Environment commissioner gives Canada a failing grade for contaminated sites in North – Winnipeg Free Press

OTTAWA – Canada’s environmental commissioner says Ottawa is failing to remediate contaminated sites in the north, putting indigenous peoples at risk and increasing the government’s own financial liability for the contaminated areas.

Commissioner Jerry DeMarco says in a new audit released today that the government’s liability for contaminated sites has increased by $7 billion in the nearly two decades since the government launched a plan to remediate and reclaim abandoned mines.

More than 60 percent of that liability lies in the North.

Federal Environment Commissioner Jerry V. DeMarco will hold a press conference in Ottawa on Thursday, April 20, 2023. DeMarco gives the federal government a failing grade for reducing their financial liability in remediating contaminated sites in the North — and says they are excluding some Indigenous people from the process altogether. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

DeMarco says one mine still requires work to prevent contaminated water from spilling into surrounding areas, while another still contains a large amount of arsenic, which must remain frozen underground.

Most of these sites are on Indigenous lands, but DeMarco says Indigenous people are not fully included in recovery efforts.