Moved second reading of Bill C-76, An Act to amend the Canada National Parks Act.

She said: Honourable senators, the people of Jasper, devastated by wildfire, need every opportunity to rebuild quickly, effectively and with responsiveness to local needs and conditions. Bill C-76 is the next logical evolution in the relationship between Parks Canada and the Municipality of Jasper. The government and the leadership of Parks Canada believe this, the Municipality of Jasper believes this, and I believe this as well.

As the former mayor of the Town of Banff, located in Banff National Park, I have always worked closely on shared priorities with Jasper, located in Jasper National Park, and their mayor, Richard Ireland. As the only municipalities within the national park system, Jasper and Banff are alike in many ways and have faced similar challenges, but there has been one key difference.

Since 1990, the Town of Banff has benefited from our status as a self-governing municipality with jurisdiction over our own land use and development. While Parks Canada rightfully manages the national park, local authorities have the autonomy to make the day-to-day decisions of running a town while upholding the highest standards of environmental conservation.

The Town of Banff Incorporation Agreement, signed by Parks Canada and the town, provides that the local government has responsibility for municipal services as well as land use planning and development. In practice, that means that we don’t have to obtain approval from Parks Canada officials in Ottawa to build homes for our residents or make repairs to our roads, or seek federal input over what kind of siding to use on our buildings.

Eleven years later, when Jasper negotiated its own agreement for the establishment of local government, the federal government refused to replicate the model that has been so successful in Banff. In Jasper, the Agreement for the Establishment of Local Government in the Town of Jasper — signed by the Minister of Canadian Heritage who, at that time, was responsible for Parks Canada — provides that the local government has responsibility for municipal services, but it explicitly excludes responsibility for land use planning and development.

The Municipality of Jasper is responsible for delivering a range of services to its residents; however, authorities for land use planning and development are delivered by Parks Canada through the Canada National Parks Act — a federal agency designed and equipped to manage national parks, not vibrant and complex communities serving the needs of 5,000 residents and over 2.5 million visitors per year.

For the two dozen years of its municipal life, the people of Jasper have been building their community with the planning and development decisions ultimately residing in Ottawa. This process can be time-consuming and cumbersome.

However, today, as part of the rebuilding effort, Parks Canada and the federal government are proposing amendments to the Canada National Parks Act that would remove barriers and transfer land use planning and development authorities to the municipality.

The transfer of responsibility is intended to give the municipality greater control over the rebuilding effort and to simplify the process for residents and developers. In this crucial hour of need, this bill to amend the Canada National Parks Act is an important and, indeed, necessary step in assisting Jasper with its recovery and rebuild.

This past July, Canadians watched in horror as the wildfire spread and thousands of people were evacuated. Iconic structures were destroyed, and many people — including Mayor Ireland — lost their homes. One firefighter, Morgan Kitchen of Calgary, was tragically killed. Six days after the fire was first spotted, Parks Canada declared that it was the largest wildfire that Jasper had recorded in 100 years.

At one point, I know that many people — myself included — feared that the whole town would be lost. But thanks to decades of preparation by Parks Canada, the Municipality of Jasper and Indigenous partners, the damage was not as severe as it could have been.

Parks Canada and Mayor Ireland have worked to fire-smart the community, and they worked with other partners and stakeholders to do tabletop mock disasters to prepare for this exact scenario. Thousands of hectares of forest had already been removed from around the town, which limited the spread of the fire.

Thanks to those preparations and the valiant efforts of emergency responders, the majority of the town structures were able to be saved, including much of the critical infrastructure.

I would like to acknowledge the firefighter crews who did a heroic job in saving 70% of the infrastructure in the townsite. With rising average temperatures creating drier conditions and with more intense wildfires expected across Canada in the future, I invite all Canadians to thank them.

The community of Jasper has obviously been devastated, and its residents are reeling, but they have demonstrated again and again their resilience and resolve. The people of Jasper stand ready to work with the provincial and federal governments to rebuild and welcome Canadians and the world back to this special place.

The passage of this bill not only equips them with critical tools to accelerate their rebuild and recovery, but it also demonstrates that those in this chamber and in the other place have expressed confidence that the people of Jasper and their duly elected representatives can be entrusted to accountably exercise authorities common to every municipality across Canada.

I was glad that our elected colleagues in the other place gave unanimous consent to pass this legislation quickly. Today, I am urging my colleagues here to do the same.

The passage of this bill has been expedited because of the time-sensitive situation. Jasper must rebuild quickly, and the last thing they need are delays caused by politics.

As you’ll see from reading the bill, it is a very small change to the Canada National Parks Act; it is limited in scope, but it will have a profound impact on the people of Jasper.

It is very important to note that these legislative changes will not affect the conservation of Jasper National Park. Parks Canada, Mayor Ireland and the Municipality of Jasper recognize the special nature of this park community and its place in the national park system, and they are committed to ensuring its protection for the enjoyment of current and future generations.

Parks Canada will continue to exercise oversight in the community. Jasper’s community plan and bylaws will continue to be certified by Parks Canada to ensure they meet federal requirements, including ensuring the ecological integrity of Jasper National Park.

Jasper is about to embark on the most urgent and significant rebuild in its history. It needs the tools to do so. This is one such tool. It’s a critically important one — one that we can provide them.

As the Mayor of Jasper has said, “Passage of these amendments cannot come quickly enough.”

Thank you. Hiy hiy.

Senator Batters, do you have a question?

Yes, I do. Senator Sorensen, could you give us a bit more detail about what this bill does? I certainly understand the very significant tragedy that happened in Jasper, but I couldn’t tell from your speech what this bill actually does. For a second reading speech, we should have some concrete details about it. Thank you.

When land use planning was done within that municipality, previously everything had to go through the Parks Canada representatives in Jasper National Park and potentially upward to Ottawa. Now it will allow the mayor and council to make decisions on their own within the town limits and within the set square footage of the Town of Jasper — not out into the national park — as to where and what they can develop within the town limits. Previously, everything had to be approved through Parks Canada. On that question, I would like to note that there are several pieces of legislation above the land use bylaw: It includes the incorporation agreement and the Jasper National Park Management Plan, and they’ll be creating a community plan, all of which Parks Canada and the town will work on together. But at the end of the day, a planning department in the Town of Jasper will be able to make decisions on future development and rebuilding.

Of course.

It was an everyday occurrence, but a good example would be that a few years back — time goes by, and I don’t remember what year it was — we built an under market-value housing development, predominantly for our staffing needs within the town. It was a town-owned property. With Parks Canada, we were able to decide the location. By the way, I should add that it was Parks Canada who gave us the land for that. That’s where the parks and the municipality often do work together. In terms of what the building would be, how big it would be, how many units would be in it, what it would be made of and how it would be structured, the Town of Banff and our planning department could make those decisions. If something like that were proposed in Jasper, all the paperwork that would go to the Town of Banff’s planning department would go to the Parks Canada offices instead. They do have planning staff there, but I would suggest that planners for urban planning operate a little bit differently.

Yes, absolutely. I mentioned all the other documents that the Municipality of Jasper will have to adhere to, and I can’t stress enough the stringent standards that are put in place for these communities that the municipalities are mandated to adhere to, which follow in the mandate of Parks Canada.

I think the other interesting part about our communities is, first and foremost, that we’re on a set footprint. We can’t build out. We can’t build a ring road around the community. That’s number one: We’re on a set footprint and only have so much space.

Second, we have what’s called a commercial cap. The amount of commercial square footage that we have to develop is capped. In fact, Banff has reached its cap. There will never be a Walmart. There will never be a Ferris wheel. There will never be any kind of large development.

Because of the need-to-reside clause — which is a speech all unto itself, and I’m happy to explain it to anybody who wants to understand that — a majority of this has to do with housing and housing people who live in those municipalities in order to serve visitors to the national parks.

I can’t stress enough the number of guidelines that we live by that no other municipality in Canada lives by in order to achieve that goal.

Senator Sorensen, will you take a question?

Absolutely.

You are undoubtedly very familiar with the particulars when it comes to Banff. With these changes, do we have an equivalent set of circumstances now in terms of Jasper and how they operate? Is it identical to Banff, or is it different?

It will be almost the same. I would have to read both of the actual documents, but it will be much the same.

That raises another point. This change will not happen the minute this bill is passed. There is a process that will need to happen in order to get this legislation agreed upon and signed off on by both parties.

What will happen immediately is that an exemption will be given for a lot of these barriers so that Jasper can get going, but in terms of actually getting the legislation passed, one thing Jasper has to do is redo their community plan. The minister will, in fact, have to sign off on their community plan.

I expect that the legislation will be very similar, but until I actually see what it looks like — and it will be months down the road before the actual legislation is written — it will take some time. There will be some time allowed to ensure things are done correctly.

Is there any particular reason why Jasper should be treated differently than Banff in terms of its operational capacity and how it runs its town?

There was never a time when Jasper should have been treated differently than Banff.

My opinion is that in 2001, what we’re doing today should have been done at that time. Then the two municipalities would have operated in the same way all the way along.

I wanted to double-check something. We have agreed to a very express passage of this bill through all the stages and so on, in a matter of days, and all of us here have done it on the understanding that this would provide an immediate ability for Jasper to issue things like building permits and do inspections and all of those things that would normally have been done somewhere else by bureaucrats.

I just want to make sure that’s the case. We have talked a lot about the land planning and no Ferris wheels and so on and months, but that’s not why you are asking for the express passage, right? They will be able to issue a building permit within days of this passage. Is that fair to say?

That’s my understanding. I was at the briefing this morning with the Parks Canada staff, and that is where the word came up that, yes, it will be immediate, because there will be an exemption immediately. Getting the paperwork done right is important, and so that’s how they are going to allow them to get these authorities immediately while they continue to work on what it looks like in the endgame.

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak on Bill C-76, An Act to amend the Canada National Parks Act.

This bill was introduced by the Minister of Environment and Climate Change on September 18 following the wildfires that devastated the town of Jasper on July 24, 2024. Colleagues, I speak as the official critic of this bill.

I would like to begin my speech by paying tribute to the residents of Jasper, victims of the wildfires, some of whom tragically lost their homes and belongings. The entire community was forced to evacuate in the face of this disaster.

The damage was extensive. One third of the town was burned, with 800 home units lost. Out of a population of 5,000 people, 2,000 lost their homes. Entire neighbourhoods were destroyed, and the material losses from the fires are estimated at $283 million. A total of 358 structures, including homes and businesses, were destroyed. Insurance companies are expected to pay out $880 million to cover the losses caused by the fires.

As Senator Sorensen did, I would like to also honour the firefighter who tragically lost his life in this disaster. Morgan Kitchen, a 24-year-old young man, gave his life fighting the fire. I would like to share what his mother said about him:

He wanted nothing more than to be in community with other courageous and committed people doing meaningful work. We are grateful to his crew for their care following his injury and for the support of the entire Alberta Wildfire community. We are comforted knowing he brought joy and laughter to the many people who called him a friend.

These events, colleagues, remind us of the courage and dedication of our firefighters, who wake up every day willing to risk their lives for others. Their bravery and commitment in the face of danger inspire deep gratitude in all of us.

Before diving into the core subject at hand today, allow me to talk a little bit about the town of Jasper. Jasper is a small community, as I said, of 5,000 residents in Alberta, located within Jasper National Park, very close to the British Columbia border. It lies at the heart of the beautiful Canadian Rockies, more specifically in the Athabasca Valley between Mount Edith Cavell and Pyramid Mountain. The nearest large city is Edmonton, which is situated almost at the same latitude as Jasper.

For those who have never visited, I encourage you to take a look at the stunning images available online of the town of Jasper and the breathtaking landscapes offered by Jasper National Park. The town is also known for its ski activities, mountain hiking and climbing.

Jasper is home to a national historic site, established in 1813, known as Jasper House. Jasper House was a fur-trading post that served as a hub for the fur trade and a vital stop for travellers crossing the Yellowhead and Athabasca passes. It was a significant strategic point used by the Hudson’s Bay Company.

Jasper House had two locations throughout its history and ceased operations in 1857. It was later declared a national historic site in 1924.

The town and park drew their names from Jasper Haws, the post’s steward, who had been a paddler for the North West Company for many years between Montreal and Fort William and then to the Red River. Jasper Haws continued his career with the company for 20 years, which eventually led him to the Athabasca River district. He was later appointed the steward of the post that now bears his name.

In 1907, the Government of Canada, known at the time as “the Dominion,” established Jasper Park Forest Reserve, which later became Jasper National Park in 1930. In 1911, a train station was established in Jasper by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, known as Fitzhugh. Thanks to this new railway line and, later, the road linking Jasper to Edmonton, the town’s development and activities accelerated.

I would like to remind everyone that Jasper National Park is classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site under the Canadian Rocky Mountains Parks category. It is the second-largest dark sky preserve in the world and the largest national park in the Rockies. The park receives more than 2 million visitors each year.

I felt it was essential to share the history of this town and park so we are fully aware that these wildfires, which burned 36,000 hectares, devastated a cultural and historical gem that is part of Canada’s national heritage.

Honourable senators, I would now like to address the measures in Bill C-76 and discuss the current status of the town of Jasper. As I mentioned earlier, Jasper National Park was created in 1907, and the town lies within the park, which is subject to strict regulations from Parks Canada. Parks Canada manages and preserves the surrounding protected lands under the Canada National Parks Act.

Parks Canada is also responsible for land management, meaning it makes decisions regarding urban planning and development, including where construction is permitted, the types of construction allowed and how land is used.

On April 1, 1945, the Government of Alberta established Improvement District No. 12, which corresponds to the geographical perimeter of Jasper National Park. An improvement district is a structure set up by the Alberta government to manage sparsely populated areas where the provincial government directly administers municipal taxes, regulations and services.

In August 1995, a second improvement district was created, called the Jasper Improvement District, to facilitate the transition to a specialized municipality.

It wasn’t until later, in 2001, that an agreement was signed to establish local governance in collaboration with Parks Canada. This agreement, titled “Agreement for the Establishment of Local Government in the Town of Jasper,” allowed, by provincial decree, for the creation of the specialized municipality of Jasper.

This municipality holds the same powers as any other city under the Alberta Municipal Government Act, except regarding land management and development, which remain under the jurisdiction of Parks Canada.

Due to the unique location of Jasper within a national park, the agreement I just referenced allows for the exclusion of Part 17 of Alberta’s Municipal Government Act, which typically grants municipalities authority over land use and development.

The bill before us seeks to grant the local government in Jasper autonomy and the authority to manage land use and development within the town’s limits.

The bill also exempts the town from certain regulations, which I will cite from the bill:

(a) the Town of Jasper Zoning Regulations;

(b) the National Parks Building Regulations;

(c) the National Parks Signs Regulations; and

(d) any regulation made under this Act that repeals the regulations referred to in paragraphs (a) to (c).

The federal government has chosen to prioritize this bill in the legislative agenda to facilitate the swift reconstruction of Jasper.

By granting the town these powers without having to go through Parks Canada, it will be able to expedite the process of rebuilding without needing approval for building permits, land subdivision, zoning and community planning, while addressing the immediate needs of residents and businesses affected by the fires.

This bill is, therefore, necessary and urgent to pass, colleagues, to allow the town of Jasper to rebuild as quickly as possible and help the victims of the fires.

I remind you that Jasper hosts many visitors each year, and it is essential for the town to rebuild rapidly to continue welcoming tourists and prevent the loss of significant economic revenue generated by tourism.

However, I would like to emphasize one important point: These new powers requested by Jasper were also the result of a process that began before the terrible wildfires. In fact, as early as 2022, Jasper had requested these powers from Parks Canada.

Parks Canada subsequently held public consultations in March 2023 at the local, provincial and national levels, as well as consultations with Indigenous peoples, to determine how to address the request without compromising the park’s ecological integrity.

The consultations ended on April 19, 2023, and the What We Heard Report was later published. In this report, Parks Canada noted:

Following extensive outreach, there does not appear to be a strong desire to immediately begin the process to amend the Canada National Parks Act, regulations, and Establishment Agreement for Local Government in the Town of Jasper (2001). Instead, participants overwhelmingly felt that the underlying concerns should be addressed first before pursuing potentially lengthy governance changes.

Honourable colleagues, it is clear that the wildfires in Jasper changed Parks Canada’s perspective on this matter. It is now urgent to grant these powers to the Jasper community so they can quickly and safely rebuild.

However, where I raise concerns is regarding the responsibility of Parks Canada and the Minister of Environment and Climate Change in this tragedy. This is a sensitive subject, where we must avoid partisanship, as many people have endured extremely painful situations over the past few months.

However, as parliamentarians acting on behalf of citizens we serve, we have a duty to examine what went wrong and how we can improve to prevent future disasters of this magnitude.

We have a responsibility to question the federal government and its agencies where there are signs or evidence of failure in their mandates or negligence in their duties. It is our role to ensure the government is held accountable.

There were clear warnings over the past few years that a disaster was looming in Jasper. Two scientists and researchers, Emile Begin and Ken Hodges, had already alerted Parks Canada officials to the impending catastrophe and the lack of necessary preparedness and prevention measures.

Here’s what Hodges told the CBC about this in 2018:

You have fire suppression that has occurred for many years — therefore, you get a lot of dead fuel that would have been consumed by a natural process. The mountain pine beetle adds even more fuel to the situation. . . . You’ve got a major catastrophe on your hands if you get a match thrown into that. If you do not reduce the fuel, then you’re leaving a fire that might burn similar to what happened in Waterton.

The researchers felt that Parks Canada was not adequately prepared and, even worse, was not able to provide the researchers with their emergency preparedness plans.

Of course, Parks Canada held a different view on the matter. Here’s what Alan Fehr, the Superintendent of Jasper National Park, said at the time:

Jasper is located in a forested environment and wildfires are always a concern to us. We’re quite comfortable with where we are with our own emergency planning and evacuation planning.

Honourable senators, we could go further back, to June 2017, when Jasper’s mayor had already sounded the alarm about the risk of a major fire in Jasper. I would, therefore, like to share with you what he said to the CBC in 2017:

If a fire starts in the Miette River valley in dry conditions with a bunch of dead standing trees, the intensity of that fire could just be enormous.

This issue was even raised in the House of Commons by Conservative MP Jim Eglinski, who questioned the Liberal government on its plan to address this risk. Here’s what the then-Minister of Environment replied:

Our government is absolutely committed to the ecological integrity of our national parks. That is my first priority as a minister. I look forward to talking to the member further about this and seeing how we can move forward.

I ask a simple question: Why did this catastrophe eventually happen when the government seemed so confident in its ability to act in the event of wildfires?

Colleagues, this is not all.

In 2022, a report was published on the implementation of an action plan launched in 2017 to protect certain endangered species in Jasper National Park. One of these species highlighted in the report was the whitebark pine. The whitebark pine has been severely impacted in recent years by the mountain pine beetle, a North American pest that targets mature trees, particularly various species of pines.

Years of fire suppression have led to a significant increase in the number of old pines, creating ideal conditions for the proliferation of the mountain pine beetle in the Southern Rockies’ forests. This, in turn, has led to more dead trees, increasing the amount of combustible material in these forests.

To give you an idea of the scale of the damage caused by this pest, I would like to quote from a fact sheet from Natural Resources Canada about the mountain pine beetle:

An ongoing outbreak of mountain pine beetle that started in British Columbia in the early 1990s has affected more than 18 million hectares of forest. . . .

Since the early 1990s, the beetle has attacked 50% of the total volume of commercial lodgepole pine in British Columbia.

By 2017, the total cumulative loss of pine that could have been sold was estimated at 752 million cubic metres (58% of sellable pine volume).

Honourable senators, in the 2022 report on the status of the 2017 action plan’s implementation, we can find a detailed summary of the progress made on the whitebark pine population and habitat restoration in Appendix A. Over six years, there was only a 3.5% increase in the number of restored or newly created habitat hectares. I would like to share a passage from that report on this subject:

We planted over 18,000 seedlings Since 2017, over 18,000 seedlings have been planted and more than 160,000 seeds collected. Based on recent restoration plans for similar areas, it is likely that 520,000 seedlings may be required to meet long-term objectives.

Further along in the report, there is another interesting section that discusses another method of promoting whitebark pine regeneration:

Fire has not yet been applied for Whitebark Pine restoration. Mechanical thinning has been completed in 1.6 hectares which is a small area relative to the amount of Whitebark Pine habitat.

Honourable senators, prescribed burns can play a role in whitebark pine regeneration because they create conditions favourable for seed germination and young tree growth by reducing mountain pine beetle populations and limiting the accumulation of combustible material. The absence of prescribed burns coupled with slow progress in habitat restoration contributed to a buildup of combustible material in these forests. Whitebark pines play a critical role in the forest ecosystem’s resilience, and without their regeneration, the forests have become more vulnerable to uncontrollable wildfires.

It is precisely this inadequate management that exacerbated the intensity of the recent wildfire disaster in Jasper. The accumulation of dead wood and fuel, combined with the lack of large-scale treatments, created the perfect conditions for a fire of such magnitude.

Colleagues, was the minister aware of this?

The answer is yes. We can find this information in the 2022 Jasper National Park Management Plan. Here’s what the report says:

A mountain pine beetle infestation has brought significant change to forests in Alberta, including Jasper National Park, with consequences for wildfire risk, public safety, infrastructure management and long-term forest succession. White pine blister rust and invasive plants are already threatening terrestrial species and ecosystems in the park . . .

Honourable senators, there were clear signs and evidence pointing to the risk of a major wildfire in Jasper National Park. It is undeniable that since 2017 — seven years ago — ministers in the current government were aware of this risk and, in my view, demonstrated negligence. The report I just cited shows the slow pace of Parks Canada’s response.

It is high time the Minister of Environment and Climate Change stopped focusing solely on ideological rhetoric and started taking real responsibility for the management of our parks and forests. This government should take concrete action to ensure that effective initiatives, like the regeneration of whitebark pine, are properly implemented. The slow progress in forest conservation projects, such as Parks Canada’s poor results in reforestation and the lack of prescribed burns in Jasper, is unacceptable.

They were told then, and we know it now: This lack of action on the ground puts our forests and communities at risk. It is time for the minister to focus on his responsibilities here at home.

I was also surprised by the minister’s attempt to dodge accountability during the last meeting of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development on September 25 regarding the factors that led to the recent fires in Jasper National Park. At no point did the minister acknowledge his responsibility for what could have been better managed or what went wrong. Instead, he simply praised his government’s action and his department’s investments while claiming that Jasper was one of the best-prepared towns for wildfires — despite the fact that one third of the town burned down.

So I ask this question: According to this government’s wildfire preparedness plan, does a town where one third has burned down now meet the new federal standards?

I remind the minister and the Leader of the Government here today that 2,000 people lost their homes, that this is a tragedy for this community, that a quarter of the town is gone and that a firefighter has died. There are people who have lost everything and will have to face the consequences of this disaster. This government must seriously reassess its preparedness and ability to prevent wildfires near communities.

Colleagues, I would like to conclude my speech by reiterating my sympathy for and solidarity with the residents of Jasper, who have been deeply affected by this tragedy. I ask my honourable colleagues to pass this bill to help them rebuild their community. Hopefully, this can happen quickly so they can regain the peace, calm and beauty they deserve.

For the future, I remind you of what Ken Hodges said in 2018 about the risk of a major wildfire in Jasper. He said, “The potential that’s out there is actually scary. Hopefully, we’re wrong.” Unfortunately, they were right. And this is a failure we cannot afford to repeat.

Honourable senators, it is imperative that we learn every lesson from this catastrophe. We must demand concrete and immediate actions to protect our communities and national parks before the next disaster strikes. This is not an option; it is our duty. Thank you.

Is it your pleasure, honourable senators, to adopt the motion?

Hon. Senators: Agreed.

(Motion agreed to and bill read second time.)