¶ Published Monday, May 17th In Environment - No Comments »
In a split 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled last week that a mining project may not proceed without undergoing a federal environmental assessment. The decision turned on the EA of a mining project in the territory covered by the James Bay Treaty, signed in 1975 by the Cree and Inuit communities with the governments of Quebec and Canada. Interestingly, the Treaty was groundbreaking at the time in its recognition of Aboriginal participation rights, but this time it was the federal government arguing that it was being shut out of the process. Indeed, the top court had toRead the Rest…
¶ Published Friday, January 22nd In Environment - No Comments »
News today that MiningWatch Canada won its Supreme Court case concerning the Red Chris mine. Interestingly, the Supreme Court ruled that the project can move forward because the BC government had already given it the go ahead. But environmentalists are nonetheless claiming victory because the Court also ruled that from now on the federal government must conduct comprehensive assessments of all big projects over a certain size that might affect the environment, the people and the long term future of the area affected by a major project. The decision says that the Canadian government violated the Canadian Environmental Assessment ActRead the Rest…
¶ Published Thursday, October 29th In Environment - 1 Comment »
Businesses continue to be discouraged in the absence of any concrete steps towards unifying Canada’s patchwork of requirements for environmental assessments (EA). Overlapping responsibilities between provincial, territorial and federal levels of government, not to mention competing agencies at all levels, have predictably produced unbearable delays in the regulatory process. Making matters worse at the municipal level, land use planning and EA processes lack proper coordination, which causes long delays. Without a doubt, the dream of a “one project-one assessment” approach to conducting environmental assessments across Canada has still a ways to go. But as this Bennett Jones update argues, thereRead the Rest…
¶ Published Monday, April 20th In Legal Issues - No Comments »
In an attempt to ‘stimulate’ the economy, the feds may have stirred the pot a little too much. Their removal of environmental assessment on infrastructure projects tied to stimulus has raised some questions. Though removing EA requirements will certainly speed up some projects, it will likely be taken advantage of by companies planning to build otherwise questionable projects. Not much more to contribute to this idea, but see the article here for more information. The money quote from Environmental Defence: “These changes to the law are like cutting the brake line to make a car go faster.”
