Enforcement Branch

Appearance before the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development – May 12, 2021

Modernization funding

Issue

• Recent audits conducted by the Commissioner of Environment and Sustainable Development on toxic substances (2017) and protecting fish from mining effluent (2019) called on EB to implement a risk-based approach. This new funding, and EB’s implementation strategy, respond directly to these recommendations.

Points to register

• The Government provided support to help ECCC modernize the enforcement of environmental laws and regulations.

Background/current status

• To modernize enforcement of ECCC laws and regulations, the Government provided ECCC with $50.9 million over five years, starting in 2020-21, and $10.2 million per year ongoing.
• For ECCC’s Enforcement Branch (EB) - $46.0M over five years, starting in 2020-21, and $9.2M per year ongoing.
• For the Administrative Tribunals Support Service of Canada - $4.9M over five years, starting in 2020-21, and $1.0M per year ongoing to provide support services to the Environmental Protection Tribunal of Canada, which adjudicates citizen requests for review of Compliance Orders and Administrative Monetary Penalties.
• With this new funding, over 5 years, EB will build on its success and develop world-class, scientifically robust knowledge of the risk to the environment and conservation due to non-compliance with ECCC laws and regulations, and implement a larger, better trained and equipped group of officers to address it. There are 4 areas of action:
  • Risk Analysis – Combining the best of ECCC’s science with its enforcement mandate to identify offences that cause the greatest damage to the environment or conservation objectives, and those most likely to occur. As a result the worst offenders will be those most likely to be targeted by ECCC enforcement.
  • Field Strength – EB will onboard 8 new officers in 2021/22, and the remaining 16 in 2022/23. The location of new officers will be linked to where the highest risk non-compliance is identified. The initial 8 officers will be stationed in Western and Atlantic Canada, as well as the North.
  • Training – EB will develop and implement more expansive officer training on ECCC laws and regulations, advanced investigative techniques, major case management, and computer forensics. Such training is essential to take on the biggest polluters and worst offenders.
  • Electronic Infrastructure – As all law enforcement organizations are, EB will invest in infrastructure to better integrate into its operations the use of advanced data science, major case management, and computer forensics.
• Note: $960,000/year will go to cover rising prosecution costs.
• Supplementary Estimates C provided the first installment of $2,396,856. With this funding EB is making initial investments to ready its data and existing systems for better integration with departmental data sets and systems (including the Cloud), conducting analysis to improve officer training, and advancing risk analysis.
• Assuming the majority of Canada’s population is immunized for COVID 19 by fall, 2021, implementation of this initiative is not at risk.