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Canada’s environment commissioner says the Conservative government has made negligible progress on a national water strategy it promised more than two years ago.
Scott Vaughan said the Tories have made plenty of announcements about the water strategy but they haven’t yet followed up with enough action to merit an audit by his office.
“The position of the office is that we don’t examine a program if it’s based only on a press release,” Vaughan told the Commons environment committee on Tuesday.
“We did not see any measurable progress in developing a national strategy or a national framework.”
The Conservatives first promised a clean-water strategy in March 2007 when the government tabled its yearly budget, earmarking $93 million over two years for projects.
Those projects included $11 million to clean heavily polluted spots in the Great Lakes Basin and $39 million to “increase fisheries science research programs to strengthen fisheries management and resource conservation.”
But environmentalists have criticized the Tories for announcing only piecemeal projects. They say Ottawa still lacks a comprehensive approach to dealing with water pollution and shortages across the country.
Vaughan said little progress has been made.
“There’s been a couple of media releases. There have been some announcements,” he said.
“But when we went in to the departments, there wasn’t enough in terms of discernable progress to say it actually looks like there’s something in place.”
Environment Minister Jim Prentice’s office referred questions to Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq’s office, which was not immediately available to comment.
Environment Canada drafted an internal report in December 2007 urging the federal government to be more hands-on in managing the country’s water, which is now largely done by the provinces.
Ottawa still manages most of the fresh water in the North through water boards.
Vaughan appeared before the committee to discuss two recent audits on the safety of drinking water and air quality.
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