ibiting Bulk Water Removal from Watersheds (the Accord) an effective mechanism for regulating bulk water exports or diversions?Draft proposals for this Accord provide in part: Federal, provincial and territorial ministers responsible for the environment commit to a Canada-wide approach for the protection of Canadian waters, in part by prohibiting bulk removal of water from Canadian major drainage basins, including for the purposes of export. The goal is to provide sustainable management of waters, ensure clean, productive and secure fresh water resources and ecosystems while promoting social, economic, and environmental benefits for present and future generations. We agree that: Each jurisdiction will determine the approach to be used for achieving the common objective of prohibiting bulk water removal from major drainage basins. We suspect that the notion of such an Accord would seem like a reasonable, even desirable approach for dealing with the problem of bulk water exports. In fact, when viewed from the perspective of federal-provincial relations, the Accord has certain features to recommend it. It would, for example, offer an opportunity to integrate the efforts of provincial and federal government to ban water exports and diversions. The Accord also embraces the concept of watershed management, which has strong appeal from an environmental policy perspective. 3.1 Of itself, an Accord would do nothing to Prohibiting Water Exports However we believe that there are four fundamental problems with this approach to safeguarding Canadian water. To begin with, the Accord would of itself do nothing to actually prohibit export initiatives that might be undertaken by provincial governments, municipalities, Crown agencies, corporations or even private parties. This would require legislation, and when it comes to international trade, it is the federal government, and not the provinces that has the constitutional authority to regulate. While j...
