Evidence of meeting #24 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was housing.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
I don't have an opinion.
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Thank you for helping me respond.
Bloc
Patrick Bonin Bloc Repentigny, QC
No problem.
We often discuss the importance of players on the front lines. We've met with municipal officials here. We've talked about the close management of emergency measures, meaning a central front line. The province then steps in.
What is the federal government doing in terms of emergency preparedness that couldn't be done by a province such as Quebec?
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Good question. It varies from province to province.
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
In the case of Quebec, I couldn't say.
I'll talk about my own experiences over the past few years and about what often happens. It all depends on the situation and the scale of the event. First, the provinces must determine that they have used all the available resources to address the situation. At that point, they turn to the federal government to ask for assistance in specific areas. We've seen a number of situations and different requests.
Bloc
Patrick Bonin Bloc Repentigny, QC
Okay. I understand.
I would now like to talk about preparedness. For example, Quebec has well‑mapped flood zones. Would it make more sense for a province to manage these risks, describe and quantify flood hazards and maintain control over this expertise, or for an overarching national body to tell the province what to do?
I'm talking about a province such as Quebec, which has a great deal of money and a head start.
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
As you said at the start, the municipality and the province respond first. The province will address the situation first and prepare to respond to the flooding. If the province needs help, it will contact the federal government.
We remain in constant contact with the provinces and territories. We have a good relationship with them. We have a round table that manages this.
Liberal
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Thank you very much, Chair. I appreciate it.
Thank you, witnesses, for being here today.
It is a serious subject that we have here, but a little levity kind of maybe cracks the ice a bit.
I want to approach this a little bit differently but still in the same thread. I want to look at this from the perspective of the taxpayer as the final underwriter for disaster recovery. We should be driving at a model that minimizes the impact on the taxpayer as well as protects the assets, the lives and the livelihoods of citizens and the people at large. It's part of the notion of collective defence, and how we craft that is important. It comes down to risk and risk mitigation, but the measurement of risk is two components: severity versus frequency.
I'm not sure if you've seen it yet, but there was a report put out by the Parliamentary Budget Officer, I believe, that talked about severity and frequency. Some frequencies are quite flat over time, a flood frequency, for example. Forest fires are a little bit different, but we want to look at the methods and methodologies of digging into that. I want to understand a little bit how both....
You indicated, Mr. DeFazio, that frequency is increasing, but the PBO says maybe not specifically related to floods. What measures do you use to evaluate the frequency of serious events?
Director, Risk Management, Strategy and Products, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
We would use industry data from organizations like CatIQ to take a look at the trends. From what we've seen in our research, the trends show that insurance losses from catastrophic events like flooding have been on the rise over the last 10 to 15 years.
February 10th, 2026 / 4:15 p.m.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
How do you quantify that? At what threshold does it become catastrophic? Is it just a dollar value, or is it a normalized measurement over time?
Over time, over the last several decades, over the last century, the houses that we live in, for example, have become much more elaborate. We've become accustomed to a much higher lifestyle. How is that taken into account and normalized along with the choices we make to live on the banks of a river because it's a nice place to live?
Director, Risk Management, Strategy and Products, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
I can't speak to that, sir. I can just say, looking at the metrics from CatIQ, that it would have a dollar amount. Then, once it reaches a certain amount, it would be considered a catastrophic event.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
I appreciate that. It's arbitrary.
To the resiliency in building back better, I think this is an insurance question.
Whenever there's a recovery, and insurance pays us back, it's supposed to put us back in like quality, and there's an effort to put better shingles on, better siding on or build berms or something to mitigate future.... I'm worried about the experience where an insurance company will then say, since you've improved the property now, it's worth a lot more money and that's going to increase your premiums. I'm worried about that from first-hand experience, because that happened to me. How can we address that systemically?
Director, Risk Management, Strategy and Products, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
I don't really have a good answer for you on that, sir, in terms of the functioning of the pricing for insurance markets. I think what you've described is taking a look at the materials that are used to rebuild the house and the value of the house, then the insurers assess the risk and develop the premium. I understand what you're saying, sir, but I wouldn't have an answer to be able to explain that.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Thank you.
Of the high-risk areas that we currently have now on the maps that exist, how long have they been high risk?
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
The maps...? We don't have public maps—
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Concerning whatever areas we allocate or describe as high-risk areas right now, how long have they been high risk?
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
I have to check on that. I don't have an answer.
Director General, Policy and Outreach, Emergency Management Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Maybe in some cases but not—
