Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
It's a pleasure to be here today. I want to start by introducing the people I have with me here at the table. Claire Dansereau is the deputy minister at DFO; Guy Beaupré is the director general of the international fisheries directorate; Loyola Sullivan is our Ambassador for Fisheries Conservation; and Gilles Gauthier is director general of multilateral trade policy at DFAIT.
I'd like to thank them all for attending today.
Thank you for inviting me to return today. It's always a privilege to appear before the committee on critical fisheries issues that are of importance to coastal Canadians. I must say that I do know from speaking to many of you personally that you have a vested interest in this industry and that you always look out for it.
My department, our government, has taken decisive action in defence of Canadian sealers in light of the European Union's intention to ban the placing on the market of seal products in the European Community. This has been a priority file for me, personally, since taking office as Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. The May 5 vote in favour of banning seal products from markets in the European Community struck a blow to sealers in the north and the south, their families, and our country as a whole. The European Union's decision is purely politically motivated. The ban is without just cause, and we believe it is contrary to international trade law.
Prime Minister Harper has been clear that the Government of Canada will vigorously defend sealers' access to markets and will take whatever trade action is necessary. Our trade lawyers are carefully reviewing the legislation. However, the text will not be considered final until after the Council of Ministers has voted, which we have been told will not take place until June or this coming fall. We are committed to taking this measure to the World Trade Organization, because we believe this measure is contrary to WTO rules.
Since early 1996, our government has made repeated and unrelenting efforts to impress upon the EU and its member states the value of the Canadian seal hunt. We have voiced our commitment to responsible management of a hunt that prioritizes animal welfare and sustainability. Prime Minister Harper has made numerous interventions with his counterparts in the European Union. Leading up to the vote, our government escalated efforts to counter the proposed ban.
To help illustrate the steps taken by the government, I would like to take this opportunity to highlight the tireless advocacy work of the Ambassador for Fisheries Conservation, Loyola Sullivan, since his appointment in 2007, as well as actions taken by my department since I was appointed minister last November. He is attending with me and can expand on what he's been doing.
I think it's important to note that over the last two years, Ambassador Sullivan has led or participated in several Canadian delegations to Brussels, which is the seat of the European Union, and to all 27 EU member states. He advocated alongside key Canadian representatives, including the premier and federal, provincial, and territorial ministers, as well as other senior officials from Quebec, Nunavut, Newfoundland and Labrador, and the federal government.
These delegations also included representatives of the sealing industry, sealers and processors, and technical experts. All points of view have been included and valued. To date, Ambassador Sullivan has participated in more than 350 meetings with various European ministers and senior government officials and over 45 members of the European Parliament. Under my predecessor, Minister Hearn, and since my appointment as minister, my department has also been working very hard, on many levels, to counter this threat to this sustainable, historic, Canadian industry.
In addition to organizing delegations to Europe, my department partnered with the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade to deliver an advocacy campaign in European member states. We led a public relations campaign and negotiated bilaterally with European governments. I personally led a delegation to Prague for high-level meetings with senior government officials from the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic currently holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, so it was extremely important for us to participate in meetings there. It was one arena in which the Czech Republic could have played a moderating role in negotiations, but they chose politics.
In January, a delegation led by Conservative Senator Fabian Manning , the associate deputy minister of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, and Ambassador Sullivan traveled to Brussels to present Canada's position to the EU Parliament's Committee on Internal Market and Consumer Protection. In our efforts to get the Canadian position on the record, and to ensure that EU representatives were in possession of the facts, we wrote letters to the chairs of the European parliamentary committees that were examining the proposal. We wrote to the rapporteur and to the shadow rapporteur of the lead committee to register objections to a one-sided and largely fallacious press release published on January 22, 2009.
We invited rapporteurs and shadow rapporteurs to visit Canada. We sent letters to all the member states' ministers of environment.
I personally called the Portuguese minister and other members of the European Parliament to impress upon them the consequences of allowing policy to be driven by the animal rights campaigns.
We visited key European countries and spoke to European parliaments. My officials quite ably responded to technical questions from various EU representatives. We prepared and presented position papers to all members of the European Parliament, and to the environment ministers of the member states.
We responded to questions from members of the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection, and we arranged to have those responses posted publicly on the parliamentary website.
We wrote an article that became the first balanced story on this issue to be published in the European parliamentary magazine, and we made very strong interventions at the North Atlantic Fisheries Ministers' Conference.
Honourable members have raised the issue with their European counterparts in face-to-face meetings, through letters, and by phone.
My esteemed colleagues, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of International Trade, have worked diligently at the international level to advocate for Canadian sealers. Their departments have also worked extremely hard in support of our efforts.
We intensified our outreach activities this spring, and our government has advertised in various European media. Our philosophy is that we need to be involved in changing the hearts and minds of Europeans and not just European parliamentarians who are getting feedback from their constituents. With this in mind, communication efforts will continue.
As part of our ongoing commitment to adhere to the highest standards of animal welfare, DFO has made amendments to the marine mammal regulations and licence conditions governing the hunt. We consulted seal harvesters and scientists to ensure these changes would provide the best possible outcomes for the industry and the resource.
In addition to these measures, we have enhanced monitoring and enforcement of the hunt. Fishery officers and the Canadian Coast Guard continue to strengthen enforcement measures.
From every angle, my department has led the way in defending the hunt against misinformed accusations and attacks from radical animal rights groups. In all our outreach activities the information provided has been confirmed by independent experts, yet European Union decision-makers have instead favoured the misinformation propagated by radical animal rights groups. The inflammatory publicity campaigns organized by anti-sealing groups have been relentless and supported with seemingly unlimited funds.
I cautioned my European counterparts that they may yet find themselves on the very slippery slope they have begun with this emotion-based, unjustifiable ban. Their short-sighted position will result in serious consequences, notably for other similar hunting activities in the European Union and elsewhere.
Mr. Chair, I have attempted to paint a picture of commitment, of steadfast determination to defend this country's sealing industry. In the last three years we have made every effort possible to counteract destructive publicity in this senseless ban. But to our surprise we also had to counter destructive actions by a member of the Canadian Parliament. Senator Harb's actions, I would suggest, just made the EU's decision that much easier, and that's very unfortunate.
The European Parliament's proposed ban cannot become law until it has been adopted by the Council of the European Union, which represents the member states. Our government is studying the exact wording of the proposed regulation and will take appropriate action.
Our advocacy efforts will continue until we have achieved a reasonable solution that is acceptable to both the European Union and to Canada. We will continue to inform international discussions so that decisions are based on the facts, not on the emotional rhetoric that has clouded this issue for far too long.
Our government recognizes the negative impact this ban could have on sealing communities in Atlantic Canada and in the north, even with a limited exemption for Inuit. And we're going to continue to defend the rights of Canadian seal harvesters to earn a sustainable living. We will continue the dialogue, we will negotiate, and we will exercise our rights to the fullest extent of the law.
Our Conservative government is standing up in defence of Canadian sealers' right to earn a living safely and lawfully, and Mr. Chair, we will continue to do that.
Thank you.
