Opening Statement to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts

Emergency Management—Public Safety Canada

(Chapter 7 - 2009 Fall Report of the Auditor General)

2 December 2009

Sheila Fraser, FCA
Auditor General of Canada

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for inviting me to discuss Chapter 7 of our Fall 2009 Report on Emergency Management—Public Safety Canada. With me today is Wendy Loschiuk, Assistant Auditor General, and Gordon Stock, the Principal responsible for our audits of national security and public safety. This audit examines emergency management and in particular, the coordination role of Public Safety Canada.

I would like to start by saying that we were pleased with the responses of Public Safety Canada and the Privy Council Office to the recommendations noted in our chapter. They have agreed with each of the recommendations addressed to them and have committed to taking corrective action.

I would also like to emphasize that we recognize that the role of Public Safety Canada is very challenging. In 2003, Public Safety Canada was created to coordinate an overall federal approach for emergency management in an environment where departments have traditionally managed their own responses to emergencies within their respective mandates. However, today, emergencies such as floods, forest fires, or human-induced events, such as power blackouts or cyber attacks could quickly outstrip the ability of an individual department to respond. The emergency could also quickly escalate beyond a single department's mandate. In 2007, the Emergency Management Act was enacted to improve coordination on the part of the federal government, and in cooperation with provinces and municipalities, by clarifying the leadership role of Public Safety Canada as well as the responsibilities of other departments for emergency management.

We found that Public Safety Canada has had difficulty exercising the leadership necessary to ensure that federal emergency management activities are coordinated. It has taken the necessary first steps by drafting the interim Federal Emergency Response Plan—a framework that outlines a decision-making process to be used to coordinate emergency response activities. However, we found that work on developing this Plan has been ongoing since 2004, and it has not yet been formally approved by the Government or endorsed by all departments. As well, many of the needed, operational details that specify how a coordinated response should happen have not been reviewed or updated.

We found that Public Safety Canada needs to improve the guidance it provides to federal departments for their emergency management plans. Once in place, it should analyze these plans to ensure that they provide the basis for a coordinated response. For example, we note in the chapter the need for guidance on preparing and responding to potential chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or explosive events. While Public Safety Canada issued a strategy in 2005 that outlined federal roles and responsibilities, it has not developed the operational protocols or agreements on how the departments involved should work together in a coordinated manner.

Public Safety Canada has made considerable progress in setting up its Government Operations Centre. The Centre provides better communications between departments on the status of potential and ongoing emergencies. Confusion can occur during emergencies if decision makers do not have a full picture of what’s actually happening on the ground. The Government Operations Centre helps to reduce this confusion by providing decision-makers with a common set of facts.

Under the 2007 Act, Public Safety Canada is to promote a common approach to emergency management between first responders. Public Safety Canada has assisted groups in developing standards for personal protective equipment and has completed a draft document on communications interoperability nation-wide. However, we found that the federal government could do more to promote the use of standardized equipment and share the costs with first responder groups. Officials told us that it has not done so due to a lack of resources; however, one third of its budget remained unspent.

Public Safety Canada is also the lead federal department for coordinating the protection of Canada’s critical infrastructure. Public Safety Canada is working with provinces, territories and the private sector to develop an implementation plan for its proposed national critical infrastructure strategy and has taken the first step in drafting the strategy. It has identified ten main infrastructure sectors, and the federal department to head each sector. However, progress has been slow and it has not yet determined what infrastructure is critical at the federal level or how to protect it.

Threats to computer-based infrastructure, or cyber threats, are increasing and Canada is certainly not immune to them. Disruptions could have damaging consequences to our computer and communications networks that would also impact our electrical grids or energy distribution networks. As we noted in our chapter, progress to determine what needs to be protected and how, has been slow until this past year, and at the time of our audit Public Safety Canada was just developing the key elements of a national cyber strategy.

Public Safety Canada has provided us with a copy of their draft action plan to respond to the findings in our chapter and implement our recommendations. We found that their action plan is thorough and that it specifically addresses the concerns we raise in this report. The Committee may wish to ask the Department whether progress on obtaining formal agreement for the Federal Emergency Response Plan remains on-track.

Before concluding, I would like to remind committee members that I recently sent a letter to the Chair on issues related to this audit. It summarized our assessment of actions taken by Public Safety Canada and others in response to our 2005 audit that included emergency preparedness. It also contained follow-up information on some of the recommendations issued by your Committee in its June 2005 Report on national security.

Mr. Chair, thank you for your attention. We would be happy to respond to any questions the Committee may have.