Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure that I speak to Bill C-325. I strongly support any measure to improve conditions of emergency service volunteers across Canada, particularly in rural Atlantic Canada.
I think many people from larger urban centres do not realize the degree to which emergency services in rural Atlantic Canadian communities are overwhelmingly provided by volunteers. They risk their lives and are subject to significant injury. They take time from their careers and their families to go out and potentially make the ultimate sacrifice in trying to protect us, whether it is in search and rescue operations, or in first response paramedic services, which many of our rural fire departments are now providing, or in simple fire protection.
There has been a tremendous increase in the burden placed on our rural volunteer fire departments and emergency service volunteer organizations in recent years. If we were to ever consider the cost to government, federal, provincial and municipal, of trying to provide adequate emergency services to rural and small town communities, we would find that providing a federal tax benefit, either a tax credit or a tax deduction, would seem to be a pittance compared to the actual cost of government run infrastructure to provide emergency services, or fire protection, or search and rescue or first response services to rural communities.
I live in a community called Cheverie in Hants county, Nova Scotia. This is the community in which I grew up. We benefit from the local fire protection of the Summerville volunteer fire department, as well as the Walton volunteer fire department. In many cases, when there is a fire, we see volunteer fire departments work together to deal with the situation. The level of emergency services that we enjoy in that small community or the protection we have against disaster there is extraordinary, and the services are all provided by volunteers .
The fact is it has expanded beyond simple fire protection, to the extent that if something were to happen to a member of my family or myself from a health perspective, a medical emergency, the first people to the scene in all likelihood would be the first response team of the Summerville fire department. They are well trained but they are still volunteers.
The idea of finding ways through the tax system to encourage volunteerism in our emergency services makes so much sense. I know one argument I heard during other debates in the House by members opposite, even in the debate about a motion that I presented to the House in 2000 to provide a tax credit for emergency service volunteers, was that if we provided a tax credit or tax advantage for volunteers in the emergency services, then we would have to do it for volunteers in youth recreation, sports, the Boy Scouts or Girl Guides or whatever.
Emergency service volunteers are by definition different from any other sort of volunteer. When we talk about emergency service volunteers, we talk about people who risk their lives to protect us from things whether it be our house burning down or a medical emergency, or to protect us during a search and rescue. It is during these life and death situations that these volunteers take time from their lives, their families and careers. It is an extraordinary commitment that goes well beyond ordinary volunteerism, frankly.
I have some excerpts from the 2002 annual report of the Windsor, Nova Scotia, volunteer fire department. It states:
We have been responding to unprecedented numbers of Mutual Aid calls over the past few years and indications are that this situation will continue into the foreseeable future...most of these responses occur during what are working hours for the majority of our volunteer firefighters, which makes it difficult for us to continue to muster up the people we need for an adequate response...on the other hand, we recognize the fact that we too require assistance on a more regular basis than we once did, as we are much more conscious of our obligation to keep our station adequately staffed during times when we are out on calls.
Based on the annual report of the Windsor fire department in Windsor, Nova Scotia, there are more and more calls for volunteer firefighters and those calls are happening during working hours. It is not just the firefighters themselves who are making a contribution. Their employers are also making a contribution indirectly by providing that level of career and work flexibility to enable volunteer firefighters to provide that level of protection.
With regard to the issue of finding enough local volunteer firefighters for the proposed South West Hants fire station, the Windsor fire chief cited a lack of funding and acknowledged that:
We have seen very few people in the area express an interest in becoming firefighters.
It is becoming harder to find emergency service volunteers. If we consider the sacrifice to careers, time with families, the risk of life and the dollar cost of being a volunteer, whether it is the cost for equipment or the cost for fuel and car expenses to travel to the emergencies, we ask a tremendous amount of our emergency service volunteers. If we were to consider the cost of providing this sort of infrastructure through a cooperative level of government, whether federal, provincial or municipal, without the involvement of volunteers, it would be basically impossible to afford the kind of protection that is taken for granted in a lot of rural communities.
I know a lot of people from urban Canada who, when they visit me in rural Nova Scotia, find it almost unfathomable that basic fire protection is provided by volunteers, but it is. We have to find a way to recognize the incredible contribution that our emergency service volunteers, our firefighters and first response paramedics, make on a day to day basis with a benefit through the tax system. Year in and year out these individuals are there to protect us.
I agree with the hon. member for Elk Island and his suggestion that it would be better to have a tax credit than a tax deduction. It probably would be simpler and it would provide a more direct benefit. The gross amount could be reduced to reflect the difference in terms of the actual tax benefit of a tax credit compared to a tax deduction.
I support Bill C-325 in terms of what it is trying to accomplish. I urge all members of the House to take a very positive step and recognize in a meaningful way the extraordinary commitment and contributions that emergency service volunteers provide across Canada. This type of legislation, whether it be a tax credit or a deduction, has been debated for many years in this place.
I have been here since 1997 and we have had these sorts of debates on various private members' motions, including my own. We have debated them ad nauseam. We have discussed this at finance committee as well as in the House during prebudget discussions. It is time for a multi-partisan response to the crisis that exists across Canada of the growing demands on our emergency service volunteers and the diminishing number of Canadians who have the time or the willingness to risk life and limb, to spend their own money, to sacrifice their career time and their time with their family to protect the rest of us.
The right thing for us to do would be to support this sort of tax deduction or tax credit and to move forward with a firm commitment to making Canadian communities safer while recognizing the extraordinary commitment of our emergency service volunteers.