Well.....ok......First reaction:
It sounds like a good starting point to me. The government is finally trying to clarify it's roll in deciding who can dive what, it makes an attempt to embody some kind of definition for certain wrecks and it mentions both explicitly and in intent that they want to get along with divers.
If you ask me this is long overdue but in practice it probably won't differ significantly from the defacto situation today. As it is the Canadian government claims ownership of everything underwater and in principle you need to ask to dive and/or salvage it.
On the positive side this legislation protects sites with possible archeological value until they can be reasearched. Furthermore, it allows for either prohibiting or allowing diving depending on the intrinsic value of the site. So let's face it. Some sites need protecting and the ones that don't aren't going to be a problem.
On the less than positive side it makes some blanket definitions that could encompass much more than the spirit of the hertitage act intends and/or exclude things that really should have been included. The Edmund Fitzgerald, for example, wouldn't be considered a heritage site by this definition even though it's one of Canada's ship-wreck icons..... To me the definition is too sloppy to be of much use in practice.
An on the really negative side the permit system won't work in the long run because of the overhead it creates and the costs it will entail to hold a permit. This need a serious reworking for a real-world solution.
All in all. Nice idea. Not much real change as compared to today and a sloppy bit of work on definitions and the permit process.
This has no chance of passing as it is.
R..
