QUESTION PERIOD — Ministry of Emergency Management and Community Resilience
Emergency Management Strategy
October 7, 2026
Minister, while experts continue to call for a stronger federal role in emergency preparedness and disaster mitigation, your government’s efforts often seem to concentrate on disaster response.
Minister, you have given a number of examples of mitigation announcements, budgets and amounts, but it didn’t help this year. What concrete results are you expecting out of those announcements and investments next year?
Senator, just with respect to this last wildfire season, in 2025, there were 17 requests for federal assistance received by the federal government, specifically by my department. This year, there were two. I can’t tell you anything other than anecdotally, but I would like to think the investments we’ve made — including our aerial firefighting capacity and investments in our humanitarian workforce — have had a positive impact.
That said, we know we need to do so much more in order to protect this country from wildfires, floods and potentially earthquakes as well. We are very focused on that.
I completely understand that we need to move from a situation where we’re being just simply reactive and putting out fires or cleaning up floods to a situation where we’re much more proactive.
As I’ve indicated to you, I have sought information from stakeholders from coast to coast to coast. I’ve talked to people about a national strategy.
I’ve met with hundreds of stakeholders over the last 16 months and we are working very hard to make sure we shift what we do from react —
Thank you, minister.
I have one last question, minister. Has the government — and Parliament in general — looked at other regions of the world, other countries and how they deal with similar problems? Obviously, Canada’s terrain is very unique, but there are places around the world — in the south, the north, the east, the west and around the globe. Has the government been in touch with other countries? Is there anything they’re doing that we’re not that we should be looking at?
That’s a great question, senator. We know that many other countries are struggling with the effects of climate change. They have increased flooding in the same way we do. There are wildfires all around the world. I have personally, as has my department, been in touch with a number of other countries. I have spoken to emergency management officials in Australia, in Mexico and in Sweden as well. I have had direct discussions by Zoom with those individuals.
We have also studied models and emergency management models from other jurisdictions. One of the models that is most closely allied to us would be Australia. What they did after the bush fires was put in place a national agency —
Thank you, minister.
Honourable senators, the time for Question Period has expired.
I am certain that you will want to join me in thanking Minister Olszewski for joining us today. We will now resume the proceeding that was interrupted at the start of Question Period.
Thank you, minister.
