The Ministry of Forests Land and Natural Resource Operations’ enforcement staff should consider attaching stiffer penalties to administrative actions against companies that violate regulations, the forest-industry watchdog reported, according to the Vancouver Sun Thursday.
It also suggested that the Ministry of Forests publish its determinations to make them more of a deterrent.
The BC Forest Practices Board highlighted the findings of a special investigation it conducted of the Ministry of Forests’ administrative proceedings against contraventions of legislation and regulations between 2009 and 2014, which found that fewer than 10 per cent of 146 cases saw violators receive the maximum fine.
“Penalty amounts seem low,” the board wrote in its report, with 79 per cent of fines falling below $5,000.
