Canadians deserve more than toxic legacy

By Paul Muldoon and Craig Boljkovac Copyright 1998 Ottawa Citizen November 23, 1998

What do plastic toys, the Great Lakes, the Sidney Tar ponds, the Arctic and food in the parliamentary cafeteria have in common? Toxic chemicals.

The trace amounts found in bacon, broccoli, french fries and bananas a few weeks ago are low when compared to elevated levels found in top-of-the-foodchain wildlife and some human populations. But that doesn't make them non-toxic. They are a blatant reminder that we are living with a toxic legacy thanks to the pervasive use of pesticides and industrial chemicals and the discharge of chemical pollutants.

While some of the most notorious substances like DDT, PCBs, dieldrin, aldrin and chlordane have been banned in Canada for over two decades, tens of thousands of other dangerous substances are still being used or generated.

Members of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development are currently voting on Bill C-32 -- amendments to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act -- before it is sent back to the House of Commons for third and final reading. Over the next few weeks, as the ostensibly revamped act is being debated, Canadians will find out whether the federal government is serious about protecting our health and the environment from toxic chemicals.

The test will be whether the new law obliges the ministers of Environment and Health to take precautionary action to prevent serious harm to wildlife or people from toxic chemicals. The key to implementing this "precautionary approach" will be to accept that there are instances when chemicals should be controlled even in the absence of 100-per-cent proof of harm.

There are mountains of evidence pointing to health hazards associated with pesticides, industrial chemicals, and the substances found in common consumer products. But our existing laws require such iron-clad proof linking exposure to a toxic substance to an effect such as cancer, deformity or death that the regulatory system is ineffective and stalled.

Since the Canadian Environmental Protection Act was first proclaimed in 1988, evidence has grown that toxic chemicals can cause health effects other than cancer. We now know that many substances can cause other, less immediately discernible effects that result from the disruption of the hormone systems of wildlife and humans.

Feminization of males, immune suppression leading to increased disease susceptibility, altered or more aggressive behaviour, and learning deficits -- all have been observed in a variety of wildlife and human studies.

Significant steps, most notably in the U.S. and within the European Union, are starting to be taken to address the threat endocrine disruptors pose. Ironically, key evidence comes from the Great Lakes and Canadian Arctic -- the backyards of the very legislators who need to act.

The members of the committee looking at Bill C-32 are no strangers to this law. Their 1995 review called for over 140 improvements, most of which have been ignored. Bill C-32 is a step backwards, a cave-in to status quo industrial interests and a sad indication that our governments and corporate leaders don't understand the consequences of not preventing pollution.

To be a truly protective piece of legislation, some fundamental problems in Bill C-32 have to be addressed. Canadians deserve a law that:

- Provides a meaningful framework for identifying and dealing with endocrine-disrupting substances and includes a definition that incorporates the precautionary approach;

- Prevents the use, generation and release of substances considered toxic;

- Allows the public to effectively sue polluters;

- Restores the ability of the federal government to take leadership on the environment.

Bill C-32 should either be substantially amended or withdrawn if the Health and Environment ministers are unwilling to make more than cosmetic changes because:

- Industry will still be able to use and generate the most dangerous chemicals known to humans according to the bill's bizarre definition of "virtual elimination;"

- Endocrine-disrupting substances will increasingly pose a threat to the health of wildlife and humans;

- Environment Canada will lose its ability to control genetically engineered species;

- The provinces will be able to block federal action on toxic substances;

- Canadians will not have any effective legal rights to enforce the environmental protection act, despite the rhetoric in the bill.

The presence of toxins in food from the Parliament Hill cafeteria means that no one, not even an elected decision-maker, is immune to exposure to these and future generations of chemicals. Every Canadian has chemicals in his or her body that our ancestors never had and hundreds more chemicals are introduced into the environment every year. But the law of the land pertaining to controlling these chemicals is impotent. Changing C-32 to provide a framework to protect future generations of Canadians, as well as our wildlife, from a toxic legacy is essential.

Paul Muldoon is executive director of the Canadian Environmental Law Association. Craig Boljkovac is with the World Wildlife Fund of Canada's wildlife toxicology program.

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