Public Safety Committee on Oct. 5th, 2006

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Okay, but my question--

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

This will be your final question. Go ahead.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

My question, Ms. Thiessen, is this. Is there anything planned to enhance or expand those programs or that contact?

[Tracy Thiessen]

As a result of this legislation, I would say no.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Hawn, with the government.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you all for being here.

I'd like to follow up a little bit on what Mr. Comartin was talking about, and that's the connectivity between the federal-provincial-municipal and U.S. operations centre authorities.

What changes do you see coming out--not necessarily as a result of the act but maybe that are covered by Bill C-12--in the connectivity between federal-provincial-municipal and at the federal level with U.S. authorities in response to a situation?

[James Deacon]

One of the things that legislation does, that we articulate, is provide the framework for the federal government to get its house in order, so to speak, with a clear lead role for the Minister of Public Safety, with clear responsibilities for other federal ministers.

Building on that framework, working under that umbrella, we'll be able to more effectively engage our United States partners, for example, in the Department of Homeland Security. We do have strong working relationships. We're working on building those relationships in the wake of incidents like Hurricane Katrina, and more generally in the context of our partnership and day-to-day work with American agencies.

The objective of the legislation is to provide that framework and provide a clear set of parameters within and under which authorities the various departments and agencies will operate.

A big part of our work right now is getting our federal plans in place, confirming our federal plans, and then branching out for the national emergency response system. As someone has already said, it is a work in progress. Again, it's about getting the right framework; it's about getting the right infrastructure.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

As you're developing those plans, and obviously they need to be in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security, Canada Command, and U.S. Northern Command, when we're talking about larger-scale incidents, how far along are you on that, and what challenges are you facing with respect to dealing specifically with the U.S. authorities?

[James Deacon]

I think Mr. Lesser is better placed to speak to that.

[Robert Lesser]

I can respond to that. From an ops centre to ops centre point of view, we were very engaged with the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA down there. We had a 24/7 connectivity, both in a secure and unsecure manner. There's also a common chat frequency on the international portal with New Zealand, Australia, the United States, the U.K., and ourselves. So both on cyber and national security events, we're continually exchanging information immediately as it happens and sharing our threat assessments and our information, and likewise them with us.

In regard to this legislation--and maybe I'll just to go back to where it changes--a lot of things that have happened over the last few years have just been happening because it's the right thing to do and people will collaborate and say, yes, this makes sense. This legislation provides the authority to make sure our minister has the authority to ensure that everything is consistent when we talk about the federal house being in order.

As much as other departments are gaining in recognizing that there is a need for a whole-of-government coordination, there's no legislated mandate to do that. So when the question becomes, who is ultimately in charge, this legislation provides, from a leadership point of view, that the minister is ultimately in charge of the leadership and coordination. I think that is very new, and I think it is very significant when we're taking a look at a federal response. That then places us well with our U.S. colleagues in DHS, who have a very similar mandate under presidential directives.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Are we at the same stage of developing those plans and procedures in Canada as are our counterparts in the U.S.? Are we catching up to them? Where are we?

[Robert Lesser]

Depending on what report you read out of Katrina, that's really difficult to answer, because their system is different from ours. Number one, in their infrastructure they have a FEMA, which Canada doesn't. They have the National Guard, which is a huge response resource to New Orleans. We would have to go directly to our permanent forces. So we don't have those two big pieces of infrastructure.

As well, in the American system they have all adopted a similar response system, and it's mandated under a presidential directive that all states will comply with that system, from the lowest level right up to the presidential authority. In Canada, as we've mentioned, we've taken the approach that each province and territory has an excellent working system of their own and the federal system will be tailored to make sure we link with the provincial system. So it's a little bit difficult to totally compare and contrast.

I think for the size of our country and the disasters we'll probably face, we're fairly close to going along. They have a lot of resources, but sometimes that isn't an asset.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

On a more local level, you talked about how the federal government is not in a position to approve municipal emergency response plans, but you do review them. If you saw something in an emergency response plan at the municipal level that placed some unrealistic expectations on the federal level, whether it's assistance or notification or so on, how would you handle that?

[Robert Lesser]

Maybe I'll give two quick examples of what we did for the hurricane season this spring. It's only in the last two years that we developed a whole government contingency plan to assist provinces and territories, in this case, by and large, the eastern provinces for the hurricane. We developed a plan to identify federal resources that could assist provinces. We then worked, through our regional offices in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, and Labrador, with our provincial counterparts to identify: these are the kinds of resources we think could help you, what are your plans, do they fit in provincially and municipally with the plans you have--to make sure we develop a plan that will respond to all the needs. The province is obviously taking care of the municipal needs, but their mandate is to make sure that all that is aligned. Our mandate with the province is to make sure we are aligned with the provinces. So it's all one system that is fluid.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

If you saw something in one of these municipal plans that was clearly wrong, how would you handle that? Would you go through the province? Would you go directly to the municipal authority, or...?

[Robert Lesser]

We deal with that as we deal with the provinces, and then it becomes their jurisdiction as to what they want to do with it.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Okay. The kind of notification that goes on, again to go back to connectivity.... What kinds of things would you expect to see simultaneous notification on, i.e., from the municipal responder to the province and the federal authorities, and how much would be sequential? I guess that would go to how serious is the situation.

[Robert Lesser]

If I went back to the shootings in the school in Montreal, it was very sequential, from the Montreal Urban Community Police Service, to the Protection civile in Quebec City, and from them directly to our regional director and to us. So I would say within a matter of—and I'm guessing—ten to twelve minutes, we were aware of some basic details that were more accurate than what the media was starting to pump out.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Even though it's sequential, virtually it's simultaneous, in effect.

[Robert Lesser]

That's pumped out from one to the other very quickly.

In other provinces, we share the same software for event management, and they can enter immediately, at the provincial level, information that we can see right away on our screens.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

In terms of response to disasters, you mentioned some examples: floods in Manitoba, ice storms, and so on. Is there anything in the act, how it's laid out or what would fall out of it, that would dictate a different approach than we used when those things happened in the past?

[Robert Lesser]

Just the legislation that provides the leadership mandate and then the mandate to make sure that federally departments have plans that are all aligned will make a big difference. Right now, different departments have developed their own ways of responding. The coast guard responds one way, the health agency has its plan, and CFIA, for avian flu and those kinds of things. This brings it all together to make sure everybody can fit into that. It's a physical location, the Government Operations Centre, but it's the place where particular functions occur. It brings the entire federal family together so we can speak one language, which we didn't have before that.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Is there a critical missing link right now that you see in any of that connectivity? At the risk of overusing the words, between municipal, provincial, and federal, is there something missing that needs to be addressed that we're having difficulty addressing?

[Robert Lesser]

No, what needs to be there is there. The changes that need to be done are to have more of it and to improve and enhance the capabilities.

Secure connectivity is an example. It's there, but it's not the fastest. We need to get faster equipment out there, and there are projects ongoing that do that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you, Mr. Hawn. Maybe you'll have to wait for the next round.