Mr. Speaker, on May 29 in the House, I raised the issue of the importation of MOX plutonium into Canada. Unfortunately, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources sidestepped my question.
In fact, I mentioned that 161 municipalities and MRCs in Quebec had written to the Minister of the Environment asking him to drop his plan to import plutonium. The parliamentary secretary said just the opposite.
On May 24, the Montreal urban community commission on the environment rejected the plan. In its recommendation to the city executive council, it recommended:
That the Council ask the Government of Canada to drop the plan for eliminating American and Russian military grade plutonium in Canadian CANDU reactors, as well as the research project to that effect by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited and, consequently, to accept no more samples of MOX fuel.
No recommendation could be clearer. Moreover, 161 municipalities and MRCs in Quebec are making the same request.
The issue that I am raising today is not whether there is a danger with such importation. My request is totally justified because, whenever MOX is burned in Candu reactors, more than 50% of the initial plutonium mass persists in the form of waste and that waste has a chemical mean life of 24,000 years. We must not forget that, at this time, more than 23 million kilograms of uranium are stored in Canada and that there is no permanent solution to dispose of them.
The public must know that in February 1998, a panel chaired by Blair Seaborn presented a report, one of the recommendations of which was as follows:
Any plan for the permanent storage of nuclear fuel waste in Canada should aim to.
1) ensure that the public has an appropriate level of knowledge of and control over nuclear fuel waste management in Canada and that such management is in keeping with changing public priorities particularly in light of the dread factor about nuclear issue and:
2) achieve informed and collective acceptance at every stage of development.
It added, and I am still quoting:
Public participation must be incorporated in a comprehensive and credible manner throughout future steps. This implies that the public must accept the plan before it is implemented.
I am still waiting to hear the reasons for the Liberals' actions. But I am warning them, voters will not hesitate to punish them in the next election. We must give some form of power back to the people. Again, I cannot help deploring the dictatorial attitude of the government.
People want to know if they will be consulted with regard to the importation of MOX fuel before being forced to live with tens of tons of highly radioactive material for thousands of years.