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“The frequency of natural disasters is also increasing on-reserve,” says the document, comparing 118 incidents in 2011-12 to 76 in 2010-11 and 54 the year before that. Between 2009 and 2015, 480 “natural hazards” affected reserves, it says.

First Nations chiefs have declared 20 emergencies since April 2015, Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada confirmed, not including health crises.

The department reimburses First Nations and provincial and territorial governments for emergency services out of an annual $67-million emergency management budget. It may also respond to situations that aren’t officially declared.

Four of the five most recent emergencies were related to spring wildfires — two in Alberta, one in B.C. and one in Ontario.

Trudeau waffled on connecting the Fort McMurray fire to climate change. “A greater prevalence of extreme weather events” is expected, he said, but people shouldn’t “make a political argument out of one particular disaster.”

Still, the Assembly of First Nations regional chief for Alberta, Craig Makinaw, acknowledged climate change may have made wildfires more extreme. More droughts — less snow.

Chief Leo Friday of Ontario’s Kashechewan First Nation, where flooding forces people to evacuate yearly, agreed climate change has an impact. “I think it does change a lot of people’s lives … weather being changed all of a sudden,” he said.

Kashechewan is located in the riding of NDP indigenous affairs critic Charlie Angus. He said he sees evidence of “major risks” in northern Ontario communities, including with the degradation of traditional ice roads.