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Notes for remarks

by

The Honourable Laurel Broten
Minister of the Environment

“Source Water Protection Part II Progress and Challenges”

International Conference on the St. Lawrence River/Great Lakes Ecosystem
St. Lawrence River Institute of Environmental Sciences

NAV Canada Convention Centre
Cornwall, ON
Tuesday, May 16, 2006 (9:20 a.m.)

(Check against delivery)

Good morning everyone. Bonjour.

I’m pleased to be here and to join Mayor Poirier and MPP Jim Brownell at this year’s conference.

I want to begin by thanking Jeff Ridal and everyone at the St. Lawrence River Institute of Environmental Sciences for the invitation to speak to you today.

Many of you have travelled here from different parts of our province and from outside Ontario to discuss environmental management and, in particular, source water protection.

By taking the time to share your success stories — as well as your challenges — you are helping us arrive at better, sustainable water supply solutions for people in Ontario.

Through your efforts you are raising awareness about how each of us in our own way can help make our world cleaner, greener and healthier.

The work you are doing, through this conference and in your day-to-day jobs, represents the best approach to environmental protection — using high-quality scientific work to create awareness and encourage collective action.

As Minister of the Environment, I get a lot of satisfaction knowing that our government’s environmental initiatives mean better health, more prosperity and stronger communities. As a mother of two baby boys — I believe we all have a stake in building a better future for our children.

The native ceremony that began our session is a reminder that this region has provided families and communities with life and livelihood for many thousands of years — in great part because of the waters of the Great Lakes and St.Lawrence River system.

Water is vital for life. Its presence or absence defines the quality of our lives.

Here in Ontario, we are blessed with an abundance of water. But with this great resource comes a great responsibility.

People in every community in our province expect and deserve safe and sustainable sources of drinking water. They put their trust in us — for their health and the health of their families.

It is our job, together, to live up to that trust.

And together, we’re making excellent progress.
Today, I want to outline our most significant advances in the past year, highlighted by the introduction of our proposed Clean Water Act.

I also want to talk about our commitment to protecting our most important source of drinking water — the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River basin.

The St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes helped bring us together — first as trappers, traders, and for transportation — French, English and First Nations.

These waters helped encourage the growth of communities and brought about the early beginnings of what was to become Canada.

Clearly, the Great Lakes represent much more than a source of growth and prosperity.

I want to thank all the members of the institute for the important role they’ve played in restoring wetlands and rehabilitating waterways in this region.

You are demonstrating how effective community partnerships can be in improving our environment and protecting our plentiful sources of fresh water. The work being done here will benefit people in this area for many years to come.

Certainly, the abundance of our surface and groundwater does not make us immune to the consequences of contamination or depletion.

We know how high the stakes are when it comes to safe drinking water. Nothing is more essential to our health and quality of life — and there is no higher priority for our government.

Rien n’est plus important pour la santé et le bien-être des résidentes et résidents de l’Ontario, et aucune priorité n’est plus importante pour notre gouvernement.

Walkerton provided us with the most extreme example of what can happen when water becomes contaminated. I was in Walkerton recently and met with people whose lives and health continue to be seriously compromised.

Even though less severe, events in Kitchener and Beckwith have shown us that communities and their economies can be significantly disrupted by contaminated drinking water.

One of the overriding lessons we’ve learned is the need for constant vigilance. We have to adapt to new challenges. We have to respect the sources of our drinking water and work diligently to protect them at all times.

I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished. We have entered a new era in drinking water protection for Ontario.

We have hired more water inspectors, and introduced new rules for training the people who operate municipal water treatment systems.

Ontario now has yearly inspections for municipal residential drinking water systems and twice-yearly inspections at the labs that test our drinking water.

But our plan for safe, sustainable drinking water involves much more than that.

Just a few weeks ago I was in Peterborough delivering funds for the Well-Aware program. This program demonstrates the critical importance of local community involvement in protecting local sources of drinking water — in this case, private well owners. The Well-Aware program is about property owners getting the necessary knowledge and information so they can take action to protect their wells.

On a larger scale, our government is providing financial assistance to help communities upgrade their water and sewage systems — helping reduce the risk of contaminated drinking water.

This is critical because many of the treatment plants that clean the water and the pipes that carry it are old and getting older. More than half of Ontario’s pipes are more than fifty years old — some are over a hundred.

We need to invest in them so that Ontario’s families can continue to have clean, safe water for years to come. Aging water and sewer systems must be upgraded or replaced.

These are all important improvements on what we had in the past. But if we want the best water quality in the world, we need to do more than just upgrade our existing tools. We need to expand our way of thinking.

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.

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.

Our proposed Clean Water Act would strengthen the ability of communities to come together to protect the sources of their drinking water.

If passed, the Clean Water act would give Ontarians some of the best-protected drinking water in the world.

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

The proposed act allows for the promotion of voluntary initiatives and requires mandatory action when necessary to protect public health and safety.

Those of you from this region know why the Clean Water Act is necessary and important for people’s health and wellbeing.

People in Cornwall and the surrounding communities are heavily dependent on the St. Lawrence River for drinking water, industry, recreation and agriculture.

The local economy depends on these waters to keep industry running, to continue attracting tourists and to serve people working and living here.

We all know that agriculture prospers, businesses find success and communities thrive where there is water that is free from contamination, plentiful and protected.

We all share a stake in ensuring our water sources are protected — just as we all share the responsibility.

Over the past few months we have consulted widely with people across Ontario — with property owners and farmers, municipal leaders, water experts, environmental groups and, of course, interested citizens.
I want to recognize members of the farming community who are here with us today. Thank you for the important contributions you make as stewards of the land and the water.
Much of what we are doing is building on initiatives that began with Ontario’s farmers and many of those initiatives involve a broader range of environmental issues and continue to be covered under the Environmental Farm Plan program.
We continue to count on Ontario’s farmers for their valuable input as we go forward … to ensure that our proposed bill will be workable and can be implemented easily across rural Ontario.
Everyone wants an opportunity to participate in the decisions that affect their drinking water.

People everywhere have concluded that water protection must be seen as a shared responsibility and the most effective way to protect local water is through local involvement.

We agree.

We need to put into place a framework that allows a variety of tools and voluntary measures to be used to reduce the risk to water sources.

This is where the proposed Clean Water Act and its preventive approach come in.

With this new legislation — municipalities, conservation authorities and their watershed partners would be able to develop plans to safeguard local sources of drinking water.

What this means is that the people who live in a watershed and depend on it every day for their drinking water would be given more of a say in its protection.

In this way, the Clean Water Act would make public health and safety the key drivers of decisions about activities that could threaten drinking water supplies.

Our preventive approach is based on sound science.

We recognized early on that if you want to be effective in preventing problems with your drinking water, you need to start with an accurate picture of the water supply, how it replenishes itself and what threatens it.

In November, we made a $67.5 -million dollar commitment to the science of drinking water protection.

Last month, I announced $10 million dollars in grants to municipalities and their partners for scientific studies. Our investment includes more than two and a half million dollars for municipalities that draw their water from the Great Lakes. What that means for the Raisin Region Conservation Authority and the St. Lawrence River Cornwall RAP is $736,000 dollars for groundwater, surface water and Great Lakes studies.

Our investments are delivering results for Ontarians.

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 supplies. This approach will provide tremendous benefits to our province.

Primarily, we are organizing this information around drinking water source protection, but it has many value-added uses. This information can help municipalities, conservation authorities and their partners guide initiatives in areas like forestry planning … flood forecasting … fish habitat management … and recovery planning for endangered species.

When it comes to our sources of drinking water — the greatest of all is the Great Lakes.

Together with our federal partners we are working to help improve and protect the quality and quantity of the water in the Great Lakes through the Canada-Ontario Agreement Respecting the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem.

The Ontario government has invested a significant amount — $300 million dollars to date — on the 17 Great Lakes Areas of Concern outlined in the Canadian-Ontario Agreement.

And, we are making real progress.

Over the past few years more beaches have been open for swimming … there are fewer restrictions on eating fish from the Lakes and we’ve embarked on full scale clean-up of contaminated sediments.

As you can see, the past year has seen many exciting developments in protecting drinking water sources and the Great Lakes.

Making prevention the foundation of safe water is a significant step forward.

Together, we are taking part in the greatest evolution in water protection in decades and I want to take a moment to recognize the vital contribution you are making to this work.

Many of you have provided tremendous assistance throughout the past several years — giving your valuable time and expertise to help our government draft this important and progressive piece of legislation.

I want to ask you for your continued support as we move forward with the proposed Clean Water Act.

I know I can count on all of you for your continuing dedication to protecting and sustaining our water, our land and our air. Your efforts mean better health and a stronger economy today, and a brighter future for all Ontarians.

I believe that by continuing to share best practices — by listening to each other and working together — we can make our environment cleaner and healthier for our children and for the many generations to come.

Thank you.

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