Sprinkler systems are suddenly top of mind

While Ontario is thinking of speeding up its plans to equip all seniors homes with sprinkler systems after the LIsle-Verte tragedy, Quebec is still tiptoeing around the question.

A day after eight people were confirmed dead in a horrific fire, rescuers were scrambling to find 30 missing residents in the icy ruins of a Lower St. Lawrence retirement home.

Video: Pauline Marois on Quebec seniors residence fire

Everyone is saying: Is there something more we should be doing? Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews said. We have brought in regulations that will require sprinklers in all retirement homes and long-term-care homes. There is a phase-in period, and so I think we do have to take a look, another look, to see if there is anything we can do to accelerate that.

Introduced last year, the new rules require facilities built before 1998 when sprinklers became mandatory to be equipped with such systems. Private residences have five years to comply, while publicly owned ones have until 2025. Ms. Matthews defended that time frame, but said she wants to move it up.

I cannot imagine having to deal with that situation here in Ontario, and it is, I think, an opportunity to take another look.

In Quebec, politicians of all stripes are responding with caution to calls for mandatory sprinkler systems.

The provincial Liberal government proposed a new law in 2011 to tighten regulations on elder-care homes to make them safer. But while requirements for fire-detection systems were made more stringent, sprinkler systems were not mentioned. In Quebec, only facilities in which residents have no mobility are required to have sprinklers.

When the Parti Qubcois came to power, it essentially enacted the law as it was. Minister of Health and Social Services Rjean Hbert, who is also responsible for seniors, made a plea for safer care homes after learning that a private residence in his riding had no sprinklers and did not meet basic safety standards.

Do we need to wait for a tragedy ... before we set up stricter rules for residences that house people who are losing their autonomy, Mr. Hbert said in the Quebec National Assembly last February. He is out of Quebec this week, and calls to his office were directed to his colleague, Agns Maltais.

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Sprinkler systems are suddenly top of mind