Ottawa introduces new train-safety rules
Transport Canada measures effective immediately
OTTAWA — Transport Canada announced six new emergency railsafety rules Tuesday in response to the runaway train disaster in LacMégantic, Que. — but senior officials declined to answer direct questions about whether the department had failed in previous years to respond to weaknesses highlighted both in internal and external audits.
In a news conference responding to recommendations from Transportation Safety Board of Canada investigators last Friday, the department said the new rules would be effective immediately and in place for about six months, leading to permanent rule changes for the industry.
The new measures ban one-person crews for locomotives carrying train cars with dangerous goods. They also place new restrictions on unattended trains on main tracks, as well as define minimum requirements for their braking systems.
“The disaster brought to light several industry practices which have caused some concern,” Gerard Mc- Donald, assistant deputy minister responsible for safety and security at Transport Canada, said in a conference call with reporters.
“Given that, and with an abundance of precaution, we thought it would be prudent to implement these measures now.”
The disaster, which claimed dozens of lives and destroyed multiple buildings, also resulted in the release of about 5.7 million litres of oil into the air, water and soil around the small Quebec town, provincial officials estimated this week, making it one of the largest environmental disasters in North American history.
But Transport Canada officials ended the news conference when reporters started asking whether the department had failed to respond to previous warnings about oversight weaknesses, raised in an audit by the federal environment watchdog in 2011 and an internal audit done five years earlier.
McDonald suggested that the 2011
The disaster brought to light several industry practices which have caused some concern
GERARD MCDONALD
audit, which recommended sweeping changes and a new risk-management system in the department’s oversight of the transportation of dangerous goods, was not related to the new emergency measures unveiled Tuesday.
He was unable to respond to revelations from internal Transport Canada documents, released to Greenpeace Canada through access-to-information legislation, that his department had “identified no major safety concerns with the increased oil on rail capacity in Canada, nor with the safety of tank cars” used for transportation of dangerous goods.
Despite long-standing warnings from the Transportation Safety Board and others about the existing steel cars and other issues, Transport Canada had dismissed the rail safety concerns in a memo prepared for International Trade Minister Ed Fast in January 2013.
The assistant deputy minister suggested he was not familiar with these recommendations.
“I can’t verify what that document is, so I’m not going to speculate about it,” McDonald said.
Transport Canada announced the emergency measures as some federal MPs returned to Parliament to begin hearings, spearheaded by NDP transport critic Olivia Chow, on rail safety issues.
But MPs eventually accepted a motion from Ontario Conservative Jeff Watson, who questioned whether an immediate parliamentary study was necessary, to delay the hearings, pending further results from the ongoing Transportation Safety Board investigation in Lac-Mégantic.
“This committee also should be concerned in deciding whether to commence a study now whether that draws important resources out of the field where they belong,” Watson told the House of Commons transport committee. “That doesn’t mean there won’t be a study. The answer from this side of the table is not a ‘no,’ it’s a ‘not yet.’”
Liberal transport critic David McGuinty supported the proposal to delay the parliamentary hearings, explaining it would allow federal officials to focus their attention on the investigation and rebuilding efforts, but he said the government also needed to provide more details about its response to the disaster.
Meanwhile, Chow suggested that the Conservatives and Liberals wanted to “take the summer off,” adding that immediate hearings could help address long-standing safety concerns and reassure other communities fearing similar disasters in their own backyards.