From the Vancouver Sun – June 20, 2011

by Sarah Schmidt

OTTAWA — The Conservative government took a hit from friendly-fire
Monday when a former Tory cabinet minister who has battled lung cancer
pleaded with his former colleagues to support limits on the export of
chrysotile asbestos.

Chuck Strahl, a senior Tory cabinet
minister until his retirement from politics in May, wrote a column on
the opening day of an international conference to decide whether the
substance should be labelled as a hazardous material under the United
Nations’ Rotterdam Convention.

Strahl called on Ottawa to
stand with the world’s industrialized countries and list the carcinogen
on Annex III of the Rotterdam Convention.

This is a special
list that requires “Prior Informed Consent” before countries can export
the hazardous product to another country. Placing it on the list means
recipient countries must be informed of the hazards and can refuse to
accept it if they believe they can’t handle it safety.

Strahl, a former British Columbia logging contractor, developed lung cancer linked to his exposure to asbestos.

Although
the four-day UN meeting kicked off Monday in Geneva, the government has
yet to disclose whether Canada supports the listing of chrysotile
asbestos on Annex III.

The mineral is mined in Quebec and exported to developing countries such as India and Thailand.

Strahl
told Industry Minister Christian Paradis and Prime Minister Stephen
Harper that it’s time for Canada to support flagging the carcinogen as
potentially harmful because importers and exporters have the right to
know there are serious health risks if misused.

“Loggers
like me operated some of industry’s largest and most dangerous
equipment. I loved every minute of it. Huge and powerful, they fit the
personalities of the men of the woods — aggressive, production-oriented,
no-nonsense types who didn’t wait around to listen to some do-gooder
tell them about the dangers of asbestos. That was a big, big mistake,”
Strahl wrote in the Globe and Mail.

“Not surprisingly,
exposure of this kind caused problems. But never immediately. Like
smoking a cigarette, the effects take time. And, like smoking a
cigarette in those days, people just didn’t know about the long term
impacts of asbestos. But we do today. The doctors tell me that the
cancer I was diagnosed with six years ago and collapsed my lung was
certainly caused by exposure to asbestos. Miraculously and thankfully,
my cancer hasn’t grown and I’m symptom-free. Most guys that get
diagnosed are dead in six to 12 months.”

Strahl added: “The
Prime Minister and Quebec’s regional minister have both said that they
support the safe use of chrysotile asbestos. It’s hard to argue with
that. By listing chrysotile in the Rotterdam Convention as a product
that deserves to be handled carefully and with proper warnings, safe use
is more likely to occur. Workers from all countries will be grateful
for that notification — if not today, then a generation from now.”

At
the most recent Rotterdam Convention meeting in 2008, consideration of
whether chrysotile asbestos should be listed was deferred after
consensus could not be reached. Canada split with industrialized
countries by objecting to the listing, along with a handful of other
countries, including Iran, Kyrgyzstan and Zimbabwe.

Canada
also blocked the move to list chrysotile asbestos at the 2006
conference. At the time, Health Canada’s bureaucracy wanted to include
the carcinogen on the convention’s list of hazardous chemicals.

Under
the convention, hazardous chemicals and pesticides that have already
been banned, or whose uses are severely restricted in many countries,
are listed in Annex III if they also meet certain scientific criteria.
The convention’s expert scientific committee has repeatedly recommended
that chrysotile asbestos, already banned in many countries, be placed on
the list.

Paradis was not immediately available to comment on Strahl’s salvo.

On
Friday, his spokeswoman said it wasn’t the right time to discuss
Canada’s position on the Rotterdam Convention. Paradis, who has also
served as natural resources minister, represents the Quebec riding of
Megantic-L’Erable, home to Canada’s last-remaining asbestos mine.

“There
are times when it’s time to disclose it and there are times when it’s
not the time, and now it’s not the time,” spokesman Pascale Boulay said
Friday.

“Canada knows what its position is.”

After
the opening day of the conference Monday, countries are scheduled
Tuesday to discuss the recommendation from the convention’s committee of
scientists to list chrysotile asbestos as a hazardous substance.

Anti-asbestos
campaigners say they believe Canada will continue to push to keep the
mineral off the convention’s list of hazardous materials. They accuse
Paradis — whom they call the “czar of asbestos” — of overruling health
and environment experts within the federal government.

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