Bill C-64 (Historical)

Wrecked, Abandoned or Hazardous Vessels Act

An Act respecting wrecks, abandoned, dilapidated or hazardous vessels and salvage operations

This enactment enacts the Wrecked, Abandoned or Hazardous Vessels Act, which promotes the protection of the public, of the environment, including coastlines and shorelines, and of infrastructure by regulating abandoned or hazardous vessels and wrecks in Canadian waters and, in certain cases, Canada’s exclusive economic zone, and by recognizing the responsibility and liability of owners for their vessels.
The Act, among other things,
(a) implements the Nairobi International Convention on the Removal of Wrecks, 2007;
(b) requires owners of vessels of 300 gross tonnage and above, and unregistered vessels being towed, to maintain wreck removal insurance or other financial security;
(c) prohibits vessel abandonment unless it is authorized under an Act of Parliament or of the legislature of a province or it is due to a maritime emergency;
(d) prohibits the leaving of a dilapidated vessel in the same place for more than 60 days without authorization;
(e) authorizes the Minister of Transport or the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to order the removal of a dilapidated vessel left on any federal property;
(f) authorizes the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to take measures to prevent, mitigate or eliminate hazards posed by vessels or wrecks and to hold the owner liable;
(g) authorizes the Minister of Transport to take measures with respect to abandoned or dilapidated vessels and to hold the owner liable;
(h) establishes an administration and enforcement scheme, including administrative monetary penalties; and
(i) authorizes the Governor in Council to make regulations respecting such matters as excluding certain vessels from the application of the Act, setting fees and establishing requirements for salvage operations, the towing of vessels and the dismantlement or destruction of vessels.
The enactment also re-enacts and revises provisions related to the International Convention on Salvage, 1989 and to the receiver of wreck. The enactment strengthens the protection of owners of certain wrecks in cases where the owner is unknown or cannot be located and maintains regulatory powers related to the protection and preservation of wrecks having heritage value.
Finally, it makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, madam Chair.

My next question is for all three of you.

I am going to read to you the purpose of the act: The purpose of this Act is to promote the protection of the public, the environment, including coasts lines and shorelines, and of infrastructure by, among other things, regulating wrecks and vessels posing hazards, prohibiting vessel abandonment, and recognizing the responsibility and liability of owners for their vessels.

Mr. Smith, a little while ago, you showed us photos of scenes that were rather depressing.

I am not a regular member of this committee, but I have a question.

You showed us photos that paint a bleak landscape. I am sorry. You deserve more, as do all Canadian waterways.

We want to find solutions to the problem caused by these existing wrecks, but does bill C-64 have enough teeth to fulfill its purpose?

Mr. Smith, I would ask you to respond first.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

The amount of the B.C. coastline that has a municipal authority within it is a tiny fraction, right? The chief would know that too.

I was really happy to hear encouragement from the Ladysmith Maritime Society for including in the legislation some of the models that we've seen in the Washington state abandoned vessel program, legislating that some of the fees from vessel registration go into an abandoned vessel response fund. In terms of legislating that we have a vessel turn-in program, which has been successfully done in Washington and Oregon, I think I heard you say you'd like to see that in Bill C-64 so that we're sure it goes forward. Is that fair to say?

[Rod Smith]

Technically under Bill C-64, they would be called dilapidated. Some in fact are hanging on by a thread, so to speak.

This is a picture of the Ladysmith Community Marina. Our marina is in the front, and the town is in the back.

Here are couple of pictures just to show you what we have.

There's our welcome centre, which is federally and provincially funded.

Here's the approach from the town onto our marina.

We do a number of free festival events for communities. This was an event with marine biologists and divers bringing up specimens under a special licence, for kids to get a glimpse of what's under the water.

We run a program called Dine on the Dock, for which we bring in guest chefs to let people sample their wares. We are a non-profit society, so any money raised goes to the chefs, for example.

This was from Kids' Day. It's actually called Kids' Pirate Day, but we're looking for a new name for that. About 6,000 come down. It's a wonderful family event. Everything is free, and there's a fishing derby to help the Kinsmen.

Next door is water lot 651. This is an early morning shot I took. You can see the smoke over the water. Those are illegal wood stoves. This was about a week ago. It was a strangely cold day in British Colombia, and the wood stoves were fired up. This shows about 15% of what's there.

In this shot with the post in the middle, just at the bottom, you can see some logs in the water. That's the dividing line between our water lots. To the left is our marina, and to the right are the illegally moored boats. There are three tied together, which is typical of rafting by squatters. One will be a living quarter; one might be a sleeping quarter, and one is a storage area.

That's a 90-foot 100-tonne landing craft, a barge, on which a gentleman brings in metal vessels on a regular basis and cuts them up for salvage. Once he's done with them, they seem to disappear in the night. You can see the three rafted boats off to the left as well.

This is an example. In this particular one, there are nine boats rafted together, with two people living on them. When one sinks, they step to another. On the right-hand side, you can see a turquoise sloping vessel. It's actually just held there by the bow rope. It sank.

Here's another example of a typical live-aboard vessel by a squatter. You can see they're just getting onto their boat.

This is another typical example of three rafted together. This is the Viki Lyne II when it had 33,000 litres of oil onboard it. It took the community four years to get rid of it. The boat to the right of it burned. The one to the left of it sank about two months ago.

Here are three. You can see one in the foreground that burnt earlier in the year. One sank beside it, and there's one that's just burned behind it.

Captain Wootton said they had removed seven or so vessels over 18 months. I've seen six burn. I've had too many calls in the middle of the night. I've had too many people who have been threatened by squatters. You can imagine what this does when you have a marina full of visitors and that is what's going on next door.

So to your question, most are pleasure craft, but almost all are dilapidated. I doubt that there's a vessel or two that could safely navigate the waters.

[Vice-Chief Terry Teegee, Regional Chief, British Columbia Assembly of First Nations, Co-chair, National Fisheries Committee, Assembly of First Nations]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I want to acknowledge that right now I'm in Vancouver on Coast Salish territory of the Musqueam Coast Salish people, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh.

I am the elected chief of the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations. I have recently been appointed to the national fisheries committee that I co-chair with Regional Chief Roger Augustine. I've been in Vancouver for the last couple of days to talk about all the national fisheries issues, which include many of our coastlines. I've been asked here to speak on this issue with regard to Bill C-64, An Act respecting wrecks, abandoned, dilapidated or hazardous vessels and salvage operations.

Out here on the coast of British Columbia we've experienced many issues with abandoned and other vessels that have become derelict and are spilling deleterious materials, such as oil, diesel, or gas into the ocean along the coast of British Columbia. They are threatening the fish and other sea life that we've been dependent upon for many generations since time immemorial.

The AFN executive committee that I represent has 10 regional chiefs. Each chief is elected by their community and the many other communities they represent in each province. I think this is the first time we've been allowed to present to the standing committee. I'm quite surprised by that, considering that many first nations depend on many of the alliances from coast to coast to coast. Over the 151 years of colonization, we have had many agreements with the provincial and federal governments, whether treaties or other types of agreements, whereby we have been trying to create a relationship that respects both our laws and governance. Right now, when we're talking about these different bills that affect our way of life, we're considered an afterthought. Meanwhile, we're having different agreements that should have mutual respect and recognition of our rights and title and interest and treaty rights.

As an engagement process, I look forward and hope that those who are presenting today and in the future can create a space for our first nations who depend on the coasts of this country, and also have input into how best to deal with derelict vessels along the coasts of this country we call Canada. Especially during the Trudeau Liberal government, we're living in a time of reconciliation. We need to include the many issues that affect many of our people, whether social or resource-based. We need to be involved in those decisions, especially when it comes to governance as it relates to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and its tenets of free, prior, and informed consent.

What really concerns me here is that there have been a number of issues from coast to coast to coast that have affected the resources we depend on. One of the situations out here, for example, was the Nathan E. Stewart that went derelict and sank in the Pacific coastal waters where a lot of its diesel fuel and oil spread along the coast of the Heiltsuk people, the coastal people there.

[Rod Smith, Executive Director, Ladysmith Maritime Society]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to thank the committee for the opportunity to appear before you to comment on Bill C-64 and the issue of abandoned vessels. Let me start by complimenting Minister Garneau and his team at Transport Canada for drafting Bill C-64. I also think I should recognize MPs Bernadette Jordan and Sheila Malcolmson for their tireless work on this issue of abandoned vessels.

Ladysmith on Vancouver Island is a community of about 8,600 people. Tourism is one of our key economic drivers in the community. In 2010, visionary leaders in the community set the Ladysmith Maritime Society on a path to attract large-scale international marine tourism. In 2012, with $1.5 million of federal support, half a million dollars from Island Coastal Economic Trust, and strong support from the local Stz'uminus First Nations, we opened our welcome centre and began work on a visitor dock extension.

Prior to these enhancements, about 2,000 marine visitors a year tied up at our marina. This past year, we welcomed 6,300 marine visitors, 60% of whom were from the United States. These visitors inject over $1.5 million per year into the local economy and become our best ambassadors. Recently, the Ladysmith Community Marina was recognized as one of the top 10 marinas out of 400 or so in the Canadian and U.S. Pacific northwest and had been branded by our visitors as the friendliest marina on the west coast, a testament to the efforts of our 200-plus volunteers.

Sadly, all of this is at risk. A simple Google search of Ladysmith harbour results in a disturbing number of headlines about derelict and wrecked vessels, derelict Viki Lyne II, “Boat goes up in flames in Ladysmith harbour”, and about a boat sinking in the harbour and leaking oil. We're now hearing comments from our boating visitors like, “Great marina. I love the food and the people, but we won't be back. The noise and the smells from those boats next door are just too much.”

The 50 or so abandoned, dilapidated, and wrecked vessels adjacent to our marina are a serious threat to our growing tourism industry and an environmental, health and safety, and economic risk to the people of the harbour, including Stz'uminus First Nation, who rely on a 150,000-pound annual oyster licence in the area, as well as other local shellfish producers and processors.

There are some important new tools contained in Bill C-64. Clearly designating the Coast Guard as the lead agency, as I heard Minister Garneau say on February 5, is a big step. Hopefully, this will put an end to the jurisdictional complexity that communities have had to deal with. It should not have taken from June 2012 to October 2016 to remove a vessel that had already been identified in a marine survey commissioned by the Coast Guard as being in imminent danger of sinking and spilling 33,000 litres of oil into the waters of Ladysmith harbour, as was the case of the Viki Lyne II. I have the greatest respect for the Coast Guard, and I'm sure they welcome this change as well.

I do, however, have some concerns about Bill C-64, or perhaps more correctly, what's missing from it for us to effectively address the reality of what is happening on the B.C. coast. I have two examples. First, the recently introduced abandoned boats program falls short in its application. The cost-sharing formula with local communities is unfair, and, as recognized by Minister Garneau on February 5 before this committee, the funding for the program is inadequate. There's a huge gap between the cap of the abandoned boats program at $50,000 and the reality of dealing with the most prevalent vessels of concern on the coast, ex-fishing vessels and tugs, which made up over 70% of the problem vessels dealt with, using the ship-source oil pollution fund, between 2005 and 2015.

Second, on February 5, I heard Minister Garneau answer a question about live-aboards by saying it was an issue to be dealt with at the community and provincial level. Unfortunately, his response and the inability of Bill C-64 to clearly address the issue of squatters living on dilapidated vessels creates a large grey area for those of us in coastal communities and ignores the life-cycle reality of a vessel, resulting in Bill C-64 not being as comprehensive as I think it was intended to be.

Abandoned dilapidated vessels with no apparent ownership commonly serve as free temporary accommodation for squatters, who often take little interest in sewage disposal, stewardship of hazardous fluids, or vessel upkeep. Without the opportunity to identify a vessel as dilapidated and initiate a repair or removal regime, even if there is someone temporarily living on the vessel, there can only be one outcome: the eventual sinking or burning of that vessel, and the release of pollutants into the harbour, as was recently the case with the 85-tonne Anapaya in Ladysmith harbour.

[Bonnie Gee, Vice-President, Chamber of Shipping]

Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you to provide the Chamber of Shipping's perspective on Bill C-64, an act that will take measured steps to address concerns with wrecks, abandoned and hazardous vessels.

The Chamber of Shipping represents the interests of international cargo and passenger vessels calling in the ports in Canada and, to a lesser extent the domestic ferry tug and barge operators. The west coast serves as Canada's busiest gateway for Canadian trade and tourism, and the members of the Chamber of Shipping support efforts towards a healthy and vibrant marine ecosystem.

Overall, we are supportive of Bill C-64 and would like to acknowledge Transport Canada for its approach and work on this important matter. While the bill as proposed will not resolve all the associated challenges in the short term, it does establish a strong legislative framework to build upon. I would like to acknowledge the efforts of many members of Parliament, including Ms. Sheila Malcolmson and Ms. Bernadette Jordan, in advancing the concerns of local communities.

We agree with the many witnesses who have already appeared before this committee that Bill C-64 is a positive step forward in demanding greater accountability from vessel owners, establishing the appropriate authorities and processes to deal with hazardous vessels, and outlining consequences for non-compliance. Given the expanse of Canada's coastline, the challenge will be ensuring that the legislation is fair, effective, and enforceable.

Bill C-64 falls in line with the various commitments made by the Government of Canada under the oceans protection plan to keep Canadian waters and coasts safe and clean for today's use while protecting them for future generations.

Bill C-64 seeks to implement the international convention that provides for uniform international rules and procedures to ensure the prompt and effective removal of wrecks and fair compensation for the costs. The Nairobi International Convention on the Removal of Wrecks, adopted in 2017 by the International Maritime Organization, entered into force on April 14, 2015, one year after ten nations signed the convention without reservation. We welcome Canada's accession to the Nairobi Convention, as it provides communities with added protection against vessels of concern and the potential costs associated with wreck removal in a manner that adheres to international regimes.

Global operators seek certainty in the regulatory environment and general consistency of applications supports a higher level of awareness and compliance. Canada continues to be a strong contributor to the development of good policy at the International Maritime Organization. We applaud Transport Canada's commitment to the important work of this United Nations agency.

International shipping requires a regulatory framework that is consistent, effective and implemented globally. As a founding member, Canada celebrates its 70th year of membership in the IMO this year. To date, 41 countries have ratified the convention, representing 75% of the world's tonnage. These countries include significant flag states and coastal nations such as China, Singapore, Panama, Liberia and Germany. Almost all vessels over 300 tonnes engaged in international trade will already have the appropriate insurance in place as required under article 10 of the Nairobi Convention.

A wreck as defined in the convention includes any object that is lost at sea from a ship. Under Bill C-64 the definition is expanded to include the following:

equipment, stores, cargo or any other thing that is or was on board a vessel and that is sunk, partially sunk, adrift, stranded or grounded, including on the shore.

Earlier this week, Gord Johns, the member of Parliament for Courtenay—Alberni, again raised concerns and expressed his frustration with government inaction following an incident involving 35 containers that were lost at sea just eight nautical miles off the west coast in November 2016. Several containers ended up on the shorelines along the coast. Unfortunately, in this case the carrier responsible was in receivership, leaving communities to deal with the mess, because the provisions offered in Bill C-64 with respect to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans' authority to direct, dismantle, or dispose of a vessel or wreck were non-existent. This will be addressed once Bill C-64 passes through Parliament and receives royal assent.

Ratification of this convention through Bill C-64 will also provide communities and many indigenous peoples with the mechanism to realize a broader assessment on the impact of ship-related debris in a timely manner and an opportunity to fully recover any costs associated to the assessment of hazardous debris removal operation.

All of the above are important and positive attributes of Bill C-64 , which, as mentioned at the outset of my comments, the Chamber of Shipping supports.

Thank you very much for your time and attention and for inviting the Chamber of Shipping to appear today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I'm calling the meeting back to order of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. We continue our study on Bill C-64.

Our witnesses for this panel are from the Assembly of First Nations, Terry Teegee, chief of the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations, by teleconference; from the Chamber of Shipping, we have Bonnie Gee, vice-president, by video conference from Vancouver, British Columbia; and from the Ladysmith Maritime Society, we have Rod Smith, the executive director. Welcome to all of you.

We will turn it over to Chief Teegee for five minutes, if you would like to start.

We're still waiting, so how about we go to Bonnie Gee, since you're ready, for five minutes, please.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank all of you for joining us today and for being flexible, given the circumstances we face today.

I do want to thank you, Mr. Mitchell, for your comments regarding the fact that this is a non-partisan issue and has support from all members of all parties in this House.

I do want to keep my questions very brief because I do want to hear from all of you, so perhaps you'll answer my questions in the order you presented just so, for those who are on the telephone, you will know when you may want to provide your response.

Quite simply, do you have any concerns about Bill C-64? If so, I'm imagining that you might have some amendments, and I would like to know what they might be.

[The Chair (Hon. Judy A. Sgro (Humber River—Black Creek, Lib.)), Liberal, Judy Sgro]

I call to order the meeting of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities of this 42nd Parliament. Pursuant to the order of reference of Tuesday, December 5, 2017, we are resuming our consideration of Bill C-64, an act respecting wrecks, abandoned, dilapidated or hazardous vessels and salvage operations.

Welcome to you all.

Witnesses, I apologize for starting late, but that's Ottawa and Parliament. We're never quite sure.

Recognizing that it's also Valentine's Day this evening and that people possibly have some other plans, we'll try to put this into two 45-minute sessions. We'll have five minutes for each of our witnesses and then we'll have the remaining time in that block for a round of questions. Then we can go on to the next one, and hopefully we can be completed by 6 p.m.

In the first panel of witnesses, from the Town of Bridgewater, we have David Mitchell, the mayor. Welcome.

The Environment

[Karen McCrimmon, Liberal, Kanata—Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our government has heard the concerns of Canadians, asking for a more robust and comprehensive approach to address the issue of wrecked, abandoned, or hazardous vessels.

On October 30, we did introduce the wrecked abandoned or hazardous vessels act, or Bill C-64. The proposed legislation is intended to protect coastal and shoreline communities, the environment, and infrastructure.

The proposed legislation will fill gaps within our legislative system by making owners legally responsible for their vessels that reach end of life. Ultimately, it is about prevention, helping to reduce future occurrences of wrecked, abandoned, and hazardous vessels and the impacts of those that do occur.

We invite all members to support this innovative and important bill as it goes through the parliamentary process.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think maybe my friend opposite did not hear the first four minutes of my speech.

There is a lot to support in the transport minister's Bill C-64, but it is missing the entire program I have just described. I have not heard any rationale from the government about why it is leaving it out. It was described by the Washington State derelict vessel removal program, which has been in operation 15 years, as now an integral part of its prevention program.

Knowing there is nothing in the transport minister's bill to deal with the backlog of abandoned vessels, will the government accept the amendment I am going to propose in committee to introduce a voluntary turn-in program for abandoned vessels to deal with the backlog?

[Karen McCrimmon, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for her concern for her and many other coastal communities.

I am proud to be here today to talk about the actions this government has taken to address the important issue of abandoned and wrecked vessels, an issue affecting many communities across Canada.

Our government has been looking at the best practices on the issue of abandoned and wrecked vessels. We have considered these carefully and have adopted the elements that make the most sense for Canada into a national strategy on abandoned and wrecked vessels. This strategy was announced as part of our unprecedented $1.5 billion oceans protection plan in November 2016.

In May and September 2017, two funding programs for the removal and disposal of small priority boats were launched, including one with a public education component and a vessel recycling and design research component.

We worked with other levels of government to identify options to improve vessel ownership identification systems and initiated a study on identifying gaps in our vessel registration systems for large vessels.

We have worked with the Canadian Coast Guard to develop a national inventory of abandoned and wrecked vessels and a methodology to assess the risks associated with these vessels.

We have also been engaging Canadians in discussions on options to create a robust polluter-pay approach for future vessel clean up with owner financed funds.

Very important is the fact that on October 30, 2017, our government tabled Bill C-64, the wrecked, abandoned or hazardous vessels act, the key legislative component of our plan.

Bill C-64 is extremely comprehensive in its approach to tackling the issue of wrecked, abandoned or hazardous vessels. The proposed legislation will bring the Nairobi International Convention on the Removal of Wrecks into Canadian law and strengthen vessel owner liability. It will address irresponsible vessel management, including a prohibition on abandonment. It will enhance federal powers to take proactive action on problem vessels.

We will continue to collaborate with provincial, territorial, and municipal governments; indigenous groups; and coastal communities to implement our comprehensive national strategy on abandoned and wrecked vessels. We look forward to all members' support of Bill C-64 as it goes through the parliamentary process to implement this important legislation that will help protect our coasts and shores.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise again to describe the abandoned vessel that sank in Ladysmith Harbour, the 90-foot, 100-year-old Anapaya. It has been on Transport Canada's vessel inventory of concern since 2014. It had been identified as a risk to sink. When it went down, after being overwhelmed by rain and the bilge pumps could not keep it up, the Coast Guard, bless it, took action. It boomed the wreck and contained the oil spill. That was so important for Ladysmith Harbour, because there are shellfish jobs at risk from even the smallest oil spill. The Coast Guard acted, which we are very grateful for. It lifted this 90-foot-long, beautiful old wooden boat from the bottom of the harbour, with everyone saying the whole way along that it would have been much easier to have prevented the boat from sinking in the first place.

A significant take-away for me afterward was that the previous owners, in fact the people who had been living on the Anapaya, knew that she was nearing the end of her life. She was an abandoned boat by the time she sank. The previous owners said they did not have the economic means to prevent her from sinking, but if there had been a vessel turn-in program, the same that Oregon and Washington states have very successfully used to get at the backlog of abandoned vessels, it would have prevented it from sinking and becoming a problem in the first place. This was a significant element of my abandoned vessel legislation, Bill C-352, which was famously blocked in the House. It was the first time that had ever happened to a bill. I went through all the appeals and was told that it was the Liberal majority that squashed it in the end.

The interesting thing is that now that we are studying the transport minister's bill, Bill C-64, at committee, I have been able to ask all kinds of witnesses if they wish that a vessel turn-in program were still part of the legislative offer for Canadians. It makes sense. It has been proposed by local governments in British Columbia for many years, and it was on that basis that I included it in my legislation, Bill C-352.

In the last few days, there has been testimony from Troy Wood, the manager of the derelict vessel removal program in Washington state, saying that the vessel turn-in program was the prevention arm of their very successful derelict vessel removal program. Sara Anghel, president of the National Marine Manufacturers Association, said there is no place to take boats before they become a hazard for her industry, which is significantly made up of vessel manufacturers and marine operators. She said they would welcome the opportunity to create a viable recycling program and there needs to be a place to take them.

The committee also heard from Kyle Murphy from Washington state, Peter Luckham, chair of Islands Trust Council, and Anna Johnston from West Coast Environmental Law. Georgia Strait Alliance said very clearly that in the transport minister's bill, it is left wondering about the absence of a voluntary turn-in program that could deal with this backlog and help vessel owners, who do not have the means to dispose of them responsibly and do the right thing.

I ask the government why it did not include a vessel turn-in program in its legislation to resolve abandoned vessels.

Fisheries Act

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague from South Shore—St. Margarets has also championed another bill we are working on in the House right now, Bill C-64, which deals with derelict vessels, and I thank her for that.

She happened to mention that we had a good fishery in 2012 and we will have a good fishery again. I think of the historical nature of the Fisheries Act, which came into being in 1868. Let us consider what we have lost. We had an abundant fishery, when we consider the Atlantic coast and the great Newfoundland cod fishery, which maintained communities in Newfoundland and Labrador and much of Atlantic Canada for generations. By the early 1990s, that fishery was destroyed.

Rebuilding fisheries is one of the things I am pleased about with respect to this legislation. It changed the focus to restoration of fisheries. I wonder if the hon. member has any comments on that aspect.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much to all our witnesses. It was very informative.

For the information of committee, any amendments that anyone is considering for Bill C-64 should be in by February 22. We have one more meeting on Wednesday on Bill C-64, and when we come back after the constituency week, we will be dealing with it on Monday, February 26.

Thank you all very much. The meeting is adjourned.