Fisheries Committee on June 6th, 2006

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Precisely.

[Paul Sprout]

And the how is, we instituted a design of the causeway to try to facilitate water passage. Water was passed through the causeway, but it was not adequate, so it appears, to provide for sufficient water in some sites below the causeway. We were doing a review to determine to what extent the dewatering was caused by the causeway versus natural flow reductions. We're doing a review to learn, in fact, in a future request for gravel removal, how we should approach the issue of the causeway the next time.

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

It's not as if you've never done it before. If there's one thing that bothers me about the department, Mr. Sprout, it's the fact that you don't seem to learn from your mistakes and you don't seem to learn from what you did well.

I asked you a question when we were doing hearings in Vancouver a number of years ago about why you hadn't learned from the previous.... You were supposed to provide me with some information on that, and you never did.

This wasn't the first time that you removed gravel from the Fraser. You had to know that these things were going to happen. As my colleague across the way said, there was a fish habitat monitoring plan in place that seemed to have been completely ignored until this issue became public.

[Paul Sprout]

I'm not sure if that's a question or an observation.

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Well, it's an observation. You can comment, if you like.

[Paul Sprout]

My comment would be along the lines that I've already characterized. We had a framework that we were operating under, which was based on science. Gravel removal on the Fraser is contentious, as I've noted. The particular framework proposed and identified an approach, which we have adopted, which has been signed off by the levels of government and the Fraser River council. We followed that framework. Issues occurred in 2006, in spite of that framework, and we need to learn from that to make an adjustment for the future.

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Well, I think that the reputation of the department has taken another hit in the handling of this, Mr. Sprout. It's going to take a while to get that back.

I'd like to question you on another issue. It's related to enforcement, and an issue that I know you're aware of. That's on this Cultus Lake harvest rate.

Is it true that the department's been advised that a 25% to 40% harvest rate on Cultus is acceptable?

[Paul Sprout]

Are you referring to the subgroup, Mr. Cummins?

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

No, I was referring to that particular....The question was quite simple.

Is it true that the minister's been advised that a 25% to 40% harvest rate of Cultus is acceptable?

[Paul Sprout]

We have not provided any advice to the minister to date on what the exploitation rate for Cultus should be. We have advised him, though, on the deliberations that are occurring in the industry and elsewhere about what their recommendations might be. But we have yet to provide him any formal advice in terms of what Cultus's exploitation should be.

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Isn't it a little late? I mean, by agreement with the Americans, you're supposed to provide them with advice. Have you given them any advice as to what the Cultus Lake harvest rate will be?

[Paul Sprout]

We've given them advice on what we think the late-timing population of sockeye should be, preliminary advice, and we've advised them that ultimately the fishing plan will have to be determined and approved by the minister. So the advice we've provided is provisional subject to the minister's final approval.

We have not provided specific advice on Cultus. We have advised them of a range of exploitation rates that could be considered, that are being explored internally and with various clients, but so far we've not provided final views.

[John Cummins, Conservative, Delta—Richmond East, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Thank you, Mr. Sprout.

Mr. Cuzner.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Can I give my time to Mr. Cummins?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

You can. There are other witnesses.

Ms. Crowder?

Mr. Lunney has a question.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I have a brief question, then we can go back to Mr. Cummins, if that's all right.

It was suggested that since pink are a two-year salmon and there are peak runs in every second year, we could simply confine the gravel extraction to off years. I thought perhaps that answer was a bit too simplistic. Could you comment on that?

[Paul Sprout]

I think that's actually a good question. Right now we are adhering to the actual framework I've described that we entered into with the province. We've been consistent with the framework, but the issue, I think....

That is a reasonable question, potentially, in particular sites. So it may well be that in some sites, in even years when the pink are leaving the system--they're spawning in odd years and they're exiting the Fraser River system in even years--it may be desirable not to have gravel removal operations. That's one of the questions we'll have to reflect on.

I'm not commenting on that today. I'm saying we are consistent with the framework. We did take measures, as I've noted, in terms of our assumptions this year. But I think that's a reasonable question to ask for the longer term.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I have two points. One is that I accept what you're saying about assumptions. In science it's perfectly acceptable to make assumptions; it's just never acceptable to forget them. So I'm glad you're examining the assumptions.

My last question comes back to habitat. Perhaps this is one for Ginny Flood, as she's in habitat.

The region I'm concerned about, of course, is the west coast of Vancouver Island, Tofino in particular. It was a peripheral issue in the last discussion--small craft harbours and eel grass.

I have resort owners there who have harbours. There's a tremendous tidal flow in that inlet, in and out, silted in. Eel grass is growing into some of these resort harbours, and they just can't get permission to remove it without having to go through expensive transplant operations. There are tons of eel grass in the area.

What can be done to expedite this? Somebody gets the bright idea to protect eel grass, but there's lots of it in the area, and surely, traditional use has to be taken into consideration.

[Ginny Flood, Assistant Director General, Habitat Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

I'll attempt to answer that, but I'm not really familiar with the eel grass. I look after a lot of the major projects across Canada.

I think we are actually trying to simplify some of that approval process through some streamlining and looking at helping deal with some of these issues we're getting criticized for, the time it takes to actually get the approval processes through so that people can get on with their work.

It is an issue we're aware of, and we are looking at it. But with eel grass specifically, I would have to get back to you on that.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you.

If you're not dealing specifically with Pacific region, perhaps Mr. Sprout would care to comment on that.

[Paul Sprout]

Well, the challenge, as you know fully, is that we're bound by our policy, which is a policy of no net loss.

So the challenge is exactly as you characterized it. There's a proposal to put in a small craft harbour. It's in a site that is occupied by eel grass. From our perspective, if that requires that eel grass be removed or destroyed, to be able to approve that we'd have to compensate. That means we'd have to find either an adjacent or nearby site, or some way of compensating for that loss.

In some cases that's straightforward; it's reasonably well done and we can manage it. In other cases it's quite a bit more complicated, and I think those are the ones you're referring to in the case of the west coast Tofino area.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Sprout, on the west coast, particularly in the Tofino area, if you haven't visited there, there's lots of eel grass in the area; it's prolific. It's a very small area, but if they can't get their boats in and out.... Are we trying to kill these businesses with regulation?

[Paul Sprout]

No, I don't think so. As I've explained and as you've commented, appropriately, in my opinion, this is about managing risk, and we do have to take into consideration the benefits of these projects versus the risk to the environment. But in the end we have a responsibility as an environmental organization to adhere to these policies. And these policies do require us to address issues of eel grass. So we would take into consideration the biological implications of removing this eel grass. What is our assessment of that? And we would take into consideration to what extent reasonable compensation is required to accommodate the loss of that particular location or that particular site.

This does require us to look at the issue of risk. That's what we would employ in this particular instance. The challenge, though, is that we are guided by policy constraints and so forth. I can't pretend otherwise.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I have a final comment on this. If it's a public good for eel grass and we're taking a place that's been used traditionally as a harbour for years, it's silted in and some eel grass has taken opportunity of that, if it's a public good, surely it's incumbent on the department to just go ahead and plant some other eel grass somewhere that's satisfactory to them and let them clear the harbour so they can use their facility.