{"id":77813,"date":"2025-08-18T03:42:39","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T03:42:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/77813\/"},"modified":"2025-08-18T03:42:39","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T03:42:39","slug":"conservative-mp-accuses-ottawa-of-inaction-on-wildfires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/77813\/","title":{"rendered":"Conservative MP accuses Ottawa of \u2018inaction\u2019 on wildfires"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner has called on Ottawa to dedicate more resources to wildfire control.Adrian Wyld\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner says the federal government needs to do more to fight Canada\u2019s devastating forest fires.<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Ottawa, the Alberta MP accused Ottawa of \u201cinaction\u201d on wildfires<\/a>. She also blamed that lack of action for new measures restricting activities in the forests of two provinces \u2014 even though those bans were imposed by the provinces themselves.<\/p>\n

Nova Scotia and New Brunswick last week banned hiking, fishing, camping and the use of vehicles in its forests in response to the heightened wildfire risk.<\/p>\n

Rempel Garner said that while she understands the fear Maritimers feel, restricting individuals\u2019 movements is \u201cnot right.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhenever there\u2019s a major crisis, what the Liberal government has done by their inaction has conditioned Canadians to expect that the only response they can see out of their federal government is to restrict their movement,\u201d Rempel Garner told reporters.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re calling on the federal government to actually get serious about this issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Access restrictions on wooded areas in N.S., N.B., during heightened wildfire risk face opposition<\/a><\/p>\n

Firefighters battle out-of-control wildfire on Halifax\u2019s outskirts<\/a><\/p>\n

Conservative MP Marc Dalton presented a bill last year to stiffen penalties for wildfires caused by arson. It never made it past first reading and died when Parliament was dissolved ahead of this year\u2019s election.<\/p>\n

Rempel Garner said that\u2019s one area where the Liberals could have taken action on wildfires. She also called on the federal government to dedicate more resources to wildfire control.<\/p>\n

In its 2021 election platform, the Liberals promised to train 1,000 community-based firefighters to fight wildfires and to work with provinces and territories to get them more firefighting planes.<\/p>\n

Last month, Ontario Premier Doug Ford<\/a> told reporters that Alberta-based water bomber manufacturer De Havilland was facing a four-year backlog of orders.<\/p>\n

\u201cFour full wildfire seasons ago, the Liberals promised more water bombers, more firefighters,\u201d Rempel Garner said. \u201cWhere are they?\u201d<\/p>\n

Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston<\/a> brushed off the criticisms of the forest entry ban at a press conference later Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI find it remarkable, the interest in travelling in Nova Scotia woods by people who aren\u2019t in Nova Scotia and probably haven\u2019t been here much in their life,\u201d Houston told reporters.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re only concerned with keeping people safe. We\u2019ll do what\u2019s necessary to protect lives, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re doing in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

So far this season, the total area of the country burned by wildfires is nearly the size of the entire province of New Brunswick.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner has called on Ottawa to dedicate more resources…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":77814,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,66,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-77813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-science","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77813\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}