Environment Committee on Oct. 23rd, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Unfortunately, we won't have time for the answer, at least at this point.

We'll go to Mr. Longfield.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

With three minutes, I want to talk to Mr. de Souza at length. I also want to talk to Ms. Gartner and Ms. Cardinal, so we'll see how that all goes.

These are tremendous ideas on the reconciliation in action, finding ways to have relationships and to learn new ways of implementing old ways. With the review that's ongoing right now, I want to double-check that indigenous people are on the board of the management of the park or that these ideas are also being discussed where they need to be discussed.

Do you know whether any of that is going on?

[Dane de Souza]

I can't speak to Jasper specifically, but the relationship that I do have with Banff National Park is exemplary for exactly that.

As far as wrapping up this conversation goes, this conversation needs to come to the province.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you.

We're in a culture where confrontation is the order of the day. Unfortunately, that doesn't help fight some of the challenges that we have together. Again, the lessons from indigenous people need to be something that we embrace as part of reconciliation in a real way—not with orange shirts, as you said, but with real action. Thank you so much for being here.

I'd like to flip over to the screen. I'm sorry to cut us short; it's just the time.

Ms. Gartner, thank you for being such a reasonable voice at the table. The youth in Guelph have been saying to me that, instead of fighting each other, why don't we fight climate change and stop fighting each other? In the last nine years, I've really embraced that message they've given me.

When it comes to topics like reconciliation and involving the youth in these discussions, do you have any quick thoughts that you would like to share on that theme?

[Lindsey Gartner]

I think reconciliation is a huge part of this process because the indigenous world view demonstrated taking care of the earth so much better than the western world view did.

That is the future. The future is to take that narrative and shift the paradigm to focus on social and environmental well-being. That's what we all want. That's number one. The youth will be the ones to make that shift. I feel confident in that.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

We need youth to be at the tables that we're sitting at, and we need youth to transform politics. Please stay involved. We need you.

Ms. Cardinal, it's great to see that we have a hero in the room. I'm really grateful for the work you've done on mentorship and for bringing your wisdom to our table.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you, Mr. Longfield.

Mr. Trudel, you have the floor.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Ms. Gartner, I'm going to ask you a question as well. You gave some fascinating testimony on cross-party politics. That said, what should we do?

Canada is still an oil powerhouse. Oil is responsible for a large portion of the greenhouse gases we emit. Therefore, if we want to fight climate change, we have to cap oil and gas sector production. My party agrees that we need to stop subsidizing the sector. According to a study by the International Monetary Fund, or IMF, the federal Liberals gave $50 billion in direct and indirect assistance to the oil industry in 2022. That same year, the five big oil companies made $200 billion in profit. Let's not forget that the IMF doesn't donate to Greenpeace or Équiterre.

I'm all for cross-party politics. We've been screaming for that. However, two major political parties here are still promoting the oil and gas industry. So how can we make these cross-party politics a reality?

[Lindsey Gartner]

Yes, I'll try to be really fast here. I just want to preface here that I come from a rural farming town and community in Alberta. My family has worked in oil and gas, so I understand the culture. Number one, when we think about a green transition, we need to think about a labour transition and empowering people to move out of that so that they can have a livelihood in a different way. We also need to think about our consumption, because we're not going to power our current consumption use on renewable energy. We need to slow things down and get realigned with our energy use if we are going to transition from oil.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much. I'm sorry to interrupt you. It's just a question of time, as Mr. Longfield said before.

Ms. McPherson, you have a minute and a half.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

A minute and a half is not very much time, but Ms. Gartner, as somebody who is in Jasper, who is a resident of Jasper, can you give us any additional information about what the people of Jasper need from the federal government right now?

[Lindsey Gartner]

I think they need to ask that question to the people on the ground and listen with a willingness to really support them. It's like those are the folks who are going to drive forward and build their community really strong and really beautiful and shape that future. Why Jasper was such a special place was because you could feel the community first. Yes, there were the mountains and all this beauty, but a community thriving is what enables everything else to thrive. Supporting that community to thrive, listening to what they need and allowing them to shape their own future are essential.

Then secondly, absolutely, we need to rebuild broken relationships with the people who were removed, the indigenous people who were removed from the land, and ensure that they are part of that future as well in a meaningful way. The last thing I'll say is that we need structures and policies that protect our social and economic systems from corporate opportunism, not just in Jasper but across Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Deltell, you have the floor for three minutes.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to move the following motion.

Given that the Jasper wildfire investigation has revealed: a) Then Liberal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna was warned in 2017 by multiple forestry experts that a catastrophic fire in Jasper was inevitable if the Liberal government did not act; b) “Nothing was done to address the landscape of beetle-killed timber to prevent the mega fire of July 22, 2024”, according to testimony from forestry expert Ken Hodges; c) Former Liberal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna has refused to testify at the Jasper wildfire investigation on multiple occasions despite repeated requests from the committee. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(1), the committee summon former Liberal Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna, to appear on November 6, 2024.

This is not the first time we've asked the former minister to appear before the committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Mr. Deltell, I remind you that we were in camera at the time.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Chair, I submit to you that we'd like the minister to be present. We've heard a great deal of testimony questioning the current government's management. Out of respect for the former minister, I think it only stands to reason that she should be able to appear before this committee and respond to the arguments made and, more importantly, the testimony that we heard, particularly from the former member for Yellowhead, who is here today and who spoke directly with the minister. The minister needs to come and testify, tell her side of the story and answer our questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Go ahead, Mr. van Koeverden.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Look, I've said this a number of times already, that I think the overpoliticization of this issue has gone on far too long. That has been corroborated now by locals, by journalists in the area and by witnesses on this committee. Despite that, the Conservatives seem hell-bent on overly politicizing this and turning it into a political issue when it's one that we're discussing with experts, one that we're discussing with scientists and indigenous leaders, who virtually unanimously say that there are things that we ought to adopt in terms of policy considerations and recommendations. However, they have all asked us to depoliticize and turn down the heat on this overly politicized rhetoric.

I referenced the article entitled “Recipe for disaster: Misinformation and wildfire”. It was published last week. I would like to send it to all members of the committee so they can read it, but before I do, I'm just going to read some sections that I think are very pertinent to the recommendation that we continue this study and invite former ministers to the meeting:

Record dryness, extreme heat, high winds, and a lightning storm. This summer in Jasper National Park, all of the ingredients of a recipe for disaster were in place.

Now, two and a half months after that disaster came to pass, another set of circumstances—misinformation, toxic politics and facts-starved social media blowhards, desperately looking to pin blame—have lined up to wreak havoc.

It moves on to some discussions on Parkland and Yellowhead counties and who showed up, in particular, the aforementioned enterprise Arctic Fire. With reference to that, the article goes on to suggest—

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I have a point of order.

What's the relevance? We want Catherine McKenna here. We want the previous minister here. We just heard testimony that she ignored him, so it's a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

That's a point of debate. I see it as relevant.

Thank you for the opportunity to thank the witnesses for being here.

We're going to have to stop the panel. We were almost done anyway. It was a fascinating discussion, I must say. We really appreciate all of you being here and sharing your time and your thoughts on this issue. I think we've all learned a great deal. Thank you very much. We'll now go to this debate on future business. Again, thank you for being with us.

Mr. van Koeverden, go ahead and continue.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I was referring to this article. I'll continue. It reads:

Jasper said yes. To resources. To help. They said yes early and they said yes often. They said yes to wildland teams and they said yes to municipal departments.

“We kept saying yes,” [Landon] Shepherd said.

But they didn’t say yes to everyone.

Unified Command did not immediately say yes to an independent fire fighting businesses seeking to access Jasper to perform structural protection services for a private company.

They did not say yes to a group of trucks and personnel who—while having had been deployed by the Government of Alberta—did not have prior arrangements for access.

They did not say yes to a self-dispatching team who had not signed an agreement to abide by the ICT’s rules of engagement.

And they did not say yes to a crew of mercenaries known as Arctic Fire Safety Services, the bulk of whose resources arrived the day after 350 structures burned in Jasper.

Mr. Chair, I'll go on. It later reads:

Fanning the flames of these politically-driven comments sows division, mistrust and hard feelings amongst Canadians in general, but among Jasperites in particular. The negative rhetoric is wearing on locals, many of whom were involved in the incident, and many others who lost their homes and livelihoods to fire and desperately want fact-based answers.

Even Jasper’s Mayor, now well-known to Canadians for his diplomacy, fortitude and tact, weighed in on the scuttlebutt.

“The present atmosphere of finger pointing, blaming and misinformation is beyond merely an annoying distraction, it delays healing”.... “It introduces fresh wounds at a time when we need a recovery and unity.”

Facts matter. What Arctic Fire Safety Services have said about their involvement in the Jasper Wildfire Complex is not accurate. Unified Command should not have to explain why they were not prepared to upend their established processes of deploying resources safely and effectively because some cowboys with big trucks wanted to act on “instinct.”

He goes on to say in the article:

...to ignore the bad actors trying to make political hay from our crisis....

But if we can put politics aside and filter out good information from bad, Jasper—the town and the park—has all the right ingredients to make its rebuild unprecedented, too.

That's what we should be focusing on—not politics and not bringing ministers to this meeting to lay blame, particularly when we had the former member of Parliament for Yellowhead acknowledge that what he said regarding actions following those studies was actually incorrect.

I would provide an amendment to the request to this. The amendment would simply say, with respect to the fact that in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015, due to Harper's deficit reduction action plan cuts, which affected over 1,600 employees at large at Parks Canada and resulted in no burns and no mechanical thinning—no prescribed burns at all in Jasper—between 2012 and 2015; with respect to the fact that in 2016, a forest management strategy for mountain pine beetle was developed by our government under the leadership of the aforementioned Minister Catherine McKenna....

If we're going to go back in time to revisit all of these actions, Mr. Chair, then I would also ask that we ask ministers why they decided to eliminate funding to Jasper National Park. Those ministers would be the Honourable Leona Aglukkaq, Minister Peter Kent and Minister Peter Kent's policy adviser at the time, who happens to be Melissa Lantsman.

If you'd like to have Catherine McKenna appear, those individuals can appear too.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I'm going to need that amendment in writing. I don't know where it goes in the motion. Is it a point d? Is that what it is? Okay, but what's the wording for it? I need wording.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I would like it in writing and in both languages, please.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I'm saying add point d.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

I'm just adding names to the list of people we should be inviting.