Canada’s water woes are rising. Could a Canada Water Agency help?
Could a Canada Water Agency be the right tool to address persistent drinking water advisories in Indigenous communities, destructive floods and outdated data mired in a regulatory maze?
Raúl Scorza is a Master of Public Policy student at the Max Bell School. Born and raised in Mexico, he is interested in environmental policies. Raúl, a non-Indigenous person who is not a water expert and cannot speak for Indigenous communities, has tried to share Indigenous perspectives where possible and draw from news stories, editorials, reports, and existing literature to consider – not define – challenges and potential approaches. He is committed to (un)learning and listening more closely.
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“DRINK WATER STRAIGHT FROM THE TAP? Not a chance!” After more than a decade since I moved to Canada, I still remember the shock of seeing my roommate casually place a glass under the faucet, fill it up, and take a drawn-out gulp. Having been raised in Mexico City, the sprawling metropolis where a long-standing water crisis has sharpened inequities, I clung to the common belief imparted on me throughout my privileged upbringing: drinking water directly from the tap was the quickest way to end up at the doctor’s office.
And there I was, marveling at the simplicity of getting a glass of water at our dorm sink. No having to trudge out the plastic, 20-liter jugs that many households in the Mexican capital buy from private water companies, and most surprisingly, not having to worry about the potential effects of what I was drinking. “Drink water straight from the tap? How amazing!”
My perception of an idyllic relationship to water in this country was not uncommon – in fact, it is one shared by most Canadians. Nine in ten Canadians are either ‘very’ or ‘somewhat’ confident about the safety and quality of water in their homes, and eight out of ten Canadians are at least ‘somewhat confident’ that the country, and the regions they live in, has enough freshwater to meet long-term needs.
But the mounting number of recent water-related crises in Canada and years of frustration at the chronic water quality issues Indigenous Peoples contend with made me realize that I was not listening closely enough back then.
As has long been the case in Canada’s history, First Nations, Inuit, and Métis activists have been fighting relentlessly to defend fundamental human rights, such as the right to water, in the face of challenges closely tied to systemic racism and colonialism. Last month, Iqaluit, Nunavut’s capital, confronted another water contamination problem after traces of fuel were again found in its drinking water. The small capital had already spent nearly two months under a do-not-consume state of emergency in late 2021. Emergencies and drinking water advisories such as these have been outrageously prevalent in northern and First Nations communities all over Canada.
Back in 2015, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau pledged to end all long-term drinking water advisories by March 2021. This deadline was missed. The federal government now estimates it will not be able to lift all long-term advisories in First Nations until 2023-24. Ensuring long-term solutions to stabilize the drinking water supply for some affected communities would likely take until 2025-26.
Young activist and chief water commissioner for Anishinabek Nation in Ontario, Autumn Peltier, responded to the unresolved commitment. “To promise to resolve a big issue like that within a certain amount of time and [not do it], and there are still communities that can’t drink their water after over 25 years, how are we supposed to trust the government?” she says.
When asked if there was something Prime Minister Trudeau could do to give her more confidence that he cares about the issue, Peltier added: “I think instead of making promises or just speaking about it, taking action and actually doing something.”
So what could that action specifically tackle, and how could it help prepare for further, looming threats to water in this country? In the case of Iqaluit’s emergency, former Deputy Mayor and current MLA in Nunavut Janet Pitsiulaaq Brewster has pinpointed one underlying cause: the city’s inadequate and dilapidated water infrastructure. “We need about $100 million to address the expansion of the water reservoir and to replace the aging and crumbling piping systems,” she says. Following the second contamination incident in Iqaluit, Nunavut MP Lori Idlout called for $180 million from the federal government to “end the water emergency.”
Aging and at-risk water infrastructure is also a growing worry in communities across the rest of Canada. The Federation of Canadian Municipalities published a ‘Canadian Infrastructure Report Card’ in 2019, which assesses all publicly owned infrastructure at a national level through a voluntary and federally administered survey. It found that 30 percent of water infrastructure (from water mains that deliver fresh drinking water to sewers) are in fair, poor or very poor conditions.
Notably, the Report Card pointed out that climate change places “additional strain on these infrastructure systems.” This means that the main driver behind more potent weather events causing catastrophic floods, like those that washed over British Columbia last November, impacts our water infrastructure, too – and could include the possibility of water treatment plants having to adapt due to increased health risks linked to warmer lake temperatures.
Data that could assist in predicting when and where the more direct impacts like extreme flooding events will strike is either lacking, sorely outdated, or closely guarded. Last month, the Council of Canadian Academies released a report that found a dearth of localized climate projections to plan for future risk prevention and mitigation. Flood maps “are often out of date, reflecting past climate conditions and land uses.”
Furthermore, the report states that in some cases, data exists but is not readily shared with those in need of it. Local governments have previously been denied access to a national all-hazard risk assessment over national security concerns. The disjointedness between different levels of government hints at the complicated regulatory patchwork that Canadian water governance has historically been lodged in.
Under the Canadian Constitution, fisheries, navigation, federal lands, and international waters are federal responsibilities; water resources and water supply are provincial and territorial responsibilities; and additionally, water supply is usually managed by municipalities. Yet water issues also seep into other government portfolios like agriculture and health, and water itself often crosses municipal, provincial, territorial, and in some cases, national boundaries.
At the federal level alone, this results in no less than 20 departments and agencies sharing responsibilities for fresh water in a decentralized structure which has been characterized “by a lack of intergovernmental coordination, a duplication of efforts, poor data collection and sharing and inadequate monitoring and enforcement.”
This highly fragmented framework also extends to drinking water governance in Canada. The responsibility for drinking water quality is shared between provincial health authorities and municipalities, although the latter is mostly in charge of providing safe drinking water.
Canada also lacks national, legally enforceable drinking water quality standards. Instead, a federal agency with provincial and territorial membership develops national guidelines that are both voluntary and non-enforceable. It is then up to the provinces and territories to choose whether these guidelines are adopted, to what extent they are applied, and whether to make them fully or partly enforceable.
Researchers have found that this decentralized ‘sub-structure’ produces wide variability not only between provinces but also between municipalities and water management agencies. Though this combined reality is alarming for the country, it is vital to recall that all these challenges are occurring while an enormous chasm still exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities regarding reliable access to clean, safe water.
The strongly criticized Indian Act has framed drinking water management on First Nations reserves as a shared responsibility – currently between Chiefs and councils who manage “day-to-day water and wastewater systems” and Indigenous Services Canada, who provides “funding and advice for water systems.” A 2021 report by the Auditor General found “overall; Indigenous Services Canada did not provide the support necessary to ensure that First Nations communities have ongoing access to safe drinking water.”
How then could Canada address this host of compounding and interrelated water problems?
One proposal put forth by the government and advocates is the creation of a national Canada Water Agency. Proponents see it as a golden opportunity to course-correct water management in the country. Some say it is an appropriate vehicle because the problems affecting water in communities like Iqaluit – deteriorating infrastructure and scarce capital, overlayed with rising pressures connected to climate change – are “all in the national government’s wheelhouse”.
Others suggest it is the “right mechanism” to apply a human rights framework to water policy more broadly – and more specifically, address drinking water issues in First Nations and establish national drinking water standards.
Would such an Agency be the right tool to help protect and manage freshwater for everyone, everywhere in Canada? A Canada Water Agency could act as a centralized hub for the production and sharing of freshwater research, knowledge and information among all levels of government to mitigate some of the planning and coordination obstacles underpinned by the fragmented state of water governance.
This could better support adaptation responses to climate change and freshwater protection initiatives. Inputs from municipalities could also be recognized more greatly at the Agency, which some experts think could be a potential avenue for modernizing federal-municipal relations in Canada.
The Canadian Environmental Law Association (CELA) also brings attention to applying a ‘two-eyed seeing’ approach to water governance, which could carry on to the Agency’s knowledge production and sharing capacities. Two-eyed seeing “refers to learning to see from one eye with the strengths of Indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of Western knowledge and ways of knowing, and to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all”.
This highlights an overarching recommendation presented by CELA in creating the Agency: advancing reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, which helps frame questions regarding national drinking water standards.
On the one hand, if the newly created Agency had the power to, and would consider setting up the binding, national drinking water standards, it would likely need to contemplate the risk of developing an “unfunded mandate” if it were not backed by robust, suitable resources – especially when these standards would require consistent monitoring and testing. Researchers, therefore, suggest that approaches concerning standards may want to balance at least a ‘floor’ of uniform, appropriate drinking water regulations with considerations for capacity, such as local water operators.
On the other hand, if the Agency were to lay down enforceable, national drinking water standards, it would have to ask itself how these would relate to advancing reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples. Considering past initiatives could inform this reflection.
In 2013, the Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act (SDWFA) came into force. It established a federal regulatory framework for drinking water quality, training, treatment, monitoring, and protecting source water on First Nations land. However, the Assembly of First Nations has stated that the SDWFA was subject to intense criticism from First Nations across Canada “for lack of meaningful engagement and consultations with First Nations as well as insufficient resources for First Nations to comply or implement the regulations.”
This example shows how it is essential that the Agency consider whether it is genuinely advancing reconciliation in all aspects of its work. To strive towards that end, another CELA recommendation states the Agency should ensure Indigenous Peoples have a role in its development and operation and “ensure all decision-making and planning is driven by a commitment to advance Indigenous rights of self-determination.”
The Agency could advance that commitment by taking part in another suggestion: modernizing the outdated Canada Water Act (which is the main federal freshwater legislation) in a co-drafting, partnership approach alongside Indigenous Peoples, agreeing on its policy objectives and goals support Indigenous rights to self-determination.
Creating a Canada Water Agency would be an attempt to address a set of complex, interwoven problems. Because of this reason, and with no intention to minimize the necessity of water for a full, dignified life, it is useful to remember that these challenges do not just touch upon water issues. They are positioned as part of a larger overlap of political, economic, cultural, and historical factors, which encourage us to think of these challenges outside the ‘water box’, particularly in the context of decolonization.
Therefore, it will be crucial for the future Canada Water Agency to earnestly include and center the voices (like those shared with the Indigenous-led Keepers of the Water organization) and leadership of Indigenous Peoples from the start of, throughout, and beyond this process.
The Bell is edited by Jaclyn Victor, Jason Kreutz, Shweta Menon and Phaedra de Saint-Rome of the Max Bell School of Public Policy at McGill University.