Thank you, Mr. Chair. I support this amendment. It strikes a good balance between the need for expediency in emergency situations while still allowing collective decision-making at the Cabinet level when a request for exemption comes forward. The reason why it’s important to have that collective decision-making in my perspective is exemptions may come from any area and it may be a low-emissions industrial actor, something like that where these regulations might unduly impact their economic success.

Having the perspective of more than one department – sorry, I should say more than one Minister who has of course advised by the department, but having more than one perspective on the issue whether it’s the Department of Health, whether it’s the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment and represented through their Ministers, it allows for a broader range of opinions on proposed exemptions. It allows sharing of that important power. We are talking about exempting people from law. I think kicking this to the commissioner and executive counsel encourages collective decision-making is more in keeping with consensus. As we’ve seen from issues very close to my heart such as the arsenic in Kam Lake, we have often been in the situation where one branch of government is well aware of the issues of contaminants in the environment and another branch of government is not aware of those issues.

To break down the silos and bring a whole government approach to exemption making authority, I think is the real spirit of our intent of this amendment and I do support it for those reasons. For anyone who’s concerned that there might be an urgent need to grant an exemption, that power is also contemplated here in this amendment as well. It does strike that balance. That’s exactly the purpose of good legislation is to balance all interest equally and to ensure that authority is shared appropriately. You never know, you may have one Minister with a different perspective on the environment and the economy and how they need to work together that might need help from colleagues on the executive council side to make an informed decision about exemptions. This allows that to happen. I do support this. I encourage honourable Members of this House to do so as well. Thank you, Mr. Chair.