Evidence of meeting #93 for Indigenous and Northern Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was training.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal MaryAnn Mihychuk
Keep that thought, because you have a lot of very excellent points.
Let's move on to the second presenter. I'm sorry to rush, but we need to hear from the Micmacs.
Franklin, are you still there?
5:05 p.m.
Director of Public Security, Micmacs of Gesgapegiag
You guys caught me off guard because I didn't know what this conference was for, but I'll do my best to do my presentation.
I'm Franklin Condo, and I have 25 years in policing and 23 years as a volunteer firefighter. We started in 1995 with a small group of guys. We had training. People came down from Quebec after we had a tragic fire and a lady and a couple of her children died in the fire because we didn't have a fire department back then. It was a neighbouring town, Maria, that was covering our sector, and it took them about 15 to 20 minutes before they could get over here.
After that, it was decided we were going to establish our fire department, and from there we trained 10 volunteer firefighters. After that, they slowly had no interest, and then we tried to recruit volunteer firefighters, but we're having a hard time. We're back to 10, but they're not all fully trained, because they had to train us too over here. We had problems getting the training in an English community over here. We can't go to the French training. There's the possibility of taking the training in French, but our guys over here don't speak French, so that's another barrier we're facing.
We have a fire chief. He's a part-time fire chief, but when there's a fire, he's there, and he's also our fire prevention officer at the same time. We don't have somebody specified for fire prevention, and our population is about 700. We have a tanker that has been there since 1995, and I don't know what the lifespan of the fire truck is. I think it's a 20-year span, so we're facing having to change the fire truck.
Equipment-wise, we purchased new bunkers not too long ago, maybe last year, because those too were outdated. I think we'd had them since 2003, so we had brand new bunkers last year. Other than that, we've got a fire station. It's a small fire station, but it does the job.
Another problem we're facing is that we have two ends of our community that have no fire hydrants, and we don't have a tanker. The only fire truck that we have is the 900-gallon fire truck, and 900 gallons.... They say it's 100 gallons per minute, so we only have nine minutes to fight the fire. Then we have to call the neighbourhood town, which is Maria, but by the time they get there, it could be 15 to 20 minutes. In the meantime, if we use all those 900 gallons in nine minutes, by the time they get here, we didn't have water for 11 minutes.
That's about it for me.
5:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal MaryAnn Mihychuk
Okay. We'll be back to you with questions very soon.
Let's have our last presenter, Chief Matilda Ramjattan.
Welcome.
5:10 p.m.
Chief Matilda Ramjattan Lennox Island First Nation
Thank you, Madam Chair, for the invitation to appear before the committee. I would like to acknowledge unceded Algonquin territory.
I am Chief Matilda Ramjattan. I'm from the small community of Lennox Island. Our membership is a little over 1,000. About half of those live on reserve. Of two first nations in P.E.I., Lennox Island is one.
Our community has three reserves. One is populated. Abegweit has three reserves, and all of them are populated. We are on the western part of the island, and they're in the eastern part of the island. They do not have fire safety service within the community. They do have volunteers in other communities.
In my community, we've had a fire department for about 40 years. It started with just little backpacks of water. After a house fire burned down a home that had 13 living there, who then were all homeless and were put throughout the island, the men decided that they had to do something. They were able to start their fire department with a few men with just those backpacks.
In our community now, we have 24 volunteer fire members altogether. Fourteen of them are medical first responders. We have two certified pump operators. We have three licensed drivers, which again is an issue, because our community is a fishing community, and if they're fishing.... Somebody has to drive that truck, but we only have the three drivers. We have one level 1 firefighter, so training is definitely an issue. The fire chief is working towards his hazardous material awareness training, because when he did his training, it wasn't mandatory, but now it is.
We definitely have to work on some infrastructure as well. We also need some other things, such as a new pumper truck and an all-terrain vehicle.
I will show you a quick picture of our community. It's shaped like a pork chop. I'll show you where most of us live. We would like to have some fire roads, because although there are walking trails, we can't get our truck back there. We're an island off P.E.I., and the closest city is about 55 kilometres away. We do operate with mutual aid within 50 kilometres around us.
Our medical first responders have increased from three to 14, and we do have men and women. Last year, they responded to about 200 calls, with 30 calls in terms of mutual aid. The thing is that our people are volunteers, and resources for them, as much as they want to help.... We are an isolated community. If we don't help, we won't get help. You know from other communities that this has happened; they will not respond because somebody didn't pay the cheque or something, and funding was held up somewhere.
In the summer, spring, and fall, it's easy to get access to our community, but we are an isolated community in the winter months. Even our bridge sometimes will fill up so much that we can't get off the reserve, so trying to have an emergency response to medical situations can be challenging in the winter months.
A lot of the issues that have been spoken about already are ours as well, but I wanted to make a note too that it's not only about fire safety. It's about emergency management. In terms of emergency management in the Atlantic, with the Mi'kmaq Confederacy of PEI we had a health emergency management coordinator who helped to build capacity within our communities. We also went to the housing and infrastructure network at the Atlantic Policy Congress level, which helped build the capacity of all the first nations in the region.
That funding was cut, so there is nobody in that position now. There is none. I believe that could be a real asset to help build capacity within the region in emergency management and health emergency management. We had to activate a shelter back in 2010, when we had water surge and an ice storm, as you know. We had to put our warming centre up, and 24-hour care is really difficult when you don't have the trained individuals for that situation. That's what we found. In terms of infrastructure, we used the school, which was identified in our emergency plan. However, when we actually went to use it and we had all those people in there, the bathrooms were not flushing because the power was out and our generator kicked in for just the minimum. Those sorts of things will be an issue, because when the power goes out, there's minimal electricity, just to keep the heat and lights on, and the plugs don't work. You have all these children and elders in there, and it's a recipe for disaster.
Even though we are talking about fire safety overall, at a higher level of thinking, emergency management in general needs more capacity building in our communities, and we need someone in our communities to do that.
In my community, we don't have a salary for our fire department. We get $25,000 for our fire department. That's pretty much it. That has to cover the lights and the heat and maintenance of the truck and what have you. We need a new building.
There are issues that are building up. We're trying to do the best we can with what we have, but we definitely need help, because we're just going to collapse in on ourselves. As this man just stated, we're trying our best with what we have, but eventually volunteers may give up on us, and that's something we have to keep our attention on overall.
5:15 p.m.
Lennox Island First Nation
Is my seven minutes up? I tried to speak really fast.
5:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal MaryAnn Mihychuk
You were trying so hard that you got a little bit extra.
Let's go on to the questioning. We're running out of time. Unless we go over by five minutes, we will not be able to make the 5:30.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Madam Chair, I'm going to suggest we do five-minute rounds and that beyond 5:30 there no longer be any votes or motions. There are some members who have to go to other engagements.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal MaryAnn Mihychuk
Okay. We're starting out with the member, so MP Anandasangaree, go ahead, please.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, panel, for joining us. I know we were delayed because of the vote, so I do apologize for the time limitation today.
I want to talk about the proposed indigenous fire marshal. I'd like to get your input in terms of what you think the role would be and how you feel that a fire marshal's office could support the local work that you do. The question is for all of you.
5:20 p.m.
Fire Chief, Cree First Nation of Waswanipi Fire Department
I think there's a great benefit to having an indigenous fire marshal. That person could do a lot of case studies and check across the board in Canada, not just in certain regions, and see if we're meeting at least the minimum requirement as an essential service. I'm sure it's off balance right now.
Some departments are way ahead and some are way behind, so maybe that could be one of the main things. Once we get to that minimum, we have to continue to strive and improve and get better and better and make it safer for all communities across Canada. Native or non-native, it doesn't matter. We all deserve to have the minimum protection and to make sure that we can sleep and that our kids are going to wake up the next day.
5:20 p.m.
Lennox Island First Nation
I think that having a marshal would definitely help in terms of providing some standards for fire safety in the homes and also with how we can support our staff. When we had a fire in our health centre, the staff didn't know how to take the fire, so we had to send the fire chief in to teach them.
In terms of standards, I know that one of the fires we had was inside the roof of the house. We weren't able to replace the furnace because we couldn't get a furnace in. There was only a crawl space, so instead of putting a furnace in, we put in those wall heater things. I think that caused overstress on the old wires because it was an older house, 30 years old. Putting these new things in put more pressure on, and the fire started off in the roof.
I think those kinds of things help us raise our awareness. Even in planning, our first nations need to be able to know what to keep in mind when we're building something or the things to keep an eye out for if we're upgrading our older houses. Definitely, we need standards.
5:20 p.m.
Director of Public Security, Micmacs of Gesgapegiag
Yes, it's also to improve the standards in terms of the building codes and fire codes. As of now, I don't think we are respecting fire codes in any public buildings or even in personal houses. There are things that gather up at the door entrance. When you go to a gathering, you don't see any exit signs or anything like that. Also in wintertime, they all push the snow to the doors. If we had a fire marshal who comes and gives standards, we'll have no choice but to follow them.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I want to thank each and every one of you for being here.
One of the things we haven't talked about a lot in this place.... Some of you have brought it up.
You have 14 medical responders. You're lucky, Matilda.
5:25 p.m.
Lennox Island First Nation
Five of them are on crutches right now. I don't know how much more we can take out of them. We take what we can get.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK
In terms of hazard training, some have talked about the cancer, the asbestos, the stuff you are exposed to when you go into a building. You have no idea what chemicals you have there.
We're dealing with this municipally, and they're there 24-7, but you don't have a lot of staff.
I just want to say, Timothy, your mission statement is great—protect any time, any place. You're putting people first, but sometimes we need to put our firefighters first, and I'm really concerned with this.
I want all of you to comment. We'll start with you, Timothy, because we see too many people at 42 and 43 in obituaries that say “I was a firefighter for 15 to 20 years.”
5:25 p.m.
Fire Chief, Cree First Nation of Waswanipi Fire Department
Every year the NFPA makes standards. We're starting to have all kinds of different statistics that go back to the 1950s. Before, there was more of a mental thing for firefighters: “I'm tough. I can go in there without SCBA on.” People started saying, “Hey, he's not around anymore. Why? Must have been that time....” All these statistics are coming up, and they're trying to improve on the equipment, even the balaclava you put over your head. Now they're putting a liner within that piece of equipment. Of course, they made a modification to improve it, so the price of that item just went up four times. Again, it comes down to price. You have to invest in the safety of your firefighters.
The first thing I did was I made sure that all the bunker gear in my department was up to code. At least 20 bunker gear were out of service, meaning there's a 10-year expiry date. A lot of them were past 12 or 15 years. My first action was the health of my own guys and making sure they had a proper breathing apparatus that was getting hydrostatically tested, the proper equipment to resist fires and chemicals. All that costs money. In everything you try to do, if you want to have more people involved, it costs money. If you want to have equipment that works, equipment that's efficient, it costs money.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK
It's pretty hard to volunteer when you know you may not have the correct equipment, right?
5:25 p.m.
Fire Chief, Cree First Nation of Waswanipi Fire Department
Yes, and when we give this training, we let them know there's cancer, so I think that might be a reason that's scaring a lot of volunteers away. Why should I volunteer for something that's going to hurt me in the long run?
5:25 p.m.
Lennox Island First Nation
I know in our community, we've had issues with just trying to keep our SCBAs for the firemen to breathe. We had a system, a cascade system, a 1986 model, but it has been just recently put out of service by the inspector who comes by. He said, “Whoa, you can't be using that.” We now depend on the next department to help us to get oxygen. It costs them $1,000 just to replace theirs. If they have to do calls, then they want to make sure that they have it, so they don't want us to fill up there anymore, and we have to go further.
Definitely, it's safety first. We say “safety first”, but really, how much can we be safe? In our communities we're saving our grandmothers, grandfathers, uncles, aunties, maybe our own children, and it's a very tight community. We're going to do it anyway to save our children and save our families, but we shouldn't have to be put in that position of being at risk.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kevin Waugh Conservative Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK
Franklin, we're just talking about the hazards of being a firefighter. We're seeing more chemicals. A lot of fire people go into buildings and they have no idea what's there, asbestos and so on. I wrote down here that you're a 23-year volunteer, and you're struggling like everyone else trying to get volunteers. I don't know if you heard my opening statement, but why would I volunteer when I know 10 or 15 years down the line I may have cancer because I volunteered for you?