Speech

 

Good morning and thank you for joining me today.

LeBreton Flats was one of Canada’s oldest industrial and residential neighbourhoods. Settled in the 1800s, it was reduced to ash and rubble by a huge fire in 1900.

The area was rebuilt with housing, rail yards, flour mills and sawmills, and several other industries. The activities of these industries, combined with the ash left from the Great Fire, resulted in contaminated soil on the Flats.

LeBreton Flats Park has now become a major cultural site in the heart of the Capital and is also home to the magnificent Canadian War Museum which presents exhibitions on Canada’s rich military history from earliest times to the present.

And thanks to the Federal Contaminated Sites Action Plan, the next phase of remediation will take place around the area of this important site.

Phase I of this program, which ended in 2011, invested approximately $1.3 billion for remediation activities at 1,400 sites and assessments at 9,400 other sites across the country.

While we made huge progress during Phase I, our work is far from over. In the official inventory, about half of the 22,000 federal sites listed are now closed because remediation is either completed or was not required.  The other half still needs to be assessed or remediated.

Today, as the next step in the process, I’m pleased to announce that the Harper Government is investing $1 billion over three years for Phase II of the Federal Contaminated Sites Action Plan. We plan to conduct remediation activities at 1,100 high-priority sites and assess another 1,650 sites.

As you know, our Government’s top priority is jobs, growth and long-term prosperity, and today’s investment demonstrates yet another way we are working for a cleaner and healthier environment while protecting jobs and the Canadian economy. This program generates spin-off benefits for local economies through training, jobs and the purchase of goods and services. This is especially significant for Aboriginal communities and others who live in northern and rural areas.

Also, Phase II is expected to create about 7,300 jobs in waste management and remediation; an equivalent of about 1,500 full-time jobs per year. We also expect that the program will continue to strengthen the environmental business sector, encouraging the development of innovative technologies. And, in addition to its obvious environmental benefits, the program will leave a legacy of management tools that can be used by other levels of government and the private sector to address other contaminated sites.

Our Government takes its responsibilities to protect Canadians and the environment very seriously. Our investment today in the renewal of the Federal Contaminated Sites Action Plan demonstrates our commitment to address the harmful effects of past practices, and to protect Canadians and our environment for future generations.

Thank you.

 

Related information:

• Federal Contaminated Sites Action Plan Priority sites receiving funds [Backgrounder 2012-10-04]
• • Harper Government Launches Phase II of Contaminated Sites Clean-up Plan [News Release 2012-10-04]