Wednesday August 23, 2023 | LANGFORD, BC
by Mary P Brooke, B.Sc. | Island Social Trends
Today in Burnaby, NDP leader Jagmeet Singh met with BC Premier David Eby and Emergency Management and Climate Readiness Minister Bowinn Ma “to discuss the federal assistance that British Columbians need as wildfires rage across the province”.
Eby was in the BC Interior region yesterday, seeing wildfire impacts first hand and meeting with local first responders and residents. There was some pushback about how and when people were asked to evacuate. There was a reliance on incoming support from firefighters around the province, as well as RCMP.
Thanking firefighters:
First off, today Singh wanted to “thank everyone for their hard work”. In the interior of BC “it’s been a really tough time”, he said today.
He noted that firefighters and other first responders are helping people rebuild homes and communities but that “a lot of work still remains”.
The federal NDP Leader said that the NDP “will be pushing to make sure that gets done”.
Aiming for a national emergency team:
Singh told media today that Canada is in need of “a better national focus on emergency teams”. He said that international firefighters arriving here in Canada are appreciated, but “we are not able to respond on our own”.
In recent weeks, BC has welcomed firefighters from Mexico, Brazil and South Africa, as well as specialized incident management personnel from Australia.
A Canadian national firefighting force would be equipped, trained and ready to be deployed, Singh said today. That would be to catch fires early and respond quickly, and manage the evacuation of thousands of people or deal with a national crisis “on the spot”.
That type of preparedness would be instead of “building a team at the last moment” after a wildfire situation has emerged to the point of crisis.
“It would be ready year-round, a firefighting team around the country,” said Singh.
He didn’t say this specifically, but a domestic firefighting team within Canada would help reduce any challenges related to any language barriers and levels of training, and increase familiarity with local resources and techniques. Also, firefighters have different types of specialities — particular structure vs wildland. A pre-designed Canadian team could organize itself to have a desired range of skill sets.
Unfortunately these are times of extreme weather events: “It seems like there’s a crisis around the country year-round. To catch things early would be the right thing to do,” Singh told media today.
The federal NDP leader added that the provinces are not in the best position to secure resources (such as fire retardant gel and water bombers), that the federal government is better positioned to make those procurements.
Political picture:
The federal NDP are still in a Supply and Confidence Agreement with the Liberal minority government, and as such, their input can have more impact than under normal circumstances.
Singh reiterated today as to how much more impact an NDP government would have federally. Currently they have 25 seats in the 44th parliament. After summary break, The House of Commons gets back up and running after Sept 17.
===== RELATED:
Eby visits wildfire areas along with federal emergency preparedness minister (August 22, 2023)
BC Wildfire update Aug 21 after a smoky air weekend (August 21, 2023)
Smoky Sunday skies in the west shore (August 20, 2023)
Smoky skies & health reminders (August 19, 2023)
Additional state of emergency to assure accommodations during wildfire evacuations (August 19, 2023)
State of Emergency called due to wildfire (August 18, 2023)
BC preparing for extreme fire conditions & accepting NWT evacuees (August 17, 2023)