Mr. Speaker, I wish thank the member for Burnaby--Douglas for raising the issue of government funding to train Canadian firefighters to respond effectively to acts of terrorism on Canadian soil.
I am happy to inform him that the government does indeed recognize the critical role of firefighters in responding to terrorism, particularly acts of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear terrorism, otherwise known as CBRN terrorism.
In a terrorist incident firefighters, together with the police, emergency medical services and hospitals, are on the frontlines working to ensure public safety and security. Our government agrees with the member for Burnaby--Douglas that in order for these first responders, including firefighters, to do their job effectively they need adequate training.
Before the 2001 budget was brought down, the federal government held consultations with almost all the provinces to discuss how we could combine our efforts to strengthen the ability of our country to fight terrorism. Many people attended these meetings, including a large number of firefighters.
The results of these consultations were fed directly into the preparatory work that went into the 2001 budget which, and I ask the member for Burnaby—Douglas to listen carefully, allocated $513 million over five years to strengthen national response capability for CBRN terrorism, chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear terrorism. This included funding for equipment and training for first responders, including firefighters.
As well, the Office of Critical Infrastructure Protection and Emergency Preparedness, OCIPEP, has responsibility for overseeing the allocation of the funding and has in place a federal-provincial program to cost share the purchase of CBRN related equipment. To date firefighters have received $5 million over the past two years to purchase CBRN related counterterrorism equipment.
OCIPEP was also given the responsibility for developing a national training strategy in collaboration with other departments. The training program, which is being developed in close consultation with experts from the participating federal departments as well as first responder subject matter experts, will include four levels: introductory, basic, intermediate and advanced.
Pilot presentations of both the introductory and basic courses have already been held, with the intermediate courses to follow. Feedback from first responders on the pilot courses has been extremely positive.
Training will be harmonized in order to ensure the effectiveness of the programs, including interoperability and avoiding overlaps.
When the training program was being developed, an in-depth review was done of the current chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear terrorism training programs in Canada and the United States. I can also assure the hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas that firefighter training needs were taken into consideration in the development of the course.