Public Accounts Committee on Dec. 2nd, 2009

[Myles Kirvan]

I'm not really in a position to say; it will depend on the ongoing exchange between the two governments. But I can tell you there has been very cooperative work between both levels of government.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Merci.

Mr. Schellenberger.

[Gary Schellenberger, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm very pleased to be filling in today. This is different, as I mainly sit at the front end of the table. But I am very pleased to be here today.

As a former volunteer fireman, I understand emergencies and disasters to a limited degree, and I've taken part over the years in training. And as a former municipal councillor, I understand the chain of command from the bottom up, or let's say the front line, the people who actually deliver the Emergency Management Act at the source. Mr. Shipley and I were both on municipal councils, so we do understand—in rural Ontario, anyway—how those things work.

In the action plan provided to the committee it states that Public Safety Canada will develop standard operating procedures with each province and territory and the respective public safety regional office.

Can the Deputy Minister for Public Safety describe the number of hours that go into these negotiations? How labour-intensive is this process?

[William Baker]

Mr. Chair, as a relatively new person in the public safety portfolio, I haven't participated in those myself. With your consent, I will ask Monsieur Lavoie to respond.

[Daniel Lavoie]

Thank you.

We will be working with each province. You just talked about Ontario, which is different from Quebec or Newfoundland or the Northwest Territories. We will be looking at clarifying the authorities, the governance, the roles and responsibilities of the emergency management office of that province, their operations centre, our operations centre, and our regional office, to see how this will mesh during an emergency. Then we'll talk about the basic elements that will define how we will work together: situation awareness; risk assessment; impact analysis; the planning, either contingency or action in terms of response; logistics; and public communications. We will put that into standard operating procedures that will reflect all of this and will define the relationship between the federal government and the provincial authorities.

So that's how we're going to do that. We will do that regionally with each government. It will be tailor-made.

[Gary Schellenberger, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you.

Are the majority of main responders across the country volunteers, or at least it's not their main occupation, who would be coordinated then by the local government? Would the bulk of them be volunteers, or are they police, for example?

[William Baker]

Mr. Chair, I don't know of anybody here who has the statistical split. Suffice it to say that from Public Safety Canada's point of view and our management of this area, it's a distinction that doesn't matter to us in that respect. If a municipality chooses to have volunteer emergency first responders, so be it. We will work with them and provide tools and training. It's available to either.

[Gary Schellenberger, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

As mentioned in your action plan, can you give an example of the type of information that the emergency support functions document would contain?

[William Baker]

With permission, I'll again ask Daniel, who could give you some more expert testimony on that.

[Daniel Lavoie]

The federal emergency response plan describes the overall approach, but if there is a problem that involves significant disruption of, let's say, the transportation system, obviously we will turn to the Department of Transport and ask them to work on that specific transportation problem. They will be the lead for the emergency support function of a government emergency for transportation. Industry Canada will be responsible for telecommunications. We've identified 13 of these and have given the responsibility to certain departments where they indeed have the expertise.

This will take the shape of a document anywhere from 10 to 15 pages in length that will describe what we can expect of them, how they're going to go about it. This will be part of the federal emergency response plan.

[Gary Schellenberger, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you. And thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you very much, Mr. Schellenberger.

Mr. Christopherson, you have five minutes.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I'm going to follow along lines similar to those of the previous speaker, but I will also mention that like Mr. Shipley and Mr. Schellenberger, I served in an even earlier previous life on Hamilton city council and our regional council, so I know that this issue of one first responder department being able to communicate with another is huge. It's huge within a city, within the region, within the province, interprovincially, and also between nations.

If you're in Windsor or Detroit and you've got a major disaster, it's not unusual for them to call on each other. In fact, I know they have compatibility agreements, and only the federal government can ultimately enter into binding agreements there.

The fact that the standards haven't been issued is huge to me. I noted that Mr. Shipley said that the local councils have the carriage of a lot of this, and they do, including fire, police, paramedics, and water treatment centres. You mentioned the transportation system; first responders are still local.

I want to get clear on something and drill down a little further. I'm confused, and maybe you can help me clarify. In the document that the Auditor General sent around that has the comparison of the 2005 audit, on the second page...

I know my time will run out because I'm so bloody long-winded, but I want to say that the most optimistic thing in all of this, deputy, is your being there. I was part of this committee when it reviewed the work you did at the revenue agency, and it was impressive. I accept that you've only been there a little while. It's a problem that we have deputies coming in and out, and that alone is a problem, but really the brightest light in this whole thing is your being there. I'm really counting on you to show us what you showed at revenue and to deliver the goods here. I just wanted to say that.

However, I also want to get clear on this. In dealing with recommendation 2.163, it talks about what was found in 2005. It rates it as unsatisfactory. It says:

Public Safety Canada has promoted the development of certain national standards, but none had been issued.

Then when I look at paragraph 7.46 on page 19 of the Auditor General's report, it says, and I quote:

Public Safety Canada officials told us that its role is not to establish standards but to assist first responder groups that purchase and use the equipment to develop their own standards.

That's fine within a small municipality, but it starts to break down when communities merge, as mine did. Interprovincially and internationally, if you don't have common standards across the board, either these local purchases are going to wait until you're done or they're going to make a purchase and then maybe find out that it's not the right equipment.

Municipalities can't make those purchases over and over, so help me understand: are you issuing standards? If you aren't, why not? If you are, why aren't they done?

[William Baker]

Mr. Chair, the issue of lack of standards is indeed problematic, and it comes down to several areas.

Equipment is the first consideration: there's the question of whether one phone or one piece of equipment can talk to another. There is also the network. Then there's the language, and in this area it's not just official languages; in some jurisdictions they'll say they've got a three-eight going on, while somebody else might say they've got a flood going on. We're working on a number of those.

I think the response largely comes down to jurisdiction as well. I'm quite certain the federal government cannot prescribe those types of standards to provinces, so I think the strategy that's been adopted is a wise one: we're working with the Canadian Standards Association and the Canadian General Standards Board, which have legitimacy with all of these jurisdictions, to come up with a standard.

My understanding is that work is progressing very well, and we're hoping to get to the point of having that determination before the end of 2010.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

You're saying it will be the end of next year.

[William Baker]

Well, it's December 2009 now.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Here's the problem. It was identified in 2005. Municipalities that were going to purchase equipment may have seen hundreds of millions of dollars spent on equipment across Canada that may or may not be compatible with what may ultimately be determined.

I understand you can't force a standard down, but I've been to provincial, federal, and territorial ministers' conferences at which there would be an understanding in the room that we needed a common standard and that the lead would be the feds. If the feds don't do it, then the locals... Again, it's all the municipalities, all the provinces; I don't understand why it's not a bigger priority. Why hasn't it already been done?

[William Baker]

Well, Mr. Chair, making progress on this is certainly a priority with respect to our action plans.

We shouldn't assume that nothing has been done. Through the ongoing work we have with provinces and through the Canadian Emergency Management College that we use to train first responders and so on, there's a collective wisdom around what the right things to use are, but it is by no means consistent. I agree with you; we need to get there.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

But your predecessor was here in 2005 and made the same commitment about the same problem. It's not like we haven't been here before, sir.

[William Baker]

With respect, our focus here is on what's now and what we will do. We have set out an action plan that I stand by.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Mr. Christopherson. Thank you, Mr. Baker.

Mr. Duncan, you have five minutes.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Thank you.

I've listened with great interest. We have national emergencies and preparedness, regional emergencies and preparedness. We also have local emergencies and preparedness. I know that much of the discussion here has revolved around the federal and the provincial/territorial. There's a lot of stuff happening at the municipal level, and I know we've had some emergency simulation exercises in the area I represent.

We've also had the corporate sector do some very interesting things that didn't cost them a lot but have a major, significant, positive impact on what could be brought to bear in terms of resourcing during an emergency. That could be a local emergency or a regional emergency. I could even see it transpiring at a time when it could be somewhat of a national or multi-regional emergency. I'll describe one example.

We have a community of 5,000 people with its own airstrip that is part of a three-centre hub that has about 10,000 people. One of the major operators there is a helicopter company. They have redone their hangar and office facilities with geothermal, wind power, rain collection, and they can move their aircraft out and basically house the entire population that might be displaced. They've done all that with no reward other than good corporate citizenship. I'm just wondering if there has been any thought about how to maybe reward this kind of thinking or behaviour.

Have we even inventoried this kind of thing? Because I think it would be nice to know for any greater emergency planning, for any preparedness, where these facilities are.

[William Baker]

If I may, Mr. Chair, I will not speak to the inventory because I don't know. I'm going to ask my colleague. I doubt it. In fact, he's confirming that my suspicions are correct.

The department administers a number of grants and contributions programs as support, but to my knowledge they do not go to the private sector. They go to non-profit organizations and different entities. I would suspect for that particular company that it has its own business continuity plan. It wishes to remain viable in the event of an emergency and perhaps even develop some business opportunities at the time of an emergency.

That's great. I'm delighted to hear that, because you're right. We have been talking about the federal government. We've talked about provinces and territories and municipalities, but at the end of the day, when it comes to critical infrastructure in this country, so much of it is administered through the private sector. I'm pleased to hear that. We'll take you up on that suggestion as to how we can get a better handle as to what the private sector is doing. I think that would be helpful in our planning.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Related to the private sector, the energy and utility sectors have critical infrastructure. We're a big country, and we have infrastructure everywhere. It can't all be critical, but any part of it would possibly break the link.

Who is defining what is critical, and what are the complexities involved in that?