SENATORS’ STATEMENTS — Access to Safe Drinking Water

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak about drinking water safety in the Northwest Territories.

In November 2025, the Chief Environmental Health Officer advised residents of Hay River, Enterprise, Kátł’odeeche First Nation and Kakisa to take precautions when using their water. I was there during the boil-water advisory. I was told that if I showered, I should keep it brief and leave a window open. The temperature was below -20 degrees Celsius.

This warning was the impetus for a closer examination of water safety in the Northwest Territories, leading to alarming findings. I started learning about trihalomethanes, or THMs, a chemical byproduct formed when chlorine used to disinfect water reacts with natural organic matter. In Hay River, the average THM level over the past year exceeded the national guideline of 100 micrograms per litre. Additional advisories, including in Fort Liard, demonstrate that these are not isolated cases but part of a broader pattern of chemical exposure concerns.

Health Canada has also noted that monitoring data for THMs is available across provinces and territories, with the exception of the Northwest Territories. This raises critical questions: How do we assess safety where data is incomplete? How can safety be claimed where it’s not consistently measured?

These concerns are reinforced by recent findings related to lead. Recently, testing performed in schools and public buildings across multiple Northwest Territories communities — including Yellowknife, Fort Smith, Aklavik, Tsiigehtchic, Behchokǫ̀ and Fort Simpson — has identified elevated lead levels in those facilities, in some cases reaching up to 20 times Health Canada’s maximum acceptable level, with Fort Liard and Sachs Harbour schools added to the list yesterday.

We’re also seeing microbiological risks. In Ulukhaktok, the testing of untreated source water identified coliforms at 2 most probable number, or MPN, per 100 micrograms per litre. Health Canada’s acceptable level requires non-detectable levels.

In Sachs Harbour, a boil-water advisory was issued in February 2026 after the community’s water treatment system was unable to operate due to frozen intake and infrastructure failure.

Taken together, these findings span at least 12 of the 33 communities in the Northwest Territories, demonstrating that these issues are not isolated but widespread and recurring. Recently, the federal government announced $20.1 million toward a new water treatment plant in Hay River. This investment is welcome and necessary, but it also underscores that these issues are not isolated but ongoing and systemic. In under‑resourced systems, communities are not facing a single risk; they are navigating multiple overlapping risks at once.

In the Northwest Territories, the risks associated with drinking water cannot be separated from the broader realities of insufficient and outdated infrastructure. It points to something larger: a system under strain, where risks are not only present but increasingly difficult to detect, manage and prevent. In these conditions, the federal government must do more than acknowledge the problem; it must continue to address system gaps, ensure communities are informed and provide the resources needed to monitor, mitigate and, ultimately, eliminate these risks.

Thank you, quyanainni, mahsi.