44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 5, 2023 11:00AM
- Jun/5/23 10:12:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, I first want to reiterate all my best wishes in solidarity with every community that has been affected in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada because of the current crisis. I understand that this is an important topic. It is actually urgent.
When the NDP requested this emergency debate this evening, the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie said that the federal government should do more and do better, including with respect to planning, training and accessibility to equipment.
I am not sure whether my colleague could inform me about the situation in his home province, because in Quebec, as far as I know, the federal government's response has been swift. I am not saying that the government is perfect, but when Minister Bonnardel in Quebec City asked for help from the Canadian Armed Forces, it took only a few hours for the Minister of Emergency Preparedness to accept the request and send boots on the ground. All in all, crisis management seems to be going well so far.
That may not be the case in the rest of Canada. I would like my colleague to say a few words about that.
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- Jun/5/23 10:28:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech.
I was reading in Le Devoir earlier that a “jewel of the Innu nation”, an outfitting camp owned by the Innu government of Uashat-Maliotenam near Sept-Îles on the north shore, was destroyed by fire.
I also read that 80% of indigenous communities in Canada live in forested areas and are among the first victims of this growing phenomenon. My colleague made the connection between climate change and global warming.
I would like him to talk more about what we must do. What is our responsibility as elected members to protect these communities?
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- Jun/5/23 10:43:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, earlier this evening, I had the opportunity to personally thank the Minister of Emergency Preparedness, who has been providing the opposition parties with daily updates on the situation in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada. We are very grateful for that. When Minister Bonnardel requested federal assistance, the federal government was quick to respond. That is reassuring.
What is not so reassuring, however, is to hear the Canadian Prime Minister and the Quebec premier say that the current situation could continue throughout the summer. This is an abnormal situation that will become increasingly normal. The local authorities and the provinces are doing an extraordinary job, and I think the federal government's role is to lend its support where necessary.
However, if this situation does become increasingly normal, does the federal government even currently have the capacity and resources to support the provinces?
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- Jun/5/23 11:26:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, since I do not have much time, I will make a comment instead. I really want to commend my colleague and thank him for his personal commitment in the situation in Nova Scotia. I want to commend him and his constituents for their courage and resilience. I think we can all agree that Nova Scotia has not had it easy over the past few years. There was the pandemic, hurricane Fiona, Portapique and now the wildfires. I want to thank him for his work.
During a briefing given to us by the office of the Minister of Emergency Preparedness, the minister said that my colleague was his man on the ground in Nova Scotia. We could see the trust and communication between the minister's office and the members of the opposition, and I think that is a good thing. We all need to work together in situations like these.
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- Jun/5/23 11:27:35 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to inform you that I will be sharing my time with the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue.
I would like to once again thank my colleague, who is far too humble, in my opinion. Naturally, we are grateful to local authorities, the provinces and everyone who is pulling together right now, but to see a member become involved this way too is unusual. Of course, we are there for our constituents, to reassure them, or at least to try. That is part of our role. However, I think the member's involvement in this case is of a different order.
On behalf of the Bloc Québécois, I would like to express my support for everyone affected across the country. We are talking about more than 26,000 evacuees at the present time. The situation is extremely fluid. I think that all members who have risen to speak this evening have reported different figures on the number of fires and on the number of fires currently burning out of control, simply because the situation is changing so very quickly.
The teams in the field, local authorities, firefighters, the provinces and the federal government, which agreed to help the provinces that ask for it, all deserve our acknowledgement.
Early last week, we saw Quebec fire crews lending a helping hand out west. Now we have to bring those people back home because we need to have as many resources as possible all over.
I am starting to look at websites that show a map of Canada and what is happening everywhere. There is data on air quality. What we are going through right now is extremely worrisome.
I really want to give all my support to the people affected. I am thinking especially about my colleague from the north shore, the member for Manicouagan, my colleague from Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou and my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue, who is going home tonight to be with his constituents.
I commend them because when we go through times like this, we wonder a bit about what our role is. It is obviously not always easy. When Quebec was first affected, the Quebec government was in charge of the situation along with SOPFEU and local authorities. As federal members, we were asking what we should be doing.
Not long ago, a tragedy occurred in my riding and civilians were killed. We wondered what we could do in that type of situation. We do not want to hinder the authorities who are doing their job, but it is important that we be there to reassure people and inform them of the information that must be passed on. That is what my colleague was doing before me.
I believe that it is important to repeat messages. I was reading about the potential causes of fires. I know that some are caused by lightning, but we must also mention open air fires and cigarette butts that could be thrown out and start fires. I believe that these messages bear repeating; we also need to make clear that no one should try to be braver than the others, that we should let professionals handle the situation and that we should follow the authorities' instructions.
I think our role is to be there for our constituents, so I would like to salute the work of my colleagues in the Bloc Québécois and across the country. I know that many members are affected.
I want to reiterate my gratitude to the Minister of Emergency Preparedness and his staff. They have been working hard to keep us, the critics for public safety and emergency preparedness, informed of the situation. They told us from the outset that they were going to communicate directly with the MPs affected, because it was important for them to know what is going on.
I have worked with a number of ministers in the House since 2019. I really want to emphasize that collaboration with the Minister of Emergency Preparedness is always impeccable. It is good to see this level of cross-party collaboration. We can set politics aside in these situations. I think the affected citizens deserve nothing less.
Is it important to have this debate tonight? Of course it is. It is urgent. This situation must be discussed and solutions must be found. As I was saying, most members are out on the ground. Afterwards, they will be able to come back and give us their assessment of the situation. They will have seen first-hand the resources mobilized. They will know what additional resources are needed and what should have been done better.
I know I am not allowed refer to the presence of members in the House, but I am glad to see that the people who have to work on this are doing so while we are discussing it.
I do not know what will come of this debate tonight. We certainly need to talk about it. I am talking about Quebec's experience. Until there is evidence to the contrary, we saw that the federal response was quite quick once the request was made. Are we going to run out of resources? That may be the case. We have to ask ourselves these questions. I think there is a contingency plan under way. We need to ensure we have these resources, particularly given that the Premier of Quebec pointed out this afternoon that the situation is likely to continue throughout the summer. Approximately 3.3 million hectares of forest have burned down so far. That is far more than the ten-year average. Normally, it is about 260,000 hectares. That is worrying. We need to make sure we have the necessary resources.
I think we need to take stock and understand the root cause of all this. Obviously, there is the inevitable link with global warming. We have to ask ourselves these questions. Today may not be the right day for that. The Bloc Québécois feels that the priority is putting out the fires and making sure we have the resources on the ground.
I am going to talk more specifically about the situation in Quebec, and my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue will provide a more detailed description of what is happening in his region. I can speak on behalf of my colleague from the north shore, who went to be with her constituents on the ground as soon as she heard that residents of Sept‑Îles were being evacuated. The situation is extremely worrisome. We are talking about two fires that are very close to each other and are surrounding the city of Sept‑Îles. I was told that the wind was out of the southeast but that, if the wind changes, then the whole city could be destroyed. Obviously, that is very worrisome.
I often hear my colleague from the north shore talking about the importance of breaking the isolation of that area. I would imagine that it takes a situation like this to realize how important it is to do that. When we look at the situation that people from the north shore are currently facing, we see that they have a forest on one side, where the wildfires are burning, the ocean on the other side, and the Touzel bridge, which is currently damaged. They are a bit trapped. People are being evacuated by air, mainly for medical reasons. Supplies are going to be sent in to people in some communities that are also somewhat trapped.
We should be asking important questions about these heavily forested regions, which may be more affected than others. I was saying earlier, in response to a speech by my colleague, that the majority of indigenous communities live in forested or wooded regions. They inevitably become the first victims of this growing phenomenon. What are we as elected members doing to protect these communities?
I understand that fire crews are currently focusing on the out-of-control fires that are closest to inhabited communities, and we can understand what that is urgent. However, seeing the photos, the images of fires that are devastating hundreds of square kilometres of forest, makes me very sad. Obviously, the priority is human beings, but it is still shocking to see how much of the forest has been obliterated.
Today, I travelled from my riding to Ottawa. I live just on the other side of the north shore, so I expected the air back home to be thickly contaminated. It was not too bad. Oddly, the closer I got to Montreal and the Outaouais region, the heavier the smog became. Now, even the people living in communities that are nowhere near the fires cannot say that they are unaware of the situation and unaffected by what is happening.
My colleague was showing me a map of his riding. The fires are closing in. For some communities, it is only a matter of time before the fires reach them. Obviously, this is worrying. More than 780 international firefighters have been or will be deployed on the ground. President Macron will be sending approximately 100 firefighters and fire experts, particularly to Sept-Îles on the north shore. Firefighters have come from South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. The Canadian Armed Forces have also deployed soldiers and military personnel to lend a hand. The scale of the situation is obvious. I hope we are ready to face what is coming.
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- Jun/5/23 11:38:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question. I was watching the news on the weekend and the woman who does the weather. She spoke about the air quality in certain regions.
I thought to myself that it was not normal to be speaking about that. Is that the new normal? Will the weather forecast now be about the rain, the sunshine and the air quality?
This has a huge impact on people and human health. Scientists have been saying so for a long time. Climate inaction will be more costly in the long term. The costs to human health will be enormous.
I was saying earlier that this may not be the time to talk about causes or point fingers, but I believe that we have a lot of work to do. We must do more and we must do better, especially when it comes to climate change. The fact that we are already at adaptation and mitigation is not a good sign.
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- Jun/5/23 11:40:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is exactly what I was saying earlier. The people of the north shore are practically stranded by the fire. They have the forest on one side and the sea on the other. The Touzel bridge has been closed for other reasons since last week, and the Rio Tinto rail line that runs north has also been damaged.
I was talking earlier about opening up the region. We are going to have to adapt our infrastructure, even in remote regions. It is just wrong that such a large community would have no emergency exits. I often say that my riding is big, at 15,000 square kilometres, but Manicouagan is a different story. It is immense. These people could find themselves completely cut off. It just does not make sense. Investment in this infrastructure absolutely must be considered right away, since it really should have been done long ago.
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- Jun/5/23 11:42:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always daunting to answer a question on the environment and climate change from my colleague, who knows so much about the subject.
I was talking about climate change adaptation and mitigation earlier. Unfortunately, some changes are already at a critical point, already irreversible, and we are going to have to live with that, unfortunately. As she said, we may have missed the boat on temperature.
Is Canada's climate change plan enough? Certainly not. Are the plans of other major countries sufficient? Certainly not. We should have done better.
Now we are at the adaptation stage. What are we doing to adapt to these new realities? Earlier, we were talking about adapting infrastructure. Some essential infrastructure is under threat. There is certainly more to be done in this area.
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