PEO President George Comrie, P.Eng., met with Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant on December 6 to continue pressing the regulator's case on recent legislative initiatives of significance to Ontario's engineering community (see President's Message, p. 3). At issue once again are the Building Code Statute Law Amendment Act, 2002 (Bill 124) and Regulation 305/03 from the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, and the Brownfields Statute Law Amendment Act, 2001 and Regulation 153/04 from the Ontario Ministry of the Environment. PEO has concerns that both acts impose external certification measures on elements of engineering practice and, as such, threaten to underrhine the regulatory authority of the Professional Engineers Act (PEA). Scheduled to come into effect July 1, Regulation 305/03 requires all building-design professionals, including engineers and architects, to pass Ontario Building Code (OBC) examinations set by the ministry in order to submit building plans for approval by municipalities. While the bill was originally aimed at streamlining conditions in Ontario's construction industry, some engineers believe it adds significant bureaucracy and cost to the plans approval process, with minimal public benefit. Its requirement that practitioners pass building code examinations is seen as an encroachment on engineers' self-regulating authority under the PEA. Section 72(2) (d) of Ontario Regulation 941 already requires all professional engineers to make provision for "applicable statutes, regulations, standards, codes, by-laws and rules," including the OBC.
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