What we examined (see Focus of the audit)

This audit focused on the extent to which Transport Canada and the Canada Energy Regulator implemented recommendations from our 2011 and 2015 reports regarding these organizations’ compliance and enforcement responsibilities for the safe transportation of dangerous goods. This audit also focused on whether the organizations followed up with companies that had contravened regulations to ensure the companies returned to compliance, among other things.

Why we did this audit

This audit is important because accidents involving the transportation of dangerous goods can have tragic consequences, including loss of life and significant damage to property and the environment. For example, if released during transportation, chlorine used in purifying water supplies and anhydrous ammonia used in fertilizing crops could spread easily under certain conditions and pose a hazard to health.

Overall message

Overall, we found that since our 2011 audit of the transportation of dangerous products, Transport Canada had made some improvements in the areas we followed up on, but we also found that there was still important work to be done. For example, we found that the department still had not followed up on some violations or granted final approval to many emergency response assistance plans. We also found that, although Transport Canada implemented our recommendation to develop a national risk-based system to prioritize its inspections, the underlying data was incomplete and outdated. Transport Canada has more progress to make to address the problems we identified in order to support the safe transportation of dangerous goods.

We also found that since our 2015 audit of the oversight of federally regulated pipelines, the Canada Energy Regulator had largely implemented the 3 recommendations that we followed up on. For example, it implemented an information management system to improve the tracking and documenting of its compliance oversight activities, and it improved its verification that regulated companies had taken corrective action to address non-compliance.

What we found about …

Transporting dangerous goods by rail, road, ship, and air

• Transport Canada still had shortcomings in its oversight of dangerous goods, despite having made some progress

Transporting dangerous goods by pipeline

• The Canada Energy Regulator improved its compliance oversight

Responses to recommendations

See List of Recommendations.

Related information

For more information

Media Relations
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Email: infomedia@oag-bvg.gc.ca