The Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs want the federal government to take action on creating a national forest-fire coordination agency, and look at American bodies like FEMA (well, as it used to exist rather than the hollow shell it is now). The problem? That disaster management, which includes wildfires, is squarely within provincial jurisdiction in this country, and if such a body were to be created (and it’s a big if), then provinces would have to agree to sign onto it, and good luck with that—unless maybe you’re willing to shell out a whole lot of money to “compensate” them for it.

The other problem? We already have such a body, called the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, which is a not-for-profit owned and operated by existing firefighting bodies at all levels, which does the very work that these fire chiefs want it to do—coordinating to share resources, mutual aid, information sharing, and so on. If they don’t think this agency is doing enough, then they should say so. But if this is really just a backdoor way of saying the federal government should pay for everything, well, maybe they need to be honest about that.

We have a big problem in this country where provinces have learned that they can get away with short-changing their emergency management systems because they can call on the federal government to deploy the Canadian Armed Forces to do all kinds of said management, and even though the federal government has the option of cost-recovery from those provinces, they don’t, because it would be bad optics to be “nickel-and-diming” the provinces whom they give assistance to. Except of course, the provinces know that’s the case, so they cut their spending further, and the cycle continues because no federal government will stand up and say “We know you cut your funding to get free federal assistance, so we’re going to charge you for the services.” This is why I’m deeply suspicious of any move to create a federal civilian disaster emergency response agency, whether for wildfires, or other natural disasters, because it will give the provinces licence to cut further, and then beg for more federal assistance once they do.

Ukraine Dispatch

That gas interconnector that the Russians attacked in southern Ukraine appears to still be operating. Investigations have found that in spite of sanctions, Russians have been using Siemens technology in their factories, obtained by middlemen in China.

Good reads:

• Mark Carney met with some Métis leaders in Ottawa to promote Bill C-5, and then once again talked about “focusing on building Canada”  as tariffs escalate.
• David McGuinty says that Canada has now “removed all restrictions on air and missile defence,” which could allow for participation in the so-called “Golden Dome.”
• The government has agreed to uphold the CRTC decision to allow telecom companies to access rivals’ networks so long as it’s outside of their core regions.
• Signing bonuses haven’t increased military recruitment over a number of trades including engineering, which still leaves them with skills shortages.
• Here is more information on the American “visa bond program” whose targets include Canadian permanent residents, requiring them to put up $15K to visit.
• The Supreme Court of Canada has denied leave to appeal of a terror case involving plans to derail a VIA Rail train.
• Pierre Poilievre announced plans for a bill to obliterate environmental laws to build pipelines, and insisted that David Eby can’t stop them.
• Here are some of the consequences playing out from Ontario’s decision to close a number of safe consumption sites.
• Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan want to study the feasibility of a west-east pipeline (but there is no proponent, and an existing pipeline that transits the US).
• It looks like the Alberta government has been overselling just how much their planned auto insurance changes will actually save consumers.
• An Alberta judge has reserved his decision on whether to review the proposed separatism referendum question, and will made his decision on the 14th.
• Mike Moffat’s Missing Middle Initiative offers ten solutions the federal government can implement to help deal with the housing crisis.

Odds and ends:

In which the author lists federal privacy laws as a barrier and not the fact that these records are provincial jurisdiction, so getting a federal database would require provinces to agree to participate, which is the actual hill to climb.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2025-08-08T00:54:23.495Z

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