And there's the ice.
Evidence of meeting #47 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was region.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #47 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was region.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Member, Maritimes and Gulf, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
The ice is a factor. We have global warming and the impact of rising sea levels. That's another thing that concerns us, and we're seeing the impact of that. We're seeing more infilling, more storms, and less ice cover.
That's something the committee should address as well, because that's going to have a significant impact as we go forward. In many cases now, I believe they're designing, if you talk to Public Works, somewhere in the range of a metre of additional height for newer facilities to try to deal with it. Of course, here we're mostly patching up and repairing existing facilities. We don't have the dollars to even visit a whole lot of new facilities at this point in time.
Liberal
Lawrence MacAulay Liberal Cardigan, PE
Do you feel that we need an analysis, or should DFO do a study on the situation of wharves—of what is essential, what needs to be done in two or three years, and what needs to be done over the next five years?
The problem I see, having been involved in this, is.... I know that one harbour in my district was a $150,000 job, but by the time we got to it, it was a $1.5 million job. It was done, but you know what that does to the A-base funding.
Member, Maritimes and Gulf, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
Certainly, and I'd ask any one of the others to jump in here.
Liberal
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
I think you raise a great point. For years we've been playing catch-up here. At some point we can't do that; we're going to lose facilities. We have facilities now that are becoming divested because they become derelict.
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
Well, we all know why; it's because of lack of funds. It's great, at some point, to get the $200 million so that there's a good portion of work being done in a very short period of time, but we know that's not realistic for a long-term plan.
You see this throughout the country. You see docks that are slowly deteriorating. You can't get the funds to do the small work that we should be doing at that particular time, rather than the big work, but the problem you run into is just trying to get the money in the department to do the work. If we don't have any money, we don't have much to do anything.
I think most harbour authorities have five- to ten-year plans. We know what the problems are in our harbour. So I'm not sure that a study would help.
Liberal
Lawrence MacAulay Liberal Cardigan, PE
Harbour authorities have them, but does DFO have one?
I think the $40-million increase would eliminate some of the big problems down the road.
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
A $40 million increase would?
Liberal
Lawrence MacAulay Liberal Cardigan, PE
I'm talking about the emergency funding, the $20 million. If the emergency funding allocation were increased, you could deal with a lot the difficult problems.
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
I think...but I would put the number far higher than that.
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
Yes, it's a matter of scale. You're going to get what you pay for, at the end of the day.
Conservative
Bloc
Yvon Lévesque Bloc Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good day, gentlemen. I also want to welcome the individuals accompanying you and who seem extremely interested. They are not missing a word of what is being said.
Luc, you mentioned in your report a $2.3-million amount just for dredging. In your opinion, would it be preferable for dredging fees to be taken out of your budget and allocated to the navy? You could then use the rest of your budget to maintain small craft harbours.
You mentioned a problem you had dealt with, Ben, on the Pacific coast. You talked about adopting legislation under which you could divest yourselves of small abandoned boats. I don't know whether anything has been done in this regard. Once Luc has answered, could you respond to this question?
If there is any time remaining, I will give it to Raynald.
Member, Quebec, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
The budget forecast sets out a formula for this, but we are not going to get into a fight over money. Some politicians do not want to provide any more money for this. Whatever happens, I certainly believe that the best-case scenario for the Quebec region would be to have dredging considered separately. You have to remember that at the moment dredging represents 66% of the budget, and next year that figure will rise to 70%. Dredging costs are not static; however, they are recurrent, and have to be addressed every year. If the matter could be settled for 10 or 15 years, that would be great, but today there are so many problems with dredging in Quebec that we have to start from scratch every year. It is becoming increasingly expensive, especially because of storms. The situation is set to become increasingly catastrophic for the Quebec region. The reason that I am speaking about Quebec is that I cannot speak for the other regions.
You have to mitigate the high costs Quebec faces because of dredging. We have nothing left to repair our wharfs. We only have $1.2 million over 5 years to repair our wharfs, and that is a serious problem. In fact, we no longer repair our wharfs, we patch them up. Rather than carrying out $30,000 or $40,000 dollars' worth of work, we spend $1,000 or $2,000 and then do it all again the following year. We are unfortunately not solving anything.
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
Are you referring to the derelict vessel problem in Pacific region? I'm not quite sure what you were referring to in the Pacific region.
Bloc
Member, Pacific, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
Yes, okay.
In the Pacific region a committee has been formed to study the issue. It involves agencies from small craft harbours throughout the province, but also the volunteer organizations, harbour authorities, and what's called the HABC, the Harbour Authority Association of B.C. The committee has been formed, and they've done a study to get a handle on the problem to see where the solutions can be found.
It's a very difficult issue, because it crosses so many jurisdictions. The problem you have, of course, is that once again you have volunteers trying to find a solution for a problem, and it's taxing. But there is a study underway to try to get a handle on the problem. It's very big, from what we understand from the numbers we're getting. We're hopefully going to be able to come up with some solutions, but it's a very difficult issue, and we don't really have any answers to it right now.
We had presentations during the conference on derelict vessels. The truth is that one sinking of a derelict vessel at your harbour can bankrupt the harbour authority. It's that simple. We need to find a solution for it. This is going to be an issue right across the country. I talked with Morris earlier, and it's an issue in Newfoundland now.
The problem we have, once again, is that we have volunteers trying to find a solution to a problem.
November 26th, 2009 / 4:30 p.m.
Member, Quebec, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee
If I may, I would like to comment on that.
Unfortunately, in today's society, the various port authorities and departments act once a problem has arisen. Why do we not act until disaster strikes? I am sure that if the Canadian Parliament took preventive measures, rather than waiting for problems to arise, it would make life easier for all of the departments and port authorities concerned.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
Mr. Chair, I've been on this committee for almost three years, and this is the first time this has ever happened. We actually have an Albertan testifying at the committee—
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
—so I would like to welcome Mr. Linington here.
I'm assuming that you're filling in for or have replaced Mr. Benson, who I think was here last year representing the central and Arctic region. Is that correct?
