Transport Committee on Dec. 12th, 2024

[Chris Case]

We turn to the National Fire Protection Association in the U.S. a lot.

They're beginning to develop standards, but from a fire chief perspective, one of the reasons I'd like to see a national fire administrator is that it's the question your administrator would be putting to you at policy: “Let's talk about how we're going to do this, and let's get that guidance down to all fire chiefs.” Once we know what we're dealing with and what we need to do, believe me, we can then go and seek funding from whomever to try to get the equipment we need.

Again, we keep repeating this, but everything comes back to it. There needs to be a single person at the federal level who can advise policy-makers and who can bring forward that perspective so that these gaps don't appear.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

Not to put too fine a point on it—and I understand that I'm probably putting you in an unfair position—but let's say that tomorrow a train derails while containing a large number of sodium-ion batteries. What's your plan of attack?

[Chris Case]

First of all—knocking on wood—let's hope not. Secondly, it's evacuation. Like I say, we have two choices: We move the bad stuff away from the people, or we move the people away from the bad stuff.

If you were to get an incident of that magnitude, which we see now with some lithium-ion batteries—we're seeing quite large cells being placed in wind turbine farms to collect and maintain energy—all of those are designed, to a certain extent, with evacuation, with getting people away. I know that one of my colleagues has equipped his vehicles with chains, so that if there's a vehicle fire, a battery fire up against a building, they'll physically pull the vehicle away from the building. That's the level of intervention we have right now.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

I think it's fair to say that the lack of a standard for firefighters to rely on to attack a sodium-ion battery fire is concerning or highly concerning. Is that fair?

[Chris Case]

In speaking to colleagues around the world, I can tell you that with the fact that the technology of lithium-ion batteries is advancing so quickly, it's going to be very difficult to keep up with it in terms of what can be a response. That's one of the benefits of such an agile industry, but yes, this is the type of thing where we'd very much like to see federal guidance, the same way we'd like to see federal guidance on cancer prevention and PFAS and bunker gear. A single voice of leadership would be much appreciated.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Case, for your excellent testimony. I apologize for putting you on the spot a bit.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Mr. Lawrence.

Next is Mr. Badawey.

The floor is yours for five minutes, sir.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chief, I want to give you, as well as the mayor, the opportunity to speak a bit more in depth about the national fire administration. It seems to be the topic of your passion today with respect to trying to get this off the ground. Quite frankly, I agree with you. One point of contact is very beneficial to streamline a coordinated approach of relevant partners to any given situation.

Again, I've been in situations in the past where it was three o'clock in the morning and we'd have a ship coming into the Welland Canal with everyone on the ship sick, and we wouldn't know why. It was delegated to my fire chief versus Health Canada. It was very frustrating. Simply having that protocol in place before the fact, versus trying to deal with it during or even after the fact, would be beneficial.

May I first request that you submit to us the report you've authored, Tina—not you, but your association—so that we can enter it into the testimony? It would be reflected on the record, to be included with the final recommendations or the final report, and, therefore, with the recommendations the analysts will provide us.

That said, I'd like you to comment on the emergency management attached to local, provincial and national priorities, and the alignment of same. I know that's one of your priorities within the plan of moving forward with the national fire administration. I'd like you to talk a bit more in depth about that and your thoughts on how, especially in our case, it aligns with our jurisdiction over national priorities.

[Chris Case]

Through you, Mr. Chair, when you look at the things that Canada is now facing in terms of wildfires, climate change and all the aspects we've talked about today, to be able to have that single voice that can advise the federal level, as well as having the provincial level.... To be able to see those three levels of government more aligned would be gratefully received by first responders.

Speaking from personal experience about some of the incidents I've dealt with in the past, where we've had some real evacuations and explosions and that type of thing, we go straight to the province, but to see that leadership on all three levels would be very reassuring for the community. The fact that we're all seen to be aligned and everybody is looking at this.... From what I've seen in the past, that really would be appreciated more by the people we serve. I think it would send a real, powerful message to the communities.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

To that, again, as I mentioned earlier, there is a reality attached to the costs, which I'm sure you struggle with every single day. You're right; policing is more HR-related. I think 95% to 96% of a police budget is human resources—through a collective agreement—and about 4% or 5% is the capital side of it in terms of equipment and so on.

EMS, as you mentioned correctly, is half covered by the provinces, while you are simply covered by the property taxpayers. That includes your human resources as well as your suppression equipment, your vehicles, and the list goes on—totally driven by costs to the property taxpayers. When we run into situations like wildfires, climate change and disaster mitigation, again, it falls to property taxpayers, water and waste-water ratepayers, which then can be a burden on them.

With that, do you believe that, with a lot of the mechanisms that we're putting in place at all levels of government—at the federal level, we have the carbon tax—a portion should go to municipalities to cover some of those costs that would otherwise be defaulted to a property taxpayer?

We have the disaster mitigation fund. We have the Canada community-building fund, and the list goes on with respect to some of the contributions that we're making at the federal level.

The provincial level, we would expect, would do the same, and of course other partners, such as the private sector, within their own organizations and sectors, would do the same. Do you find any other funding mechanisms that can be made available to otherwise cover some of those costs?

Tina.

[Dr. Tina Saryeddine]

Yes. Thank you very much for the question.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Before I go to you, Tina, I would love to give the mayor an opportunity to speak.

[Dr. Tina Saryeddine]

Sure, absolutely. Please.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

He's at that level.

Mr. Mayor, I would love to hear your comments.

[Yves Lessard]

As long as the railways and those who transport hazardous materials by rail aren't responsible for the damage caused by an incident or accident, the current situation will suit them. Today, all we're talking about is the responsibility of firefighters and municipalities.

Mr. Masterson clearly explained the philosophy behind this by saying that he's working to limit the damage. He isn't saying that he makes sure there's no damage or that he pays for the damage. I'm not calling him anything by saying that. He's absolutely right. That's what we're seeing, and what he's confirming today.

However, I think we need to change that paradigm so that the railways and the companies that move dangerous goods by rail take responsibility for the damage they cause. I'll give you a concrete example. The companies didn't pay for what happened in Lac‑Mégantic; it was the government. So citizens paid for that. It cost over $500 million.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Chief, and thank you, Tina. I appreciate it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Badawey.

Mr. Barsalou Duval, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, I'd like to thank Mr. Case for his testimony. I haven't had the opportunity to ask him questions so far, but I may do so later on, depending on my speaking time.

I wanted to respond to something that was raised by one of my colleagues, and that's the issue of transporting batteries, which is a new technology. I find that relevant and interesting. How could we intervene on that? Nevertheless, I wonder whether it was a self-serving or disinterested question.

We're talking about the transportation of dangerous goods in general. When I talk to people in my riding, that's a concern. What happened in Lac-Mégantic has to do with the transportation of dangerous goods. As the mayor of Saint-Basile-le-Grand said, the concern is the same in his area.

In general, people talk to us mainly about the transportation of those famous petroleum products because they're the dangerous goods that circulate the most on our tracks. In the case of the Lac-Mégantic tragedy, petroleum products exploded, destroyed the town and killed 47 people. In my riding, people are concerned about the effects of transporting those petroleum products, especially since the construction of the Kildair facility in Sorel.

Mr. Lessard, you said earlier that the best strategy to prevent that kind of disaster was to eliminate risks at the source. To do that, we need fewer petroleum products on our tracks. Right now, in Quebec, but elsewhere in the world as well, we're working on an energy transition, we're working to get out of oil by eliminating those products, or at least by greatly reducing their quantity. Do you think that's part of the solution?

[Yves Lessard]

We must recognize that petroleum products and other hazardous goods will continue to circulate for a short time. Serious consideration must be given to building bypasses in densely populated areas, such as those with a string of towns and villages. That would solve part of the problem.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Mr. Barsalou Duval.

Next, and finally for today, we have Mr. Bachrach.

Mr. Bachrach, the floor is yours for two and a half minutes, sir.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I want to thank all our witnesses. This has been really excellent testimony.

Mr. Case, your recommendation around a national fire administration is one that we'll certainly take to heart. I can pledge to you that I'll do my part in trying to ensure it's among the recommendations in this report.

I did want to go back to community preparedness and this wide variation that we see among communities of different sizes. In my region, local fire departments are offered training by the shippers several times per year...or once per year—I'm not sure of the frequency. I've had a chance to observe some of that training, and I think it's certainly better than nothing.

The question is around whether there should be national standards for community preparedness and capacity. I don't think that many residents of our small communities understand the limitations of first responders. Our fire departments, our first responders, do incredible work, and they do incredible work within serious limitations. The question is whether there should be some thought put to establishing a standard for communities to respond to dangerous goods incidents, or whether the current patchwork of volunteer training opportunities is adequate to really protect lives.

We've had the conversation about how the costs should be distributed. I think they have to be distributed fairly. That's a clear point, but when it comes to having adequate and sufficient response capacity and having the capability—having enough water, having enough materials, having enough trained people—should there be some sort of standardization across the country so that communities know that they are adequately protected?

[Chris Case]

We've talked a lot about leadership. We see differences between the different provinces. I'll give you one brief example. When we talk about incident command, it's an incident command system. In some provinces, emergency management is an incident management system, which sounds like a difference in language, but it's a difference in approach.

When we talk about the national fire administration and when we talk about the lessons learned from Mégantic, leadership is what's needed right now, and I think that having any kind of leadership at the federal level that comes down to a community is going to be significant.

I'll draw your attention again to the E2 regulations, whereby large producers of dangerous goods have to consider the community, have to consider their emergency response plans and have to consider what they do with us as responders. That might very well be a model.

I appreciate the question.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much, Mr. Bachrach.

Chief Case, I want to thank you for your service on behalf of all members of our community, and for your testimony today.

I want to thank all of our witnesses for being here, sharing with us and contributing to this very important study.

With that, I want to wish everyone a wonderful evening. This meeting is adjourned.