Deprived of electricity for six days, the Minister of Public Security during the 1998 ice storm criticized the less “humane” management of Hydro-Québec today.
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“I really feel like I’ve fallen into the no man’s land of Hydro-Quebec”, denounces Pierre Bélanger, former minister of the government of Lucien Bouchard.
Last Wednesday, he lost power in his residence in the borough of Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, in Montreal during the ice storm.
The following night, a city tree fell on his property, destroying the electric mast of his house and the wires that connected it to the network.
He then himself called an electrician to repair the broken pole for the modest sum of… $4,000.
However, six days later, Mr. Bélanger had still not found the power yesterday afternoon and he was repeatedly told that it is “impossible” to know when his problem would be solved, while his wife fell ill by dint of living in the cold despite its generator.
“It would be so much easier to live with if we felt like we had constant communication. Right now, I feel completely cut off from Hydro-Quebec,” he told the Log.
During the first days of the outage, Mr. Bélanger tried in vain to speak to “a human” at Hydro-Québec. Each time, he was redirected to the Info-pannes online service, which incorrectly told him that his breakdown had been resolved.
Exasperated, the ex-minister, who had to manage the Ice Storm 25 years ago, does not mince his words against the state company which, according to him, will have a “big post mortem to do” after this second crisis.
“I don’t find that the lessons of 1998 have been learned so much,” he says, speaking, among other things, of the importance of human beings being able to respond to the population.
“I have the impression that there were plenty of computerized systems [dont Info-pannes]but very few people coordinating the information.”
Mr. Bélanger, who now heads the public relations firm Leliken, also believes that Hydro-Quebec did not have “visible and very present spokespersons” to inform the public, like Steve Flanagan at the time.
As in time
It was finally by questioning a Hydro-Québec employee on his street at the end of the afternoon yesterday that Mr. Bélanger was able to move his case forward, since she told him that he could be reconnected in the evening after write down his information.
“It’s the good old way of the 80s [qui a fonctionné], he wonders. It’s still paradoxical.”
It was finally during the evening yesterday that the former Minister of Public Security was reconnected to the Hydro-Québec network.
There were still just over 7,000 customers without power.
Hydro-Quebec, for its part, claims to have been notified Monday of the repairs by Mr. Bélanger’s electrician, a necessary step to proceed with a reconnection.
For his part, the former minister maintains that his electrician could not contact the state company earlier because of an administrative problem that he tried to resolve for several days. The info-failures platform would not have generated an event number.
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After the ice storm
- Spring 1998: the Nicolet commission is investigating the ice storm.
- Fall 1998: Pierre Bélanger is defeated in the election by Liberal Alberto Berardinucci, who had paid voters to vote under a false identity.
- Spring 1999: the Nicolet commission recommends burying the lines in urban centers and giving more power to the municipalities during a crisis situation.
- Fall 2000: the new Minister of Public Security, Serge Ménard, tabled a bill which essentially takes up the recommendations of the Nicolet commission in matters of civil security.
- Fall 2001: a law incorporating most of the recommendations is adopted, but the section concerning the responsibilities of cities does not come into force immediately.
- The law provides that the government can declare a state of emergency in the event of a major disaster, and that municipalities can declare a “local state of emergency” which gives them extraordinary powers.
- 25 years later, Pierre Bélanger maintains that “about 40% of this law is not in force”. “But it may be that the government has agreed with the cities rather than activating certain articles of the law”, he nuances immediately.
– Gabriel Côté, QMI Agency