OTTAWA — The Liberal authorities is mulling arming the Canadian Coast Guard because it launches a big reform of the civilian maritime company to offer it an even bigger function within the nation’s safety equipment.
The transfer is considered one of many vital modifications that the Liberals are planning for the chronically underfunded Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) that Prime Minister Mark Carney has promised to equip with new gear and a brand new safety mandate.
On the identical day Carney introduced his plan to speed up defence spending this yr, his workplace advised Nationwide Put up Monday that the CCG — which presently studies to the minister of fisheries — would shift to the minister of nationwide defence’s portfolio.
The transfer away from the fisheries minister makes it each doubtless simpler for the CCG’s funds to be included in Canada’s defence spending within the eyes of NATO and is a part of Carney’s need to pivot the 63-year-old civilian company in the direction of a extra security-oriented function.
“Canadians elected our new Authorities on a powerful mandate for change — to guard our borders and defend our sovereignty with elevated focus and funding. To that finish, the Prime Minister will quickly provoke the method of shifting the Canadian Coast Guard to the management of the Minister of Nationwide Defence,” PMO spokesperson Emily Williams mentioned in an announcement.
“The change will allow the Coast Guard to satisfy higher each its civilian and safety tasks.”
The assertion didn’t say when the changeover would occur, with Williams promising that “extra particulars will come sooner or later.”
A senior Liberal supply additionally advised Nationwide Put up that the federal government is contemplating arming the CCG, although they harassed that no resolution has been made but as officers proceed to chart the reform.
Arming the CCG, which might be an enormous — and expensive — change for the particular company that has all the time been an unarmed civilian group.
“We’re not there but,” the official mentioned of the choice. The supply was granted anonymity to debate inside authorities deliberations.
The Coast Guard has struggled for years with its mandate, pulled between its varied tasks similar to analysis, search and rescue, icebreaking, marine safety and coastal surveillance, however with none regulation enforcement powers.
Because of its icebreaking capabilities, it additionally has distinctive experience on the Canadian Arctic inside the authorities.
Within the latest election marketing campaign, the Liberals
promised to offer the CCG a brand new mandate
“to conduct maritime surveillance operations” together with the required gear.
Final week, the Liberals tabled a border safety invoice that proposes to offer the CCG a brand new safety mandate, the facility to conduct “safety patrols” and the flexibility to share data with the army and intelligence companies.
In an interview, former CCG Commissioner Jody Thomas mentioned the company is lengthy overdue for vital reform and that she’d been “nagging” the federal government to maneuver the company to the defence or public security portfolio for years.
“It’s a main change, and I feel it’s an essential change. I feel that that is simply one other sign that Canada is altering its perspective on our personal sovereignty,” mentioned Thomas, who was additionally headed the Division of Nationwide Defence and was Nationwide Safety Advisor to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Relating to armaments, she mentioned that icebreakers presently below development have been fitted for, however not with, weapons, that means that arming them could be a comparatively easy activity.
The actual problem of arming the Coast Guard, she warned, is coaching.
“It’s a really costly resolution, not for the weaponry, however for the coaching and the fixed preparation and exercising that’s required,” she mentioned. “The Navy is all the time in coaching… for what’s coming. The Coast Guard is on the market working. So, it’s a really completely different fleet and with very completely different functions.”
There are additionally talks inside authorities of switching the Coast Guard from a particular working company, which remains to be a part of its host division, right into a departmental company with its personal governing laws that studies to the Minister of Nationwide Protection.
In an interview in late Might, Thomas argued that that should occur.
“It does have to be a legislative company, the particular working company standing proper now, that’s a really flimsy type of structure and authorized foundation for an company” with a safety focus, Thomas mentioned.
A continual problem for the Coast Guard has been the deteriorating situation of its fleet whereas it operates on a “shoestring” funds, based on Thomas.
As of November,
making it the second-largest icebreaking fleet on the earth. Its fleet registry exhibits it has simply over 120 ships on responsibility, nearly all of that are small rescue vessels.
However the growing old fleet can also be deteriorating quickly, with ships spending extra time in repairs and fewer time within the water.
“The CCG’s growing old vessels have gotten extra pricey to take care of and are extra steadily taken out of operation for unscheduled repairs, inserting additional pressure on the remaining fleet,” the company
mentioned in its 2024-2025 division plans report
. “The necessity to change the vessels has by no means been extra essential.”
In March, the federal authorities contracted two new polar icebreakers that are anticipated to be delivered between 2030 and 2032. However Thomas mentioned the coast guard has a lot larger wants.
“We’re one of many few international locations that makes use of the identical fleet for northern and southern ice breaking. We ice break year-round, basically,” she mentioned.
“So, you need to have a look at the wear and tear and tear on the ship and the belongings you need them to do, and the locations you need them to be, and so they’re going to must plan the fleet accordingly.”
Nationwide Put up
cnardi@postmedia.com
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