Maybe I can answer that.

I am John Moffet, the ADM at the environmental protection branch at Environment and Climate Change Canada.

There are two parts to your question. One is with respect to the 98% and the second is with respect to what we are improving.

First of all, in fact we're not slow. We are the fastest country in the world with respect to having assessed all of the substances in commerce in the 1980s. No other country has come close to our record.

We looked at all the substances in commerce and said that we don't have a regime to say that we can't use it until we prove they're safe because they're already here, so what are we going to do? Every country in the world has wrestled with the same issue. As I said, we have moved farther and faster than any other country in reviewing that stock of substances.

Notwithstanding the fact that we are almost all the way through that list, we recognize that the job is not done. It's not just because we have a small number of those substances left but because lots of new substances are being introduced and developed all the time. Some of them are being introduced and used in different manners.

We also know, as a result of evolving science, that substances can have different synergistic impacts when they're used together and when they're combined with other substances in the atmosphere, in the body or in products. We are now moving towards that more complex type of science. We're not just looking at individual substances, but a combination of substances and different uses of substances.

We're also, as the minister explained, putting much more emphasis on not just generic impacts, but on impacts across Canada and across different populations and peoples so that we pay close attention to the most vulnerable members of society.

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