National Defence Committee on March 11th, 2009

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

The coast guard will have a heavy icebreaker capable of breaking a passage. The Arctic offshore patrol ship will be a class 5 haul, which is capable of working in about one-metre ice--very different. One is heavy icebreaking to open routes of navigation, the other is to operate in areas in and near ice. That's the difference between the two.

[Philippe Hébert]

Mr. Gardam referred to Operation NANOOK. Most of the time, the coast guard participates in exercises led by our navy. A great deal of work is done as concerns interoperability.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Thank you very much.

I will now go to Mr. Wilfert.

I know you're going to share you time with Mr. Bagnell.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

All three of us.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Okay.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Chairman, a group of retired U.S. senior generals wrote a report called National Security and The Threat of Climate Change. It said that climate change is a direct threat to U.S. national security. They highlighted the accessibility of the enormous hydrocarbon resources in the Arctic region and they looked at the changing geostrategic dynamics of the region and concluded that this is an area that the United States had to be at the forefront on because it could create international instability.

This is the genesis of what I'm looking at in terms of this report. I wonder if you could briefly comment on that or indicate to us who would be best, if we don't already have them on our list, to talk to about that aspect.

[Philippe Hébert]

There are a number of people in academia, obviously, who are looking at that, but from our perspective, the issue of resources in the north and the accessibility and the potential for conflict.... These, again, are mostly international law issues that probably Foreign Affairs, from a government point of view, would be able to address, as well as Natural Resources Canada. I don't have a map here with me, but I've seen maps that show that a lot of the resources in the north around the Arctic are already found either in the territory or in the maritime zones of countries, so there's not a lot of stuff that's blank in the middle of the Arctic Ocean.

Personally, I think that some of the projections about conflict and what not over resources may be a little bit exaggerated at the moment. As I said, there's a very clear international legal framework that applies to the north, especially through the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and so on, and the process that we have now, in terms of charting our continental shelf. The Russians are doing the same, and the Danes, and so on, so I think there's a process in place to deal with these issues.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Also, we're following the oil and gas issues in particular.

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

Yes. I think if you looked at a polar projection, you'll find there are only two or three areas that are not claimed, and that's where China is looking. That's also why the EU is interested in having a seat on the Arctic Council.

But the vast majority of the resources for Canada, 25% of our resources, are north. They're there for Canada to exploit. There are only a few small areas that have not been claimed, and those are the areas where you'll see China and the EU have a very keen interest. The rest of the Arctic nations are there. They're in their exclusive economic zone, they're their resources.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Very quickly, do you have any relationship with the territorial governments? If so, how does it work?

[Philippe Hébert]

Not from Ottawa. We don't directly interact with them. I think that's done more at the operational level--Brigadier General Millar, I think.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

That's fine. Thank you.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I'm just finishing up my last session on the AOPS. I'll assume, because you said there are three months of open water, that's approximately when they'd be in the Arctic.

There was a government announcement a couple of summers ago that there would be limited dumping allowed by the navy—a new policy—into the Arctic Ocean. Has that policy been rescinded?

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

I'm sorry, I didn't hear that.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

The government announced the navy would be allowed to dump waste--food, this kind of stuff--periodically in the Arctic Ocean. Has that directive been rescinded?

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

I'm not sure if that directive has been rescinded. I know why it was put in place. It was specifically for one operation. It's what we call food waste. We mulch it up—

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Actually, maybe you could get back to me on that, because I want to get another question in.

On search and rescue, as you know, for years we haven't replaced our fleet. The minister said he was going to, which is great, but he didn't say if there would be any fixed-wing planes north of 60. We need them there. Do you know of any plans in that respect?

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

As you're aware, we have a project for fixed-wing SAR that is moving its way through the approval process. I think last year, out of 18,000 SAR incidents, we had 160 in the north. We responded to each one of those in the north. Right now I would say we have the right number to manage that, the correct balance between SAR assets and incidents.

Understand that everything we do is based on risk management. It would be impossible to have all the resources you need; therefore we have to manage risk, and I think we're managing it appropriately.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ms. Gallant.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, I'd like to start off by welcoming back Larry Bagnell. It's a long time since he's been here, and he was here when I first arrived a number of years ago. Larry was the first one who always harped on the importance of northern sovereignty and the defence aspects. Through all those years Larry was on this side of the table. I just want to point out that it took a little change there for us to get the job done and started.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

He was sitting there earlier on, when we arrived.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

My questions, first of all, have to do with the unmanned aerial vehicles. Does Canada currently own UAVs that are known to be able to withstand the harsh conditions in the Arctic? Are they workable?

[Cmdre D. Gardam]

We currently are using UAVs in Afghanistan. I am not an expert in UAVs. All I know is that the conditions of the Arctic, because of icing and other issues, do make it difficult to fly at certain times because of the meteorological conditions. I can't really comment on that because I'm not an expert in aviation.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Okay, so we don't launch any from ships.