INAN Committee Meeting

     I call this meeting to order, please.

    Good afternoon and welcome to meeting number 31 of the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs.

    We are gathered here today on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe nation.

    Today, we will conclude our fourth study, which pertains to Arctic sovereignty, security and emergency preparedness of indigenous peoples.

    On today's first panel we will hear from Meeka Atagootak, an elder who is here as an individual. We will hear from Merrill Harris, who is a reeve in the Municipal District of Taber, Alberta, and from Mr. Kurt Eby, who is director of regulatory affairs and government relations for the Pelmorex Corporation.

    Each of our witnesses will have five minutes for opening remarks, and then we will go to questions.

    To ensure the orderly flow of this meeting, I would like to outline a few rules to follow.

    Members or witnesses may speak in the official language of their choice. Interpretation services in English, French and Inuktitut are available. Please be patient with the interpretation. There may be a delay, especially since Inuktitut has to be translated first into English and then into French, and vice versa. The interpretation button is found at the bottom of your screen and you can listen in either English or French. If interpretation is lost, let us know and we'll try to fix the problem before we carry on.

    Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name. When speaking, please speak slowly and clearly. When you are not speaking, your microphone should be on mute. As a reminder, all comments should be addressed through the chair.

    With that, before we go to questions, we will have the witnesses' opening statements. I would now like to invite Elder Atagootak to start us off for five minutes.

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᑕᐃᒪ, ᑐᓴᖅᓴᐅᓯᐊᖅᐳᖃᐃ, ᐋ ᒦᑲ ᐊᑕᒍᑦᑕᐅᔪᖓ, ᒥᑦᑎᒪᑕ-ᓕᒻᒥᐅᑕᖅ.

    ᑕᐃᒪ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ 2010ᖑᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᑐᓗᖅᑕᐅᓚᐅᖅ-ᓯᒪᒻᒪᑦ ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒥᖅᑕᐅᑎᖓᓄᑦ ᐊᖏᓛᒧᑦ ᑕᐃᑲᓐᖓᑦ ᐱᒋᐊᖅᓱᓂ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᐃᑭᐊᖓᒍᑦ ᐃᖕᒥᓕᓚᐅᖅᓯᒪᕐᓂᕐᒪᑦ ᐃᒪᖃᓕᖅᓱᓂ.

    ᐊᕐᕌᓂ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᑕᐃᓐᓇᕋᓱᓚᐅᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐅᖅᑯᓂᖓᓄᑦ ᓱᕈᓯᖅᐳᖅᑕᐅᖅ ᐅᕙᒍᑦ ᐱᖃᓯᐅᑎᓪ-ᓗᑕ ᐅᕕᓂᕗᑦ ᐱᐅᔪᓐᓃᖃᑦᑕᓕᓚᐅᕐᒪᑦ ᐋᓐᓂᐊᕕᒻᒥ ᐃᓅᓕᓴᖅᑕᐅᖃᑦᑕᓕᖅᓱᑕ ᑕᒪᓐᓇᐃᓕᖓᓚᐅᖅᑐᖅ. ᑕᐃᑲᓐᖓ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᐱᐅᔪᓐᓃᐸᓪᓕᐊᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊᓗ ᐅᖅᑰᓴᐅᑎᐅᑉ ᓱᓪᓗᓕᖏᑦ ᓴᕕᕋᔭᐃᑦ ᕿᕐᓂᖅᓯᕐ-ᓗᑎᒃ, ᓴᓗᒪᑎᓐᓇᓱᖃᑦᑕᓚᐅᖅᑕᕋᓗᐊᕗᑦ ᑭᓱᒧᑦ ᐅᖁᐃᔭᕈᓐᓇᕐᒪᖔᑦ.

     ᐃᑲᔪᖅᑕᐅᒐᓱᖃᑦᑕᓚᐅᖅᑐᒎᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᐃᓪᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᐃᑲᖅᑎᓕᒃ ᑲᒪᔨᐅᒻᒪᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᓱᒃᑲᐃᑦᑑᓂᖓᓄ ᖃᓄᐃᓕᔭᐅᕙᓪᓕᐊᖏᒻᒪᑦ ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᑦᑯᓐᓄ ᓵᖔᓚᐅᖅᑐᖓ ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᑎᖔᓕᖅᓱᒋᑦ ᑖᑦᓱᒥᖓ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑎᓐ-ᓂᒃ.

    ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᓕᕐᒪᑕ ᐃᐊᔅᐄᐆᖓᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᓕᕐᒪᑦ ᑕᑯᓇᖅᑕᐅᓕᕐᒪᑦ ᐃᖅᑲᓇᐃᔭᖅᑎᐅᔪᓄᑦ, ᑕᐃᒪᓕ ᐊᓂᔭᕆᐊ-ᖃᓚᐅᖅᑐᒍᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑎᓐᓂᒃ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᓴᖃᓐᖏᓇᑦᑕ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖏᓐᓄᑦ ᐃᓯᖅᑎᑕᐅᓚᐅᖅᑐᒍᑦ, ᑕᖅᑭᓄᑦ 8ᓄᑦ ᐃᓯᖅᓯᒪᔭᕆᐊᖃᖅᓱᑕ ᐱᔭᕆᐊᖅᑐᖅᓯᒪᓂᑯᖓᓄᑦ ᐊᕐᕌᒍᓕᒫ-ᐸᓗᒃ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓᓃᓚᐅᖅᑐᒍᑦ.

    ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᒫᓐᓇ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᓚᐅᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᓱᓪᓗᓕᖏᑦ ᒫᓐᓇ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᓐᓂᖏᒻᒪᑕ, ᒫ ᓐᓇ ᒪᓴᒃᑲᓐᓂᓕᕐᒥᔪᖅ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᑕᐅᓐᓇ ᐊᑖ ᐊᒻᒪᓗ ᑖᓐᓇ ᖁᕐᕕᐅᑉ ᑐᓐᖓᕕᖓ ᕿᔪᖓ ᐊᕿᑦᑐᑯᓘᓕᖅᑐᖅ ᑕᒡᕙ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᒋᐊᓐᖏᓚᖅ ᓱᓕ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᑯᓐᓂ, ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᑉᐹᓃᑦᑐᑎᒍᑦ ᑲᒪᒋᔭᐅᑦᓯᐊᖏᑦᑐᒍᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᑯᓐᓂ.

    ᑕᐃᒪᓕ ᐊᔭᐅᖅᑐᖅᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᒥᓇᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᑦ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗ-ᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᖃᓄᖅᑑᖅᑲᓂᖅᑕᐅᓗᑎᒃ ᐱᒋᐊᖅᑎᑕᐅᖅᓯᐊᒃ-ᑲᓐᓂᕆᐊᕐᓗᑎᒃ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖅ ᐃᒡᓗᖃᖅᑎᐅᔪᒍᑦ ᑕᑉᐹᓂ ᓄᓇᕗᒻᒥ ᐃᒃᓯᓐᓇᖂᖅᑰᔨᔪᒍᑦ ᕿᑐᕐᖓᖃᐅᖅᓱᑕ ᐃᕐᖑᑕ-ᖃᐅᖅᓱᖓ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑎᓐᓂ ᑕᒡᕙ ᒪᓴᓕᕐᒥᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᐃᒪ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅ-ᑐᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᑎᓕᓚᐅᖅᑕᒃᑲ ᑕᖅᑭᐅᓚ-ᐅᖅᑐᒥ, ᓱᓕ ᑕᒡᕙ ᑭᐅᔭᐅᓚᐅᓐᖏᑦᑐᖓ ᐅᒡᓗᒥᒧᑦ. ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᒪᓐᓇ ᐋᒻ ᐊᔭᐅᖅᑐᖅᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᒥᓇᖅᑐᐊ-ᓗᐃᑦ ᑕᑉᐸᒃᑯᐊ ᓄᓇᕗᒻᒥᐅᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖃᖅᑎᐅᔪᑎᒍᑦ ᑲᒪᒋᔭᐅᖅ-ᓯᐊᖏᓐᓂᕗᑦ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ, ᐱᓗᐊᖅᑐᒥ ᓱᕈᓯᖃᐅᖅᓱᓂ ᐃᒡᓗᖁ ᐅᖁᖅᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᐊᒻᒪ ᐊᓂᕐᓂᑲᓴᖃᖅᑕᖅᓱᓂ ᓈᒻᒪᖏᑦᑐᐊᓘᒪᑦ ᑕᐃᒪᓇᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᐃᒪ ᐱᑕᖃᐅᖅᑐᑦᓴᐅᒻᒥᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᑉᐹᓂ ᓄᓇᕘᒻᒥ ᐃᒡᓗᑦ ᐅᖁᐃᑦ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᕆᔭᐅᔪᑦ.

    ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ-ᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᐊᔭᐅᖅᑐᖅᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᔭᕋᓗᐊᒃᑲ ᓱᓕᑦᓯᐊᖅᓱᖓ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖅ ᐃᒡᓗᖃᖅᓱᖓ ᐅᐃᖃᕈᓐᓃᖅᓯᒪᓪ-ᓗᖓ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᓱᖓᓗ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᒃᓱᕈᓐᓇᖅᑐᐊᓘᒻᒪᑦ ᑲᒪᒋᔭᐅᑦᓯᐊᖏᓐᓂᕗᑦ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ.

    ᑖᓐᓇ ᑕᐃᑲᓐᖓᓂᒃ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᓕᓚᐅᖅᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᒻᒪᑦ ᐊᓕᐊᓇᐃᖑᓚᐅᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑭᓯᐊᓂᓕ ᒫᓐᓇ ᐅᓪᓗᒥ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑕ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᑖ ᒪᓴᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᓕᕆᕗᖅ, ᑕᐃᒪ ᐊᕐᕌᒍᓄᑦ ᖃᑦᓯᓄᑦ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᓂᐊᓕᕆᕗᒍᑦ ᐅᖅᑯᒃᑲᓐᓂᓕᖅᑐᑦᓴᐅᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᑕᒪᔾᔭ ᐊᔭᐅᖅᑐᖅᑕᐅᔾᔪᑎᒋᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᕐᔪᐊᖅᑕᕋ, ᐃᒡᓗᖃᖅᑐᑦ ᓇᒻᒥᓂ-ᖃᖅᑐᑎᒍᑦ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᐃᒃᓯᓐᓇᖂᖅᑰᔨᓂᕗᑦ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ.

    ᓱᓕᒃᑲᓐᓂᖃᐃ. ᐆᑮ, ᐋ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᓱᓂ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑕ-ᓘᓐᓃᑦ ᓯᓚᑖ ᒪᓐᓇ ᐊᒥᐊᖃᕈᓐᓃᓕᖅᑐᖅ ᑕᒪᔾᔭ ᑲᒪᒋᔭᐅ-ᑎᓐᓇᓱᒃᓱᒍᑦᑕᐅ ᐊᔪᕐᓇᖅᑐᐊᓘᒻᒥᒻᒪᑦ, ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕋᓐᔅᖃᑦᑕᓚᐅᖅ-ᓯᒪᒻᒥᔪᒎᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊ ᐱᔭᕆᐊᖃᓗᐊᓐᖑᐊᖅᑐᑦ ᐊᓯᔾᔨᖅ-ᑕᐅᖁᓪᓗᒋᑦ ᐊᔪᕐᓇᑦᓯᐊᕐᒪᑦ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕋᓐᔅᒥᒃ ᐊᑑᑎᔪᓐᓃᓚᐅᖅ-ᑐᒍᑦ, ᒫᓐᓇ ᐅᒡᓗᒥ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᑕᐅᓐᓇ ᓂᕿᒃᑯᕕᒃ ᑳᕐᑦᕗᐊᕐᑦᒥᒃ ᐸᐃᑉᐹᒥᒃ ᐊᓪᓕᖅᓱᖅᓯᒪᓪᓗᑎᒃ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᓕᖅᑐᖅ ᒪᓐᖏᖅᑐᕆ ᑕᑉᐹᓐᖓ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐸᐃᑉᐹ ᒪᓐᖏᖅᑐᕆᔭᕌᓐᖓᑦ ᐱᖅᓱᑎᒍ ᐊᓯᐊᓂᒃ ᐃᒡᓕᕆᖃᑦᑕᖅᐸᕋ ᑕᒡᕙ ᐃᒡᓗᑦᑎᓐᓂ ᑕᐃᒪᐃᓕᖓᕗᒍᑦ ᑕᒪᓇ ᒪᓐᖏᖅᑐᕆ ᓴᕕᕋᔭᐅᒻᒪᑦ ᒪᓐᖏᖅᑐᕆᖓ ᓂᕿᒧᑦ ᑕᓕᐅᒪᑎᓐᓇᓱᑦᑐᒍ ᐊᓪᓕᖅᓱᖃᑦ-ᑕᖅᑕᕗᑦ ᐸᐃᑉᐹᒥᒃ, ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᑐᑎᒍᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᓐᓂ ᐃᓱᒫᓗᒋᔭᐅᓐᖏᑉᐳᒍ, ᑕᒡᕙ ᐃᑲᔪᖅᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᒪᕗᖓ ᑕᒪᑐᒧᖓ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᖃᓂᕐᒪᓯᕐᒧᑦ ᓵᓚᐅᔪᒪᓐᖏᑦᓱᖓ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊ ᐱᔭᕆᐊᑐᓗᐊᓐᖑᐊᖅᑐᑦ ᑕᓕᐅᒪᑎᓐᓇᓱ ᐃᓛ ᓴᓗᒪᑎᓐᓇᓱᖃᑦᑕᖅᓱᒋᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᒥ-ᐅᖑᖃᑎᖒᑎᒍᑦ ᑕᓕᑎᓐᓇᓱᑦᑐᑎᒍᓪᓗ ᐊᓯᔾᔨᕆᐊᖃᓕᕇᖃᑦ-ᑕᖅᑐ ᑖᓐᓇ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᓚᐅᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑕᒫᓐᖓᑦ ᓱᕈᓕᕇᖃᑦᑕᕐ-ᒥᒻᒪᑦ.

    ᐅᓂᒃᑳᓐᓴᖃᑦᓯᐊᕈᓐᓃᕋᒪ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

     My name is Meeka Atagootak from Pond Inlet.

    In 2010, a water truck ran into our house. The house has been damaged ever since and has started to flood.

    We tried to have it repaired last year, but we started having health problems with skin conditions. We had to go constantly to the health centre. The house was deteriorating. The metal turned black. We try to keep it clean, but we haven't been successful.

    We got help from the housing corporation, but they are very slow in repairing anything, and nothing has been done to the building ever since.

    The staff of the Hamlet of Pond Inlet investigated the building, and we had to move out of our house. We moved to government housing for eight months. It has been a difficult year. Things moved slowly, so we stayed there at the government housing for a year.

    Right now, they aren't working on the pipes and the bottom part of the building, the wood foundation, is very soft where the toilet area is in the bathroom. The housing corporation is looking into this at this time, but it would be very encouraging if you can push and get decisions when these types of things happen for us who are living in the north.

    We have many children and grandchildren in my home. It's an emergency. In the past month, it has been an emergency because I haven't got any response about my urgent requests. The people who are living in the north should really be given a priority in consideration of this type of thing. It's not acceptable to be living in that condition.

    There is mould in pretty much every house up there. Because of that, the housing corporation should be encouraged to help communities. I am now widowed and I have nobody to help me. It's been a struggle when nobody is really taking care of us.

    Since the collision happened, it's been a slow process. Today the bottom of the building is flooded again. I don't know how long we're going to wait to have that repaired.

    I encourage you to help the people who own their own homes in the north. With owning our own home, sometimes the paint wears off around the house. We cannot do our own painting. The emergency cases especially should be handled promptly. We don't have any insurance to cover the repair.

    We have cardboard that's being used. I put the cardboard around where the mouldy parts of the building are. That's how we are in our home. There are rusting metal pipes, which are hard to keep clean. We just cover it up with cardboard.

    Those of us who own our homes are neglected by the housing corporation, so we get sick, and those are the emergency cases. We try hard to keep our homes clean, but sometimes they have to be replaced. Once you replace them, they easily deteriorate again.

     Thank you.

[English]

     Thank you very much, Elder Atagootak, and thank you for coming all the way from Pond Inlet to give your testimony today.

    We will now go to our second speaker, Merrill Harris, reeve of the Municipal District of Taber.

    Mr. Harris, you have five minutes.

     Honourable chairman and members of the committee, as we begin today, I would like to acknowledge that the land the MD of Taber is on and the lands in the projects I'm going to describe today are Treaty 7 lands. I acknowledge those whose ancestors walked and lived on this land.

    We would also like to acknowledge that as part of the process with the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, we have had to have consultations with numerous indigenous groups regarding the Horsefly emergency spillway, which I'm going to try to describe here today.

    I believe your discussion today is around emergency preparedness. I want to thank my own MP, Mr. Martin Shields, MP for the Bow River riding, who has invited me to explain what the Southern Regional Stormwater Drainage Committee is doing to prepare for emergencies.

    In 2010, southern Alberta experienced a one-in-a-hundred-years rain event in both the eastern and the western portions of the province. In 2011, while the rainfall amounts were less than what we experienced in 2010, there was significant flooding in many hectares or acres of land. These events led to the discussion between the reeve of the municipal district and the chairman of the St. Mary River Irrigation District on how the main canal of the irrigation district could be used as a conduit to move this excess water off farmland and minimize the effects of flooding.

    As you might know, an irrigation district is designed to deliver water to farmland and not as a means to accept flood waters. Irrigation canals get smaller as they move east, as they deliver water to farms along the way. Drainage canals need to get bigger as they move east to accept more drainage water.

    A quick example of the size and amount of water that's carried in this canal is where the canal leaves the Chin Reservoir, southwest of Taber. It has a capacity of about 110 cubic metres per second, or roughly 29,000 gallons of water per second. When the canal reaches west of Medicine Hat, Alberta, its capacity has been reduced to about 8.5 cubic metres per second, or about 2,000 gallons per second, so the canal significantly decreases in size over that 250-kilometre stretch of main canal.

    The Municipal District of Taber spearheaded the drainage project and brought onside the counties of Lethbridge, Warner, Cardston, 40 Mile and Cypress, as well as the towns of Taber, Coaldale and Bow Island, the city of Medicine Hat, the St. Mary River Irrigation District and Taber Irrigation District, Alberta Environment and Parks, Alberta Transportation and Alberta Agriculture. This has been the makeup of our committee since 2013.

    The committee was able to secure funding to do a regional drainage study for the area, which encompasses over two million acres of land. Over 500,000 acres of that land in the study area is very high-value, irrigated land, producing diverse crops such as potatoes, sugar beets, seed canola, alfalfa, timothy hay, vegetables and numerous other specialty crops that are the economic engine of southern Alberta.

    The study was completed in 2014 and identified seven projects that would help reduce the flooding risks in the area. The total cost for all of the projects in 2014 dollars was about $152 million. With inflation and so on, the estimated cost for all seven projects is now about $169 million.

     The Horsefly emergency spillway was identified as a top project to start with, at a point about 10 miles southeast of the town of Taber. The St. Mary River Irrigation District main canal is closest to the Oldman River, a place where the excess drainage water can be returned to a natural river basin.

    Also at this point on the main canal is the first downsizing in the canal since leaving the Stafford Reservoir, south of Chin, Alberta. The capacity at this point is 110 cubic metres per second, and the plan is to divert about 47 cubic metres per second out of the main canal and into the diversion or spillway. This will leave the main canal able to pick up more drainage water as the canal continues eastward.

    In reality, this project has two purposes. The first is to drain flood waters off private land, using the SMRID main canal as the delivery method. The second is to protect the St. Mary River Irrigation District main canal from a breach or a washout by diverting the excess water back to the river.

    This main canal is the lifeblood of southern Alberta irrigated agriculture. Economic devastation would happen if the canal's ability to deliver water was lost for a growing season, or even part of a growing season.

    Again, the two purposes of the project are to drain flood water off the land and to protect the main canal's ability to deliver irrigation water in an efficient and timely manner.

     In the spring of 2018, we had another flooding event. There was a lot of snow over the winter and a quick melt. We almost lost the main canal. It was almost breached by the volume of flood waters entering that main canal. It was the worst overland flooding that the MD of Taber had ever experienced. We were in a state of local emergency for 50 days due to the flooding.

    A call for tenders for phase 1 of this project has now been put out. That closes on October 13 of this year, and we still hope to get construction started this year. Phases 2 and 3 of the project are in the engineering design stages, and we hope to get those tendered and constructed starting next year.

    I'm sure that I'm over my five minutes already, so I would take questions anywhere along the line.

    Thank you, Mr. Harris.

    We'll now go to Mr. Eby from the Pelmorex Corporation.

     Sir, you have five minutes.

     Thank you, Mr. Chair. As introduced, I'm Kurt Eby. I work at Pelmorex Corporation. I think most of you would know us more by our popular brand names The Weather Network and MétéoMédia in Quebec. These are our primary businesses.

    What I'm here to talk about is another thing that we lead and do for the country. In 2010, as a condition of our broadcasting licence, we built what we call the National Alert Aggregation and Dissemination system, or the NAAD system, which is the technical component of the national public alerting system. Originally it processed alerts that were distributed on TV and radio, so we're talking about Amber Alerts and alerts for tornadoes, severe thunderstorms, flooding and forest fires. I'm sure everyone is probably familiar with these now, especially because in 2018 we launched the wireless alerting component of that system. That's increased its presence in people's hands and in people's homes.

    We're effectively the technical vendor of the alerting system. We have two roles. One is the technology. We take direction from authorized government agencies—basically all the emergency management organizations in the provinces, as well as Environment and Climate Change Canada and Public Safety Canada—on technical upgrades to the system. We are also the system administrator, which means we have agreements and manage the accounts of every province and territory and Environment and Climate Change Canada right now. That's what we're here to talk about.

    We manage those accounts based on who has the jurisdiction to issue an emergency alert. Environment Canada issues tornado alerts anywhere in the country. Most public safety jurisdiction falls to the provinces and the territories, which is why we have contracts and accounts with the provinces and territories, and they decide who can and cannot issue alerts within those jurisdictions, and for what. There is a mix of ways in which those are administered. Saskatchewan has many issuers. In Ontario, the OPP issues Amber Alerts and active shooter or dangerous person alerts on behalf of other police agencies, and then everything else is through the provincial EMO. It varies from province to province, for a number of reasons.

    On a jurisdictional basis, we can't give an account to a police agency, because if you were an emergency management organization for a province and all of a sudden a police agency started issuing alerts and you didn't know, obviously they would be jumping over that jurisdiction.

    What we are here to discuss today is something we have been discussing internally and with some of our colleagues and those we work with: It's the concept of Pelmorex taking on administration of accounts for first nations that want them, for which we would get direction from the federal or provincial governments or some combination of the two. This is where we're uncertain.

    We understand that first nations do have an amount of sole jurisdiction. First nations and indigenous affairs fall largely under the federal government; right now public safety on first nations falls largely under the provincial government. That's something we wanted to start talking about to see how we could do that. We would be taking on greater responsibility for administering accounts and helping folks get up and running on the system.

    The alert system is very customizable, so any issuer can have permissions set for them. Those might say that they could issue alerts for only, say, forest fires and floods and that police agencies would handle other types of alerts, or something like that. There is a lot of customization available. Definitely one thing to keep in mind is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution in any account across the country. We see a variety of approaches used and we help to facilitate those.

    This is something I'm really looking forward to speaking with the committee members about.

    Thank you.

     Thank you, Mr. Eby.

    We'll now go to the questions in the first round, starting with the Conservatives.

     Mr. Shields, you have six minutes.

    Thank you.

    I appreciate all the witnesses being here today.

    I think that final comment made by Mr. Eby—“no one size fits all”—is what we're really hearing in the variety of witnesses we have here today when we're talking about emergency management and communication.

    It's great to have you witnesses here.

    As Reeve Harris mentioned in terms of his area just to the north of him, while people remember the flooding that happened in 2013 in Calgary, what they obviously don't know or remember is that the flood water went past Calgary and hugely affected the Siksika Nation and the Eastern Irrigation District. They got together afterwards and built an emergency dam to take care of flood water in that area, and that has now been completed.

    Mr. Harris, you're an agriculture producer, right?

    Yes, that's correct, Martin.

    You understand this in the sense of a producer as well as in the sense of a person in municipal government. As you organized, I know that you were involved in emergency management. There are two pieces to my question.

    First, how did emergency management work and how did it resolve the issue at the time? Then, once you built the plan, in working with the other groups that weren't directly on the land, such as Kainai Nation to the west of the Blackfoot Confederacy, there was consultation that followed up with them as well.

    Could you do those two parts?

    As a result of the flooding in 2010 and 2011, the council—I wasn't on council at the time—brought together the Municipal District of Taber and the counties of Lethbridge, Warner, Forty Mile and Cypress, because we were all affected one way or the other by this overland flooding. As I said, this committee has worked tirelessly in the past eight to 10 years to get this project off the ground, and we're finally there.

    As far as the indigenous part of it goes, we have consulted with numerous first nations to get their approval and their blessing on doing this project, and they've given their blessing to it. They are interested in being part of the construction part of it, if that's possible, probably in the subtrades. We have been keeping them in mind throughout this whole process.

    The process you're referring to, in a sense, is returning the water to its natural watercourse, which is the Oldman River. One of the things that people may not understand—and that you probably do, from living in that area—is that returning water or flood waters being in a river basin actually keeps the river environment healthier.

    From your experience, is that something that you could relate to from what you know?

    Yes. The St. Mary River main canal kind of acts as a dam through southern Alberta. It blocks somewhat the natural flows of water back to the river basin. By doing this project, in flood years we're returning water back to the natural river basin that is held up as a result of the St. Mary River main canal as it goes across the land. It kind of impedes the natural drainage flows, and most farmers don't like their land being flooded, especially when there's a crop on it, so the idea is to get that water off the land and fields as quickly as possible. This emergency spillway helps get the water back more quickly to where the water would naturally flow.

    You mentioned a bit about agriculture. From my understanding, 4% of the land in Alberta produces upwards of 20% of the agriculture GDP. This is a critical aspect when we're talking about food security in this country. This is a critical project.

    Yes. As I mentioned earlier, there are lots of potatoes grown in this area, and sugar beets, seed canola, timothy and all those kinds of high-value crops. A potato crop or a sugar beet crop, for example, doesn't take long to die or to become unmarketable when it's under water.

     We were doing a harvest the other day for potatoes. When the potatoes are on the side of those pivot track ruts, they're often very soft and gooey. One of the jobs of the graders is to pull those kinds of potatoes out of the line, because they're unmarketable. If your whole field is under water, your potato crop becomes unmarketable pretty quickly when it's under water like that.

     As the only area left in Canada that's actually growing sugar beets and has a sugar factory, this is the only place left where that sugar can actually be refined.

    That's correct. Taber has the only beet sugar refining plant left in all of Canada. The other growing areas have all shut down over the years. We produce between 8% and 10% of the Canadian sugar market demands, and most of it is marketed here in western Canada. Some of it gets down into the U.S. in TRQs, but most of it is here for the market in western Canada, and it's the only place left in Canada that produces domestically grown sugar.

    Thank you for explaining your emergency management. I really appreciate that. Thank you, Reeve.

    You bet. Thank you, MP Shields.

    Thank you, Mr. Shields.

    We'll go to Mrs. Atwin for six minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    Thank you to our witnesses today, and to our committee members for joining.

    I have a few questions that might be a little all over the place, so I'll try to direct them to each of you individually. Maybe I'll start with Mr. Eby.

    You mentioned that there are customization options for these kinds of alerts. Has there been a request at all to have indigenous languages incorporated to ensure that everyone is able to access these alerts?

    I can't remember a request for it. The NAAD system has supported four indigenous languages since it was built in 2010, those being Cree, Dene, Inuinnaqtun and Inuktitut. I believe the Inuktitut feature has been used for some of the test alerts in Nunavut, but the others have not been used in a live alert.

    Thank you very much.

     Mr. Harris, you mentioned consultations with indigenous communities when you're preparing, developing and rolling out projects. I'm wondering if you could give us a little bit more of an explanation about what that looks like and if you have advice for other municipalities on how to have a successful engagement to include indigenous voices.

    As I said earlier, the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, which we have to work with, required.... We consulted with the following Treaty 6 nations: the Samson Cree Nation, the Louis Bull nation, Montana First Nation and the Ermineskin Cree Nation. We also consulted with, from Treaty 7, the Stoney-Nakoda Nations, the Tsuut'ina, the Siksika and the Piikani nations, the Foothills Ojibway First Nation and the Métis Nation of Alberta. They were all given the information on what we were doing and were invited to come down here. Three of them actually visited the site and gave their blessing to what was happening here.

    As I said, some of the ones who were here who provided letters of response indicated they'd be interested in participating on the construction side of things if that was ever possible, so once the tender is awarded, they'll be notified of who got the general contract, and then they can see if they can work with the general contractor to provide labour, skills and resources in the construction process.

    Excellent. Thank you.

    Are you seeing the same level of preparation in neighbouring municipalities? How can the Government of Canada best support you in these efforts?

    As I said, there were seven projects that were identified in the overall drainage study that was done, and they span across the region from Lethbridge all the way to Medicine Hat. This project is the one that's closest, as I said, to a natural river course, which is the Oldman River, but there are other projects. Three of them, as I can see in front of me, are actually in Cypress County, closer to Medicine Hat. One of those projects is already being done by the St. Mary River Irrigation District, and one of the other projects that's closer to Taber is being done by the St. Mary River Irrigation District, so that's three of the seven projects under way now.

    What I found is that whenever we met with our members of Parliament, MP Shields and MP Glen Motz from the Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner riding, they very strongly encouraged us to work collaboratively, regionally. It carries more weight when you can work together. We do have a very good working relationship with all of our partners in getting this project done.

    Excellent. Thank you.

    My last question is for Madame Atagootak.

    Qujannamiik for being here with us today.

    I really would like to tap into your knowledge. In your experience, what are the kinds of climate change impacts that you're seeing in your community, and how can the Government of Canada better support more resilient communities in the north?

    We were talking about the different housing needs and some of the materials being used, perhaps. Could you talk generally about what you're seeing on the ground in your community?

     [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐆ, ᐅᕙᓐᓅᑦ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᓯᓚᒧᑦ ᐅᖅᑰᓯᕙᓪᓕᐊᓂᖓᓄᑦ ᐊᑦᑐᖅᑕᐅᓯᒪᖃᑦᑕᕐᒥᔪᒍᑦ ᓂᕐᔪᑎᕗᑦ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ ᐊᒻᒪ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᐃᑦ ᑕᐅᓐᓇ ᑐᓐᖓᕕᖓ ᓱᕋᑉᐸᓪᓕᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᓪᓕ ᓱᕋᑉᐸᓪᓕᐊᑎᓪᓗᒍᓕ ᓱᕋᑉᐸᓪᓕᐊᖏᓐᓇᖅᑰᔨᒻᒪᑦ ᑐᓐᖓᕕᖓ ᑕᐅᓐᓇ ᓄᓇ ᐊᐅᑉᐸᓪᓕᐊᓂᖓ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ. ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᑐᑎᒍᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᐱᒋᐊ ᐊᑦᓱᕉᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᔪᒥᓇᖅᑐᒻᒪᕆᐊᓘᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᐊᒻᒪ ᑲᒪᒋᔭᐅᑦᓯᐊᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᒥᓇᖅᓱᑎᒃ ᐃᑦᓯᓐᓇᑰᓗᐊᕐᓂᕗᑦ ᑕᒃᐹᓂ ᐃᓪᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᓯᓚᒧᑦ ᐅᖅᑰᓯᕙᓪᓕᐊᓂᖅ ᑐᓐᖓᕕᓐᓄᑦ ᓈᒻᒪᒍᓐᓃᕈᑕᐅᖃᑦᑕᕐᒪᑦ, ᐃᓕᖅᑮᓪᓕᕙᓪᓕᐊᓪᓗᓂ ᐃᒡᓗ ᑖᓐᓇ ᑐᓐᖓᕕᖓ ᐊᐅᒃᐸᓪᓕᐊᓂᖓ ᐱᔾᔪᑎᒋᓪᓗᒍ, ᑭᐅᑦᓯᐊᓐᖏᓚᕋᓗᑭᐊᖅ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

     This climate change definitely has changed especially the animal harvesting seasons, and the foundations of the buildings started deteriorating because the ground is rotting and deteriorating. This should be an emergency. It shouldn't be abandoned; it should be dealt with right away. There should be emergency preparedness for those.

    All of the foundations of the buildings are damaged by the climate change because the permafrost melted towards the community, so the foundations have deteriorated from the climate change.

[English]

     Thank you very much.

    That's all, Mr. Chair, for me.

    Thank you, Ms. Atwin.

    Mrs. Gill now has the floor for six minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    I'd like to begin by asking Mr. Eby a question about alerts.

    Mr. Eby, you explained quite nicely that it was difficult to take action with a number of players and that improvements could be made to the way things are done. I'd like to know what is different in indigenous and northern communities. Obviously, they don't have access to the same services and infrastructure as other communities.

    What changes would you suggest to the committee to make collaboration more effective?

    Thank you.

    It's not really an issue of what's different. What I was trying to say is there are different approaches across the country.

    Saskatchewan and Alberta, for instance, are the only provinces that give access to municipalities to issue alerts. It's really more tightly controlled and centralized in most places. This is not necessarily an issue about first nations versus non-first nations.

    From our standpoint, we saw the jurisdiction was not clear for us and we thought this was an opportunity for some more communities, and first nation communities especially, that might be a little more vulnerable, in particular to flooding and forest fires. They would want the autonomy to use the system in some instances, and we wanted to facilitate that. What we need is direction, either from the provinces or from the government, to help move this along.

    Mr. Eby, my question wasn't in any way intended to pit one person or group against another. It was more technical in nature. You say that you're working with the communities and that they will issue an alert.

    Do you see any differences in the issuing of alerts?

    What challenges do communities that don't have exactly the same resources as others face?

    To issue an emergency alert, you need an Internet connection. We provide an interface that a duty officer or someone would log in to. You type in where it's going to go and what the message will look like, and that's really it.

    Obviously, there's an issue in the sense that you have to have an LTE connection on your phone to receive an alert. Some first nations would be more remote, and I hear they don't have very good cellphone coverage.

    Exactly.

    Thank you very much, Mr. Eby.

    Actually, that's what I wanted to validate with you. I wanted to bring this to light, because that's exactly what's happening in my home. We have no cell coverage at all. When there are storms, like what happened recently with Hurricane Fiona, people are without those services, so it's very difficult to reach people.

    Mr. Chair, if I have any time left, I would like to ask Elder Meeka Atagootak a question.

    Ms. Atagootak, my question is along the same lines as the one asked earlier by my colleague Ms. Atwin, and it concerns the current situation in the community and their needs.

    Do you think climate accidents are happening more and more frequently?

    You are appearing before the committee as an individual. How do you feel about the help you receive, and what is the margin between the help you receive and what you would like to see for the community as a whole?

    Thank you.

     [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋᒻ, ᐋ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᑐᐊᕕᓐᓇᖅᑐᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᓇᓱᒃᓱᓂ ᓲᕐᓗ ᒫᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᓈᒻᒪᒍᓐᓃᑲᓐᓂᕐᒪᑦ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅᑐᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᑎᑦᓯᓇᓱᑦᑐᖓ, ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐋ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᒃᑯᑦ ᓈᒻᒪᔪᓐᓇᖏᓐᓂᖏᓐᓄᑦᑕᐅᖅ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᑦᓲᔭᕆ-ᐊᖃᖃᑦᑕᕋᑦᑕ ᐅᒥᐊᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᑎᑭᓛᖅ ᑎᑭᓐᓂᐊᖅᓱᑎᒃ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐊᐅᔭᓐᖑᑉᐸᑦ ᐃᓚᑦᓴᖅ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓗᒪ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖓ ᐅᒥᐊᕐᔪᐊᒃᑰᕆᐊᖃᓕᖅᐸᑦᓱᓂ ᐊᐅᔭᓐᖑᖅ-ᓰᓕᕐᒥᓗᖓ. ᑕᒪᓐᓇ ᐱᑕᖃᒃᑲᓐᓂᕆᐊᖃᓪᓚᑦᑖᖅᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑕᑉᐹᓂ ᓄᓇᑦᑎᓐᓂ ᓄᓇᓖᑦ ᒥᑭᑦᑑᑕᐅᓂᖅᓴᓂ ᐃᓱᒪᒋᔭᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐ-ᓇᖁᓪᓗᒍ ᐃᒡᓗᓄ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᕆᔭᐅᔪᓄᑦ ᓇᓪᓕᐅᒃᑯᒫᒃᓴᓂᒃ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐃᒡᓘᑉ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖏᓐᓄᑦ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᐊ ᓈᒻᒪᒡᔫᒥᓗᑎᒃ ᐱᑕᖃᓕᖅᑎᑦ-ᓯᖁᔨᒪᓇᖅᑐᒡᓛᓘᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᓱᓂ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᓂᒃ ᐱᑕᖃᐅᓐᖏᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᑦᓲᔮᓗᒋᐊᖃᖃᑦᑕᖅᑐᒍᑦ. ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᒃ

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    On emergency preparedness, for example, today my house is unliveable, and I would like the housing corporations to be encouraged to help.

    There are lot of [Technical difficulty—Editor] are neglected by the housing corporation. We have to get our parts from sealift, and it would be wise to encourage the housing corporations. Especially most neglected are the people who own their own homes.

    Thank you.

    Thank you, Mrs. Gill.

    Go ahead, Ms. Idlout. You have six minutes.

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᒃ ᐃᒃᓯᕙᐅᑖᖅ, ᐋ ᓯᕗᕐᓕᕐᒥ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐅᓂᒃᑳᕆᐊᖅᑐᓵᖅᑐᐃᑦ ᐅᕙᑦᑎᓐᓄᑦ ᖁᔭᓕᔪᒪᕙᑦᓯ ᑕᒪᑦᓯ ᐋ ᐅᓂᒃᑳᖅᑕᓯ ᐱᒻᒪᕆᐊᓘᒻᒪᑕ ᖃᐅᔨᒪᕙᒌᖅᑎᑦᓯᖃᑕᐅᔪᒪᑐᐃᓐᓇᖅᓱᖓ ᐋ ᐊᑕᒍᑦᑕᖅ ᑖᒃᓱᒧᖓ ᐃᓕᓐᓄᑐᐊᖅ ᐊᐱᖅᓱᕐᓂᐊᕋᒪ ᑐᑭᓯᑎᑦᐹᓪᓕᕈᒪᒐᒃᑭᑦ ᖃᓄᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᐋ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐅᓂᒃᑲᐅᑎᒋᔭᑎᑦ ᐋ ᐅᖃᐅᓯᕆᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᒐᒃᑭᑦ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᐊᐱᕆᕙᒋᑦ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᒪᓕᕋᓕᐅᖅᑎᕐᔪᐊᖑᖃᑎᒃᑲ ᑐᑭᓯᐅᒪᖅᑰᖏᒻᒪᑕ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐋ ᓂᐅᕕᕐᕕᖃᓐᖏᓗᐊᕐᒪᖅᑲᐃ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐃᒡᓗᓂᒃ ᐋᖅᑭᑦᓱᐃᓂᐊᕐᓗᓂ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊᒡᓕ ᐋ ᐃᒡᓗᒥᓐᓂᒃ ᐋᖅᑭᑦᓱᐃᒋᐊᕐᓂᐊᖅᐸᑕ ᓄᓇᓯᐅᑎᒥᓐᓅᕐᓗᑎᒃ ᐊᖅᑯᑎᒧᑦ ᑕᐃᑯᖓ ᓂᐅᕕᕆᐊᑐᐃᓐᓇᕐᓗᑎᒃ ᐱᔪᓐᓇᕐᒪᑕᓕ , ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᓕ ᐋ ᓇᒥᓂᖃᖅᑎᒡᓗᑎᑦ ᑕᐃᒫᑎᒋ ᐊᔪᕐᓇᓐᖏᑎᒋᒻᒪᖔᑦ ᐅᓂᒃᑲᐅᑎᔪᓐᓇᖅᐱᐅᒃ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    Thank you, Chair.

    First of all, thank you very much to the witnesses who are present here today. Your comments are very important.

    I just want to ask Meeka Atagootak to clarify what you're talking about here today as a witness.

    I asked you.... We parliamentarians here, if we have to repair our homes, would go to the local hardware store and buy their products. It's not the case for us. Perhaps you can explain a bit more how everything is more out of reach.

[English]

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋ, ᓴᖅᑭᕆᐊᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᖅᑕᕋ, ᓲᕐᓗ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᑎᐅᒡᓗᖓ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖏᓐᓂᒃ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᔭᕆᐊᖃᓚᐅᕐᒪᑦ ᓄᑦᑎᖅᓯᒪ-ᓕᖅᑎᓪᓗᑕ ᐃᒡᓘᑉ ᐊᓯᐊᓄᑦ, ᐅᒥᐊᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᑎᑭᑦ-ᑐᖃᖅᐸᑦ ᑕᐅᓐᓇ ᐊᑖ ᐃᓐᓯᓖᓴᓐᒥᒃ ᐱᑕᖃᓐᖏᒻᒪᑦ ᒥᑦᓯᒪᑕᓕ ᓄᖑᓯᒪᒻᒪᑕ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓘᑉ ᐃᑭᐊᕐᒥᖓᓅᕆᐊᓖᑦ ᐃᓂᓯᓖᓴᓐ-ᖑᓂᕋᖅᑕᐅᔪᑦ ᐱᑕᖃᓐᖏᒻᒪᑕ, ᐊᐅᔭᓐᖑᖅᓰᓚᐅᖅᓱᑕ ᐅᒥᐊᕐᔪᐊᖅ ᑎᑭᒻᒪᑦ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᔪᓐᓇᖅᓯᑕᐃᓐᓇᖅᓱᓂ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᓱᒃᑲᐃᑎᒋᔪᒍᑦ ᑕᑉᐹᓂ ᓄᓇᕗᒻᒥᐅᑕᐅᓪᓗᑕ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᑦᓲᔮᓗᖃᑦ-ᑕᖅᑐᒍᒡᓕ ᐊᐃᑦᓯᑐᐃᓐᓇᕐᓗᑕ ᐱᔪᓐᓇᖏᓐᓇᑦᑕ ᓇᐅᒃ ᐱᑕᖃᖅᐸᑦ ᐄ ᐱᔪᓐᓇᖅᑐᒍᑦ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐱᑕᖃᓐᖏᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᑎᑭᓴᐃᔪᖃᓚᐅᖅᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᐅᒥᐊᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᖃᖓᑕᓲᒃᑯᓘᓐᓃᑦ ᑎᑭᑎᑦᓯᔪᖃᑕᐃᓐᓇᓲᖑᒻᒪᑦ, ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᒃ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    I can say, when I own my own home, that I had to wait for my housing supplies after we had moved to another home because it was unliveable. By the time the ship arrived, the house foundation had already deteriorated, so the supplies that we ordered were not feasible.

    Everything is a very slow process, and we have to wait for a very long time for certain things to be repaired. We have absolutely nothing locally, and supplies cannot even be shipped by airplanes.

    Thank you.

[English]

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᑦᑕᐅᖅ, ᐅᓇ ᓇᐃᑦᑐᒥᒃ ᐅᖃᐅᓯᕆᐱᓪᓚᖅᑲᐅᒻᒥᒐᕕᐅᒃ, ᓲᕐᓗ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕆᓐᔅᓕᕆᓂᖅ, ᑕᒪᓐᓇ ᑐᑭᓯᒋᐊᖅᑎᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᖅᐱᒌᑦ ᖃᓄᖅ ᐱᕕᑐᒻᒪᖔᖅ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕆᓐᔅᖃᕋᓱᑦᓱᓂᓗ ᐊᒻᒪᓗ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕆᓐᔅ ᐃᑲᔪᖅᓯᔪᓐᓇᕋᓗᐊᕐᒪᖔᑦᑕ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᓕᖁᑎᓕᓐᓄᑦ ᐋ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐊᖏᕐᕋᕆᔭᒥᓐᓂᒃ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᑐᑭᓯᒋᐊᕐᓇᖅᑎᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᖅᐱᐅᒃ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    Thank you.

    You had briefly stated about the insurance. Can you clarify more about the insurance and how hard it is to get insurance and how hard it is to make a claim, for example, with your home insurance?

[English]

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᖅᑕᕋ, ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕋᓐᔅᖃᑦᑕᓚᐅᖅᓯᒪᒐᓗᐊ-ᕋᑦᑎᒍ ᓲᖃᐃᒻᒪ ᐃᓐᓱᐊᕋᓐᔅᖃᕈᓂ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᑐᒃᓯᕋᖅᑕᕗᑦ ᐱᔪᓐᓇᕐᓂᖅᓴᐅᒐᑦᑎᒍ, ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐃᓐᓯᐊᕋᓐᔅᖃᕋᓗᐊᖅᓱᑕ ᑕᑯᓇᖅᑕᐅᒐᒥ ᐅᓇ ᓈᒻᒪᒻᒪᑦ ᖁᔭᓇ ᐱᔪᓐᓃᕐᓕ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᑐᓗᖅᑕᕈᑎᒋᖃᑦᑕᕋᑦᑎᒍ ᑕᒃᐹᓂ ᓇᓪᓕᐅᒃᑯᒫᖃᑦᓯᐊᕋᓗᐊᖅᓱᓂ ᐊᑑᑎᔮᖏᑦᑐᖅ ᑖᓐᓇ ᓇᓪᓕᐅᒃᑯᒫᖅ ᑐᑦᓯᕋᐅᑎᒋᔭᒪ ᐃᒡᓘᑉ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖓᓄᑦ ᐱᔪᒪᓪᓗᓂ ᐊᑑᑎᖅᑰᔨᓐᖏᑦᓯᐊᕐᒪᑦ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᑐᓕᖅᑎᑕᐅᒃᓯᐊᒃᑲᓐᓂᕐᓗᓂ ᑕᐃᒃᑯᓄᖓ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᐃᓱᒪᓇᒻᒪᕆᑦᑐᖅ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᖓᑦ ᑐᓗᖅᑕᖃᑦᑕᓕᓚᐅᕋᑦᑕ ᐃ, ᓇᓪᓕᐊᒃᑯᒫᒥᒃ ᐃᓱᒫᓗᒍᓐᓃᖄᑎᒋᓯᒪᔪᒍᑦ ᑕᒃᐹᓂ ᓄᓇᕘᒻᒥᐅᑕᐅᓪᓗᑕ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    Yes. We have insurance for our house, of course. We can get our supplies upon request, but when they look over our insurance, they see that what we actually need for the homes doesn't apply in our insurance, so it is completely unusable and invalid for the specific needs in the north. Therefore, the housing corporation should be informed of what kind of insurance would be covered under them.

[English]

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐅᓇ ᑭᖑᓪᓕᖅᐹᕆᓂᐊᖅᑕᕋ ᐃᓕᓐᓄᑦ ᐊᐱᕆᑲᐃᓐᓇᕐᓂᐊᖅ-ᑕᕋ ᑖᒃ ᐅᖃᑲᑕᖅᑲᐅᒐᕕᑦ ᓲᕐᓗ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᑲᔪᖅᓯᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᓪᓗᒋᑦ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖁᑎᓕᓐᓂᒃ, ᐋ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᑐᑭᓯᒋᐊᖅᑎᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᖅᐱᒌᑦ ᖃᓄᐃᑉᒪᑦ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᒃᓱᕉᑎᒋᓗᐊᕐᒪᒑᖅᐱᑦ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᑲᔪᕈᓐᓇᖅᓯᒃᑲᓐᓂᖅᐹᓪᓕᖁᒡᓗᒋᑦ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᓕᓐᓂᒃ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    This is my last question to you. You said earlier that the housing corporation needs to assist. Can you clarify that a bit more? What do you think we should recommend to CMHC?

[English]

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᑖᓐᓇ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᑎᐅᓪᓗᖓ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᔭᕆᐊᖃᖅ-ᓱᓂ ᐊᑯᓂᐊᓗᒃ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᓇᕐᒪᑦ, ᓲᕐᓗ ᒫᓐᓇ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᕋᓗᐊᕐᒪ ᑕᒡᕙ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅᑐᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᑎᑦᓯᓇᓱᑦᑐᖓ ᓱᓕ ᐅᒡᓗᒥᒧᓄᑦ ᐱᑕᖃᓕᓐᖏᓚᖅ, ᐊᑯᓂᐊᓗᒃ ᑭᐅᔪᓐᓇᖃᑦᑕᖏᑦᑐᑦ ᑕᓚᐴᑲ-ᑕᐃᓐᓇᖃᑦᑕᓕᖅᓱᒋᑦ ᑕᒡᕙ ᐱᓕᕆᐊᖑᓂᐊᖅᑐᕉ, ᓱᓕ ᑕᐃᒪ ᐱᑕᖃᓕᕈᓐᓇᓐᖏᓚᖅ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᖃᓄᖅᑑᖅᑕᐅᒃᑲᓐᓂ-ᕈᒥᓇᒻᒪᕆᑦᑑᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᕐᔪᐊᒃᑯᑦ ᑐᐊᕕᕐ-ᓇᖅᑐᖃᓪᓚᕆᑦᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᐊᑑᑎᑦᓯᐊᖅᑐᒥᒃ ᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᐱᔭᐅᑲᐅ-ᑎᒋᔪᓐᓇᖅᑐᒥᒃ ᐱᔪᓐᓇᖅᓯᖁᔪᒥᓇᓪᓛᓗᒻᒪᑦ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    My house needs lots of repairs and we have to wait for a very long time for the supplies, although it's an emergency case. They don't even answer us for a very long time. They just promise us they will do something about it, and they don't. I wish they would be encouraged more about our need to get our buildings repaired. It would be very useful if they could have everything ready for us when we have our emergency situations.

[English]

    Thank you, Ms. Idlout.

    Colleagues, I can offer a shortened second round. It would be three minutes for Conservatives and Liberals, and one and a half minutes for the Bloc and the NDP, if you wish to avail yourself of that.

    I see Mr. Vidal is interested, so, Mr. Vidal, why don't you kick it off for three minutes?

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    I want to thank all of the witnesses for taking time to be here with us today. With my limited time I am going to focus on just one question for Mr. Eby.

    Sir, you talked about the NAAD system and the alerts and authorizations, etc. As a former mayor, I've been through that process of having to go through the authorizations for who could issue those alerts for our little city in northern Saskatchewan. You went on to talk about accounts for first nations communities. In my riding, which encompasses the northern half of Saskatchewan, there are very many unique circumstances of remoteness, including rural and remote communities and first nations communities. My colleague Mr. Shields talked about one size not fitting all.

    In the context of pursuing this idea of the individual first nations being able to be part of this system, would one of the benefits be that it could be more localized with content very specific to their community? In a more general sense, what would be the benefits and the barriers that you would see in advancing your system into the localized efforts of each first nation?

    Thank you for the question. It's a good one.

    To clarify, Alberta does have some first nations that do have access to use it, but as far as I understand no other province does.

    The benefit is just to have the local emergency management organizations on the ground issuing the alerts and having that autonomy to do so.

    I could see another benefit. Right now we see that the system is used on an inconsistent basis. There's never been a forest fire alert issued in Ontario, and there have obviously been forest fires. Enabling more users would lead ideally to more use of the system. We built the system to be used to save lives, so that's a major benefit, whether to first nations or to any community.

    A remote community might benefit more. They know what's going on there, and it might be even more of a challenge to have an alert issued through a centralized agency. That wouldn't always be the case, but that could be the case.

     How much time do I have?

    You still have 35 seconds.

    Thank you. I have a quick follow-up, then.

    A couple of my colleagues have already mentioned remoteness and connectivity and the availability of Wi-Fi. I assume those are going to be huge barriers on a localized level. Is that correct?

    I could only speculate from what I hear about the level of connectivity in certain areas, but the alert system does also issue alerts over radio and TV, so it's a three-pronged approach. It helps, obviously, if your radio is on or your TV is on, so you'll still get alerts. That helps to cover more of the bases, regardless of the situation. However, you need an LTE connection to receive alerts otherwise.

    Thank you, Mr. Vidal.

    We are going to Mr. Weiler for three minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for joining us on our important study today.

    I want to direct my questions, in my limited time, to Mr. Eby.

    First, I want to confirm that the system you administer—I'm a B.C. MP—is one and the same as the Alert Ready system.

    Correct. I did mention that the brand name of the system is Alert Ready.

    Great.

    One of the topics brought up here was the challenge of a lack of cellphone reception in many remote communities, especially indigenous communities across the country.

    In communities where there isn't cellphone reception, have there been policies and programs put in place so that the alert is shared with an area that does have those connections, so that it could be rebroadcast by other means to where individuals may not have that cellphone reception?

    There's nothing like that.

    As I said, it's on TV and on radio, and there are also a number of apps that take those alerts. The Weather Network app rebroadcasts alerts in local areas, so you have to be connected to Wi-Fi and not LTE. It's a multipronged approach. Right now it's TV, radio, wireless, and then some apps to rebroadcast the alerts as well.

    I'm curious about the province of British Columbia. You mentioned that Alberta had allowed some first nations to be on the system. Have you had any conversations with indigenous nations in B.C.—or rather, with the Province of British Columbia—about having that same type of ability?

    We have not done that yet. It's something we want to pursue, but we started at the federal level. We've had some informal conversations with Public Safety Canada to say that this is something we would take on and facilitate if the challenge was having a different agency to administer the accounts.

    If that's not the challenge, the provinces could do it. You would also find there are probably many first nations that like the current situation of having it issued on a provincial basis, but we're trying to put it out there as something to move forward on and help where we can.

    Absolutely.

     As an MP in B.C., I am concerned about the operation of the app here. In fact, it wasn't even used at all until 2022. As you know, there was considerable controversy last year, when we had the heat dome, the wildfires and the atmospheric rivers. I know there was no notification sent at all to people. I know of people who were caught in landslides or were driving on unsafe roads that were destabilized because of the atmospheric rivers.

    I would hope that would change. In B.C., what are the different weather events that can be circulated as a risk on the app?

    To clarify, it's not an app. It's a cell broadcast system.

    For weather events right now, Environment Canada issues alerts for tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. For other weather events—and I had this conversation with other colleagues of yours in British Columbia—such as flooding, even though flooding is caused by a weather event, the alerts are primarily for anticipated damage, road closures and evacuation orders. Those would come from the provincial EMO. I understand the situation in B.C. now is that it has asked the regional municipalities to request the alerts.

    Thank you, Mr. Weiler.

    Mrs. Gill, if you like, you can have the floor for a minute and a half.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair, but I don't have any further questions.

    Thank you to the witnesses.

    All right. Thank you.

     Madam Idlout, you have a minute and a half, if you wish.

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᒃ, ᒦᑲᒧᑦ ᐊᐱᕆᒃᑲᓐᓂᕐᓂᐊᕋᒪ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᐅᖃᐅᓯᕆᖅ-ᑲᐅᔭᑎᑦ ᓲᕐᓗ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖅ ᐊᖏᕐᕋᕆᔭᐃᑦ ᕿᒪᑦᓯᒪᕆᐊᖃᖅᓲᔭᓚᐅᕋᕕᐅᒃ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᖃᓄᖅ ᐊᒃᑐᐃᓂᖃᓚᐅᕐᒪᖔᖅ ᐃᓕᒡᓄᓪᓗ ᐃᓚᒋᔭᓐᓄᓪᓗ, ᐋ, ᓲᕐᓗ ᐊᖏᕐᕋᖃᖅᑑᔮᓐᖏᑦᑐᓯᒡᓘᓐᓃᑦ ᐅᒡᕙᓘᓐᓃᑦ ᖃᓄᑐᐃᓐᓇᖅ ᑕᒪᒃᑯᓂᖓ ᐅᓂᒃᑲᐅᑎᖃᔪᓐᓇᖅᐲᑦ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᖏᕐᕋᕆᔭᕋᓗᐊᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᒋᔪᓐᓇᖏᑲᐃᓐᓇᖅᓱᒍ ᖃᓄᖅ ᐃᒃᐱᓐᓂᐊᑎᒋᓚᐅᕐᒪᖔᖅ ᐅᓂᒃᑲᐅᑎᒍᓇᕐᒪᖔᖅᐱ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    Thank you.

    I'd like to ask Meeka Atagootak more about what she talked about.

    You own your own home and you were not able to live in your own home. How did that touch you personally, and your family? You felt that you were homeless. Can you tell us a little bit more about your personal experience of not being able to live in your own home?

[English]

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᑖᓐᓇ ᐅᓂᒃᑳᕆᔪᓐᓇᖅᑕᕋ, ᑕᖅᑭᓄᑦ 8ᓄᑦ ᐊᖏᖅᑕᐅᓯᒪᑐᐃᓐᓇ-ᓚᐅᕋᑦᑕ ᑖᓐᓇᓗ ᐃᒡᓗᒐ ᓱᒃᑯᓯᒪᓪᓗᓂ ᐃᒪᕐᒧᑦ ᓱᒃᑯᑕᐅᓯᒪᓪᓗᓂ ᐅᖁᕐᔪᐊᖅᓯᒪᓪᓗᓂ, ᐱᔭᕆᑐᓂᕋᖅᑕᐅᓪᓗᓂ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᒃᑲᓐᓂᕆᐊᖃᓯᓪᓗᑕ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖓᓂᒃ, ᐱᑕᖃᓐᖏᒻᒪᑦ ᐃᓚᒃᓴᖓᓂᒃ, ᑕᒡᕙᓂ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓᓐᓃᑎᑕᐅᓚᐅᕋᑦᑕ ᐃᒡᓗ ᑲᒪᒋᑦᓯᐊᕆᐊᖃᖅᓱᑎᒍ, ᓱᕋᑉᐸᑦ ᐊᑭᓕᑦᓴᓂᒍᓐᓇᖅᓱᑕ, ᑖᓐᓇ ᐊᒃᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᐅᔾᔨᖅᓴᕆᐊᖃᕐᓂᖅ ᑕᖃᓇᓚᐅᖅᑐᖅ ᐅᕙᑦᑎᓐᓄᑦ, ᐃᕐᖑᑕᖃᐅᕋᒪᓗ ᒥᑭᑦᑑᑎᓂᒃ ᕿᑲᕈᓐᓇᖏᒻᒪᑕᓗ ᓱᕋᐃᑦᑕᐃᓕᒪᓪᓗᑕ ᐊᒃᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᐅᕙᑦᑎᓐᓄᑦ ᑕᖃᓇᓚᐅᖅᑐᖅ ᑲᒪᒋᑦᓯᐊᕋᓱᒃᑲᑦᑎᒍ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓗ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᒋᒻᒪᒍ. ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᖃᓄᐃᓕᓚᐅᓐᖐᓇᖅᓱᓂ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓗᕗᑦ, ᐱᐊ, ᐃᓚᑦᓴᖓ ᐅᑕᖅᑭᑐᖃᓗᐊᓕᕌᒐᑦᑎᒍ ᐱᐊᓂᑦ-ᑕᐅᓯᒪᓐᖏᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᒡᓘ ᐊᑖ ᐃᓐᓯᓖᓴᖃᓐᖏᑎᓪᓗᒍ ᓄᑦᑎᖁᔭᐅᓕᓚᐅᕋᑦᑕ ᓲᖃᐃᒻᒪ ᐊᑐᖅᑐᐊᕋᑦᑐᒍ ᑖᓐᓇ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓ ᓈᒻᒪᑦᓯᔾᔪᑎᒐᑦᑕ ᑕᒡᕙ ᐅᑎᓚᐅᖅᓯᒪᔪᒍᑦ ᑕᐃᒪᓐᓇ ᐱᐊᓂᒃᓯᒪᓐᖏᑦᑐᒧᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᒧᑦ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    I can say that for eight months, I was homeless. My home was absolutely damaged. There was mould everywhere. It was really hard to repair. We waited for a very long time for the supplies.

    We were in government housing, and we had to take good care of it. If we broke something in it, we had to pay for it. We had to be extra cautious. I have many grandchildren. They're small, so they just want to destroy this and that. It was challenging to look after this unit where we were, which was owned by the government. We managed to keep it pretty clean and undamaged while we waited and they worked on the house foundation and the floor.

    We had to move before the house was completed, because our term with the government housing had ended. We had to move to an unfinished house.

[English]

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋᒻ, ᐱᖁᔨᕗᖔᓕᐅᕈᑎᔪᓐᓇᕐᓂᕈᕕᑦ ᒐᕙᒪᑐᖃᒃᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᐋᖅᑮᒋᐊᕈᑎᓂᒃ, ᖃᓄᕐᓕ ᐱᖁᔨᕗᖔᕈᑎᒥᒃ ᑎᑎᕋᕋᔭᖅᐱᑦ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    If you were to make a resolution or recommendation to the the federal government, what would that be?

[English]

    [Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋᖅᑭᒋᐊᖁᔨᓐᓂᕈᒪ ᓲᕐᓗ ᓇᒻᒥᓂᖃᖅᑐᑎᒍᑦ ᐋ, ᐃᓯᕈᓐᓇ-ᖏᑦᓯᐊᕋᑦᑕ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓᓐᓄᑦ ᐊᔪᕐᓇᖅᓯᐊᕐᒪᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᒧᑦ ᐃᓯᕆᐊᑦᓴᖅ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓᓄᑦ, ᐃᓯᕋᓱᖃᑦᑕᓚᐅᕋᓗᐊᖅᑐᒍᑦ ᐊᔪᕐᓇᕐᒪᑦ, ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᒃᑯᑦ ᐱᓕᕆᓕᕐᒪᑕ ᕼᐊᒻᒪᓚᒃᑯᓐᓂ ᐃᓯᖅᑎᑕᐅᓚᐅᖅ-ᑐᒍᑦ ᒐᕙᒪᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖁᑎᖓᓐᓄᑦ. ᑕᐃᒪᓕ ᐱᖁᔨᕗᖔᕈᑎᒥᒃ ᓴᖅᑭᖁᔨᔪᒪᓕᖅᑐᖓᐅᒐᓗᐊᖅ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᓇᖕᒥᓂᖃᖅᑐᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᓕᕆᔨᒃᑯᑦ ᐃᒡᓗᖓᓐᓄᑦ ᐃᓯᕈᓐᓇᖅᑎᑕᐅᔪᓐᓇᖁᓪᓗᒋᑦ ᓴᓇᔭᐅᔪᖃᕐᓂᐊᖅᑎᒡᓗᒍ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    I would say that those of us who own our own home cannot get into CMHC housing at all. We tried to get into their units but were not allowed. Finally, the Hamlet of Pond Inlet gave us government housing as an emergency shelter. I would like to see people who own their own home, when there's an emergency case in their home, being able to occupy CMHC buildings.

[English]

    Thank you.

    That brings our first panel to an end. I would like to thank Meeka Atagootak, Mr. Merrill Harris and Mr. Kurt Eby for coming this morning, giving us their opening remarks and answering all of our questions on this very important topic.

     With that, we will now suspend for a few minutes as we transition to the second panel.

    Thank you.

     Thank you, colleagues. We'll resume with our second panel.

    Our second panel will consist of Chief Dwayne Thomas and Chief Sarah Sunday-Diabo from the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne. They are here in person today. We also have Chief April Martel from the K'atl'odeeche First Nation, if she manages to join us. She is not on yet.

    Also joining us is Mr. Lucas King, director of the territorial planning unit of Grand Council Treaty #3.

    To the panel witnesses, there is English, French and Inuktitut interpretation, if you choose to have it. Select a language on the button that's called “interpretation”. It looks like a globe at the bottom of your screen. You can listen to the proceedings in either English or French. However, there will be questions in English, French and Inuktitut asked by the members of the committee.

    That said, before we go to the question period, let me invite Chief Dwayne Thomas and Chief Sarah Sunday-Diabo to take the microphone for a combination of five minutes.

    Thank you.

    She:kon.

    My name is Chief Sarah Sunday-Diabo. I represent the Tsi Snaihne district of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne.

    This is my first year on council. In my previous role, I was the emergency manager for the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe, which is our counterpart on the southern portion of Akwesasne.

    As you may know, Akwesasne is a multi-jurisdictional community. The international border runs straight through our community, so we have to deal with the American side as well as the Canadian side. There are two counties—St. Lawrence County and Franklin County on the New York state side—and the two provinces of Quebec and Ontario.

    My role was to assist with.... I didn't see a border in my community, so whenever we would have any planning activities, we did Akwesasne joint emergency operations plans that consisted of all our hazards. I would do mitigation plans, continuity of operation plans and pandemic plans for my community.

    I would always have external as well as internal stakeholders. Our stakeholders consisted of about 50 federal partners such as FEMA, which is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as well as the New York State Office of Emergency Management and Emergency Management Ontario through Canada. In Quebec, because of the language difference, we didn't really participate with them. We don't speak French, so it was hard to work with them.

    We do have two police departments, which are the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribal Police and the Akwesasne Mohawk police.

    We have one fire department. The fire department has substations in Akwesasne, Ontario, and Akwesasne, Quebec, as well as the main headquarters, which is in New York state. We have one fire department that serves two countries and two provinces. They're all volunteer. I think there are probably about 240 active members. They do anything from haz-mat response to ice rescue. They have a marine unit. They're very active in the community and sometimes they're employees of Mohawk council.

    We do have one ambulance unit that's New York State-certified. It's housed in Quebec and responds to New York state, Ontario and Quebec. We have three paramedics, some advanced life support, basic EMTs and drivers. They're all New York State-certified.

    As well, we have an environment crew that does haz-mat response. We have had multiple incidents of ships that run aground through the St. Lawrence River. We have to respond because it would affect our water treatment facilities. We've learned how to do boom deployment and cleanup and how to take care of our waters. In our culture, our water is sacred, so we all have to protect that because of the water intake and things like that.

    Oftentimes we do all this training with the U.S. Coast Guard, as well as with the Canadian Coast Guard, so we have a good relationship with both the United States' and Canada's coast guards so that they come in and train with us. We do a lot of mutual aid with them, as well as with U.S.-Canadian customs and Canadian border protection. We have various tabletop exercises and mock drills. Whatever we would need, they were a support to us. We have this local emergency planning committee of all these different agencies that come onto our territory, train with us, give us guidance and share their resources with us.

    We do have our own health department on both sides. In Akwesasne, everything has to be duplicated, because we have about 14,000 members who are enrolled on both sides. Some live on the U.S. portion of Akwesasne and some live on the Canadian portion, so we have to have New York State Department of Health, as well as our own health department.

     We have two long-term care facilities, one in Ontario and one in the Quebec part of Akwesasne. We have day care centres. We have recreation facilities and our own school system. We have an Akwesasne board of education on our territory up to grade 8. One is Mohawk immersion, teaching the Mohawk language, culture and ceremonies to our youth. We're trying to bring back the language and make them fluent speakers.

     We have our own busing that transports these kids. On a daily basis, they have to go through the United States and report to customs, go back in and go into the Quebec portion of Akwesasne. That's probably about a 40-minute round trip for these children. On the way home, they have to go through Canadian customs as well.

    The five minutes are up, but we will have questions for you, Chief Diabo. Thank you.

    I would now like to go to Mr. Lucas King, director, territorial planning unit, Grand Council Treaty #3, for five minutes, please.

     Thank you.

    Good morning, everyone. My name is Lucas King, and I'm the director of the territorial planning unit at Grand Council Treaty #3.

    I certainly appreciate the invitation to be here today and to work together with the federal government on the critical issues of water regulation and emergency management in Treaty No. 3. I'd like to thank the committee members and other participants for having the Grand Council represented.

    Several weeks ago, we were asked by one of our local MPs to share our experiences with and knowledge about water in Treaty No. 3. Over the past two years, to say the least, things have been extreme in Treaty No. 3. Last year, the territory experienced one of the lowest water levels on record. This resulted in well-known drought and fire emergencies across the territory. I wanted to share some photos, but due to time constraints and translation, we couldn't get them in front of you this morning. However, one photo we would have showcased is of the 10-foot difference between the water levels this past year and the year before.

    Climate change is creating increasingly unpredictable water levels, making it very difficult for emergency management planning and damage mitigation in Treaty No. 3. This past year, in contrast to the year before, we had large amounts of snowfall and rain throughout the winter season. Then, in the spring, there was a lot of flooding that damaged land, water treatment plants, docks, bridges and homes, leaving communities in Treaty No. 3 with impeded access to food, medical appointments and work. Evacuations and loss of sacred sites to flooding also impacted Treaty No. 3 communities and directly impacted their inherent and treaty rights.

    Through all of this, lingering impacts of the global pandemic weighed incredibly heavily, compounding the struggles people faced, including their ability to evacuate and be with family or in safe spaces through everything.

    The second photo I wanted to share was on harmonizing governance structures. October 3 is a special day in Treaty No. 3. Today specifically marks 149 years since the signing of Treaty No. 3. We are coming up on 150 years in 2023, a year to celebrate that special and sacred relationship. It's our responsibility as treaty partners to work together in relation to shared lands in Canada, because that's the essence of treaty land. We have a responsibility to harmonize our governance and work together as brothers in that shared capacity.

    Modelling provides a great tool for understanding a basin when we talk about water regulation and quantity. However, in the last two years, especially with the impacts of climate change, we've seen that our understanding certainly needs to be more holistic, and our decision-making structures need to reflect this. It's only through the harmonization of governments and decision-making protocols that we'll be better able to manage our own responsibilities for, and relationship to, water in Treaty No. 3.

    That doesn't mean managing water; it means managing ourselves and understanding the protocols between both governments in terms of what water looks like in Treaty No. 3. We at the Grand Council are always going to be willing to co-operate with any level of government or any treaty partner because of that sacred relationship. We are willing to share our knowledge, experience and expertise in order to find solutions to the issues we face together.

    Today, as we see it and as we move forward, we need to harmonize those governance structures, because, for the last two years, Treaty No. 3 communities have been the most affected by these water regulation impacts. The communities also have the least amount of say in terms of water regulation and protocols. It's all within that western structure. We really do need to take a hard look at how we manage ourselves, what our principles of decision-making are and what our governance structures are, moving forward, so we can take that more holistic look. As we found out through the global pandemic, we can only work on something like this together as a whole. Climate change and water regulation are the same, as they don't sit in just one jurisdiction. They connect everywhere.

     With that, I really appreciate the opportunity to be here today and share our experiences from Grand Council with you. I'm looking forward to the rest of the session. Thank you.

    Thank you, Mr. King.

    Unfortunately, our third witness, Chief Martel, is not yet with us, so we're going to proceed with questions, beginning with the Conservatives.

    I have Mr. Vidal for six minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

     Thank you to our witnesses for taking the time to be here with us today.

    We were chatting briefly about the fact that fall is in the air, and we're probably not going to avoid that as it transitions to winter. I want to thank you for coming and sharing your knowledge with us.

    I have a couple of questions for Chief Thomas and Chief Diabo. The comments you made were quite amazing in the context of your managing multi-jurisdictional challenges. As a former mayor who dealt with different levels of government, I appreciated your perspective—a very positive perspective—and I'm sure it has its challenges.

    Emergency management is a shared responsibility, obviously, and you're sharing it way more than most people have to. We heard testimony in the last hour from the people who issue the alerts—the alerting system—and they talked about wanting to engage individual nations on maybe being part of that at their own level.

     I'm trying to flesh this out in the context of your having to deal with what I used to have to deal with as a mayor: multiple jurisdictions. Would it be beneficial for you to issue your own emergency alerts just for your nation and your communities, or do you do this already?

    We don't have the reverse 911. It's only good for the Ontario portion of Akwesasne. I wanted to start something called CERT, community emergency response teams. They are almost like a neighbourhood watch, neighbourhood groups that we would create.

    Akwesasne is kind of one big family, so everybody knows everybody. Everybody knows who's the elder and who lives alone. We would create these little teams and have them do door-to-door checks if we needed to evacuate or things like that, but we don't have any reverse 911 or alert system, because our phone numbers are both American and Canadian, so you can't do that. It would just have to be the old-school way, door to door. You knock on the door to see if they're okay.

    We also use social media. As well, we have our own local radio station, which is our lifeline to Akwesasne. If there is a power outage or evacuation or winter storms, everybody tunes in to CKON. In the past we have given these kits that have three to five days' worth of food, water, a little radio, a flashlight and batteries. We would deliver them door to door and give them to our community so they could at least turn on the radio and have some way to be in touch with first responders.

    I appreciate that very much, and the effort you make in doing that. That approach makes a lot of sense. A witness in the last hour talked about TV and radio; it's not just an alert on your phone. It's a multipronged thing.

    If you could have an alerting system that worked, so that you could issue very specific local alerts without having to rely on going door to door, would that be a benefit to you?

    I'm looking for a pretty quick answer because I want to get on to something else before my time runs out.

    A cellphone service would be beneficial for us as a first response type of capability, yes.

    Most people have access to cell coverage, don't they, in your...?

    Yes.

    Okay. That's good.

     We do have pockets in our community, though, where we don't have cell service just because of the geography of our community. Sarah and I represent the same district. We live about a quarter of a mile from one another, and there are times when we don't get cell service at our homes. I have my chief's phone on the Canadian side, but it's Verizon on the American side, only because I get better service with Verizon where we're located.

    I appreciate that. Where I come from, there are many in communities in my riding who don't have cell coverage at all, so I can appreciate that very much.

    My time is running out. I want to switch gears a little bit and ask you one further question. This is maybe a little bit more of a curiosity question.

    There has been a lot of talk in the last few weeks around policing on first nations, and this is all driven out of an incident that happened in my northern Saskatchewan area. You have your own police force already. I would love to chat with you in more detail some day about that.

    In the context of having your own police force, I want you to tie that back specifically to emergencies. Could you talk about the benefit of having your own police force when it comes to an emergency situation in your communities?

     I will speak to that.

    In our community, for the last close to 50 years, on the northern portion we've had the Akwesasne Mohawk Police . It has only been in the last couple of years that we have let people come in and map our streets. Currently we don't have a 911 system, because some of our community members don't feel comfortable giving out their information to the outside world.

    With a local community force, for years it was only people from our community. We were lucky that people were stepping up and filling those roles. However, in the last five years, we have had a lot more people from outside the territory apply because we had no other applicants who got in.

    With my house, for example, when I was a dispatcher for the Mohawk police and I said go to Dwayne Thomas's house, the guy on the other end said “Okay”. I didn't have to say “318 Wade Lafrance”.

    In our community, that knowledge of who we are and where everyone lives, and the families and the closeness, really helps when you get into that situation. All of a sudden, you can be in a panic mode and something's happening. There's a house on fire. There was the ice storm of 1998. It can be any of those things.

    You say to go to somewhere, and the person on the other end says, “Who's that? Which district is that?” They want a physical address, because that's what they know, but our local community, as I said, was being serviced for probably the first 45 years by people who were all from Akwesasne, so they knew where to go. In that respect, it was a positive thing.

    The other thing with being in a small community is that everybody knows your business, so when somebody is sick or something, our first responders are aware of that. Sarah's husband is an EMT. He has a great memory and he remembers a lot of things. He knows things that someone from the outside might not know. I think those are great things.

     In my case, I went to school off the reservation. I had a lot of friends in our neighbouring town of Massena, New York, because that's where I went to high school. In the early nineties, going up to visit them, when I'd get pulled over and asked why I was in Massena, I would always say, “Is it illegal to be in Massena?” I knew what they were getting at, because I was coming from the local first nations community and I was into trouble or something. I don't know why that assumption was. However, to get pulled over on your territory and recognize a person and see a friendly face and stuff like that definitely helps in our community.

    Thank you, Chief.

    We will now go to Mr. Powlowski for six minutes, if I have that right.

    Yes, it's me.

    Thanks, Chief. That was a very interesting and good response.

    I'm going to concentrate on Lucas.

     Lucas, welcome to INAN. I'm glad you're here. The committee won't know it, but the western part of my riding is all Treaty No. 3.

    During the flooding this spring, I was up there. I certainly saw in Seine River that there were cars floating in the river. The community centre was basically an island surrounded by sandbags, and water around that. In Couchiching, which is close to Fort Frances, there were a lot of houses flooded as well.

    Lucas, maybe you could tell me more about the extent of the damage in the spring, and in which communities. As I recall, the communities further upriver, like Lac La Croix, had the flooding first, and then as the water levels rose downstream, there was flooding in other areas.

    Could you maybe tell us more about the damage this spring?

     Sure, and I think the first thing I'd touch on there is that it wasn't just the spring, and that was the issue in Treaty No. 3 this year. Normally when we have a flood event, it starts at the headwaters and we have that flood, and then by July and August it has flowed through the system. There was so much water this year. The eastern portion of Treaty No. 3—Couchiching, Seine River, Lac la Croix—all experienced housing loss, damage to infrastructure on the water, to water treatment plants. All of that then flowed through the Rainy River to Lake of the Woods, and that's where we then saw the level of Lake of the Woods rise, impacting our communities on the lake to the same extent with regard to access to community centres, education, roads in and out of the communities and evacuations. The sandbagging efforts were out of control, and this went on into July and August.

    It wasn't actually until about two weeks ago that water was off a lot of the physical infrastructure on the lake, but that same situation is then still being experienced on the Winnipeg River flowing into the Lake Winnipeg system.

    That high water was also unprecedented in terms of the longevity within the territory. We just tried to keep getting as much water out as possible, but the infrastructure wasn't in place to get enough out soon enough. White Dog First Nation, for example, instead of sandbagging, actually dumped a pile of sand in front of their water treatment plant to try to stop water from coming in, because there just wasn't time.

    Each community now has had costs for roadways and other infrastructure associated with rising water. It was up about six to seven feet in some places.

    Lucas, you and I have talked about this before.

     In the Winnipeg River system, there are several dams. There are several natural choke points, and the water builds up behind those points. Let's say you're looking at how to alleviate the problem in, for example, Rainy Lake. If you were to make a bigger passage going into Rainy River, then you would create more of a problem potentially in Rainy River. Similarly, out at Lake of the Woods, there's a dam there, but I don't think that's the choke point; it's further downstream. However, if you were to open it up there, then you could potentially have more flooding in the Winnipeg River.

    Could you explain some of that?

    For sure. We've had this conversation around the infrastructure that's currently in the Rainy Lake-Lake of the Woods system.

     A lot of that has been around for decades now. There are natural choke points along the way, and that's where you can't get enough water through the Rainy River in this situation to bring down Rainy Lake and Namakan Lake, and you experience that high-water level. Similarly, for water going out the Winnipeg River to bring down the Lake of the Woods, which is the big storage reservoir, and then Lac Seul, you can't get enough water out fast enough to then alleviate that pressure. You'll actually see gravesites being eroded in Lac Seul. There are physical bones showing in shorelines.

    That being said, that's why we're sitting here now again. It's to start to redo or manipulate those choke points, but is doing more manipulation to Mother Earth really the right answer? The conversation at grand council is about how we can do a better job of getting more information so that our predictions are actually more accurate.

    My point of concern is that the rule curves in the Rainy-Namakan system actually went 0 for 2 in the last two years in terms of predicting either that drought or that flood, and we're supposed to be the experts. Those models and those engineers are supposed to be the experts. However, we're just human and we need as much information as possible.

    That's where we get into starting to look at this as treaty partners. It's a problem for everyone, and we need to start bringing a more holistic approach to how we talk about water regulations, because it's not going to be just widening dams and choke points that's going to get us out of this; it's managing our relationship to that water and bringing in more knowledge and harmonizing those governance systems to really do a better job.

    Do I have any extra time?

    There are only about eight seconds, Mr. Powlowski, so I think we'll call it there.

    Mrs. Gill, you have six minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    I'd like to thank all the witnesses for being with us today.

    My next questions will be for Chief Thomas and Chief Diabo from the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne.

    As a member of Parliament from Quebec, I have met a few tunes with members of the Akwesasne community regarding, among other things, the Jay Treaty, which they are very familiar with.

    Our study discusses emergency and crisis situations, in addition to the issue of the Canada—U.S. border and the many different difficulties that this causes for the Akwesasne community.

    Chief Thomas and Chief Diabo, in a crisis situation that the community may be experiencing or has experienced, what additional challenges should be raised to enable you to better meet the needs of the community on both sides of the border? For you, this is really a unique case.

     We can start with Mr. King.

    Actually, Mr. Chair, my question is for Chief Diabo and Chief Thomas about the Jay Treaty.

    My apologies.

    Sorry. We'll start with Chief Diabo.

    During the pandemic, for example, because of the ArriveCAN app, it was difficult for our physicians to come to the homes for the elderly. They were coming from Canada, but they would have to go through the United States, so it was difficult for them to go back through. Even though it was for just 8-10 hours a day, they weren't able, so that hindered our health care sector. We had very few doctors and very few nurses, and the same applied to the American Red Cross. It was difficult for the American Red Cross employees to come and assist us because of the international border. They weren't members of Akwesasne, so there was no right to entry. They would have to go through the whole process of ArriveCAN.

    All of our nurses, the PSWs and the community health nurses were becoming fatigued, so we needed some support to come in. The American Red Cross was not able to come in during COVID.

    In our district, it could be something as minor as my washer and dryer needing repair. Nobody would come over from Ontario to service our appliances in Quebec. We would have to load up our appliances and take them over the border.

    A lot of our goods...We couldn't get lumber; we couldn't get any deliveries. It's difficult in the Quebec districts, because you have to go through New York state. From New York state you couldn't come over to Quebec, because of the border. There's no manned border, but individuals would still have to report to U.S. customs at Massena.

    There's the geography of the whole thing. Our district of Tsi Snaihne and the district of Kana:takon have water on the northern portion and then land on the southern portion. The only way to get there is through the United States, with all the border restrictions during COVID. Prior to COVID there wasn't a problem, because we didn't have the border restrictions, but we really were exposed to a lot of that.

    Thankfully, we have a great community. Everybody steps up and volunteers. If you want to talk about supplementary things we did to navigate COVID or anything that came up, I can tell you that our people really step up.

    Right now, we're really suffering from COVID fatigue, because we couldn't get that outside support. Many people just don't understand how Akwesasne is built until they come down, tour Akwesasne, see the border and see all the difficulties we face. Our people are waiting for answers, trying to figure out how to do it.

    We've been accustomed over the years to saying, “Okay, we'll pick you up by boat on Cornwall Island, bring you by boat to Tsi, let you do your thing, and then take you back.” American customs and people in Washington, and sometimes people here in Ottawa, don't understand what we're faced with until they come and see what's happening in Akwesasne. Often we're forced to do things ourselves—

    I'm sorry, Chief Thomas, but I don't have much time left.

    I'll ask you one last question, which could sum up a lot of the topic.

    Would an agreement between Canada and the United States regarding the border, as you are requesting, under the Jay Treaty, for example, be a solution or at least an improvement in the security of your people?

    I would like to hear from you and Chief Diabo on this.

     Currently we have an agreement with the CBSA office in Cornwall. We have a remission order that allows that freedom. We don't have that same freedom at the Dundee port, which is on the easternmost part of our reservation. That leads us directly into Montreal.

    Really, what the Jay Treaty does is talk about our individual rights, not our community rights. A remission order in Dundee to match the one in Cornwall would probably be a first step. I don't think it would solve it. I think there are other things that need to be worked out between all three governments—our government, the United States government and the Canadian government—to recognize it.

    Even with funding, when we get funding, it's tagged only to Ontario. It's not tagged to Akwesasne; it's tagged to Ontario. We have three jurisdictions, and everybody is the same. I have family that live on the American side. They're not any different from me, and they all live on Akwesasne, but we have funding in place for only certain people. I call it discriminatory funding because it can't service everyone, even though we're all one.

    Thank you.

    We'll go to Ms. Idlout now for six minutes.

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᓯᕗᕐᓕᕐᒥ, ᐋ, ᐅᓂᒃᑳᕆᐊᖅᑐᓵᖅᑐᓯ ᐊᒃᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᖁᔭᓕᒍᒪᕙᑦᓯ ᐊᑦᓱᐊᓗᒃ ᐅᐱᒋᒐᑦᓯ ᑕᒪᒃᓯ, ᐋ, ᑲᓇᑕᓕᒫᕐᒥᒃ ᓯᕗᓕᖅᑎᐅ-ᒐᑦᓯ, ᐋ, ᓴᖅᑭᔮᖅᑎᑦᑎᑦᓯᐊᕋᑦᓯ ᑕᒪᓐᓇ ᐱᓕᕆᖃᑎᒌᑦᓯᐊ-ᕆᐊᖃᕐᓂᖅ, ᐋ, ᐱᒻᒪᕆᐅᓂᖓᓂ ᐊᒻᒪᓗ ᖃᓄᖅ ᑲᔪᓯᑦᓯᐊ-ᕈᓐᓇᕐᒪᖔ, ᐋ, ᑐᑭᓯᕚᓪᓕᖅᑐᖓ ᓄᓇᒋᔭᑦᓯᓐᓂᒃ, ᐋ, ᐊᐅᓚ-ᓂᕆᔭᖏᓐᓂᒃ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᐅᓂᒃᑳᒃᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᕐᒪᖔᑦᓯ ᐃᓕᒃᓯ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ, ᐋ, ᓯᕗᓕᖅᑎ ᓰᑉᑎᐊᐴᒃᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᐊᐱᕆᒍᒪᕗᖓ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᓲᕐᓗ ᑐᓴᓪᓗᐊᑕᓵᕋᒃᑭᑦ, ᐋ, ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᖅᑐᑯᓗᐃᒃᒎᖅ ᓯᑰᓪᐸᔅᑰᖅᓱᑎ ᐃᑲᕐᕋᐅᑉ ᓇᑉᐸᖓᓐᓂᒃ ᐃᑭᒪᒋᐊᖃᕐᒪᑕ ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᕆᐊᖅᓱᑎᒎᖅ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊ, ᐋ, ᐅᓂᒃᑲᐅᑎᒃᑲᓐᓂᕆᐊᕈᓐ-ᓇᖅᐱᑎᒎᖅ ᖃᓄᐃᒻᒪᑦ ᑕᐃᒫᑎᒋ ᐊᑯᓂᐅᑎᒋᔪᕐᓗ ᐊᒻᒪᓗ ᖃᓄᖅ ᐊᒃᑐᐊᓂᖃᓲᖑᒻᒪᖔᖅ ᐃᓚᒋᔭᖏᓐᓄᑦ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᕐᓂᐊᖅᑕᒥᓐᓂᒃ, ᐋ, ᑲᔪᓯᑦᓯᐊᕐᓂᐊᕈᑦᑎᒃ, ᑐᑭᓯᓇᕐᓂᕈᒪ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    Thank you very much to the witnesses who gave us presentations. I am very proud of you, especially from Canada, and the leadership you have shown, the tremendous support, and the fact that it's very important to support each other as to how we can carry this out.

    I understand that in your community operations—I'd like to ask Chief Diabo this, if she can tell us—the school bus takes over an hour and a half just to go to school. Can you clarify that a bit more or tell us a little bit more about that, about how long it takes to cross the borders and how much impact that has on the families, especially with the kids who are going to school to achieve their education?

[English]

    It depends on how long the wait at U.S. customs is. Coming from Cornwall Island, Ontario, they have to cross into U.S. customs. Often it can be anywhere from 40 minutes to close to an hour of waiting in line to go to school. Often the parents will just bring the kids back to their closest district, but because the parents want their children to learn the language, because our language is dying, they send them to the school in the village of St. Regis, where there's immersion. It's 100% Mohawk language. Sometimes they drive them in themselves and pick them up at school and drive them home in their own vehicle.

    [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋ, ᒫᓐᓇᐅᔪᖅ ᑲᑎᒪᔨᕋᓛᖑᔪᑎᒍᑦ ᑲᑎᒪᔾᔪᑎᖃᕋᑦᑕ ᒫᓐᓇ ᑐᑭᓯᓇᓱᒃᓱᑕ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅᑐᓕᕆᓂᐅᕐ ᐸᒃᓇᐅᑎᖏᓐᓂᒃ ᒥᒃᓵᓄᑦ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊ, ᐋ, ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᕆᐊᖅᐸᑦᑐᑯᓗᐃᑦ, ᐋ, ᐸᕐᓇᐅᑎᒋᔭᐅᑦᑎᐊᖅᓯᒪᒐᓗᐊᖅᐸᑦᑕᖅᑲᐃ ᑐᐊᕕᕐᓇᖅᑐᖃᕐ-ᓂᕈᓂ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    At this time, this committee is meeting about understanding preparedness measures. Are there any emergency preparedness measures for these children who go to school?

[English]

    Yes, they do drills and they have things on the bus should anything happen. If they get in a car accident or things like that, they have communication with the central dispatch as well as with the school itself. They do evacuation drills and they do bus drills, because a long time ago we did have a bus accident, so that's one of the priorities they do have, along with fire drills. We are really well prepared for active shooter scenarios and things like that. We do all those kinds of drills with the school.

     [Member spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]

    ᐋ, ᑭᖑᓪᓕᕐᒥ ᐊᐱᕆᓂᐊᖅᐸᑦᓯ ᖃᓄᕐᓕ, ᐋ, ᐊᓯᔾᔩᒋᐊᒃ-ᑲᓐᓂᕈᓐᓇᕋᔭᖅᐱᓯ ᓲᕐᓗ ᐅᖄᓂᖅᑲᐅᒐᓗᐊᖅᓱᓂ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐱᖃᑖ, ᐋ, ᐊᓯᔾᔩᒋᐊᕈᓐᓇᕋᔭᕐᒪᖔᑦ, ᐋ, ᐋᒻ, ᑯᐊᕐᓐᐅᐊᓪ ᑖᓐᓇ ᐃᔾᔪᐊᖅᑕᐅᖁᔭᐅᓪᓗᓂ ᑭᓯᐊᓂ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᖅᑐ-ᑯᓗᓐᓄᑦ ᓴᐳᔾᔭᐅᑦᓯᐊᖁᓪᓗᒋᑦ ᖃᓄᖅ ᐊᓯᔾᔩᒋᐊᖁᔨᒐᔭᖅᐱᑦ ᖃᓄᖅ ᒐᕙᒪᑐᖃᒃᑯᓐᓄᑦ ᑐᒃᓯᕋᒐᔭᖅᐱᑦ ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᑲᔪᖅᑕᐅ-ᒋᐊᒃᑲᓐᓂᖁᓪᓗᒋᑦ, ᑖᒃᑯᐊ ᐃᓕᓐᓂᐊᖅᑐᑯᓗᐃᑦ.

    [Inuktitut text interpreted as follows:]

    If you were to change the Cornwall example in order to protect the school children, how would you make changes? What kinds of changes would you like to see from the federal government in order to get more support for the school children?

[English]

    I would like to see the Canadian customs moved from Cornwall, because even if you're on Cornwall Island, or if I'm coming from my district and I have to go to the doctor's on Cornwall Island, I still have to go to Cornwall, turn around, report, come back through and go to the school.

    I would just like the port authority to be moved by the U.S. customs or have something in place like that, because in order to go from one district to the other, I still have to go from Quebec to Ontario and I still have to go report, even though I'm still in Akwesasne.

    It's the same thing with the children. You still have to go to Cornwall, come back and go to the island. Putting it next to the U.S. customs is one solution.

    I think there's another thing we have to look at. Prior to becoming chief, I spent 16 years as the transportation supervisor for our school board, and our geography, again, is a big issue, because there's only one way on and off Cornwall Island. We have an international bridge going south and the low-level bridge going north, but if either one of those bridges gets taken out, we're stuck.

    It's the same for the district of Kana:takon: There's one road in and out, and that's it. It's the same with Tsi Snaihne. There are two roads in and out, and that's it. We don't get enough funding to help maintain those roads, number one, but we need to have alternative roads outside of the ones we have now so we can be better prepared.

    The customs are a hindrance, absolutely, but the fact that we only have one way in and out to our districts is, I think, a bigger hindrance.

    Thank you very much.

    We have an opportunity for a shortened second round if members wish to avail themselves of it. It will be three minutes for Conservatives and Liberals, and one and a half minutes for the Bloc and the NDP.

    I'm going to turn to Mr. Shields for three minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    I appreciate the witnesses today.

    In terms of the coordination you do and what you're talking about, I could ask the political question: Of the two countries, the two provinces, the two counties, which is the easiest one to deal with? However, I know you're not going to answer that. You've developed a partnership and you know how to make it work, which is incredible.

    I'm going to go to Mr. King about something you brought up in your testimony, because I think it relates to you as well.

    Mr. King, we were talking about water. In my riding, I had two examples. In a previous one, we were working with indigenous people and we had to adapt in dealing with the flooding situations occurring in my riding from the two major rivers. In yours, what I want to get to—and you didn't talk about it much, but you did mention it—is the mental challenge of constantly moving people from their territory to an isolated setting in an urban area. What does that create, and how can we resolve it? What's your recommendation?

    It's huge. The mental, emotional and spiritual impacts of evacuation from your home are absolutely massive.

    One of the biggest issues is because of the different jurisdictions that Akwesasne is dealing with. In Treaty No. 3, we're in Manitoba and Ontario, and then water flows in from Minnesota as well, and there are relations in Minnesota and Manitoba.

    Actually, the choice of many of our communities is to head west towards a larger Anishinabe nation, to Winnipeg and Manitoba, and that's more like home base. What happens right now is that those emotional, spiritual and mental impacts are actually increased, because we can only do evacuation funding in Ontario and we have to move folks further away instead of making a close drive to, say, Winnipeg, where many people have relationships and family members.

    The evacuation piece speaks to our preparedness and better regulating water and being better prepared so that we don't need to evacuate, but in the instance of evacuation, we need to have protocols in place that allow for that to happen to somewhere where that space is as comfortable as possible for those who are being evacuated and everything is being done for them to return home as soon as possible as well.

     What you're saying in terms of adapting is that we need to do something that's different from evacuation.

    Yes. We need to be more prepared for evacuation. We need to build up and have better access in terms of roadways, right? If you have only one access spot to a community and that gets flooded out, your access to food and medical help is taken away. We need to have better access roadways, better communication in flooding events and better resources prepared prior to flooding events.

     That comes to those strategies of water regulation, early notices and making sure that we have food, water and accessibility to everything in a community so that we don't have to evacuate. Then, in the instance of an evacuation, we have to make sure that it's the safest and most comfortable space as possible in that area.

    Thank you.

    Thank you.

    We'll now go to you, Mr. McLeod, for three minutes.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    Thank you to everyone who has presented today.

    There have been very interesting presentations. It points to some of the challenges in the indigenous communities when it comes to emergencies.

    My question is for Treaty 3.

    I listened with real interest. I come from the Northwest Territories. We have two reserves, but most of our communities are indigenous communities, and we have a number of different local governments. We have the Indian bands and the Métis councils. Some communities have the Inuit councils. Then we have the municipal government and the Government of the Northwest Territories, and then, when it comes to emergencies, the federal government has a role to play.

    It takes a lot of co-operation. In some cases, there are alliances, and in other cases there are co-operation agreements that have been signed so that everybody knows their role. If there's a mix-up, lives could be lost, and if you're not sure who's handling what, it becomes very concerning when it comes to infrastructure and other properties, and there could be loss of life.

    I'm aware that some provinces, such as B.C., have moved to trilateral agreements to ensure coordination between first nations and the federal and provincial levels of government. I'd like to ask if the representative for Treaty 3 thinks that having a trilateral agreement and arrangement in Ontario would also be beneficial.

    Yes, I think that would be hugely beneficial.

     I think the other side of it is that it may not even be trilateral. We could even talk quadrilateral because of the portion of Treaty 3 that is in Manitoba as well. We could make sure that all of those jurisdictions are at the table when we talk about emergency management and the resources and planning that need to go into it. An agreement between the Anishinaabe Nation in Treaty 3, Manitoba, Ontario and the feds would definitely be a milestone in terms of working together that way.

    My next question is for the Mohawks of Akwesasne.

    I really had to try to sort it out in my head to follow the number of different jurisdictions in your community. It's a split community that's in two countries, two counties and two provinces.

    I'm wondering, when it comes to a national emergency, who declares a state of emergency. Is it the chief who does that?

    Could we have a quick response, please? We're running out of time.

    It depends on where the emergency is. It could be the emergency management office at the tribe or it could be the emergency measures office at the Mohawk council.

    Mr. Michael McLeod: Okay. Thank you.

    Thank you very much.

    Mrs. Gill, you have a minute and a half.

    Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    I would like to quickly address Chief Thomas and Chief Diabo.

    First, I want to tell you that we know how complex and unique the Akwesasne situation is. I would echo Chief Diabo's comments that perhaps the committee could go there and get a better understanding of what's going on.

    If you wish, you can conclude by specifying what would be most important to you with respect to emergency situations. You can also send us any additional comments or ideas that you would like to see highlighted in our report that our committee could make recommendations about.

    Thank you.

     My wish list would be to have continuing funding so that we can provide more equipment and training of our people to be better responders, as well a large unified public safety building and one central dispatch unit.

    It's just funding for the public safety building, training, equipment and PPE.

    Thank you, Mrs. Gill.

    Ms. Idlout, you have 90 seconds.

    I want to ask my question to Lucas King.

    First of all, congratulations on the anniversary of the signing of Treaty 3.

    I'm interested in the PowerPoint slide that you sent us, which is called “Reconciling Sovereignties in Treaty #3”. I wonder if you could quickly explain how child protection, just as an example, could be explained by the slide you sent us.

    Qujannamiik.

    Totally, and I will do my best to do it as quickly as possible as well.

    What you see in the slides are two parallels of governance. One is the Anishinaabe Nation in Treaty 3 and the other is western governance systems, in that instance harmonized through the signing of Treaty 3.

    What most often happens when we talk about, say, child protection or emergency management working “in partnership” with Crown entities is that they say they'll fund this work to do it this way and this is the way they expect it to be done. They provide the protocols by which it will be done, and it needs to be worked within that western track.

    That is the issue. For child care, for example, it is the federal and provincial governments that are dictating how Anishnaabe children are being cared for. Really what we need to be looking at is how to harmonize those governance approaches so that it's actually the Anishnaabe Nation in Treaty 3 protocols and processes that are guiding child care, so that they are being cared for in a way that is culturally appropriate and safe and doesn't go back to policies around integration into a western parallel.

    At the end of the day, when we talk about participation and inclusion of traditional knowledge and nations, we need to look at harmonization and operating in that treaty space, as opposed to just participating or trying to move one governance structure into another governance structure.

    Thank you very much. This brings our second panel to a close.

    Thank you, Mr. King, for appearing before us today. Thank you to Chief Diabo and Chief Thomas for coming here from Akwesasne to answer our wide-ranging questions. We very much appreciate it.

    With that, I will end panel number two.

    I see that Mr. Badawey has his hand up.

    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Mr. Chairman, before you adjourn the meeting, I have two questions, if I may.

    One is with respect to the study we are discussing today. When are we expecting to discuss drafting instructions?

    On that question, given the fact that last week we agreed among ourselves, with a couple of amendments, to focus priority on Bill C-29, that will take us to October 28 for the last session. Then, of course, we have to follow that up by doing clause-by-clause consideration in an expeditious manner, so we're into early November.

    I would just add that I mentioned two other things that we need to revisit. One is the updated NIHB report, which the analysts are going to update, given the amendments, new resolutions and new recommendations that we proposed. Also, at some point—this Thursday, for example—we were going to look at future studies. The drafting instructions for this study are important as well.

     In the coming days and weeks we should decide what should come right after Bill C-29. Should it be how quickly we want to do one of the three? Which of the three should we do, and in which order? Should it be the drafting instructions, the NIHB report or deciding on future studies, and in what order?

    Mr. Schmale, go ahead.

     Chair, given the fact that we on this side could potentially have one more week left in our time here, could we use time later this week to talk about drafting instructions? I don't want to leave navigating this to the new group, who will have no idea of what has been said in the past.

    Are you leaving us?

    I don't know. We don't know. If you could message Pierre, that would be awesome. Maybe later in Question Period, you could throw a note that way. I will miss you too, Vance.

    If we could get this part out of the way—I mean that in a nice way—before we leave, that would be great.

    I have a suggestion.

    We said we wanted to start off with Bill C-29 this Thursday. That would probably be with the ministers coming. It's up to the committee to decide whether we might want to reserve 20 minutes at the end of that meeting to look at drafting instructions, so that the old gang from the Conservative Party—

    The former gang.

    —the former gang can have an opportunity to speak up.

    Is that something that would be acceptable?

    Did you say to take 20 minutes with the ministers?

    The ministers will be asked to be here on Thursday in connection with Bill C-29. It's the normal thing to invite the sponsoring ministers.

    Will they be here for two hours?

    That I don't know at this point. The committee hasn't made a decision on that. Normally they come for an hour, but that would leave us some time.

    Do we have agreement on that, or is this another connected—

    I want to put it forward that we set some time aside on Thursday afternoon.

    Do you mean out of the two hours?

    Yes, that would be out of the two hours. Maybe for 20 minutes we could discuss some drafting instructions for—

    I'm sorry. We're talking about internal stuff here—

    The second question I would have, Mr. Chair, is with respect to Bill C-29. I'm assuming that the names of witnesses are to be submitted by October 5, which is this Wednesday.

    That's what we agreed to.

    That's great. Thank you.

    Finally, Mr. Chair, through you to the clerk, if we could have the amended and adopted Bill C-29 forwarded to the members so that we can be prepared, that would be wonderful.

     The minutes will be posted later today for the meeting.

    Right, but he's also confirming that we will get the proposed changes to Bill C-29 that may be coming up to the members—

    No. Not the motions.

     [Inaudible—Editor] on Bill C-29. We can have that forwarded.

    Yes. As you know, any proposed changes will go through the legislative clerks, to see what shape they're in and if they're allowable. They'll then go to the clerk, who will distribute them.

    That will hopefully be before Thursday.

    I don't think we're going to get them before Thursday. Remember that they have to be bilingual, and the inputs will come over the course of the next few weeks. If you're talking about potential changes to Bill C-29, we didn't decide when those had to come.

    I circulated the email.

    I read the email from the clerk. There's an email from the clerk. It has a very good little three-minute video that I encourage everybody to go through, because it spells out how a committee deals with legislation at committee stage. It gives very good advice on the process by which we get to the point where we go through clause-by-clause study of the proposed changes. I'm sure you're very familiar with that.

    I want to be clear, Mr. Chairman. All I'm looking for is the amended version of Bill C-29. That's all I'm looking for.

    That may not come. At the moment, there is no specific....

    Mr. Chair, the only thing that I circulated was the order of reference that came from Journals. That's all I have.

    It doesn't spell it out. I encourage people who know what changes they may wish to make to Bill C-29 to go through that process that's described in the email as quickly as possible, so that they can be looked at, we can find out if they're allowable and in which form they will be, and then they can be translated and distributed.

    That's the process. Is that okay?

    Thank you.

     Very good.

    Are you happy, Mr. Badawey? Very good.

    Everything has to happen yesterday. I know, I know.

    With that, thank you very much to everybody on the panel—

    Go ahead, sir.

     Mr. Chairman, I just want to extend an invitation to anybody who would like to come and visit our reservation. Chief Diabo and I are willing hosts and tour guides.

    That's a very kind invitation. Thank you very much, Chief Thomas and Chief Diabo.

     It sounds like a full day, because we will have to go to a lot of countries and a lot of places.

    Thank you.

    The meeting is adjourned.