Public Safety committee  Sure. Thank you very much, Mr. Breitkreuz. Before I respond directly to your question, I want to thank Ms. James for the clarification of my comments. I can assure Mr. Garrison that I read every line of every debate in the House, and it comes from no one other than myself. I fin

Public Safety committee  Yes, I own six firearms.

Public Safety committee  Me, not at all, because all of mine are non-restricted. I own no restricted or prohibited firearms.

Public Safety committee  Thank you, Mr. Leef. As I noted during my remarks, I think it's disrespectful when those types of terms are applied to legal, law-abiding firearms owners. My organization has a large youth component. It has a lot of women members. It has a lot of family members. At least 22,000

Public Safety committee  Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the committee, and my fellow panellists. On behalf of the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters, the largest conservation-based organization in Ontario, our 100,000 members, supporters, and subscribers, and our 725 member clubs

Fisheries committee  Thank you very much for the question, Ms. Davidson. You will be aware, given the riding that you represent, that there is an ongoing issue between.... There are nine provincial hatcheries in Ontario, and there are 50 volunteer hatcheries that supplement the efforts of the nine p

Fisheries committee  I'll address the monitoring question, Mr. MacAulay. The Ministry of Natural Resources is responsible for monitoring in Ontario. We do, however, have what are called FMZs—fisheries management zones—which are cooperative efforts between the ministry and local on-the-ground organiz

Fisheries committee  Clearly more of them could be done. Give or take, there are about 300 boots on the ground—if you will—or conservation officers in Ontario, which is not very many for a very large stretch of land. You could probably double or triple the number of COs out there, which would certain

Fisheries committee  I don't think that it's any surprise that anglers, and particularly in this case recreational anglers, are any strangers to environmental causes or any strangers to conservation of the resource. That's been the case for well over a century. At the Ministry of Natural Resources i

Fisheries committee  I can't tell you the exact number, but one of the most prolific organizations or clubs that is part of OFAH is the Chinese Anglers Association in Toronto. It's based in Toronto. All its members are in Toronto, and it is an enormous organization. It's very vocal and active, and it

Fisheries committee  Unfortunately those activities are generally in large part—and when I say this I mean by all political parties—undervalued in terms of seeing them as economic drivers. The immense reach of fishing, hunting, and related industries across this country, from some of the figures I i

Fisheries committee  In a word, the continuation of the recreational conservation partnerships program. As I said in my remarks, it's been an overwhelming success. It allows hundreds of on-the-ground projects to be done in local communities across this country, from coast to coast to coast. Expansion

Fisheries committee  Thank you for the question; I appreciate it. I'll address your first part, obviously. Sure, you would think that increasing the number of recreational anglers would, quid pro quo, put pressure on the resources. Obviously fish and wildlife management are managed on the basis of s

Fisheries committee  Well, the politics dictates that recreational anglers are the targets. The politics does not dictate that commercial fishing—in particular unregulated commercial harvest—is a target in Ontario. That's where the pressure on the resource is, and that's a political decision that gov

Fisheries committee  It's $12 million.