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Notes for remarks

by

The Honourable Laurel Broten
Minister of the Environment

Funding Announcement —
Rideau Valley Conservation Authority

Ottawa, ON
Friday, April 28, 2006

(Check against delivery)

Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for coming out.

I’m very pleased to join John Miller (Chair — RVCA) along with all our partners at the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority and the Mississippi Conservation Authority.

As Minister of the Environment I really appreciate the opportunity to speak to people who share my passion for a clean and healthy environment.

I’m here in Orleans today to talk about clean water — how to keep it safe and how to make sure it is managed responsibly.

In this province, there’s no question — we are blessed with an abundance of fresh water.

We have more than a quarter of a million lakes, rivers and streams and we share the vast reservoir of the Great Lakes Basin.

We also have a supply of groundwater in aquifers that is even greater than all of our surface water.

This abundance does not make us immune to the consequences of contaminated drinking water. Events in Walkerton, Kitchener and Beckwith have shown that it can happen here. And they’ve shown us what’s at stake — our economic strength, our health and, in the most extreme cases, our lives.

Only constant vigilance will enable us to meet our responsibility to make sure no other community has to go through what people in these communities have experienced.

Walkerton’s legacy is a rethinking of the way drinking water is protected in Ontario. It has led to real progress as we’ve moved ahead on our commitment to fulfilling the recommendations of Justice O’Connor.

Over the last two years, our government has also hired more water inspectors, and introduced new rules for training the people who operate municipal water treatment systems.

We have implemented yearly inspections for municipal residential drinking water systems across the province and twice-yearly inspections at the labs that test our drinking water.

Our government is providing financial assistance to help communities upgrade their water and sewage systems, to help reduce the risk of contaminated drinking water.

This is critical because more than half on Ontario’s pipes are more than fifty years old; many of them are over a hundred.

Many ‘boil water advisories’ get issued as a precautionary measure when there is a mechanical breakdown in the infrastructure. One broken pipe can cause anxiety and disruption in hundreds of households.

Continued investment in infrastructure will lower the risk of these sorts of disruptions and help us reduce the risks of contaminated drinking water.

Our government is passionate about ensuring people have water that’s protected and plentiful. That’s why we’ve introduced legislation that we think was long overdue — our own Clean Water Act. This ground-breaking piece of legislation sets prevention — above all else — as its fundamental principle.

Notre gouvernement veut absolument que l’Ontario dispose d’une eau propre et abondante. C’est pourquoi nous avons instauré une loi qui aurait dû, à notre avis, être instaurée depuis longtemps — la Loi sur l’eau saine. Cette loi novatrice met l’accent sur la prévention de la contamination de l’eau et en fait le principe fondamental de protection de l’eau — plus important que tout autre.

We think that it is smarter, safer and more effective to protect water from contamination than to clean up problems after the fact.

Here, the very location of your city symbolizes the critical importance of water in all our lives. The city grew up here because of the merging waters of the Ottawa and Rideau rivers.

In fact, the Ottawa River was an important trading and transportation route that helped lead to the growth of our nation.

Ottawa and its neighbours are communities where we can see the potential benefits of the Clean Water Act.

Here, you face unique challenges with your particular mix of municipal supplies and private wells — many in high-density village areas. Also, the Ottawa and Rideau rivers face different challenges.

The Rideau River is covered by a conservation authority and good progress is being made to protect it.

However, the Rideau-Mississippi planning area is also home to Beckwith Township — an example of what can happen when effective preventive measures are not in place.

Now, in contrast to the Rideau, the Ottawa River to the west is not managed by a conservation authority, even though it is home to many industries and small communities.

Problems affecting water in the Ottawa River can affect people in Ottawa, as well as those living downstream in the St. Lawrence Basin and parts beyond.

The Clean Water Act, if passed, would help by enabling municipalities to develop plans even if they aren’t covered by a conservation authority. Communities along the western portions of the Ottawa River would be able to come together to plan how best to collectively protect their drinking water resources.

We’re seeing active planning and partnerships in places like Whitewater Township, which has already received 10,000 dollars to study its water sources.

The Clean Water Act reflects our government’s most fundamental beliefs about drinking water and the best ways to protect it.

The proposed act is locally-driven because we believe that water protection is very much a local issue.

We want to make sure that people in every community across the province have a voice in developing workable, effective solutions.

It’s our strong belief that the local authorities are in the best position to determine the protection measures that are needed in their own community. They can best decide how these measures should be carried out … who should take responsibility for leading them and how to best ensure the community has a protection plan that works.

The Clean Water Act would give communities the power to take steps to prevent potential threats from becoming serious problems. It would do this by requiring a plan for protecting each watershed in Ontario.

And our proposed act will be based on the best available science. If we are going to effectively protect our drinking water, we need to know how much we have in reserve, how it replenishes itself, and what poses a threat to our supply.

Right now in Ontario, conservation authorities and municipalities are using leading-edge research and technology to build the most comprehensive maps ever of our surface and groundwater supply.

This is part of our government’s recent 67-million dollar commitment to the science of drinking water protection.

Earlier this month, I’m pleased to tell you, our government provided the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority with 267,000 dollars for scientific studies. We also provided more that $760,000 dollars in funding to the Raisin Region South Nation Conservation Authority. In fact, we have now provided more than 1.6 million dollars over the past two years to the RVCA and its partners to support watershed planning.

The most recent funding includes:

• $111,500 dollars for groundwater studies, and
• $155,500 dollars for surface water studies.

Those studies will provide a better understanding of this area’s water sources.

And that will work out well for the people of the Rideau Valley.

Now, the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority will be better able to protect local drinking water.

We all share in the responsibility to ensure that our water supports good health, a vibrant quality of life and strong communities, like this one.

Our government is fortunate to have partners like the Rideau Valley Conservation Authority and the Mississippi Valley Conservation Authority who share this responsibility and share our commitment.

We owe it to each other — more importantly we owe it to future generations — to our children and their children.

I look forward to continuing to work with you towards our shared goal: healthy, clean, life-sustaining water.

Thank you.

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