Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, gentlemen, for taking time out of your busy schedules to appear before us on these important issues. I appreciate your being here.
Let me begin with a fellow British Columbian, Chief Atleo. We care about some of the same issues with respect to fisheries. Unless I heard you incorrectly, I thought you were characterizing the changes in Bill C-38 as removing protection of fish habitat. To be frank, I'm not sure how you came to that conclusion. I would have thought you would welcome a more focused approach to protection of recreational, commercial, and aboriginal fisheries. That protection is in a prohibition in the new section 35, which is defined as serious harm to fish, the death of fish, or any permanent alteration to, or destruction of, fish habitat.
I'm just curious, and let's take the Nuu-chah-nulth, for example, and their aboriginal fisheries. Wouldn't this include all those fisheries and all of the habitat that supports those fisheries, and place an obligation on the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to protect that habitat in order to protect those fisheries as a clear reading of this proposed section in the bill?