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(CP) – Environmentalists are warning that the federal government is rewriting one of the strongest pieces of environmental legislation in the country to dilute its commitment to protect fish habitat from trout streams to oceans.
A coalition of 29 groups says planned changes to the Fisheries Act allow Ottawa to shuffle off its constitutional responsibility to protect such waterways and give the minister too much leeway to ignore damaging development. “It’s all about the feds dumping regulatory responsibility,” Stephen Hazell of the Sierra Club said Monday.
But Randy Kamp, the Conservative MP shepherding the changes through Parliament, said the new bill will have teeth.
“It wasn’t our goal to make things easy for industry,” he said. “We wanted to have an effective but streamlined approach to managing habitat.”
Last week, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government introduced a modernized version of the Fisheries Act in Parliament. The act regulates all fish habitat across Canada and since most large developments have some impact on waterways, it triggers federal oversight and ensures stricter environmental oversight.
“It has made huge differences,” said Martha Kostuch of the Friends of the Oldman River, which used the act to force improvements on a dam built on the southern Alberta waterway in the early 1990s.
Private citizens can bring prosecutions under the act as well, and Kostuch has used it to help stop gravel mining in Alberta riverbeds and improve standards for stream crossings.
The act has also been used to bring federal environmental regulators into projects such as the Ekati diamond mine in the Northwest Territories or the Great Whale hydro project in Quebec.
“It’s very powerful legislation,” said Hazell.
Federal environmental assessments tend to be much broader in scope than their provincial counterparts, he said.
“Most of the provincial environmental assessment regimes aren’t worth the paper they’re written on.”
But the planned changes would allow Ottawa to transfer responsibility for administering the act to provinces, territories or unspecified “other groups.”
That responsibility could include establishing standards and codes of practice. As well, provincial regulations could replace federal ones if they were deemed “equivalent.”
That’s a problem, said Kostuch.
“Provincial governments are often more interested in encouraging development than in protecting the environment. Their conflict of interest is stronger.
“The federal government can provide a backup where the provinces fail – and they are failing.”
Kostuch also believes the changes would no longer force the minister to conserve fish habitat, only to take it into consideration.
“In the new (act), he has discretion to do whatever he wants.”
Kamp said the new act stengthens the minister’s ability to enforce habitat conservation.
“I’m puzzled why they think that’s weakened in any way.”
The modified act will still trigger federal environmental reviews, Kamp said.
“If somebody’s going to build a mine, there’s still going to be complete environmental assessments done.”
Provincial governments and other bodies such as fisheries associations that may take over administering the act will be monitored, Kamp promised.
“We’re certainly not placing blind faith in anybody. If it proves they’re not meeting the federal goals, then we go back to the federal regulation.”
Hazell agrees the 138-year-old act needs updating and that it makes sense to delegate some tasks to more local authorities.
But he suggests the government hasn’t sought enough public input.’
“There’s been no meaningful consultation about this bill at all.”
© The Canadian Press 2007
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