‘Combatting a pandemic requires mobilizing intelligence’: former PCO clerk calls for reforms to emergency preparedness

With no 'institutionalized' emergency response group, the capacity for ministers to tackle pandemics is 'woefully lacking,' says Mel Cappe.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, Transport Minister Marc Garneau, Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, Health Minister Patty Hajdu, Treasury Board President Jean-Yves Duclos, and moderator and Toronto Star reporter Bruce Campion-Smith, pictured on March 16, 2020, at the National Press Theatre in Ottawa. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

News

BY MIKE LAPOINTE

September 7, 2020

More than half a year into the government's unprecedented commitment of time, money and resources to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, a former clerk of the Privy Council Office argues that improvements can be made to fix “woefully lacking” capacity at the ministerial level for dealing with emerg...

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