Fisheries Committee on May 8th, 2007

[Dr. William Doubleday]

An example that I think would be close to your heart is the sentinel survey for groundfish in Newfoundland. In previous years this involved an explicit use of fish, where we entered into basically a contract whereby the amount of money that we paid to, in this case, the fishermen's union deducted the amount received by the sentinel fishermen for their sale of fish. So the amount of fish they caught was explicitly taken into account in the arrangement.

We can't do that now. However, we have determined that as long as the amount of fishing is only what's required to meet scientific requirements, that it's not increased in order to generate money, and as long as the commercial fishermen could retain the dead fish that were caught, the sentinel fishermen can do the same. The sentinel fishermen can sell them. The sentinel fishermen can retain the money. We simply won't have that as a consideration in the contract for the sentinel fishery. So they'll still be catching fish, they'll still be selling fish, but it won't be deducted from what we pay. This may result in some change in the balance between what the department contributed to the sentinel fishery and what the industry, through the union, contributes.

We believe this will allow the sentinel fishery to go forward without requiring a large infusion of cash.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Ms. Watson-Wright is going to get a comment in here.

[Dr. Wendy Watson-Wright]

I only wanted to clarify the $24 million versus the $12 million. The $24 million was the total of all the collaborative arrangements where the industry was contributing. The industry was contributing in some cases in kind, in cash, or in fish. So of the $24 million, $12 million was determined to have been contributed from the use of fish. The $24 million was everything else. So there is not a $24 million shortfall.

[Kevin Stringer]

To add to that, the courts did not pronounce on collaborative arrangements. They did not pronounce on the issue of somebody wanting to contribute to science work, that they can't do that and the department must pay for the whole thing. What the court said was that the minister shouldn't be allocating fish for that purpose, that it's not his to allocate, it's a public resource and all that kind of stuff.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

So fish could still be used for the purpose of science, for any particular fleet.

[Kevin Stringer]

Well, what can be used is cash. If you want to sit with an organization and say that the department will put this much in, and the fishermen's association wants to put a certain amount in, you can still do that.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Okay, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Thank you very much, Mr. Simms.

We're almost out of time. You'll be our last questioner, Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to make a brief comment and then I'll ask one last question.

My comment is that I used to work as a fisheries technician for the Province of Alberta. I remember a specific incident around a walleye minimum size experiment we were doing, a catch and release experiment. We basically went out with a gillnet to see how many tagged fish we would get back in correspondence with others. Of course, we used the fish for aging, sex verification, growth rates, and all the other good things.

I remember that when we went out, we netted a whole bunch of walleye. Of course, there's not a commercial fishery for walleye in Alberta. There's a commercial fishery for whitefish and other types of basically pelagic fish. And incidentally, if you catch walleye or northern pike, as a commercial fisherman you can sell them, as you well know.

I remember that we specifically couldn't contract out anybody to come and do that work for us. We caught a bunch of walleye and basically ended up puncturing their bladders after we did our test and getting rid of them at the bottom of the lake. The optics of bringing in all those fish in front of a bunch of sport fishermen wasn't very good either.

It seems to me that some common sense has to prevail in all of this so that we're not wasting the resource and we're not doing things that are clearly in violation of the law either.

But I just throw that out as a comment.

The last thing I want to talk about concerns page 16 of the deck that was provided by Madam Kirby.

I consider Alberta and Saskatchewan to be very similar in their resources and so on, although I know that one has a little bit more water. Based on “Annex 2: Application of Operational Statements by Provinces”, it seems to me that an operational statement is fine for directional drilling in Saskatchewan, and not in Alberta. It's fine for beach maintenance and log salvage in Saskatchewan, but not in Alberta. In fact, if you look at how the application of operational statements by provinces lines up, Alberta has the least amount of operational statements that apply.

Is that because there is less water, or there are fewer conditions for operational statements in Alberta? Or is it particularly a matter that we need to be more careful in one province than in another?

I'm just wondering why there's a discrepancy there.

[Sue Kirby]

There have been national operational statements developed for all of these. There are national operational statements that can apply in Alberta. In the case of Alberta, there are some instances where the province has chosen not to apply them, and we would continue to use the national statements.

Do you want to add to that, Richard?

[Richard Wex, Director General, Habitat Management Directorate, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Sure.

Very briefly, the only thing I could add is that provinces have their own regulatory requirements. They have their own provincial permitting requirements. They have their own laws and policies.

What we try to do is integrate or regionalize these standardized operational statements with those provinces. In some cases, they conflict with the provincial regulations, or else the province, for whatever reason, isn't yet comfortable incorporating the national statements and regionalizing them.

So in those cases they don't apply, although we are continuing to work with all of them.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Perhaps you could identify yourself for the committee.

[Richard Wex]

My name is Richard Wex. I'm the director general of the habitat management program.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Thank you, Mr. Calkins.

I'd like to thank the deputy minister and DFO staff for coming here today.

I would just revisit this for a second. There are a number of issues on the table before us today and there has been some very good discussion and a lot of discussion that will be ongoing. Could I get some follow-up from you folks on your long-range plan for environmental assessment, for remedial work around streams, for riparian strips, for culverts, for bridges?

There just seems to be a regulatory regime there that is very burdensome for industry, whether it's agriculture or forestry, and you never know who you are dealing with. And the idea of bringing in Transport Canada to decide something is a navigational waterway, to put a bridge across a 30-foot-wide river.... Somehow or other there have to be some reasonable rules that can be put into place to prevent some of this excessive regulation. It may be as simple as saying that the bridge needs to be high enough for a canoe to get under. I honestly don't know, but somewhere there are some balances to this.

It is particularly frustrating for people who have a certain timeframe to do work. They have to cross a stream bed and they have to put in a proper bridge or culvert in order to do that.

Most people don't want to damage the environment; they actually want to look after the environment. But at the same time, they have a job to do. I don't have the answer on finding that balance, but it is important.

Could you follow up with where you plan to go on that, because it is something that actually the committee might want to look at some time as well. Certainly the fish for science might be another issue the committee should be looking at, in all honesty.

Again, thank you for coming in. We appreciate it.

The meeting is adjourned.