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OTTAWA – Prompted by questions from Peace River – Westlock MP Arnold Viersen, the federal government has been forced to admit to leaving over 62,000 hectares of dead pine standing in Jasper National Park. The July wildfire destroyed 358 buildings and left 40 per cent of Jasper residents without homes.
Viersen said that the Conservatives learned that the Liberals had cancelled prescribed burns against the advice of Alberta Forest management experts, which allowed a tinder box to persist around Jasper.
“Now we know that the Liberals left a shocking 62,449 hectares of dead pine left standing, or 154,000 acres,” said Viersen in a media release Nov. 19. “At what point will Minister Guilbeault take responsibility for the terrible mismanagement for Jasper National Park and the irreparable harms to the people of Jasper.”
Viersen told Town and Country Today that since he was first elected in 2015, forest management has been an important issue for constituents with impacts on wildlife, farming and industry.
"The federal government has often ignored local experts with disastrous effects," he said.
Last month, Conservatives discovered that at least one Parks Canada employee was fired for raising concerns with the mismanagement at Jasper National Park and that 50 firefighters and 20 trucks ready to battle the flames in Jasper were turned away, said Viersen.
A Parliamentary committee is investigating how Parks Canada managers handled the Jasper wildfire.
The Liberals had blamed the blaze on climate change but the Parliamentary committee investigation is shifting the blame on Parks Canada and the federal government. Viersen said that the government has been warned for years that Jasper National Park was at risk. In 2016, Conservatives first raised the alarm that pine beetles and poor forestry management had made Jasper vulnerable to wildfires, but the government ignored the warnings.
"I and my Conservative colleagues will continue to hold the Liberals accountable and get to the bottom of this," said Viersen.
