Vancouver, British Columbia
February 19, 2014
Check Against Delivery
Good morning.
Thank you for joining me today for this important announcement.
It is great to be here in this beautiful part of the country. Canada -- and especially the BC Coast -- are renowned for their clean waters and we want to keep it that way.
The Government of Canada has zero tolerance for polluters of Canada's marine environment.
I also understand the need to know that all is being done to protect it.
With all the tanker traffic taking place and trade expected to grow significantly in the future, we need to make sure that polluters are held accountable for their acts and that we step up our efforts as tanker traffic increases in the future.
To increase environmental protection, we took action by imposing administrative monetary penalties to polluters. Last March, former Minister of Transport, Denis Lebel, announced amendments to the Canada Shipping Act 2001 and the creation of a tanker safety expert panel to review Canada's current tanker safety system and propose further measures to strengthen it. We also proposed eight tanker safety measures, one of which was increasing the aerial surveillance program.
This program was praised in the tanker safety expert panel's first report last December for its world-class capability to be a deterrent to unlawful charges of pollutants in Canadian waters and its important spill response capability.
That capability is recognized by countries such as the United States who requested a NASP aircraft help out in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
And now I am pleased to announce our follow through on this important aspect of our commitment.
I am proud to announce that we have now doubled federal funding for aerial surveillance and monitoring of ships from 5 million dollars for fiscal year 2012/2013 to approximately 10 million dollars per year (or 47.6 million dollars over the next five years.) for the program. More importantly, the Government has permanently funded this important program with an ongoing budget of 10.7 million dollars per year.
The aircraft behind me is part of this effort.
From it and the others in our fleet, our officials can monitor ships travelling through waters under Canadian jurisdiction.
The equipment on these planes is so sophisticated that from the sky, it can spot as little as a litre of oil that has spilled into our waters.
Today's increased investment translates into more flights to detect pollution in Canada's waters.
On the West Coast, it means that surveillance hours will increase from 500 to 700 hours until 2017/18 at which time it will increase to 1200 hours.
And more patrols will be dispatched for the aerial surveillance of tankers in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Vancouver Harbour, as well as surveillance around Prince Rupert and Kitimat.
In conjunction with our tangible measures to prevent spills from happening, this ability to spot oil better and more often, we can deter polluters and keep our waters clean.
And as a result, we have had a noticeable decline in the number of spills observed offshore since the late 1990s.
Transport Canada investigations have led to numerous successful prosecutions against marine polluters over the years.
In 2012/2013, 97 pollution incidents were discovered by the NASP nationally, 10,134 vessels were overflown and 120,075 vessels were monitored using the Automatic Identification System.
We also use the data from the aerial surveillance to support enforcement action against polluters.
As our government announced last March, Canada is taking concrete steps towards building a world-class tanker safety system.
And in this month's federal budget, we re-iterated our commitment to take steps to ensure that the tanker safety regime continues to improve as energy exports are expected to grow and create many high-quality jobs in Canada.
The government will develop and present detailed responses to the recommendations made by the Tanker Safety Expert Panel and the Special Representative on West Coast Energy Infrastructure.
That will help create a tanker safety system that will help both support trade and preserve our marine environment.
This demonstrates once again our commitment to a safe and environmentally responsible transportation system in Canada.
Thank you. Merci.
