:
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I'm happy to be here.
As you said, I'm Deryck Trehearne. I'm the director general of the government operations centre at Public Safety.
I just want to spend a little bit of time this morning talking about my organization, the process for requesting federal assistance and our very special relationship with the CAF and the armed forces. I'd also like to maybe give you a sense of the lessons we've learned over the last few years. As you know, there have been very significant efforts by my organization, the CAF and all federal partners with regard to COVID-19 as well as a variety of very major events of national interest.
[Translation]
We have a very special relationship with the Canadian Armed Forces, and we play a key role in CAF domestic deployments to respond to emergencies and risks through the request for federal assistance process.
[English]
Over the past two and a half years, as you know, Canada has contended with at least six distinct waves of COVID-19. We began, as you may recall, in March of 2020, by repatriating thousands of Canadians from Wuhan and from certain cruise ships around the world. We established a quarantine facility at CFB Trenton and then later on at Nav Centre in Cornwall. During this period, my partners in the CAF and I responded to significant seasonal flooding and wildfire events in 2021 and 2022, especially in B.C. last year, including unprecedented weather events like the atmospheric rivers in B.C. and the Atlantic provinces last fall, which created extensive damage to infrastructure. Those were followed by the truckers' protest in Ottawa, and more recently and ongoing now, we have damage from hurricane Fiona.
It goes without saying that this was and continues to be an unprecedented period for my organization, all federal departments and the CAF. Every Canadian, including every member of this committee, I'm sure is well aware of the impacts of some of these events, including those with respect to your ridings and your regions.
We have engaged RFAs, requests for federal assistance, in every province and territory multiple times during COVID and, in the case of some provinces, many times.
I just want to speak briefly about the role of my organization and the request for federal assistance process. In general terms, as I'm sure you've heard repeatedly, emergencies in Canada are a shared responsibility. That being said, the level of government best able to respond to emergencies does so, beginning at the local level. By far, most emergencies in Canada are managed at the local and provincial levels. It is when those emergencies spill across jurisdictions or require support beyond the capacity of a province or a first nation to respond, or there is an event in the national interest, that the federal government is then engaged under the relevant acts of Parliament.
Under the Emergency Management Act, the is responsible for exercising leadership related to emergency preparedness and response in Canada. The federal emergency response plan, otherwise known around here by its acronym, FERP, details how that authority is exercised. Within that plan, Public Safety, my organization, is the lead federal coordinating department for emergency response.
As you've no doubt heard by now, the National Defence Act outlines cases in which the CAF may be authorized to provide assistance in emergencies for public support, inter alia. In my world, the CAF is always considered a resource of last resort in Canada, and there must be ministerial approval and support from our minister and the before an RFA can be authorized.
The government operations centre specifically helps the to deliver on a number of responsibilities including response and some preparedness aspects.
As I said, with respect to the RFA process, should a province or territory make an official request for federal assistance, there is a well-established process in place to manage that, beginning with regional contact with members of the GOC team and including interdepartmental consultation. This is often behind-the-scenes work that takes place before the formal RFA is received and as an event is unfolding.
Prior to the pandemic, just to give you a sense of the workload in Canada, the GOC—and by osmosis the CAF in many cases—was supporting probably five to 10 RFAs per year. I'm happy to report that since March 2020, we have now crossed the 200 RFAs threshold in Canada in support of provinces and first nations and territories.
Those RFAs were for public health supports, health care supports, vaccination rollout supports, assistance to law enforcement, national coordination and evacuation supports. Of those 200 RFAs, 157 were supported in some way, shape or form by the CAF or CAF rangers. In the case of first nations, at least 56 deployments of CAF rangers were used to support first nations during COVID and other events.
In addition to general RFAs, some requests fall under CAF assistance to law enforcement. You've seen some of those discussed already. One notable example was the support provided to long-term care facilities in Quebec in the spring of 2020, where approximately 1,300 CAF members supported 47 long-term care facilities in Quebec during the first wave of COVID. There were also supports for Ontario.
The government operations centre acts as a single window to access federal supports, as I said, including supports for primary health care, COVID-19 efforts and health human resources. The CAF is one of several federal departments, including Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada, that created a single window in support of the COVID efforts.
As I said, the CAF is always considered a source of last resort for responses to emergencies within Canada. As a result, requests for CAF resources must undergo a strict assessment by my organization when provinces and territories ask for help. Things we would look at, for instance, are regional capacity, commercial options and other federal sources. We discuss a number of criteria with the province or territory before we get to a situation of deploying the CAF.
In addition, we try to define in advance which tasks the CAF will do that are appropriate to its mandate and capabilities, along with time-limited and response-focused emergency help. Obviously, you know that right now the CAF is deployed in the Atlantic provinces in terms of support for Fiona. You can see the types of work they're doing there.
Obviously the CAF has demonstrated its ability to meet many concurrent operational requirements, but that's come at a cost, as I think you've heard from a number of folks who have presented here.
One thing I just want to flag is that the government and Public Safety did create a humanitarian workforce program. They announced $100 million early in 2020, and that's been added to since. You heard from Conrad Sauvé, I believe, of the Red Cross. The Red Cross, St. John Ambulance and others are part of that humanitarian workforce, which has created a strategic support for surge federally to take the burden off the CAF. That was developed in the midst of COVID.
I'll just close by saying that over the past two and a half years we've obviously had an impressive level of federal response in Canada for COVID and other crises. The CAF, obviously, has been at the centre of that. They have been outstandingly supportive and great partners in response to these large-scale events. Our federal capacity to respond, as you're all well aware, is finite. The provinces also have finite and very asymmetrical capacities, in many cases.
I'll stop there, Mr. Chair. I'm happy to take questions.
:
I'm happy to go over that.
As I said, if emergencies happen and they impact the local level initially.... Think of the thunderstorm event in Ottawa a few months ago. In that case, the province did not seek federal support and did not ask to deploy the army. Ottawa managed that. It was mainly a hydro and infrastructure impact, and they managed it. Many events occur across Canada all the time that you may not be aware of. They occur locally, regionally and are handled.
If events begin to overwhelm a region or province, then conversations will begin between the emergency management teams in a province and locally. They may engage the government operations centre. We have regional offices across the country. They have very strong relationships with the emergency management operation centres in each province and territory. If something is overwhelming, say in the case of the atmospheric river last fall, there was an immediate response from the CAF for search and rescue and evacuating people from highways. Then there were additional conversations that were engaged with our team. We work with the province and its emergency management centre to deploy federal supports.
Of course, once the critical response crisis phase is over, there are a number of very strategic conversations that go on around disaster support and financing. You'll recall the ministerial working group on B.C. I'm sure folks have discussed that as well. Mainly there are conversations if the province feels that a region is overwhelmed. If something is of significant impact to the province, they'll engage our team and we will work with them to understand their needs.
As I said, in terms of the criteria of capabilities that are required, we'll understand whether the federal government has those capabilities, whether the provincial and regional assets have been leveraged and exhausted, and what private sector and public sector assets are available. That can all go on in a matter of hours or days leading up to a formal request for federal assistance.
:
Thank you. That is a great question.
The capacity of Canadian provinces, territories and municipalities to respond to emergencies has definitely evolved.
[English]
Certainly, we have very strong provinces in many cases. Quebec obviously has a very strong emergency management capability, and I think many municipalities have evolved significantly over the last, say, decade.
As I said, I think historically as Canadians we understood that there were floods and forest fires every year, though we had not really had the massive scale of things they saw in Florida, for instance, every year, or in the gulf, but I think that's changing. I think people understand. We sometimes refer to that as EM—emergency management—literacy and awareness, and I do think that many municipalities and in particular many provinces have come a long way in the last decade. I've been in this role for a little over three years, and we've seen, even through successive waves of COVID, over the last few years the engagement, the capacity and the literacy in these organizations to respond—and that affects their demands for federal assistance. All of that has significantly evolved in the last three years. People, I think, have really woken up to the fact of the challenge and have resourced it adequately.
We've had major events in which provinces have said, “No, it's fine. We have this under control. We don't need your help”, and that's the kind of thing we like to see. But I'll stop there.
:
Sure. The emergency management strategy does exist. That's a Public Safety-led strategy, and it works with the FPTs and ministers of the FPTs in terms of principles and the commitments we've made in Canada to advance the cause of preparedness and response—and mitigation, frankly. That means upfront investments in things such as infrastructure, etc., as many people have commented, no doubt.
What Mr. Fadden is talking about is what we would call.... It's a little farther down in detail in terms of a core Canadian capabilities list. A “capability” can be anything from procurement to coordination, like what I do. It could be the CAF. It can be planning. There are literally hundreds of capabilities that can be brought to bear. Firefighting, obviously, is a strength in Canada. On any given event, I think there are different levels of strategies there, if that helps clarify. There is an action plan under that emergency management strategy in Canada, which the provinces have committed to. I believe there are five or six priorities.
I don't know that there's a major governance review as part of that. I'm not sure what that might be alluding to, but certainly, internal to government, there is, federally, an EM—emergency management—transformation agenda, which is obviously supporting and leading. That's at the federal level. It has implications and engagement, obviously, with the provinces as well, due to the shared responsibilities that we continue to allude to.
There are a number of levels of strategies and work to do, I think, some of which are well ahead, and some of which are still mainly a concept. I hope that helps.
:
That's a good question.
COVID was very interesting, but, as you said, it was kind of unique. Let's hope it's fading. There were a lot of supports for medical personnel, vaccination, etc., in that one. In terms of climate change, obviously that's fires and floods, and that's about evacuation and airlift. The CAF has finite resources when it comes to airlift. Given international events over the last couple of years, that's also more constrained.
For instance, we helped evacuate an entire first nation, the Mathias Colomb, in Manitoba from a fire risk this summer. That was 2,000-odd folks. Between the first nation's emergency management folks, the provinces and us, there was a major evacuation there. Those are the kinds of things we're seeing.
Last year in northern Ontario and B.C., the fires were extensive. There were massive efforts in Ontario to airlift first nations out of isolated communities that do not have road access into places in northern Ontario and the GTA as well. Again, that's airlift, coordination, real-life supports and medical and health—
:
That's another great question.
As I said earlier, this was really amplified during COVID.
[English]
In the past, people have evolved.... The provinces have become stronger in many ways of responding, thereby needing less federal help, but at the same time, as my numbers and data point out, we have had an extreme number of requests for federal assistance and deployments of the armed forces and rangers to help.
That's a good and a bad thing, in the sense that provinces have become more aware of the supports they can ask for and more literate in terms of the EM system in Canada. They're building their own capacity, but they also know when and how to ask for help. Certainly, COVID has made that very clear to people.
Then, of course, the public also knows that the armed forces can be deployed. During successive waves of COVID, social media would light up with calls for the deployment of the armed forces, even if they weren't necessarily needed based on the facts on the ground or discussions with the province or territory. Many times, there's pressure in the system to deploy the CAF and for provinces to seek help, so that's an interesting dynamic.
It's not really for me, as a public servant, to judge whether it's too much or too little, but certainly, in the last couple of years.... We are all hoping that it somehow goes back to “normal” and that we're back in the world of five or 10 a year, but I don't know that's going to be the case, given the trends we're all looking at, the finite Canadian capacity and people's awareness of how and when to help and how to ask for help.
I hope that helps.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to our guests for being here.
I want to go back to a response you had to Mr. Fisher in talking about airlift capacities—one thing that is asked for the most. When Mr. Fadden talked to us, and obviously when we're looking at CAF, it's very expensive. You talked about contracts as well, and the fact that sometimes to get them out, it's a long process. In other words, it's not like you can turn them around as quickly as you'd like to.
Is there a possible way that you could have a memorandum of understanding or have people on retainer? I guess that's a term for lawyers. You could have some capacity, because you talk about these cyclical events and that seems to be things that happen over and over again like forest fires, flooding, etc. Talk to us. You're maybe already doing some of that stuff.
However, when we look at that critical airlift, I think Mr. Fadden would say delivery through the CAF is more expensive than potentially looking at outside. Give me your thoughts on how that all fits together.
Again, with CAF being a force of last resort, we try not to...but in a life-and-limb situation, as I cited in Mathias Colomb or others, like Bearskin Lake in Ontario, the CAF will respond very quickly and they have assets they can do that with.
In terms of their firefighting capacity, the provinces also have huge links and MOUs with various airlines, I think, for commercial capacity, so we also look to that. Again, that can be reimbursed by federal dollars.
As I said, we have often worked with PSPC. We don't have standing offers, because this gets back to the nature of emergencies in Canada, where locally and provincially, they may have those assets. For instance, the Ministry of Natural Resources in Ontario has a huge number of those kinds of assets, either that they physically own and run or that are at their disposal during the fire season.
The first choice is to get into the commercial assets before we get to the CAF, and that can often be part of the dynamic in that realm. There is quite a bit of commercial capacity available in Canada. As I said, in Ontario last year, my friends in Indigenous Services Canada, us and the province spent millions of dollars on commercial airlines and evacuating people.
:
Yes, it's a very interesting question.
I mean, I'm not a psychologist, but I would say, as just a quick point of clarification, that the 200 RFAs are not just driven by social media. COVID was exceptional. Having said that, we know that the trends are bad in some areas, and COVID was exceptional. The numbers will reflect that.
We don't really know yet what “normal” will look like once we get past COVID. However, I would say that some of those things are exacerbated by social media, concerns in the media and concerns in the public. I'm not an expert in that field. There are significant communications strategies that Public Safety has, and the provinces have to try to communicate emergency management literacy and awareness to Canadians. There's significant programming. Those are always helpful. Public Safety does a lot of that. I'm sure my colleagues in communications would be happy to come and talk about it.
I think people know that there's a place where they can put up their hands and voice their opinions as well, and they take that opportunity, but I also think people understand and have learned lessons over the last few years about how this all works and who can help. I think there's a little bit of all of that in there, but let's face it: There were significant events under way as well.
:
That's a great question.
Hurricanes are only one of my worries. They are certainly a concern. The prediction was that this year was going to be more active than normal, and here we are. Floods and fires are equally affected by climate change. I think, as a country, we need to have a conversation about our overall readiness and our overall capacity to respond to these types of things. We've seen some very unique events in the last couple of years—very unique—and I think we've all felt, in every province and territory, some challenges.
I think overall capacity across the board—up front and in the middle of a response, and capabilities across Canada federally, provincially and municipally—we need to have a conversation about that. The trends are telling us that. As I've said many times, my small view here is that we've been lucky historically. Floods and fires, we get, but on these other rodents of unusual size or strange events that defy categorization—an atmospheric river or the derecho that hit Ottawa—if you don't know they are coming the way they are coming, you can only respond.
Across the board, we need to talk about our preparedness, our analysis and our capacity to respond as a country, and federally as well.
:
I'm Eva Cohen. Before I moved to Canada back in 2003, I was a volunteer in Germany's Federal Agency for Technical Relief, the THW, a government organization that consists of 98% unpaid citizen volunteers and is located all across Germany at the local and regional level.
I have experienced first-hand the many benefits of a community-based civil protection approach that is grounded in citizen volunteers. For over 14 years, I have focused on highlighting the value that a Canadian version, modelled on the success of the THW, would bring to our society and how it could be done.
To start the process of changing the culture of preparedness and building capacity, I founded a non-profit social enterprise called Civil Protection Youth Canada.
There is no question that government needs to have a backup force to ensure adequate response to threats beyond everyday emergencies. We need to understand our risks, which capabilities are required to be prepared, and a structure to ensure readiness and rapid deployment of the needed capacity.
Even though our military is our only government tool to deploy in a disaster, it is not the armed forces' focus, and they are not adequately trained and equipped for all-hazards tasks. Using sophisticated military equipment for disaster response and recovery is expensive and not our best option. Instead of armoured vehicles, we need excavators, cranes, high-capacity pumps and other equipment—and the people trained to use them—to clear debris, provide emergency power and water, and repair damaged infrastructure.
Luckily, most of the required skills exist in our population and in the private sector. What is missing is the structure that enables government the same rapid response, boots on the ground and scalability as the armed forces but with a civil protection approach. The easiest solution often seems to be the one that builds on what we have. This is the rare occasion where the fastest and most affordable solution is to add something entirely new to what is missing and to provide the framework that mobilizes a completely untapped resource: Canadian citizen volunteers. We need an organization that would complement and integrate, not duplicate or take away from what we already have.
Even though we have seen an alarming increase in disasters over the years, none of our current stakeholders in disaster response have been able to address the need for our system to adapt with a robust and sustainable long-term vision, and now we don’t have the luxury of time. However, we are not alone in this situation.
I recommend that, instead of conducting lengthy inquiries and studies, we join forces with our international partners, Germany and the EU, and compare risks and capabilities. I ask the committee to please recommend to government that it make use of the standing offer of one of our closest allies, Germany, which, as a federation like Canada with jurisdiction of EM with states and municipalities, a vibrant NGO sector like ours and the military as the asset of last resort, has another tool for the government to rely on.
Seventy years of success and capacity building done in co-operation internationally is our shortcut, as we need to act now. The guiding principle is that government enables volunteers to be the backbone of the system and provides the long-term vision, structure and framework to ensure that this local, yet national, volunteer capacity is trained, certified, equipped and consistently integrated into the emergency response system.
This does not only guarantee efficient co-operation of all available assets; it shifts our completely reactive system to citizen-based proactive preparedness, readiness and resilience. A Canadian civil protection agency would provide the government with the operational arm that it is now missing.
Without adding an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy, it guarantees the focus, structure and standards needed for a national approach that connects all provinces, territories and indigenous communities, and enables them to provide their communities proactively with the capacity that is needed locally and regionally for rapid and prolonged response, all at a fraction of the cost of our current approach.
:
Mr. Chair and members of the committee, thank you for inviting me.
I would like to open my testimony by describing my two hats here today—first, as a retired soldier who served our country in peace, war and peacekeeping operations for 27 years; and second, as a retired emergency manager who served in operations locally, municipally, provincially, federally and internationally for 13 years.
First, I will offer, as was said in ancient times, that every country has an army—its own or somebody else's.
Let me start as a soldier. The role of the Canadian Armed Forces is, in my opinion, to protect the sovereignly of Canada, meet our commitments to the defence of North America, meet our commitments to NATO, support international security, carry out peacekeeping operations in support of the UN, and perform other tasks as assigned by the Government of Canada. These commitments mean we must have armed forces that are designed and trained to fight alone and with our allies on land, at sea and in the air.
A side benefit of a force like this is that it can provide aid to civil authorities and the civil power. Again, this is a benefit and not a primary or even a secondary goal of the Canadian Forces.
That said, the soldiers I commanded in my career were extremely proud to serve their fellow citizens in times of emergency, such as during the Red River floods in 1997 and the ice storm power outage in 1998.
Let me make three points. First, these actions take away from their primary role. Second, these actions drain time, resources and funding from their primary role—a role that has been extremely underfunded for decades. Third, these actions could normally be met far better by other agencies if we had resources committed to emergency management—which is a discipline that exists—in our country.
Here is a statement made by Paul Cellucci, the American ambassador to Canada after September 11, 2001, when I was personally briefing him in Alberta on critical infrastructure protection. He said, “Security trumps trade.” If we are seen as a parasite rather than as a partner to our allies in defence, then there will be immediate and long-term consequences.
With that, let me switch hats to being an emergency manager.
Nationally, Canada has a system called emergency management. You probably have not heard a lot about it—especially in this pandemic—because it has been ignored and, in some cases, silenced.
Emergency management has four functions: mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery. I think we will talk about these four functions frequently today.
Emergency management has an all-hazards approach. There are natural hazards, including biological, geological and meteorological. There are also human-induced hazards, both non-intentional and intentional. We need to discuss this all-hazards approach more today since resources from one hazard can be used for other hazards. The process for each of those four functions is identical.
Emergency management works across all groupings in our country, from citizens to first responders, municipal government, provincial government, federal government and international agencies. I hope we discuss the roles of these organizations in detail today.
What about the private sector? Eighty-five per cent of critical infrastructure in Canada is owned, operated and assured to a great extent by the private sector.
Clearly all orders of government have a role to play in ensuring the operation of our critical infrastructure to ensure the safety and security of our citizens. The private sector plays an essential role in emergency management when linked to emergency management properly. The same is true for non-governmental organizations like the Salvation Army, the Red Cross, the Mennonite Disaster Service, ham radio operator clubs and many others, both paid and volunteer.
Let me sum up. Emergency management has long been neglected by our country. In fact, in 2008, the standing senate committee on emergency preparedness wrote a scathing, detailed report about it. If anything, Canada has gone backwards. Just ask the members of SOREM, the senior officials responsible for emergency management from all 13 of our provinces and territories.
I put it to you that is why today you are meeting to discuss—I believe, incorrectly—using the armed forces of Canada to do emergency management. The Canadian Armed Forces do have a role in emergencies but as the force of last resort.
Members of the committee, I stand ready to answer your questions.
:
That's a very expansive question. Every performance indicator that's built has flaws.
However, let's start with the fact that there's a daily relationship between a province and the federal government when it comes to the use of the Canadian Armed Forces. The liaison officer sat right beside me in my operations centre in Alberta, and I would only call them when I needed them, and only for specifically why I needed them. In most cases, I never called them at all because I would always use the resources of the province first.
You have to understand that, when you're in a flood, you're probably not having a wildfire. The province has fire attack teams and many resources. I could take those and use them to build sandbags and dikes. I could use the private sector.
If the measure of success of the federal government to the provinces is how many armed forces' members are on the ground, we have the performance indicator wrong, because the federal government brings far more than just the armed forces of Canada. They can help the emergency management organization access provincial boundary types of resources from neighbouring provinces, if they're past the mutual aid agreement of the province next-door. They can bring someone from Quebec to help.
Remember, we have mutual aid agreements in many areas. To use wildfire, for example, there are wildfire attack teams in every province in Canada. There's a central coordinating agency that moves those fire attack teams across our country, without any involvement, until it gets past their capabilities. Ontario will send Alberta their fire attack teams, and Alberta will send them back to Ontario, when each of those provinces experiences that hazard at a different level.
Those types of coordinations exist in the silos, but are linked across all the silos of all the different hazards and all the government agencies.
:
Thank you to both of our witnesses.
I would like to hear what you both have to say in response to my first question. You both talked about the importance of preparedness and mitigation.
Lieutenant-Colonel Redman, you talked about the role of the provinces and how that could be supported by the federal government.
For your part, Ms. Cohen, you talked about a civil protection model.
In light of the current climate crisis, the federal government will have to pay for everything upfront, either by sending funds that were not necessarily planned or through the armed forces, which is an extremely expensive endeavour.
I wonder if you could comment on the importance of predictable and recurring funding, for example to the provinces or to NPOs.
Would recurring, predictable and possibly increased funding be a key factor in successful preparedness and mitigation?
Ms. Cohen, perhaps you could go first.
:
Absolutely. Let me first of all comment on Ms. Cohen's concept. It is a concept that I know. As a soldier, I did three tours in Germany during the Cold War, and I counted on the civil defence organization of Germany to make sure that my troops could get from their barracks to the border when we were deployed. I worked with them extensively in other areas as well.
Let's talk about the actual.... You're talking about funding, but I want to give you a structure. In Alberta, first of all you have first responders. Every citizen is expected to be able to take care of themselves for 72 hours. The first responders come to the aid of the citizens who are directly affected. Then the municipal order of government must have a municipal emergency plan, which is verified annually and includes a lot of volunteer organizations that exist in their community and MOUs with their bordering communities. Then there's the provincial order of government that does exactly the same thing and has those volunteer organizations embedded, things like ham radio operators.
At each order of government, there's a responsibility, and it is assumed that they are accountable for the funding. However, what we expected of a town of 100 and what we expected of a city of one million were completely different with respect to their emergency management plans, and we monitored their plans based on that level of capability, with the province filling in the gaps. I expect the same with the federal order of government: that it would work with all 13 provinces and territories, understanding their capabilities and limitations, linking in volunteer organizations, linking in the other agencies and providing funding and assistance where they are needed.
Edmonton didn't need any funding. A small town like Hanna might. You work based on a requirement, and that's from knowing your jurisdiction at each order of government.
I'm sorry. If I may, could I just add one piece?
Ms. Cohen, you talked about the capacity of the public or individuals in relation to the private sector and, ultimately, the investment in people on the ground, their skills, their education, their reaction to these things and how that can actually benefit an employer in that relationship.
Could you expand in terms of that model coming out of Germany? Ultimately, people will want to serve their country and serve their communities. That's an incentive on its own, but it cannot be the only incentive. I'll just give a brief example. In my riding, there's a gentleman, a constituent, who wanted to provide service in terms of one of the NGOs. He was unemployed at the time. He could not get EI to cover that leave because EI stipulates in Canada that you have to constantly be looking for work and you have to verify that. That's part of that system. However, he couldn't afford to go without that kind of compensation.
Could you explain how Germany handles that in terms of the model?
:
That is a very good question. I think it points to a big problem that we currently have in making the best use of our volunteers and our volunteer organization.
Germany has a system in place through which the federal government basically guarantees that you do not have any negative effects as a volunteer for this organization. It also guarantees something called the wage reimbursement program. That means that, if you are in a full-time job and your expertise is needed to respond in your region, your employer may ask the federal government for somebody to replace you and for the government to pay for that person.
In reality, that is very rarely used, as you can imagine, because the private sector makes use of their corporate social responsibility that way and they're proud to have their employees helping. Usually, because these disasters are local, the region is probably impacted anyway, which impacts the private sector, so there is no issue with that.
If I may, I would also like to link it to the mitigation piece, because we try to see this in silos. However, I also think mitigation always happens in the response, and we don't have that capability to prevent the response from escalating if we don't have the civil protection capabilities in place locally.
Another point is that I totally agree that we need as much mitigation as we can have, but then all of those mitigation projects are not a guarantee that they're not going to fail. If we build dams or dikes, we need people who will service them and who can defend or protect them if something happens. All those things link together, but the availability of staff or volunteers is what is crucial and what is missing at the moment.
:
That's a great question, because mandatory volunteerism is the death of volunteerism. It's much better to appeal to a bigger sense of purpose and being able to have a role.
If you think of the fact that government does not have a choice and as citizens we also don't have a choice as to what happens with taxpayers' money in that respect, asking reactively for donations and solidarity—and there's always room for that—and then matching that with taxpayers' money again is not the best way we can do this.
In Germany you pay around $10, let's say, a year. As a taxpayer I have the choice to be part of that response and have a role, and I like to say, “To stand on guard for Canada”. That taxpayers' money is invested proactively to create the system that enables everybody, from youth to veteran to senior, to be part of the answer to the problem.
That is a choice that currently does not exist, so government needs to enable volunteerism. I don't think it's a question of culture. It's that our government doesn't make it possible. People don't have the ability to volunteer in the capacity that needs to be rapidly available.