I think there was a “yes” in there somewhere—that it's a lack of political will. I'm reading between the lines.
Just in the interest of time, I'm going to move on. There are also serious concerns about the listing process. The concerns you've expressed in your report are about species that have already been listed, but there's also a concern about the listing process for species.
I want to discuss specifically two runs of interior Fraser River steelhead. In the Thompson River run this year, there were 371 fish that came back. There should be thousands of fish. It's the eighth lowest on record. In the Chilcotin River, 134 steelhead returned, which is the sixth lowest on record. However, these runs, which are genetically distinct, are not listed under SARA.
My question is for Ms. Bouchard from DFO. In 2018 a DFO scientist raised alarm bells about the editing of a report completed by scientists regarding these two runs of steelhead specifically. Someone from the Canada science advisory secretariat, which is essentially a secretariat that conducts the peer review of science advice for DFO, warned that the changed document was undermining the scientific credibility of the process. Essentially, the scientists put together this document that raised alarm bells about interior Fraser steelhead, and then someone in the deputy minister's office edited the report to downplay the risks. That led to a decision by then minister Jonathan Wilkinson, in 2019, to not list interior Fraser steelhead.
Has the department taken any measures since then to prevent non-scientific officials from editing scientific reports to downplay risks and prevent the listing of species under SARA?