QUESTION PERIOD — Ministry of Emergency Management and Community Resilience
National Adaptation Office
October 7, 2026
Welcome to you, minister.
Last May, Senator Muggli and I hosted an event with the Intact Centre for Climate Adaption entitled Extreme Weather and the National Interest: A Primer for Parliamentarians. That session outlined how, over the past 30 years, the financial costs of extreme weather in Canada have increased tenfold, driven by flooding and wildfires.
The statistics are startling. Flooding, as you know, is the most common and costly disaster in Canada. In the past decade, floods have averaged nearly $800 million in insured losses annually, and 300,000 Canadians were evacuated in the past three wildfire seasons.
The Intact Centre was calling on the government to establish a national adaptation office to improve coordination across all orders of government to prepare communities for extreme weather events. Will your government commit to creating this national adaptation office?
At the present time, I’m not aware of the status of discussions regarding such an office.
We absolutely know that flooding, as you’ve already indicated, is the most expensive in terms of the costs of recovery and resilience, as well. People think it’s wildfires, but it’s flooding.
There are some things we’ve done on the flooding side. I made an announcement with respect to a flood portal. I know we spoke earlier about educating Canadians. That flood portal is up and running. We’re waiting for provinces and territories to take the next step. Homeowners can type in their address and learn about what their flood risk might be and what steps they can take to mitigate flooding losses.
In addition, the Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangements were updated around April 2025. There’s a stream that was added that enables people making claims under those arrangements to receive monies to mitigate against those types of losses in the future. In addition, through the Build Communities Strong Fund, there’s a mitigation stream of —
Thank you, minister.
Thank you. That is all good news, but a national coordinated adaptation office is something that would really help.
The Canadian Youth Climate Assembly presented their report to parliamentarians last September. One of their key recommendations included — and I know this is in your title as minister — urging government:
. . . to strengthen and invest in incentive programs to ensure that communities undertake deep retrofits and employ sustainable technologies. . . . so that communities are better equipped for extreme climate disasters.
How is the government supporting communities now to improve their safety and resilience, particularly with regard to local infrastructure, in the face of this context of extreme climate events that we’re living through?
There are a few things I could highlight in particular.
One is that there is a resilience organization that is in Toronto that is partly funded by the Government of Canada. The purpose of that organization is to work with local communities, especially smaller ones, and give them advice with respect to how they can mitigate against various types of natural disasters, but flooding in particular.
There’s also another fund that we are contributing to. It was put in place by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, and it is called the Green Municipal Fund. It also provides millions of dollars to help local municipalities invest in resilient —
Thank you, minister.
