Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to you.
Let me start by saying that I'm not sure I can say a great deal that is useful to the committee about the details of self-sufficiency, or supply chains and how they've challenged our national ability to procure essential equipment and potentially, in due course, to acquire medicines and food. Rather, I'd like to say a few words about why we find ourselves, not just as a federal government but as a country, in not as good a position as we could be in to deal with crises like the one we're dealing with now.
Being able to deal effectively with crises or emergencies requires forethought, planning, coordination and the taking of actual decisions in terms of mitigation and emergency preparedness. What I'm talking about, of course, is emergency preparedness as an important stand-alone activity for all orders of government, for the private sector and indeed for individuals.
To be direct, and I believe accurate, we have not been, for decades, as good as we could have been in dealing with emergency preparedness. I want to stress that this comment is not directed at a particular government. From the time I was made a deputy minister by Mr. Chrétien, I heard virtually every prime minister and minister speak about emergency preparedness, and, to suggest that I'm an equal opportunity critic, I think the same criticism applies to the public servants and to me. We all talked a good line. We all took a few initial steps but, sometimes for good reasons and sometimes for not-so-great reasons, we did not do all we could do on the emergency preparedness front.
Parenthetically, and speaking as a Canadian, we have to find a way to deal with the challenge of democracies with regular elections making it difficult to deal with long-term issues. It's not unique to Canada, but it's a real problem.
First, I mean that in dealing with emergency preparedness, we have to think in an organized way about bad things—geopolitical and climatic issues, natural disasters and, of course, pandemics. The first part happens a fair bit, but it's the second step that we do not do as well as we could, which is to coordinate within and between governments and with the private sector with a view of agreeing on what can be done to prepare for and lessen the effects of the bad things. We need to expend both political capital and real capital to deal with these mitigating measures.
Aside from anything else, it means that decision-makers—and again, I want to stress that I don't just mean politicians—must find the time, the energy and the interest to deal with assessments of future, long-term problems. Let me give you a good example that I think applies to the current situation. A few years ago, the United States National Intelligence Council issued a document entitled “Global Trends 2025”. What did they predict? They predicted the risk of a highly contagious respiratory disease that would likely cost the United States millions of deaths.
My last point is that, as we do this, we must not accept the argument of some that Canada can be an island in and of itself and develop manufacturing and other capabilities to deal with all our supply chain issues. The best way to do this is to work with our close allies. Here, I agree to some degree with Scotty and Ms. Gray. We need to deal effectively with the United States, but it cannot be only with the United States. The United States does not provide Canada with everything we need. This is helped by formal agreements with key allies on the nature of crises that we may face in the future.
One way or the other, we will make our dealing with future crises easier if we plan for them. I say this with not just the belief but the absolute conviction that the way the world is unfolding right now, with political friction, climatic effects and other things, we are going to have other crises.
I would urge you, Mr. Chairman, not to have your committee deal only with the effects of this one pandemic, but with future pandemics and future crises, be they natural disasters or of another nature. We have to do better on emergency preparedness. We have to do so at a federal level and on a national level and, in point of fact, industry needs to do better as well.
Thanks very much for listening, Mr. Chairman. I look forward to any questions.