Fisheries Committee on March 10th, 2009

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Let us begin the meeting now. So that we can get to our witnesses as quickly as possible, I would like us first to deal with the motion that I have introduced and that you have before you. In order to do so, I am going to yield the chair to Randy Kamp who will act as chair. After we deal with that motion, we can come back to the agenda and have our discussion with our witnesses.

I would also like to tell you that Mr. MacAulay is not here today because, I am told, he fell on the ice and broke three ribs. I do not know whether it was the performance of the Boston Bruins or what happened to the Montreal Canadiens that made him laugh and fall on the ice, but I am still sure that Mr. MacAulay will recover very quickly.

If I may, I am going to yield the chair so that we can deal with my notice of motion.

Mr. Lévesque?

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

I would like to ask Julia a question.

You sent us the notes from Mr. Applebaum's presentation. Did you also send the French version? Yes? Fine.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

I have a quick point of order. I think it would be appropriate for the committee to recognize that it is Mr. Lévesque's birthday today. Let's wish him a happy birthday.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear!

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

It is my girlfriend's birthday today too, but that is another story.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Okay. I've been promoted.

Mr. Blais, are you moving this motion?

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

I would like to introduce the motion you have before you. It deals with the seal hunt, which will be starting very soon. I could have waited until Thursday so that we could have got to our witnesses more quickly, but chances are that this discussion will be very quick, I think, at least, I hope. I also hope that this motion is going to receive unanimous consent. It has two objectives. The first is to reiterate the message contained in our report on the seal hunt that we tabled in April 2007. It asks the government to take all necessary measures, one of which is to make representations to the European Parliament, particularly at this stage in the year, and to conduct an information campaign for the general public.

The second objective is the safety of the hunters. Just a few minutes ago, in fact, I met with a Liberal senator who has made it into the news recently by introducing a bill on the seal hunt. His name is Mac Harb. I tried to influence him and make him see the light; the attempt was unsuccessful, but, for all that, my discussion with Mr. Harb was very interesting. The second part of the motion before you asks the government to do everything in its power to ensure the safety of the seal hunters. As you know, of course, when the abolitionists come onto the ice, it is not just as observers. Unfortunately, they engage in a lot of provocation because they are looking for pictures showing an outraged hunter clubbing away with his hakapik, or simply losing his cool. It is important to introduce this motion in order to ensure their safety.

Thank you very much.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

The motion has been moved and explained. Is there any further discussion?

Mr. Calkins.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just wanted to preface my comments to Mr. Blais. He knows very well that all parties, with the exception of a few parliamentarians, or at least that's what we thought anyway, generally support our traditional seal harvest.

My concern with the wording of the motion is that while I agree in principle with bringing this forward and I certainly don't have trouble supporting it, I'm just wondering sometimes if some of the things you try to do are better left undone. And I'll preface it like this. I think the public opinion campaign in Europe has already been won by the abolitionists. I would argue that it would probably be in Canada's seal harvesters' best interests if we didn't try to provoke that sentiment any further, but rather focus our activities on the diplomatic channels that are available through intergovernmental relations through things such as World Trade Organization agreements, by challenging the very principles of the European Union, which seeks to only bring about change within its own territory, not to influence actions of other governments outside its jurisdiction.

All these things are very valid approaches. I just think that the Government of Canada investing heavily in a public education campaign off our shores might be more harmful than helpful.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Thank you for that point, Mr. Calkins.

Mr. Weston.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Mr. Blais, I very much admire the skill and the passion with which you defend your constituents. I am going to support your motion, whether or not you accept the recommendation that my colleague and I are making. Mr. Calkins and I agree that if we put more emphasis on the pressure on the European Parliament and less on the wider and vaguer campaign, this motion could be more effective.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Further discussion?

Mr. Byrne.

[Gerry Byrne, Liberal, Humber—St. Barbe—Baie Verte, NL]

I think the motion itself is pretty clear.

Just dealing with Mr. Weston's point about providing substantive measures for the government to embark upon, I don't necessarily agree with that particular notion, simply because if the government has indeed been involved in any campaigns in the past in Europe, they should know what to do. We've prompted them as to what to do.

I'm sure, Mr. Weston, that the appropriate response would be from the government benches. If I could read into the minds of the government, we've been doing a good job in Europe in the past. If you were to make the notion that what we need to do is define for the government what it needs to do in the future, then that's an admission of defeat of the government's past actions in Europe.

On Mr. Calkins' point that the battle is now lost when it comes to public opinion, I could not disagree more strongly. I remember extremely well back in the mid-1980s, when the whitecoat hunt was abolished and people said the seal hunt industry, at that point, was dead. It was not. We did indeed fight back.

In 2005, I'll remind my committee members, 349,000 seals were harvested, up substantially from an all-time low in the mid-1980s; seal pelt values ranged from $98 to $104 per pelt; seal protesters were few and far between on the ice floes; and the European Union was actively engaged in increasing trade in seal products, not in banning them. By 2008, harvests were down to 270,000, quotas had been cut by the government, seal pelt values were reduced by 400% to $25 per pelt, and seal protesters outnumbered the number of sealers on the ice.

To take a position now that we're defeated in Europe is simply to say that what happened in the past and the rebounding we made in terms of this industry from the darker days of the mid-1980s was not possible. So I would put my full weight behind Monsieur Blais's motion as it currently stands and suggest that this is a nice, positive reminder to the government not to give up on this battle.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Mr. Andrews.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you.

I'd like to add to what Gerry just said.

Mr. Weston, I'd like to know exactly what else you'd like us to include in this, just for the simple fact that we're running out of time. We had the deputy minister in here, and Mr. Sullivan, and Senator Manning. We're down to the last two weeks of this particular campaign to try to influence the vote in Parliament. We offered, as a committee, what we could do as parliamentarians. I think Mr. Manning and Mr. Sullivan have done a small job, but they need much more help.

What else do you think we could add to strengthen this?

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Mr. Weston, do you have a brief response to that?

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Andrews. I'm glad you asked the question, because I guess I didn't make my point clear enough.

Because time is of the essence, because, as we've heard, there are 724 parliamentarians, I wouldn't add anything. I would just delete “and implement a widespread educational campaign in Europe” so that we would focus our efforts. We only have months--weeks, really.

As I said, I will support this motion as it stands. I think it would be improved if we, like a laser beam, focused on the parliamentarians who have the vote rather than the millions of Europeans who don't.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Okay. I've heard no motion to that effect.

Mr. Duncan.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

I'm trying to synthesize some of the things I've heard. I'm just wondering if an amendment would be in order that would maybe cover some of the concerns.

Where it says, “increase pressure on”, I do have a concern that the message we're sending with those three words is that our government and previous administrations were not doing enough. I agree with Mr. Byrne that there has been a lot done; I don't think we want to send a message otherwise.

So I would suggest that we say, instead of “increase pressure on the European Parliament”, the following: “continue urgent dialogue with the European Parliament”.

I think that's a constructive amendment that would make this a more supportable motion for all parties.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Are you moving that?

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

I would move that, yes.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

The amendment is to remove the words “increase pressure on” and to replace them with “continue urgent dialogue with”. This is in terms of the European Parliament.

Is there any discussion on the amendment?

Mr. Blais is next. Then we should move this along fairly quickly here.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

I do not really want to prolong the debate, but I do not feel that my motion is trying to put the government into a corner or anything.

At the moment, time is a major factor. We have seen that, and we are still seeing it. They will soon be making their decisions over there. I do not know the exact time lines in the European Parliament, but those who know how it works know that it is not possible to say that the bill will be tabled on a given date, and so on. Unfortunately, it does not work like that.

The word “increase“ is intended to recognize the present situation. So I invite my colleagues to reject the amendment and to pass the motion as it stands. First, the motion recognizes that time is not on our side at the moment. Second, we have to send the message that we want to have a information campaign for the European public.

We already discussed this matter; we tabled a report in 2007. We were thinking about conducting a campaign for the general public even then. We know that senators and members of Parliament are influenced by public opinion. If we do not reach the population, we are going to fail.

The proposal as worded tries to deal with the matter appropriately. That is why I ask my colleagues not to see things in that way. Otherwise, the effect will be to ignore the context that is forcing us to act quickly.

[The Acting Chair, Conservative, Randy Kamp]

Thank you, Mr. Blais.

I think Mr. Weston was up.

Mr. Andrews, a brief comment on the amendment.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

On the amendment, Mr. Byrne just gave an example of how the hunt is now at an all-time low, compared to the 2005 effort, so the words “increase more pressure” I don't think are strong enough. I think if we're going to do anything, we need to go stronger on this.

Again, I get back to the point. With all due respect to the government members, in the last two months we've sent one parliamentarian over to discuss this issue with other parliamentarians, and one ambassador, to try to cover off 700-plus parliamentarians, to try to influence the vote. I disagree. I don't think we've done a good job on this. I think the motion by Mr. Blais is fine. As a matter of fact, I would probably go as far as to say that we need to strengthen it, but I think this is a pretty conciliatory motion. If you want to get stronger, we could get stronger.