Natural Resources committee  Oh, pass it.

Natural Resources committee  I think it's important they have that power.

Natural Resources committee  It is critically important that workers are involved, to see that what they do makes a difference. Again, it goes back to we can have as many regulators as we want, as many safety officers as we want, as many rules as we want, but unless it's instilled and unless people truly believe it, then they're not going to live by those rules.

Natural Resources committee  I'm not sure about industry so much as what the regulators have done in setting up occupational health and safety committees. I was involved in one 10 years ago, probably, in a meeting in Newfoundland. At that time I was in another position with a think tank here in Nova Scotia.

Natural Resources committee  I agree. I think one of the problems is that if you too narrowly define something, then you run into problems. I think that how it's written for onshore, both for Nova Scotia and for Newfoundland, should be how it is reflected in this particular legislation.

Natural Resources committee  To answer Mr. Harris' question about why this has taken 13 years, I think there was a lot of effort made to get this through faster. The fact is, though, you had so many government departments that were working on it; you had to try to get agreement among not only Nova Scotia labour, Newfoundland and Labrador labour, and the federal labour department, but also other departments that were involved.

Natural Resources committee  On transportation of workers back and forth to the rigs, for instance, the Transportation Safety Board or Transport Canada covered helicopters and covered transportation, yet the board also was responsible. That leaves a kind of.... This provides more clarity. There was a jurisdictional difference: Transport Canada versus the CNSOPB and the C-NLOPB.

Natural Resources committee  I did talk about the importance of this for the operators, the contractors, the workers, and the regulators. I'm not sure if I used exactly those words, but it has to do with how, in the end, safety offshore is the responsibility of all of us. These regulations, this change in the amendments in the bill to the accord acts, provide that the ultimate responsibility is with the operators.

Natural Resources committee  Fundamentally, there won't be a lot of change. A lot of this has been implemented by the boards over the past number of years, but as was mentioned by Ms. Payne, the fact is that it now has some legal teeth, and particularly for workers, because they now have the right to refuse work and are protected from retaliation.

Natural Resources committee  I agree, particularly on the way the legislation is written. The boards, while they have perhaps wanted to be able to release information in the past, have been restricted in releasing it, because of the protection of information provided to them by a third party and what can actually be released through access to information legislation.

Natural Resources committee  Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and honourable members of the committee. It is a pleasure and an honour to be presenting to your committee today on this important piece of legislation. The Maritimes Energy Association is an independent not-for-profit industry organization. We represent businesses that provide goods and services to the energy sector onshore and offshore, renewable and non-renewable, in eastern Canada, and predominantly in the three maritime provinces.