Competitive Canada - recommendations to improve federal assessment for major projects

in the province’s factum to the Supreme Court.5 Under this approach, the province takes the lead on intra-provincial projects and conducts the full assessment (as well as makes the decision to approve). [...] Rather, the decision should be made by three members of Cabinet: the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of Finance and the Minister in charge of the category of project being reviewed—usually but not always the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources. [...] C., for example, uses two Ministers to make the decision: the Minister of the Environment plus the Minister responsible for the type of project. [...] And there is still uncertainty over how the project approval process intersects with Canada’s implementation of the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and the right to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) and the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. [...] One is a fear of potential legal challenges.48 Another is the need to placate all participants who have an interest, even if the issue won’t influence decision-making— the “everything under the sun” approach.49 A third is that the agency tasked with defining the scope doesn’t have a good understanding of the ways in which a project is unique and may present risk, vs.