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Environmental Monitoring and Evaluation

Ms Blakeman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Despite failing to catch oil and grease leaking into the Athabasca River and for almost five years failing to catch a major oil sands company’s negligence in installing air pollution scrubbers, among other examples, the Department of Environment has now cut its monitoring budget by 23 per cent. My question is to the Minister of Environment. Giving the growing evidence that this department has failed in the past to enforce its own regulations, why did this government slash its monitoring and evaluation budget by 23 per cent?

Mr. Renner: Well, Mr. Speaker, let’s deal with the preamble first. The fact of the matter is that the government did not miss dealing with these issues. The only reason this member can refer to them is because we laid charges and the guilty parties pled in court.

Mr. Speaker, we’ll go into great detail in committee when we get into the budget. The short answer for this member is that there was no cut in the budget as it relates to compliance. There was some one-time funding that was in last year’s budget that was invested in research. That was known as being a one-time investment. The core funding remains entirely intact, and I look forward to discussing it in committee.

Ms Blakeman: No. Vote 2.0.1 has been reduced.

Again to the same minister: considering that the largest percentage increase, 70 per cent, in this department was to the communications budget, can the minister explain why the government keeps opting for a communications strategy over action on environmental protection?

Mr. Renner: Well, again, Mr. Speaker, these are the kinds of detailed questions that are very difficult to deal with in question period. With respect to the line item in the communications budget, again, it is a realignment of staff within the department that have been brought from a number of different areas. For example, we’ve brought our internal communications people that were separated throughout the department together in one office. Again, there is no increase in this budget. It’s a realignment and a consolidation of existing resources.

The Speaker: The hon. member.

Ms Blakeman: Thank you. To the same minister: given the amount of lip service that this minister pays to fighting global warming, it’s curious that the Department of Environment only spent a tiny fraction of the money that it set aside last year for climate change, so can the minister please explain which programs were not implemented in ’08-09?

Mr. Renner: Well, Mr. Speaker, the main program is the one that we’ll be having much discussion on tomorrow, and that is the consumer rebate program that was mentioned in the budget speech yesterday. We’ve issued a media advisory that we’ll be discussing it in much more detail tomorrow.