PBO at a loss to explain why cost of new Canadian warship, currently at $77B, keeps rising | The Chronicle Herald

Sur le même sujet

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  15 novembre 2018 | Local, Sécurité

  Ottawa to spend $90M to build, repair First Nations police stations

  Funding comes on top of $291M announced earlier this year to hire staff, buy equipment Kathleen Harris · CBC News The federal government will spend nearly $90 million to build and repair police stations in First Nation and Inuit communities. The money is meant to address "pressing needs" in policing infrastructure by repairing, renovating or replacing facilities, many of them in remote or fly-in communities. The program, which is cost-shared with the provinces and territories, will help ensure policing infrastructure complies with current building, policing facility and health and safety standards. The first two-year phase of the $88.6 million program will fund communities in need of urgent repairs, while a second phase will fund projects based on merit. The funding will roll out over seven years. The federal government will launch a bidding process to assess First Nation and Inuit police service facilities, which will help guide the selection of phase two infrastructure projects. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said the First Nations Policing Program serves about 400,000 people in 450 communities through "culturally relevant" policing. "Building on our government's major investments in new officers, salaries and equipment, we are making new investments in policing facilities so officers can do their jobs properly and keep their communities safe," he said in a statement. Indigenous forces complain of underfunding The money announced today comes on top of the $291 million over five years Goodale announced earlier this year for First Nations policing operations. That announcement came after years of complaints and legal challenges from Indigenous police forces that claim they've been chronically underfunded. At the time, Goodale said the figure nearly triples the basic amount earmarked in 2017, representing the largest federal financial commitment since 1991. The money will go toward improving salaries, hiring new officers and buying new equipment. Some underfunded forces had been struggling to replace expired bulletproof vests and update officer training. Kent Elson, a lawyer who has acted in cases involving policing in Indigenous communities, said the new funding represents "good progress" but doesn't go far enough to fix widespread problems. He said the funding ought to follow an essential service model based on need. Deadly conditions "If a police station is unsafe, then you have to replace it," he said. "You can't just put it on a waiting list and say, 'Sorry we're maxed out this year.' "People have died and more would die if the stations are not adequate." Elson said conditions have improved since a deadly fire at an isolated northern Ontario reserve's police station in 2006, but the inequities remain "stark." Ricardo Wesley, 22, and James Goodwin, 20, burned to death on Jan. 8, 2006, while being held for public intoxication at the Kashechewan First Nation police detachment. Community constable pilot The RCMP has a special pilot program to address gaps in policing, including Indigenous communities, but a recent evaluation of that program found that it is not focused on its mandate. The Community Constable pilot program currently has 19 armed, uniformed peace officers with local knowledge of the communities they serve, including their languages, cultures and geography. While the program's mandate was to prevent crime through community engagement, the evaluation found that most of the constables weren't clear on the mandate, and participated in more enforcement activities than prevention activities. RCMP Staff Sgt. Tania Vaughan said community constables are meant to enhance, not replace, existing RCMP services in a community. "At this time, the community constable program remains a pilot program, and no final decision on its future has been made," she said in an email. "The purpose of the evaluation was to provide senior management with a neutral, timely and evidence-based assessment of the pilot program to help inform decision-making on its permanency. The RCMP is now better informed in order to enhance the CC Program, and make changes to it that will better serve our communities." Vaughan said the RCMP is responding to the evaluation by responding to questions and concerns from the community constables and developing a clearly defined program mandate. It will also better track performance information and formalize the governance structure, roles and responsibilities. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/first-nations-policing-infrastructure-1.4566311

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  7 septembre 2023 | Local, Sécurité

  Move of Canadian Forces aerospace testing organization to Ottawa delayed by construction problems, other issues

  Fifty-four Aerospace Engineering Test Establishment members are in temporary space now, and the move from Alberta won't finish until 2026.

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  20 décembre 2019 | Local, Aérospatial

  Canada needs updated anti-aircraft systems for the modern battlefield, says army commander

  Murray Brewster The audacious attack on Saudi Arabia's Abqaiq refinery and the Khurais oil field last September sent shivers down the spines of some Canadian military planners. The stunning damage caused by a swarm of drones and cruise missiles — launched either from Iraqi or Iranian territory — proved to be an almost perfect illustration of the kind of vulnerability the Canadian Army faces in the rapidly evolving modern battlefield. It's been seven years since the army retired the last of its ground-based air defence systems. By all indications, it will be another eight years before the Department of National Defence acquires a replacement system. The Liberal government's defence policy talks about buying new anti-aircraft equipment — and perhaps now anti-drone technology — but the project is still only in what defence officials call the "options analysis" phase. The commander of Canada's army said restoring that anti-aircraft defence is one of his top priorities. "Air defence is right at the top of the pile of stuff I want to get in," Lt.-Gen. Wayne Eyre told CBC News earlier this month. "It is a capability shortfall right now. And as you see the emerging threats out there, it is one that concerns me." 'An emerging threat' Eyre, who recently served as deputy commander of the United Nations Command in Korea, described the technology used to attack the Saudi facilities as "an emerging threat" that Canada's soldiers need to be prepared for, especially "the swarming tactics of unmanned aerial vehicles." For more than 15 years, Canadian military planners — hip-deep in fighting a counter-insurgency war in Afghanistan — were unconcerned about updating Cold War-era equipment meant to shoot down low-flying aircraft. The Taliban had no air force. The last of the Canadian army's air defence equipment — the Oerlikon Air Defence Anti-Tank System (ADATS) — was retired in 2012 after an aborted attempt to modernize the vehicles. At the time, the federal government under then-prime minister Stephen Harper was cutting $2.1 billion out of the defence budget. But the threat picture for Canadian soldiers changed dramatically when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. That event launched a new era of state-to-state tensions — one where Canadian troops again face attack from the air. At the moment, the Canadian Forces' solution for deployments — such as the current mission in Latvia — is to pair Canadians with allied forces that have air defence capabilities. "We do it as part of a coalition to make sure somebody has that capability, but [the threat] is constantly evolving and we need to be on top of that," said Eyre. A.I. and the next generation of drones The use of drones in the Saudi attack — and the prospect of artificial intelligence linking unmanned vehicles into a more lethal swarm in the near future — is not something Canadian military planners were looking at until fairly recently. "One of the stressors in the security environment is the acceleration of technological change. How do we stay abreast of that?" said Eyre. "How do we get equipment into the hands of our soldiers that is advanced as some of our potential adversaries might be?" https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/anti-aircraft-canadian-forces-1.5399461