Hon. Tommy Banks:

Honourable senators, the bill before you is a reintroduction of a bill that was known as Bill S-216 in the previous session. It was introduced and debated in the Senate. It was sent to our committee, the Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources, and debated there. The committee recommended the bill's passage. It was passed at third reading in the Senate and was sent to the other place. It was introduced in the House of Commons and then debated at second reading there.

I am happy to tell honourable senators that, in debate at second reading in the House of Commons, led off by its Conservative sponsor, Stephen Woodworth, it received support from the government and from all speakers representing all parties. It was then sent to a committee of the other place where it was about to be studied for the report back to the house when prorogation occurred.

Fortunately for the life of this bill, a provision in the other place called Standing Order 86.2, which says that, in the case of lex interruptus brought about by prorogation, a Senate bill can be restored to the procedural place that it occupied in the House of Commons immediately before prorogation, provided that it is passed in the Senate — again, and in a form identical to the original — and returned to the House of Commons within 60 of their sitting days in the new parliamentary session.

Ten of those days have now elapsed. Honourable senators, I can assure you that the bill presently before you is identical in every respect to the bill that was in committee in the House of Commons and which, at prorogation, died on the Order Paper.

I am the purported author of this bill but, in fact, the bill is the unanimous bidding of the Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources, which, in examining the Federal Sustainable Development Act and relevant and connected parts of the Auditor General Act, instructed me to draft and introduce the amending legislation. In fact, the amendment to the Auditor General Act is at the specific request of the Auditor General.

This bill seeks to amend two existing acts of Parliament: the Federal Sustainable Development Act and the Auditor General Act. Since 1995, the federal government departments have been obliged by successive governments of both stripes to have a sustainable development plan of some kind and to report annually as to its success and efficacy in operating in a sustainable way.

That policy was based upon the reasonable premise that, if the Government of Canada were to ask Canadian businesses, Canadian enterprises, Canadian industry and Canadians as individuals to observe the principles of proper sustainable development, it must first do so itself; it must take care of its own backyard. For some time, the government's policy in that respect was referred to as the Federal House in Order Initiative.

Since it was instituted, that policy has been honoured "intermittently" — to put it as kindly as possible — across the various departments of government. Some have done well and reported great successes. Some have not done so well and have reported candidly and fully. However, other government departments have honoured the policy more in the breach than in the observance.

The unevenness of the application of this policy among government departments has been reported on in this place, and has been called to Parliament's and to successive governments' attention by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development and by the Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources. Both have done so several times.

The reaction to these alarms we have raised has not been heartwarming. However, in the Federal Sustainable Development Act and the Auditor General Act, we now have not merely policy but legislation that is enforceable. It has been given the weight and the teeth of statute.

The Honourable John Godfrey was, during his long service to Canadians, an indefatigable champion of the environment and of environmental responsibility. In the second session of the thirty-ninth Parliament, he devised what was then called Bill C-474. It was passed in the other place during that Parliament and sent here for concurrence. It was called the Federal Sustainable Development Act. The object of that bill was so admirable, so needed and so necessary that, when it came before us in the Senate, the Energy Committee recommended to this place its prompt passage, notwithstanding deficiencies in the bill.

We were coming to the end of that session. Mr. Godfrey, who had been a public servant, admired on all sides, was retiring and we did not want to return an amended bill to the other place in case it might be lost. We agreed that, despite its deficiencies, we would report the bill to the Senate and urge its passage without amendment. In other words, we did not want to let the perfect stand in the way of the good.

The Senate passed the bill and the Federal Sustainable Development Act is now law.

However, the Energy Committee's report, recommending its passage, included significant observations, which effectively form the substance of the bill before honourable senators now. This law requires fixing, and that is our job in the Senate; we are the quality control department of Parliament. The bill before us, honourable senators, is for that specific purpose.

Two rectifications are included in this bill of amendment. The first relates to the place of the Senate in the proper business of Parliament. Under the Federal Sustainable Development Act, various reporting procedures are required of ministers of the Crown. On behalf of the Auditor General, various reporting procedures are required of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. These reports all end up in Parliament.

However, according to the act as it is presently written, the reports are tabled only in the House of Commons. The act requires that the various reports be referred for study to the respective committees only of the House of Commons. The reports are not required to be tabled in the Senate. The reports are not required to be referred to committees of the Senate.

I will quote, in respect of that issue, from the observations that accompanied the recommendations by the Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources on Bill C-474. They said:

Until and unless the Constitution is amended, Parliament consists of the Crown, the Senate of Canada, and the House of Commons. No proposed legislation of this order would ever leave the Senate of Canada without provisions for the participation in the Act's various functions by the House of Commons. Regrettably that practicality, not to say courtesy, is absent in the present Act.

Honourable senators, in the short time that I have been here in various committees and sometimes on the floor of this place, we have caught several such omissions from the proper business of Parliament. Some of them have been inadvertent; some have been accidental; many have been fixed very quickly and some with apologies.

With respect to the Federal Sustainable Development Act as originally presented in the other place by Mr. Godfrey, both Houses of Parliament — including this one — were included in those reporting procedures. Senate committees were included in the committees to which the reports were to be sent for study. However, the references to the Senate of Canada were removed during the committee process in the other place as the result of motions by persons who do not think there ought to be a Senate of Canada.

This was not accidental oversight; this was deliberate omission. It weakens the act. It undermines the attempt to make environmental decision-making more transparent. It is an affront to us and to this place. The bill of amendment now before us fixes that shortcoming.

The second part of the present bill seeks to amend the Auditor General Act. It is a simple and practical amendment. As the Federal Sustainable Development Act is presently written, reports by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development are to be made in his or her annual report to Parliament. That only occurs once a year, honourable senators. According to the act, the commissioner may find, shortly after having made her or his annual report to Parliament, something necessary to report to Parliament with a certain amount of urgency and without letting a year pass before the next annual report.

Bill S-210, now before us, says that a report may be made by the commissioner during the course of his or her annual report in Parliament as prescribed in the act that creates the office or during other times of the year during which the Auditor General may report to Canada. The Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development is a function of the Office of the Auditor General. That provision of the bill before honourable senators is of a specific request of the Auditor General of Canada.

Honourable senators, we need to fix the act in both of those ways to make it work effectively and to maintain the proper place of the Senate in the business of the Parliament of Canada. I urge that we move this bill forthwith to the Standing Senate Committee on Energy, the Environment and Natural Resources for study and recommendation in the hope that we can return it to its standing in the other place.

Recent Statements from Liberal Senators