This amendment states that Bill C-244, in clause 3, be amended by replacing lines 1 to 6 on page 2 with the following:
34.1 (1) The owner of a vessel who transfers ownership of the vessel is deemed to remain an owner for the purposes of this Part until they notify the Minister of the transfer.
(2) The owner must, in writing, notify the Minister of the transfer of ownership within 14 days.
(3) The notice must include the name and contact information of the new owner.
Madam Chair, if I can explain the reasoning for submitting this amendment, it is basically from my 40 years of experience in the boatbuilding and boat repair business and seeing the number of vessels that are out there for which the registration of transfer is not completed because, as soon as it is done, the buyer receives notice from federal and provincial tax departments that they now owe taxes unless they've already been paid to a dealer in a dealership sale.
Through my shop over those years, and in other facilities, the number of private vessels that I saw that were transferred, oftentimes more than once, to a new owner with no record-keeping whatsoever made it almost impossible for some of the new owners to track down who may have originally been the last registered owner of the vessel.
This amendment would basically incentivize the seller to notify the department of the transfer, because once that is done, it should absolve them of liability for the vessel. They wouldn't have to go through the process that we're probably going to discuss, which is having to determine whether the new owner is qualified or not and the state of the vessel, which often requires a marine survey that can cost thousands of dollars, even for a small vessel. It simply would require the seller to provide the name and contact information of the buyer.
The purpose of this bill really is to track liability, and I believe that's what the sponsor of this bill is really looking for. It's to track the ownership and the liability of any vessel. This would make it very simple. It's just a matter of the seller providing the new owner's name and contact information. Then the government would have all of the resources to find that new owner, and they are liable.
I speak to this from my personal experience, which included the theft of a vehicle from my yard. That vehicle was stolen at three o'clock in the morning, never to be found again, but within a week's time the insurance on that vehicle was due for renewal. I thought that because it didn't belong to me anymore, I probably didn't need to renew the insurance. I checked with my insurance agent, and they said I actually did need to renew the insurance, because until it was either paid out by the insurance company, which was ICBC at the time, or I recovered it, if that vehicle was parked on the side of the highway and it rolled out and injured or killed someone, I was the registered owner and therefore I was responsible. I had to reinsure a vehicle that I wasn't in possession of and probably never had a chance of possessing again. Because I was the registered owner, I still had to pay for the insurance on it until the insurance company paid me out.
If the seller can provide the buyer's information, that should be enough to absolve them of the liability, and the government would have the ability to track the new owner. That is the reasoning and the rationale for this amendment.