Public Safety committee  Yes, absolutely. The short answer is yes.

Public Safety committee  At the end of the day, we have, as mentioned, an executive board, but we have a national advisory council board of 27 other members, which I've indicated includes the Canadian Fallen Firefighters Foundation, the Aboriginal Firefighters Association of Canada, every province and te

Public Safety committee  Certainly, from my perception, and again I don't have all the answers, but I'm just saying that the basic concept is that if you had a national action plan that could be continued through the provincial aspects and regionalized, where necessary.... So a small department from a sp

Public Safety committee  I think there's success in general. As a fire chief, I spoke at the IAFF legislative assembly and it was welcomed with open arms. I think that's always a good sign right off the bat. I think that we're collaborating very well in general. From September what we established was a g

Public Safety committee  Yes, this is simply an advisory piece to assist in moving forward. This is not to replace, replicate, or change, or do something on our own. This is to ensure that we're showing that it is a priority, that we're working hard, and putting the right people in place to give good adv

Public Safety committee  To answer your question, Mr. Miller, right now any data that would currently exist would have to be at the auspice of a departmental-specific initiative. There's nothing required under a standard incident reporting guideline at the provincial or territorial level that would have

Public Safety committee  I think in the fire service, though, we're definitely on the right path forward. There are certainly some other organizations, like our Department of National Defence, and you'll hear I believe from a witness this afternoon from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, where

Public Safety committee  As far as specific numbers, I can't give those to you, but I can tell you about a sobering aspect on the human element side. At our yearly conference, attended by numerous fire chiefs from coast to coast to coast, and delegations of over 400 every year, usually we have individual

Public Safety committee  Short answer? Lots. There is a lot still associated with that, the narrative being that if I suffer from PTSD then I'm a lost cause. In many cases people indicate that's a challenge, and there needs to be more prevention education to build it out. There is a necessity for clinici

Public Safety committee  If it's okay, in terms of the human element, I'd like to speak about a circumstance that I personally dealt with.

Public Safety committee  On June 12, 2007, I attended a call. That morning I had taken my five-year-old son and dropped him off at day care wearing a tank top, jean shorts, and a pair of sandals. I was a fire chief of a small community with two fire stations, volunteer in nature, and we got a call for a

Public Safety committee  Your point is absolutely well taken. Over 86% of the fire services across this country are volunteer and/or composite-based. Many of those resources that you speak of are often associated with financial challenges as well as the capabilities to deal with things. My neighbouring m

Public Safety committee  To that very question, I can speak to the fact that the Aboriginal Firefighters Association of Canada has representation from all first nations and aboriginal communities across Canada. Their fire chiefs, and those who are reporting challenges within their communities, have repre

Public Safety committee  I think what we often focus on is the end result. That, of course, is the unfortunate situation where we look at a suicide or loss of life. While we're looking at some of the five pillars that Mr. Marks mentioned...it's developing that overall strategy and plan. As well as the a

Public Safety committee  As I was indicating, our national advisory council includes members such as the Ontario Association of Fire Chiefs. They work directly with the Province of Ontario developing that PTSD legislation piece. So there's the automatic connection piece that needs to exist there. It's to