THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON ABORIGINAL PEOPLES
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Monday, April 19, 2021
The Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples met by videoconference this day at 2 p.m. [ET], in camera, for consideration of a draft agenda (future business); and to study matters relating to the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada, as stated in rule 12-7(13).
Senator Dan Christmas (Chair) in the chair.
(The committee continued in camera.)
(The committee resumed in public.)
The Chair: We will now proceed with the public portion of our meeting today.
I want to welcome senators and viewers across the country who may be watching us on sencanada.ca. We are meeting today on the unceded lands of the Algonquin people. My name is Dan Christmas, a senator from Nova Scotia, and I am privileged to be the chair of this committee.
I would like to introduce the other members of the committee who are joining us this afternoon: Senator Mary Coyle from Nova Scotia; Senator Brian Francis from Prince Edward Island; Senator Patti LaBoucane-Benson from Alberta; Senator Michael MacDonald from Nova Scotia; Senator Kim Pate from Ontario; Senator Dennis Patterson from Nunavut; and Senator Scott Tannas from Alberta. Later today, other senators may be joining us. We’ll introduce them as they sign in.
We have the privilege of having the following witnesses appear today: Karen Hogan, the Auditor General of Canada, and Glenn Wheeler, the principal of the study that we wish to examine this afternoon.
The agenda today is the Report of the Auditor General of Canada to the Parliament of Canada, Access to Safe Drinking Water in First Nations Communities—Indigenous Services Canada. Ms. Hogan will provide opening remarks of approximately five minutes, which will be followed by a question-and-answer session with senators for approximately three to four minutes per senator. Any senator who wishes to be placed on the questioners’ list, please raise the virtual hand and the clerk will add them to the list.
Welcome to Ms. Hogan and Mr. Wheeler. Thank you so much for being here. Ms. Hogan, the floor is now yours.
Karen Hogan, Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada: Mr. Chair, thank you for this opportunity to discuss our recent report on access to safe drinking water in First Nations communities. Reliable access to safe drinking water is vital to the health and well-being of all, including the people living in the more than 600 First Nations communities across Canada. Many of these communities have lived for a long time without the assurance that their drinking water is safe.
In 2015, the federal government committed to eliminating all long-term drinking water advisories on public water systems on First Nations reserves by March 31, 2021. Overall, Indigenous Services Canada has not provided the support needed to ensure that First Nations communities have ongoing access to safe drinking water. In fact, in December 2020, the minister acknowledged that the department was not on track to meet its March 31 target.
We found that since the federal government’s 2015 commitment, there have been a total of 160 long-term drinking water advisories on public systems in First Nations communities. As of November 1, 2020, 60 remained in effect in 41 First Nations communities, with almost half of the advisories having been in place for more than a decade. In addition, we found that some long-term advisories were lifted only as a result of interim measures that did not fully address the underlying deficiencies. For some of these water systems, long-term solutions were not expected to be completed until 2025.
[Translation]
The audit also found that Indigenous Services Canada’s efforts have been constrained by an outdated policy and formula for funding the operation and maintenance of public water systems. The department had not amended the funding formula since it was first developed 30 years ago. Until the formula is updated, it is unclear whether recent funding increases will be sufficient to meet First Nations’ water infrastructure needs.
The department has been working with the First Nations to provide First Nations communities with drinking water protections comparable to other communities in Canada. However, we found that there is still no regulatory regime in place 15 years after we first recommended it.
The federal government emphasizes the importance of reconciliation and the renewal of a nation-to-nation relationship between Canada and Indigenous communities that is based on the recognition of Indigenous rights, respect, cooperation, and partnership. Indigenous Services Canada must work in partnership with First Nations to develop and implement lasting solutions for safe drinking water in First Nations communities. This is a key component of reconciliation.
Over the last few decades, many of my predecessors have raised concerns about programs that failed to effectively serve Canada’s Indigenous peoples. I am very concerned and honestly disheartened to find myself reporting a long-standing issue that is still not resolved. Access to safe drinking water is a basic human necessity. I do not believe anyone would say that this situation is in any way acceptable in Canada in 2021.
Mr. Chair, this concludes my opening remarks. We would be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you very much, Ms. Hogan. We appreciate your remarks. We have a speakers’ list of questions that is beginning to develop.
Senator Patterson: Thank you for being with us today, Ms. Hogan.
This committee was involved in the development of the Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act in 2013, and I am dismayed to see in your report — and I’m looking at 3.88 — that the department is talking now about developing a new legislative framework. This is a time-consuming process. It was for the act that was passed in 2013, which may not have been perfect, but to start again to develop a new regulatory regime with this crisis going on in our communities . . .
Would you agree that what we need now is a regulatory regime, because no regulations have been developed, not to mention updating the O&M policy and other deficiencies you noted? Wouldn’t it be the best if we encouraged the co-development of regulations rather than basically starting all over again and trying to develop a new act?
Ms. Hogan: When you look at a regulatory regime, we have to recognize it has two components: It has an act and regulations. I would call the regulations the aspect of operationalizing the act. It defines clear roles and responsibilities, sets out accountabilities, enforcement measures and things like that. We noticed that the act is now created but the regulations are lacking. So definitely key. However, as we noted in the audit report, many First Nations communities are concerned with the way in which the act was originally developed and highlighted that it lacked meaningful engagement and collaboration.
In order to make sure that the act will actually meet their needs — as First Nations communities do have the right to be self-governed — they should see themselves in the act as well.
It is perhaps a more meaningful engagement on the text of the act, as the final touches and the elaboration of regulations are put together, which would ensure a more meaningful outcome for all of the First Nations communities. Recognizing there’s uniqueness in each community, you do need to have that work together to get this done properly.
Senator Patterson: Thank you.
Senator McCallum: I want to thank Ms. Hogan and Mr. Wheeler for the work they do.
There are circumstances that impact safe drinking water that goes beyond the operation and maintenance of public water systems maintained by ISC. In order to implement lasting solutions, it is critical that the government take into consideration the root causes of some of the communities’ unique situations. There are many communities throughout the country whose water has been and continues to be impacted by hydro, and the adverse impacts of these water fluctuations continue to contaminate the waters.
The same water pollution and degradation occur with other forms of resource extraction sites. Specifically, the Tataskweyak Cree Nation in Manitoba — their waterway is further contaminated from the waters that originate from southern Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Ontario, and ends up in their river system. In southern Manitoba, Winnipeg, Selkirk, Gimli and Thompson all have their sources of water outside the river system and yet Tataskweyak are expected to drink from this contaminated water source.
When they reached out to the federal government, they were shipped bottled water. I had asked if their drinking water could also come from an aquifer. I have seen first-hand the impacts of the destructive forces and their effects on children, plants, wildlife and environment. Tataskweyak is caught in four different gaps — the federal government, the provincial government, the municipality of Thompson and hydro — all of which contribute to this water safety problem.
Hydro operates outside the federal and provincial governments as its own entity, so enforcement doesn’t exist — not that it exists even within the federal bodies involved.
Do you have any suggestions how water can be managed with these specific situations? These situations were not covered in your report. Thank you.
Ms. Hogan: I thank the honourable senator very much for the question. Perhaps Mr. Wheeler would like to add to the discussion, but I do acknowledge that a long-term, sustainable solution is not a cookie-cutter approach. Every community with unique circumstances and needs must be considered, absolutely. Interim solutions are not right solutions for the long-term.
What Indigenous Services Canada needs to do is support communities to build up not only the infrastructure but the capacity, as well as having trained water system operators going forward so that, in the long run, not only the public systems being looked at right now by Indigenous Services Canada but the private systems can also benefit from that knowledge and expertise.
Mr. Wheeler, would you like to add to that?
Glenn Wheeler, Principal, Office of the Auditor General of Canada: Thank you, Karen.
I have a couple of points to add to your comments. The senator makes a very relevant point about the interconnectedness of issues that First Nations across the country face, and the Auditor General has mentioned one issue — capacity — as being an important solution to a number of issues that First Nations face.
It’s also important to take a step back or take the discussion to a higher level, as our office has been able to do over a number of years, having done 25 years’ worth of performance audits in the area. Back in 2011, we did such an exercise where we looked at failures in a number of areas — education, water, economic development — and tried to identify some of the higher-level or structural issues that have to be dealt with in order for the issues you’ve mentioned, Senator McCallum, to be addressed.
We spoke about the importance of not simply focusing on the issue per se but taking a broader perspective, as well as not focusing on the issue at one point in time and moving on to the next issue. What we’ve seen in audit after audit — including the audit on water we just tabled — is the importance of developing a long-term capacity to allow First Nations to properly manage programs that they are becoming responsible for. We talk in audit after audit about things like an appropriate or adequate legislative base for programs and services, whether it be water, education or health. We talk about the clarity of service levels — all parties being clear on what level of service First Nations residents are entitled to, perhaps vis-à-vis residents of provinces.
We speak about — and we spoke about it in this audit — adequate or appropriate funding mechanisms. It’s one thing to hand over responsibility to First Nations to deliver programs and services, but you also have to ensure that First Nations have the resources to develop the capacity to fully take on those responsibilities.
Last but not least, in audit after audit, we’ve spoken about the importance of there being institutions in place to help First Nations deliver programs and services that they might have difficulty delivering alone. Provinces have school boards and health authorities. It would be incumbent upon the government to ensure that those sorts of higher-level organizations to support First Nations are in place to deal with some of the issues you’ve mentioned, senator. I go back to the fact that the problems or challenges you’ve mentioned cut across audits and themes. It’s important to take that higher-level perspective in order to deal with the challenges you raise.
Senator Francis: Thank you both for your report. I found it to be very detailed and accurate. Being a former First Nations chief for a number of years, I can really relate to the challenges, issues and frustrations that our communities face across Canada over something that should be a basic human right.
Your report noted that the funding formula for operations, maintenance and infrastructure used by Indigenous Services Canada has not been updated since 1987. It also pointed to gaps in salaries for water system operators that have led to retention challenges that have contributed to problems in retaining qualified water system operators. Those are examples of systemic and ongoing inequalities that hinder our ability to build healthy and thriving communities where our people can live, grow and learn.
Water is a human right, but many First Nations do not have the same access to drinking water that is enjoyed by Canadians living off-reserve. It is simply unacceptable, and it has gone on for far too long.
What would it cost to end the existing funding gap in First Nations water systems resulting from decades of federal underfunding and neglect?
Ms. Hogan: I wish I had the number to give you. Unfortunately, I don’t, and I don’t believe that even Indigenous Services Canada does right now.
I will point to a few things that need to get fixed in the funding formula in order to be able to have a better picture. That’s why we noted in our audit that it’s unclear whether the additional funding pledged in December 2020 would be sufficient to meet the needs of First Nations communities.
As you mentioned, the funding formula hasn’t been revisited since it was created about 30 years ago. First, I don’t think that’s even a good place to start; you should revisit something much more often than once every three decades. So while the funding formula has been updated to deal with inflation, it doesn’t recognize the actual costs that have been incurred lately by the water systems. Also, it doesn’t reflect advances or changes in technology, and many of those advances are costlier and more expensive than what would have been included in the historical funding formula.
We also mention in our audit an annual evaluation that looks at the state of water systems, and many of them, 43% to be exact, were seen as being medium- or high-risk systems. That’s an indication that they’re aging or have some underlying problems. If that isn’t considered in the funding that goes to a system, then it is likely that the funding is inadequate.
There are many little buckets that need to be looked at in order to ensure that a better, comprehensive picture is available on what actual operation and maintenance costs are. Then, to also factor in that you need skilled and accredited operators in all of those systems in order for it to function properly, be maintained properly and not result in long-term costs. There are a lot of things that need to be looked at before the department could really put their finger on a more accurate picture of the funding needed.
Senator Pate: Thank you to our witnesses for this very important report. Ms. Hogan, if you were designing the regulatory and funding framework needed to fix this, what would you include in the regulatory framework, as well as what sorts of funding agreements would you set up, particularly in light of the fact that the current framework is decades old?
Ms. Hogan: I’m definitely going to ask Mr. Wheeler to add on to this. As you’ve seen from his previous answer, he has decades of experience in auditing these issues. I would not do them anywhere near the justice he would do them.
Many of the factors that I talked about now from a financial aspect that need to be considered in the funding formula and the funding policy — any formula needs to have a little bit of wiggle room and flexibility and a risk rating. If you’re going to go through the pains of annually assessing water systems and looking at their state, the funding should be linked to their state. You definitely also have to think about the operators and building long-term capacity within the communities. As I mentioned, what we looked at were water systems and public systems, which means they address five houses or more or a public infrastructure building, but there are so many other homes that are serviced by private wells or cisterns. Having the capacity and the knowledge within the community about what makes water safe and how to keep it safe, would help communities in a sustainable way in the long run. I think that would need to be figured into the funding, as well as the regulatory regime so that you can set those minimum service levels or expectations. With that, I’ll ask Mr. Wheeler if he wants to add something based on his experience.
Mr. Wheeler: With respect to the question of how a regulatory regime or framework should be designed, if you look at the way that water legislation or regulations are set up in the provinces, there is a lot of clarity around respective roles and responsibilities, who is responsible for what, and when things go wrong, explicitly what actions are to be taken. If you take the province of Ontario, for example, after Walkerton in 2000, there was legislation that came into force in 2002, and there was a series of 12 regulations that accompanied that legislation. In the case of a jurisdiction like Ontario, when things do go wrong, there’s now clarity about how to deal with those issues. I think as the federal government is working with First Nations to develop a regulatory regime to deal with water on reserves, the same model would be appropriate to take.
To add one point to what the Auditor General said regarding the funding formula and adequate funding, one of the things we found in this report was the high number of short-term drinking water advisories that happened. There can be short-term advisories for regular maintenance. We’ve all had a situation where the city or municipality has put something on our door saying, “there will be maintenance today, don’t use the water.” That sort of maintenance is standard, but whenever you have a large number of short-term advisories, say a month or two in length, this signifies more serious issues. As the government is working with the Assembly of First Nations and for First Nations to develop a new funding formula, there has to be an awareness of the importance of properly maintaining these systems so you don’t get into a position where they’re run down and then there’s more short-term advisories and, unfortunately, long-term advisories.
To the government’s credit, it is thinking in those terms, but I don’t think you can emphasize enough the importance of having enough money to properly maintain these systems to prevent short-term or long-term advisories.
Senator Coyle: Thank you very much. It’s wonderful to have our new Auditor General with us, and also Mr. Wheeler, the principal author of this very detailed report. My question was actually answered earlier, but I will probe a little further, if I may. My question is for Mr. Wheeler.
You were speaking about the connections between other infrastructure, either within the community or in close enough proximity to the community to be able to link those assets, both in terms of the physical assets as well as the expertise that goes along with maintaining those assets, et cetera. Could you go a little deeper into that aspect of this audit and other audits you’ve done, what you’re learning about those interrelationships and the possibilities and opportunities for further exploiting — in a good way — the possibilities of collaboration and connection amongst those various infrastructure? Thank you.
Mr. Wheeler: I think you’re raising a very important question from the right perspective. We didn’t get at the whole of infrastructure approach, if I could call it that, in this audit. We’ve touched on it in previous audits over the years, but perhaps not in the way you’re suggesting.
It’s incumbent upon the federal government as it’s working with First Nations to be thinking about, for example, not just a water treatment plant. You need to be thinking about the sewage treatment plant. You need to be thinking about where additional housing is going to be built vis-à-vis where the plant is. You’ve got to be thinking about roads. You’ve got to be thinking about the size of the school and the school that’s about to be constructed, thinking about future population growth. It’s a little outside the realm of this particular audit, but I think what you’re raising is an issue that is very important; not to look at single pieces of infrastructure or issues in isolation.
I know that when the department works with First Nations it tries to take that approach; to think about not only what’s happening this year, but take into consideration population growth and other issues that could be arising down the road. For example, if you’re on a First Nation where the school is 40 years old, should you be thinking about whether, over the next number of years, a new school should be constructed? If so, given where you’re building the water treatment plant, should you be thinking about the location of the school?
Again, that goes beyond what we looked at in this particular audit and audits in recent years, but I don’t think you can overemphasize the importance of taking that whole-of-infrastructure look, especially in a world where resources are limited and especially in remote First Nations where building seasons are short and, as the Auditor General mentioned, there might not be a lot of capacity in reserve to take this more comprehensive, higher-level or long-term approach to dealing with these very serious issues.
The Chair: Are there any other questions in the first round? If not, I’d like to begin the second round.
Senator Patterson: Thank you for this report, which, the way I see it, is really about broken promises. I’d like to ask about long-term advisories.
As of November 2020, 62.5% of long-term advisories were eliminated. There were 160 in 2015, so that left 60. According to your report, the department said that 32 of the remaining 60 long-term advisories would be eliminated by March 31, 2021. They then projected the other 28 would be resolved by September 2021.
Could you tell us if the department met the March 31, 2021, deadline to eliminate those 32 long-term advisories? To me, this would be an indication of whether they will succeed in meeting their promised September 2021 deadline.
Ms. Hogan: I’ll highlight a few things we noted in the report and then Mr. Wheeler might have more up-to-date information. We were talking last night and this morning about any progress so that we could help you, but I don’t believe there is much progress.
When we were drafting our report and clearing our findings with the department, we were going quickly down the path that Indigenous Services Canada would not be meeting its commitment of March 31. As I mentioned in my opening statement and we also mentioned in the report, the minister said in December of 2020 that they will not meet the commitment.
The 32 that were listed in the paragraph that you noted were not lifted by March 31. I do believe a couple were lifted, but it was not in the realm of the 32 that were there.
In December 2020, the minister made further commitments and hoped that they would address a good number of them this calendar year, but I don’t know of a large number of them being lifted at this point.
Mr. Wheeler may have more up-to-date figures, but it is clear that they did not meet the commitment on March 31.
Mr. Wheeler: Mr. Chair, the only up-to-date information is what we gleaned from the department’s website. That states that as of April 9, 106 long-term drinking water advisories had been lifted. That is six more since the time we completed our audit.
As the Auditor General mentioned, when the minister made his announcement in December speaking to additional funding and also acknowledging that not all advisories would be lifted by March, he made a commitment to get the remaining ones done as quickly as possible, but we don’t have a date for when those remaining ones would be resolved.
Senator Patterson: Thank you for those responses, Mr. Wheeler and Ms. Hogan. Your office has determined that 100 long-term advisories were lifted due to interim measures, which, because they are interim measures, meant there could potentially be a recurring incident. Despite $1.79 billion being spent between the start of fiscal 2016-17 and November 30, 2020, 43% of water systems in First Nations communities remain at medium to high risk of failing.
Do you believe that the promised $1.5 billion from the fall economic update will have any significant effect?
Ms. Hogan: I will start by addressing the interim solutions. We do highlight in a few areas in the report, that of the 60 long-term drinking water advisories remaining, some have long-term solutions but some have only interim solutions. The ones that do have long-term solutions will not be, in some cases, in place until 2024-25. It is well down the line. The interim solutions just address the problem temporarily and move that root cause and that big fix further down the line.
As we mentioned earlier in response to a question about funding, it is hard to know whether or not the additional funding committed will be sufficient to meet the needs of the First Nations. We believe the issues surrounding the funding formula and the funding policy need to be addressed in order to be able to accurately identify the funding needed from an operation and maintenance standpoint. Until you have that, I’m not sure that you will be able to have an accurate picture of the needs to address long-term advisories.
Again, I still want to say that you need to fix those root causes to also eliminate the short-term advisories. Many recurring short-term advisories last for almost a year, and some systems have had multiple short-term advisories in a year. That’s no better than having a long-term drinking water advisory. You still have a loss of confidence in your water system, and you still need a long-term solution in order to have sustainable access to clean drinking water.
Senator Francis: Ms. Hogan and Mr. Wheeler, it would be informative for our committee if you could speak to the challenges that First Nations face in making up the shortfall where the costs of operations and maintenance are not covered by the department and how that impacts water systems, projects and other services on reserve.
Ms. Hogan: I will take a crack at it and then see if Mr. Wheeler would like to add to it.
Our audit found that the original funding formula was meant to cover the 80% of the operation and maintenance costs of the public water systems, and the remaining 20% was supposed to be raised by First Nations communities through user fees.
Because the funding formula is outdated and has not kept pace with advances in technology or actual costs, many of the water systems are, in essence, not even receiving that 80%. Coupled with the difficulties that the First Nations have been experiencing in trying to bridge the 20% gap, it just means that so many systems are going without much-needed maintenance. When you do that, they get into a state that then requires a major repair instead of just some maintenance. In the long run, this increases the long-term costs of things.
I can’t underscore enough access to operators. I really do think that attracting and retaining skilled and accredited operators is essential. What we see in many of our audits in First Nations communities is a lack of housing and difficulty integrating individuals into the community has always put pressure on having essential workers, whether it be in the health care industry, for mental health or operators of water systems. Those are just long-term challenges that many First Nations communities have to fill. It’s not just a financial gap, but it’s an even bigger gap of having skilled expertise.
Mr. Wheeler, did you want to add anything?
Mr. Wheeler: Mr. Chair, to add to what the Auditor General said, what we saw was a situation where, because First Nations were not able to make up that last 20% year after year, First Nations were having to manage their water treatment systems with, ostensibly, 80% of the funding, and for many First Nations, every year they were falling further behind.
I think the government does deserve some credit here. As we mentioned in our audit report, the Fall Economic Statement 2020 has made the commitment to fund water-treatment operations to 100%. Going forward, First Nations will not be expected to make up the 20%, but as the Auditor General mentioned, this has to be seen vis-à-vis or in conjunction with the inadequacies of the funding formula. If the funding formula can be rectified and the funding is to be 100%, hopefully as we go forward you’ll see fewer and fewer of these short-term and long-term drinking-water advisories once the plans are up and running.
Senator Pate: Thank you for your comment. I think it is fantastic that this government has shown the political will to try and address these issues in ways that have not necessarily happened for decades. However, similar to what we have seen during the pandemic, when there is a political will to move quickly to address the issues that they wish to address, we’ve seen tremendous output and supports put in place. However, there are still many people being left behind, whether it’s economically or, as you were talking about, the water advisories.
I’m curious. If there were the political will, how quickly do you think a plan could be implemented to address these realities and address the recommendations you’ve made, particularly the critical ones?
Ms. Hogan: I’m not sure I have the right crystal ball to help come up with that. We are seeing, in some of the long-term plans that are in place, that they are set to be completed by 2024 or 2025. That is not addressing all of the systems that have long-term drinking water advisories; just some of them. So it’s definitely a long-term solution to put in place the fixes. To have the plan should not take that amount of time, but it does require a good collaboration with the First Nations communities, as we mentioned earlier on.
It isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. Every community might have different needs and different realities as to why the water is not safe to drink. Those solutions need to be unique to the circumstances of the First Nation community. Add to it the remoteness, the shortness of the build season, and it really does mean that you need to have a good plan in place and try to stick to it in order to meet those sort of long-term goals.
Mr. Wheeler has much more experience and a lot of expertise here. So I’d love to make sure that you hear his point of view.
Mr. Wheeler: The Auditor General puts it very well. I will add one thing to what the Auditor General raised. That’s this. It’s one thing to have a short-term or a long-term water advisory lifted because you have a new plant or have made a necessary repair, but the real challenge is and will be making sure, as we go forward as a country, that First Nations have that capacity to continue to operate a water treatment plant successfully. For example, you’ve got to have, as we say in our report, adequately paid water treatment plant operators who have the required certification to operate those plants. You need backup operators. Those things must be looked at continuously. You could have two operators on reserve. One retires; all of a sudden, you’re down to one. How is the federal government supporting that First Nation to then get another person to fit into the secondary operator position so that there is enough capacity to run the water treatment plant?
It also goes to the issue of operations and maintenance. It’s one thing again to lift the advisory, but if you can do proper operations and maintenance, you will be in the situation where you don’t have as many advisories in the future. It takes a long-term perspective, and it’s hard work.
I can give you one very good example. Back in 2015, we tabled an audit in Parliament on establishing the First Nations Health Authority in British Columbia. We did a study on the establishment of that authority. We looked at the steps taken by the federal government, First Nations in B.C. and also the B.C. provincial government, in order to establish that authority. It took 10 years. From the point where the First Nations decided they wanted control transferred to them, it took 10 years of hard work before the door was opened on that April day in 2014 at the First Nations Health Authority in B.C. It shows that despite good intentions, there needs to be follow-through. That’s what you see in this water audit and in a lot of the other audits and studies we have done in this area.
The Chair: Thank you again.
Senator McCallum: In the audit, the Office of the Auditor General of Canada concluded that the department had no regulatory regime in place with respect to safe drinking water in First Nations communities. The audit noted that until a regulatory regime is in place, First Nations communities will not have drinking water protections comparable with other communities in Canada where drinking water is regulated.
If UNDRIP, Bill C-15, is adopted, do you think it can play a major role in how safe drinking water is addressed? Will it create some or more support for First Nations to move this forward? Thank you.
Ms. Hogan: Unfortunately, I’m not sure I know all the details about that legislation. What I would give you at a high level about a good regulatory regime is this; it definitely needs to set minimum service levels, as you mentioned. The levels must be comparable to communities off reserve. We must know exactly what defines clean, safe drinking water.
You also need to have clear roles and responsibilities in that legislation so that every party knows what they are accountable for. You need to know who is accountable for the maintenance, who is accountable for the operation, and who is accountable when something goes wrong, so that they can take the steps needed to rectify the situation.
As long as those aspects are considered within the regulatory framework, then it should be comprehensive. But it is not just an act. What we found in the audit here is that an act has been in place for several years. Regulations are needed so that the day-to-day, workable things can be operationalized for every single person affected. I would call it the meat on the bones of the skeleton of having good, safe drinking water in communities.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Hogan.
Senator Patterson: We really do appreciate this opportunity to meet with the Auditor General and Mr. Wheeler on this important issue.
Mr. Wheeler mentioned the importance of training and capacity building. I would like to ask about that because your report did note that about 26% of the public water systems on First Nations reserves did not have a fully trained and certified operator. Over half lacked a fully certified and trained backup operator.
Back in 2013, we heard about Indigenous Service Canada’s Circuit Rider Training Program. Could you tell us your observations on that issue and that program? What portion of water advisories were issued due to a lack of certified operators? Do you have any comments about the effectiveness of the Circuit Rider Training Program in building that capacity?
Ms. Hogan: In the interests of time and to give you the most fulsome answer, I am going to ask Mr. Wheeler to speak up about those; he would be able to answer all of your questions.
But your statistics are absolutely correct about what we found in our audit about systems that did not have skilled and accredited operators or backup operators. Not having a skilled operator in place could be a reason that a drinking-water advisory is imposed on a system, but it would be the sad reason that it be a long-term one. That’s why needing to build that capacity is so essential. As I mentioned earlier, it’s not just for the public systems; it’s also to use the knowledge and that skill base to help with the private systems as well.
Mr. Wheeler, I will ask you to talk further.
Mr. Wheeler: Unfortunately, we didn’t do an analysis that looked at long-term advisories from the point of view of whether there was a fully trained water treatment operator in that First Nation. We didn’t go down to that level of detail. Also, in this audit, we did not make an assessment of how successful the capacity-building initiatives were that the department undertakes with First Nations through programs such as the Circuit Rider Training Program as to how successful they were. However, in some other audits, we noted the value of such programs.
Things like the Circuit Rider Training Program can have an expert goal from community to community to help train operators on the job and get them closer to getting their certification. Thinking about previous audits, we did observe the value of that program, and it does show the importance of doing that hard work — that capacity building — so that First Nations are able to properly manage water treatment plants so that they are properly able to manage sewage plants.
The more of those sorts of training and capacity-building programs that can be put in place, the better.
That also goes to an issue we spoke about in other audits where sometimes it’s important, especially in more rural and remote areas, for organizations such as tribal councils to take on responsibilities to augment training, whether for water treatment operators or other workers, because there is a better return when you can train more people at once as opposed to training one person on one First Nation and then going and training them on another First Nation. There is a greater value when you can have larger-scale programs.
But to summarize, we didn’t assess the effectiveness of the program in previous audits; we noted the effect it can have on capacity building.
The Chair: We have time for one more question.
Senator Pate: Mr. Wheeler, I would like to pick up where you left off when I was asking about some of the implementation issues. I appreciate you pointing out, for instance, the length of time it took to develop the health systems when there was not just a willingness but a desire, with everybody coming to the table to work on it.
One of the challenges that has been raised with a number of us at different times is the entrenchment — how difficult the problems become the longer they are neglected. It strikes me that this is one of the challenges the audit highlights. Also, there is the interrelatedness with other systems, whether it’s the impact on housing, education, et cetera.
I wonder if you have any areas that are not necessarily in your report but that you think the committee should be aware of? Certainly, when I’m hearing from folks in First Nations communities, from elders and leadership, the interrelatedness is a key component; without such issues being dealt with, the entrenchment of the marginalization and colonial oppression continues unabated.
Mr. Wheeler: I will defer to the Auditor General for the ultimate answer, but I can offer a few small points.
There is a value to the audits that our office does and which we have done for 25-plus years on First Nations issues. If there is a shortcoming, each audit tends to look at a single slice of the pie in that we look just at education, or just housing or just water. That has led to our intermittently doing these higher level retrospectives that try to identify some of the issues that cut across individual programs.
What you might be getting at is that it’s incumbent upon government, other stakeholders and partners to not focus solely on the specific issue but at the broader issues, if possible. When we speak to things like the importance of legislative base for the program, the adequacy of funding or, for the umpteenth time in this meeting, the importance of capacity, that might be a way that government and First Nations can get at some of those more entrenched issues, as you refer to them.
I don’t know; maybe the Auditor General can add a couple of points to what I’m trying to get at, speaking about the limitations of auditing, and how we try and get around those issues.
Ms. Hogan: If we had unlimited time and resources, it would be fantastic to do this cross-cutting audit for sure. If we did something like that, there would be a bit of a fear of where to start; the task might seem so large that you’re not sure where to start on something.
So you do need to tackle an issue and address it, but you can’t do that in a silo and forget about other things. An important aspect linked to safe drinking water would definitely be health and the consequences of not having regular access to safe drinking water that many of us take for granted. There is the impact on health, and then that impact has a strain on a community and a health care system. There might be an inability for someone to be an active and contributing member in their community or society because of health concerns.
There is a far-reaching, generational issue. If we tried to tackle absolutely everything all at once, it would take so long that we wouldn’t tackle anything.
So you have to cut it out into manageable pieces, but then when you’re thinking about the long-term solution, it’s thinking about that intersectionality with all the other things.
We definitely can’t forget the impacts that any of our actions have on the environment.
It’s all those little things. We can’t do something in isolation, but we really have to think about the solution in a more global perspective without losing sight of the fact we need to address the main issues. That is why we try to segregate our audits on an issue — flag a concern that is so important. But we expect lawmakers and government will think more broadly when they come to that solution and not just try to address the tiny little slice of the puzzle that we looked at.
The Chair: On that note, I would like to thank Karen Hogan, the Auditor General of Canada, and Glenn Wheeler, Principal of the report on safe drinking water in First Nations communities. Thank you for your report and for your testimony today. We appreciate your work.
(The committee adjourned.)