Periodically, the protection of lakes becomes an issue. The summer of 2022 was no exception, because water is not only an important resource, it plays a “vital” role. So much so that on the eve of the election campaign, François Legault announced the creation of a “Blue Fund” if the CAQ was returned to power, to finance existing and new initiatives.
Posted at 5:00 p.m.
However, as Environment Minister Benoit Charette pointed out during this announcement, “water protection is a complex issue that must be tackled in many ways”. It is complex because of the variety of public and private stakeholders involved and the diversity of interests involved.
In fact, several bodies of water in Quebec should be protected by regulatory measures aimed, for example, at limiting the speed of motorized boats. Why ? To counter or slow down shoreline erosion, prevent the release of sediment from shallow waters, fight against blue-green algae and improve the safety of all lake users.
Framing the problem more closely
The adoption of these measures is not possible, however, without the cooperation of the municipality concerned and the Ministère des Affaires municipales du Québec and, above all, without the approval of Transport Canada, on which the application of the Canada Shipping Act under which such measures may be applied.
This shows how complex the authorization process is, since three levels of approval are officially concerned, Transport Canada being the most distant body and the furthest removed from citizen concerns regarding bodies of water.
This is why the “most effective” way to tackle the protection of the lakes is to obtain a transfer of powers from Ottawa to Quebec with respect to limiting the speed of motor boats on the lakes or the outright banning of motorized watercraft on the smallest bodies of water (less than one square kilometer in area, as recommended by a parliamentary committee of the National Assembly in the 1990s).
Like other files such as immigration, Quebec-Ottawa administrative agreements are possible in order to delegate to Quebec the powers to regulate the circulation of motor boats on the bodies of water in the province.
We must take advantage of the 2022 election campaign for all political parties to promise to challenge the federal government so that Quebec can benefit from such power, thus showing to what extent the protection of lakes is truly a “vital” issue. for everyone.