QUEEN’S PARK – Ontario’s Environmental Commissioner is bang-on with his special report released today into the McGuinty government’s bungling of the province’s household hazardous waste management program.
“The Environmental Commissioner nailed it. This was an Eco Fee-‘asco’,” said NDP Environment Critic Peter Tabuns.
“Plain and simple, the McGuinty government completely bungled something that should have been easy to communicate and implement. This exercise in mismanagement is another example of a government that has lost its way and can’t seem to get anything right.”
Tabuns welcomed the Commissioner’s conclusions and recommendations.
“As New Democrats have noted, the concept of diverting and properly disposing of household hazardous wastes is a good one. But it needs to be up to producers themselves to bear the full cost. That’s something the report calls for,” he said.
Tabuns added that one way to clean up the mess is to take responsibility for running the program out of the hands of the industry-controlled Stewardship Ontario.
“Self-regulation doesn’t work. That’s been demonstrated over and over again,” he said.
“Stewardship Ontario itself ought be put out at curbside next to the compost heap. A revamped hazardous waste recycling program must be administered directly by the Ministry of the Environment. That’s what we’re calling for and that’s the only way this will work.”
