to bring it back to Java, where most of the population live.

So just taking a small example like this, which is just a unit of their life, you see that the ramifications are immense. We tried to project what it would do over 25 years.

We need dramatic examples before they happen. I was thinking that if you would pinpoint something in Canada that would impact on people - and I'm thinking of the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River - and make a projection using the tools we have -

This is what the Japanese are doing. They are using 200 input and output economics. The Americans use only 25, and we have a handful. The Japanese try to project 100 years ahead. The Indonesians, with their limited means, helped by Canadians and Americans, are trying to work 25 years ahead. But we go from four years to four years.

Coming back to what my colleague Mr. Forseth said, the Round Table might pick an example and work on something to tell Canadians, ``If we don't do this, these are the scenarios. If you do it in this way, then you're going to kill this resource''. If by any chance we could really make the cost of this impact on Canadians.... I think that today, with the example of the fisheries, people are going to listen, and I think the round table.... I don't know what the example would be - if it were up to me, then I would choose the Great Lakes - but I think that it would have a big impact on us. I don't know; I'm just tossing this out as one suggestion.

Dr. Smith: It's a very interesting suggestion. I like that approach. As you're talking, I'm thinking of areas where you might do this.

The Great Lakes is one possibility, because there are some questions about the sustainability of the whole ecosystem of the Great Lakes and the International Joint Commission exists and maybe it could be beefed up to some extent to do some of this work and we could work with them in order to achieve that.

Another place where you really have to ask yourself what the future will be is the southern mainland of British Columbia, because that's a very rapidly urbanizing area. There is very important fertile land down there, with watersheds all over the place going down into the Georgia Basin. Land use issues, roads, bridges, and God knows what are abounding, and the fishery is being damaged as we speak. It's a very interesting area. Of course, they're trying to hurry their pollution control. Pollution control is one thing; land use is another. Land use may be a bigger issue than pollution control, much as I may be in the water pollution business. I declare my conflict on that one.

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We had one joint meeting with the people who were doing the Georgia Basin work and we might follow up on that. It's continuing and we might just follow up.

Doing this kind of projection would be very meaningful. It's an interesting idea.

Mrs. Kraft Sloan: Another area the committee has been fairly concerned about is the Arctic, where you can demonstrate clearly what's happening now and use that as an example for a projection, because it shows how individual behaviour, social behaviour and industrial behaviour, affects people who live in the pristine wilderness thousands and thousands of miles away. It's a very good case study in terms of saying this is what's happening now, things are interconnected, and this is what's in store for you as well. That's another area that we're concerned about.

Dr. Smith: It's a very dramatic way of showing the effects of pollution at a distance, the migration of pollution. In fact, when the minister, Sheila Copps, who was leading a delegation that I was a member of in Southeast Asia, actually described what is showing up in mother's milk in the Arctic, there were gasps from the people, even though we happened to be in one of the least liveable cities in the whole world, Bangkok, at the time. But she really staggered people by using that example with the notion that what's happening in Bangkok can have an effect in Siberia and over here. I think that is a good example for bringing home the case.

It's a little tougher from the point of view of deciding what you're going to do about it, because it's not as though they can do something in the Arctic to deal with the matter. The effect is local but the causes are diffuse.

Mrs. Kraft Sloan: It's kind of one of those things, now that I have your attention, but it's also identifying best practices as well. When you were trying to make the shift to sustainability...we spend a lot of time on problem analysis, and if people aren't getting the point, well, we'll just have to pull them along. The issue is, what are we going to do about it? How can we identify best practice? How can we communicate that to Canadians out there? To me that seems to be quite crucial: how do we do this stuff and find examples that are working?

Dr. Smith: If I may respond to that interesting question, Mr. Chairman, best practice, again, is one of these things that people will say has a cost and why are we doing it. Then you say it's the precautionary principle. We can't show you exactly what will happen; we can't say for certain what's going to happen, but here are the stakes, and it could happen. There's enough of a risk that it could happen that a precautionary principle should come into play. As you know, that's the current international environmental thinking: the precautionary principle is often invoked.

Again, the difficulty is when any one country has to actually do something to enforce best practice. There are all kinds of wonderful rules on the books in Canada, in Thailand, in Korea, that are not being enforced. So as soon as you come to this question of enforcement, ultimately you still have to bring together the diverse interests and have it out.

I think if Canadians understood the issues.... We're into a plateau. We're into a momentary kind of lull in terms of the public understanding of and demand for action on this subject. The answer is not just to sit back and twiddle our thumbs. I think the answer is to give the public better information and force people to come to grips with the issues. I think that's the form of advocacy that will have the greatest effect.

That's really what I'm putting in front of you. I could have come in here and just exchanged pleasantries, but I'm putting in front of you that this is the direction in which I want to take this group, because I think in this time that would be the most service we could be. I'm glad we have a chance to actually tackle these ideas back and forth because I'm going to go from here to our next planning plenary in a couple of weeks from now and have exactly this discussion all over again.

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This is a serious issue of direction. You have $2.5 million or $3 million. How should it be spent? This is what I'm proposing to do, and I don't want anybody to misunderstand.

The Chairman: We have a number of small housekeeping items, so I'll urge those of you who are putting on your jackets to be patient for a moment.

We have one final question from a new member of this committee, Mr. Steckle.

Mr. Steckle (Huron - Bruce): Dr. Smith, I've found the dialogue and the discussion very interesting this morning. I think we're all impacted by what happens in the ecosystem, by what happens in our universe.

In addition to what Mrs. Payne has already introduced this morning, there is the question of the fisheries.

A number of years ago Greenpeace and persons who were interested in the preservation of the seal population made a concerted effort to make sure that the seals indeed were saved. Well, we saved the seals. They've also contributed to part of the problem we have in the fishing industry, particularly the cod stock.

How do we find a balance between allowing nature to have a balance and the intervention of human beings? In this case we lost the sealing industry, and it is also now contributing to the further extermination of our fish stocks. How do we find a balance in that? It's something that is very close to the heart, because you can touch the seal and it has pretty eyes. It's an emotional thing. How do you deal with that kind of thing when you know in fact that it's part of the problem?

Dr. Smith: If you look at the fur industry, they had the same kind of attack and they seem to be recovering from it. They seem to have pulled out of it. For one thing, we've been able to send - or they went on their own initiative - representatives of our native people, and I guess from a public relations point of view the people in Europe and elsewhere who may like to save furry animals also recognize the importance of helping native persons. In a sense you're countering one public relations problem with another public relations victory.

But when the native persons made it clear that their traditional way of life depended on this fur industry, I think a lot of the sting was taken out. I think we had to make it clear that these seals were having an effect on the fishery. I don't think we had enough facts. I don't think we attacked it hard enough. I don't think the Newfoundland fisher was equally sympathized with as the aboriginal representative might have been. These are public relations issues.

I think when Greenpeace goes too far, they lose support. When Jacques Chirac decided to have his nuclear testing in the South Pacific, one of my initial reactions, apart from great dismay that he was doing this, was that it was going to suddenly regenerate and rejuvenate Greenpeace, because Greenpeace's excessive, one-sided approaches to these things had lost it a lot of credibility. People were not giving donations any more. Suddenly, because they're now fighting something most reasonable people disagree with, Greenpeace has been rejuvenated, so to speak.

I guess all I can say is if we at the Round Table take up issues objectively and sensibly and encourage people to look at them that way, that's about all we can really do.

For instance, I don't have an answer for what to do when somebody unfairly attacks our forest industry. It was attacked very unfairly by people who had an obvious axe to grind. They obviously wanted to have their own forest industry supplant ours as the supplier of newsprint to certain German markets, so they attacked the way in which we dealt with trees. Well, it's not to say our record is unblemished. I have attacked it myself and in fact got the forest industry very mad at me, but I think we're making great progress in the way we're handling the forests. I think there's still room for improvement, but we are making progress. I don't think we're being treated fairly in Europe by those who are opposing our industry.

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There are industries in Sweden that are actually dumping untreated waste water right into the ocean, but they say it can be diluted. That's the City of Victoria argument, as you know. These people, who are dumping their water straight into the ocean, are criticizing us because we were not treating our waste water.

I don't have an answer for all of this. All I can say is that we will try to be the objective source of information, consensus and difference. I really think that if we do that, we'll have done all we can do as a small organization to advance the cause.

The Chairman: These have been two very valuable and productive hours. We have learned a lot from this exchange. We thank you for coming and we wish you well.

Dr. Smith: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and to all the members, including those who are now absent, thank you for your questions and your expressions of support.

I want everybody to realize that this meeting is not the end of it. I can be reached for further discussion. For further comments, any criticisms and ideas, please get a hold of me. We have an Ottawa office and an Ottawa phone number. It's easy to find me. Even though most of my time is spent elsewhere, they know where to find me and I'll be glad to talk further with all members individually.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Colleagues, we have limited time because the room is in demand. Item one on the agenda has been concluded.

On the second item, I'm informed that the Auditor General will be back in town on October 1 or 2. He is probably the key witness for Bill C-83. Therefore, I would be inclined, if you agree, to have him as the first witness to set the pace. Other witnesses could be the Deputy Minister of the Environment and perhaps the Round Table itself or other sources.

Could you please let the clerk know by Friday which witnesses you would recommend for the purposes of Bill C-83 and whether or not you have any amendments in mind that would first have to be discussed with the legal counsel to make sure they are within the scope of the bill. We could then launch a good, thorough process the first week in October and proceed with the handling of that particular bill.

Any questions or comments?

Mr. Lincoln: Mr. Chairman, I wonder what the view of the chairman and other members of the committee would be regarding Bill C-83 and whether you want to open it up again to hearings or have a restricted number, considering that we spent three or four months and heard I don't know how many people - a lot. It seems to me that we should really have a short list. If we must listen to witnesses, then for sure the Auditor General, but don't open it up as we did and go on for two months.

The Chairman: That sounds reasonable. I would like to hear the views of the opposition. Do they concur?

[Translation]

Mr. Pomerleau: We talked about Ms Guay. We are not thinking of bringing in more than one or two people.

[English]

Mr. Forseth: Mr. Chairman, I concur with that notion.

The Chairman: Thank you. That is the answer.

Are there any other comments on Bill C-83? If not, we will skip Bill C-94 because it is in the House.

On the outlook document of Environment Canada, there is an Environment 2000 document, which reached our desks with a covering letter by the minister. It is entitled Business Plan 2000. It was accompanied by another document. I would urge you to have a good look at it, because if we were to study that document in due course, it would allow us to discuss and investigate or have an overview of current and future issues, and it would be considered by the deputy, with whom I have had conversation, as very valuable, useful input at this stage before that plan materializes. Therefore, the department itself is welcoming parliamentary input in that respect.

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Please ask the people in your office to pull it out from the mountains of material that pile up and have a look at it so that we can have a good discussion as to whether we should investigate that item in the document and deal with number four in the next few months.

What do we do with number five?

Mr. Lincoln: Did you skip number three?

The Chairman: Yes, because it's still in the House.

The Clerk: On number five, I just want to explain that I passed out a note that I have now withdrawn because it's obviously outdated and it's not the right note. I apologize for that. We'll have another one available by tomorrow, if that's the wish of the chair.

The Chairman: Fine. Thank you.

On number six, yesterday Mr. Lincoln and I attended a meeting called by a group of parliamentarians from Sweden and Finland who came through town to discuss a parliamentary conference on the Arctic next March in Yellowknife. These are parliamentarians of the Nordic Council - Nordic, not Arctic - who have organized themselves following a meeting of parliamentarians that took place in August 1993 in Reykjavik, with delegations from some eight Nordic countries, including Canada. The United States was not there, but all the others were.

A plan is being developed for holding a conference next year in Canada of the Nordic parliamentarians. Yesterday Mr. Lincoln and I had an opportunity to discuss this matter. This is why there is a motion attached to this item number six. But before going into that item, perhaps Mr. Lincoln can give us the benefit of the conclusion of this meeting so that you are fully aware of what is going on.

Would you mind saying a few words?

Mr. Lincoln: The conclusion was that there should be a meeting of four or five parliamentarians from each country. They would meet in Yellowknife on March 13 and 14 of next year. It would be indirectly tied to the meeting of ministers of the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy, which will launch the Arctic Council next year in 1996.

The input of this committee is indirect, but we are hoping to ask that Mr. Radford be asked by the two Houses of Parliament, the Senate and the House, to be a link with the Nordic countries to assist in the logistics and everything else. Canada was appointed in Iceland in 1993 to be the host for this meeting, so we have to organize it. The budget will probably be defrayed by the Ministry of the Environment.

We have a little group of people from the Ministry of the Environment organizing the logistics, mostly to assist with the setting up of the meeting. The content of the meeting will be suggested and proposed by the Nordic Council officials and discussed at a later date.

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This is really what there is at the moment. Yesterday we had a lunch for the people who came and the motion is to defray the costs of that luncheon.

Mr. Adams: Mr. Chairman, it seems to me that these meetings add urgency to things that we should be doing anyway, following up on our work from last year in connection with the Arctic. I've had a number of thoughts on it. One is that we use your forum format for something to do with the Arctic, which gives us some scope to develop arguments and to follow up things that will be information for these meetings.

The second is that the Standing Committee on International Trade and Foreign Affairs is apparently considering hearings on polar matters, I assume, in connection with the development of the Arctic Council, possibly, I suspect, to do with our involvement with the Antarctic treaty.

It seems to me that something joint between us would be very appropriate. Again, it would have two purposes: one is the general purpose of our monitoring what is happening to the environment in the Arctic and in the Antarctic, and the other is as lead-in to the meetings that Clifford was describing.

Clifford mentioned there's a group in the Ministry of the Environment dealing with this conference. I'm sure there is. Mr. Chairman, I know we have one subcommittee, and I'm not sure how subcommittees work for standing committees, but I wondered if it wouldn't be possible for us to have a subcommittee that could run some of these things for you: a forum, negotiations with the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, liaise with the Ministry of the Environment group.

The Chairman: It's an interesting suggestion. I will examine it and consult various members of the committee and we'll see how we can flesh it out.

Could I have a motion, please, on the question of hospitality? It is moved by Mr. Lincoln. Those in favour? Any opposed?

Motion agreed to

The Chairman: The last item is one that I should have dealt with at the beginning, but it was not possible for very practical reasons. Therefore, I would like now to welcome the new members of the committee, Mrs. Payne and Mr. Steckle. This is a committee that deals with everything that surrounds us, as you have already noticed. It includes some very difficult disciplines: economics, biology, social sciences, equity, planning, and integration of various policy approaches. Therefore, it is never dull around here. We've worked well together in the past. We will continue to work well in the future.

I forgot to mention Keith Martin, but perhaps you will convey the sentiments of welcoming each one of you individually and the fact that we are very glad to have your input and we look forward to your input and to your experience and knowledge in the work of this committee. We will produce some good stuff. We are very happy to have you.

With that, I will adjourn the meeting.