Evidence of meeting #44 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was fish.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:50 p.m.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Mr. Connolly and Mr. Borowski, let's take off from where Mr. Olson just ended when he asked, where else can you do that? Do you see this as a model for other programs that you'd like to see from your government? Remember, we all like to think that we're stewards of precious taxpayer dollars. We like to hear that the dollars are being used, leveraged, and really benefiting the community.
In the world of fisheries, do you see this as a model?
12:50 p.m.
President, Swan Valley Sport Fishing Enhancement Inc.
It's definitely unique, and it is definitely a model, whatever party you are from, that politically affects a lot people who fish. They all benefit from it. Nobody that I know of can say bad things about this program because it does get people outside. What's the biggest problem with a lot of people today? They're not going outside. The more money the government can assist us with in projects that are promoting outdoor fisheries is healthy for the country. It's healthy for our communities, it's healthy for our kids, and it's healthy for our waters to improve issues. We all work for a living. We can only volunteer so much. We need to have that extra helping hand. Our logo for Swan Valley Sport Fishing is “Giving Fish a Helping Hand”. That's our mandate. That's what we're trying to do.
This fund is very interesting. I sat with Mr. Sopuck on the original fisheries enhancement fund, at its start. Bob saw that fund work and the benefits of it. Even though it was created by the NDP, he still couldn't argue about the quality of it. He was at our banquet a few years ago, and Rosanne had presented us with a $100,000 cheque for some fisheries research enhancement work. As we were leaving the stage, I patted Bob on the back and said, “Bob, do you ever think that one day the feds will step up and do something to help us?” He looked at me and said, “Don't you worry, this will happen and we will help everybody in this country”. I must commend Bob. He did an outstanding job. I was amazed that not only has it worked for one year, but it has also continued for a couple of years. It just wasn't as case of, “Here's a bunch of money. We're going to flash it and then it's going to go away”. This has big implications for future planning of work. We know that we can look at projects that require money, say projects three years down the road, and can say, “You know what? The federal grant can help us. We can stay on track with our improvements”.
12:50 p.m.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
I hate to interrupt such an eloquent soliloquy, but I'm wondering if you can speak to any specific projects. I don't want to put you on the spot, but are there any specific ones that you can refer to in your respective communities that have been funded by the—
12:50 p.m.
President, Swan Valley Sport Fishing Enhancement Inc.
Oh, yes. There's a lake that is 30 minutes north of our area. The provincial government will not let us stock it with fish. They say it can produce enough natural stocking. The two main inflows are overpopulated with beavers and it's not politically correct to go in and kill all the beavers. What we do is to go in before the ice comes off and we physically remove the dams with explosives. There are no fish in the creeks at this time because the water's low. The beavers aren't near this. In the springtime there's a four-week opportunity for the walleye to swim up, spawn, and for the walleye fry to swim back to the lake. This year that money was provided, with our funds, by the federal government. Without that, we wouldn't have done that. From the beaver dam blasting, over the last six years we have seen a massive increase in the amount sport fishing on that lake and the quality of sport fishing.
Yes, the money is working working very well here. We've applied to the fund again for the same lake because it's a high use, very public, and high visibility lake. There is another application in the process right now to improve some shore fishing access that's been filling in. Like Mr. Olson, all of our ideas are good ideas. We're not just strictly into studying the plankton in the lake to see what it looks like. We're here to get fish in the lake.
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
All right.
Mr. Olson, you said that formerly, DFO enforcement was not effective, that it did not engage humans, and that it alienated people, especially rural communities. Do you want to elaborate on that and say anything more about how things have changed favourably?
May 5th, 2015 / 12:55 p.m.
Managing Director, Manitoba Wildlife Federation
Yes.
I would start by saying that our organization has talked about that a lot and I don't want to create an impression that we're not fans of DFO. We see the need for DFO. We don't know all the details, but our perception is that DFO has been a staunch and stalwart defender of sealing, for example, off the coast of Newfoundland and in the north. We appreciate that. We appreciate their science.
If I could just go back to the border issue, as I didn't get a chance to comment on it. But on invasive species, the border situation here is dire. I don't know if that's a DFO thing or if DFO could take a role in that. However, just to put it into perspective, when our season opens here in just about a week and a half or so, there will be hundreds and hundreds of boats coming from America to fish because the fishing is so good. Those boats often come from Great Lakes states where there are zebra mussels and other things like spiny water flea—you name it. Right now it's an open [Technical difficulty—Editor].
My buddies come up to fish from the States, and they're not getting checked at the border, so that is a disaster waiting to happen for us here. We think that would be a good role for DFO. I don't know if that is what they do or if that's something that makes sense for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.
On the fish police era, to me that strikes at the heart of a really big issue that we have to deal with in landscape conservation. Most of our landscape in prairie Canada is farmed. If you're going to do something good for water, fish, wetlands, animals, or wildlife, and you want to sequester carbon, whatever you want to do on that landscape is going to be about farmers.
In dealing with farmers in rural communities, if you want to club them with a stick, you're going to turn them into enemies. The same person who will stop at two in the morning and help you change your tire is an amazing person. They're lovely, and they're giving, until you go on their land and threaten their land rights. The moment you go and club them with that stick, you better know what you're doing—there had better be a bloody good reason for it—and you'd better have exhausted every other opportunity first. Carrots get you a lot further with rural communities.
There have to be rules and there needs to be enforcement, so there's a balancing act there. It's a fine line. Reasonable rural communities know that there need to be rules. They get that, but the initial approach can't be to cop-up and get on the landscape. You can't police the landscape. Are you going to have a fish cop on every section of land looking for infractions? We have to engage those communities and get them doing it with us and for us. We have to get the people, the citizens, involved in policing, because you can't pay enough people to do it. If you alienate them, then you create enemies. You get resistance. You get hard feelings, and you get fractured relationships.
Going forward, this grant is only one small example. There have to be lots of other ways that a group like DFO can engage rural communities to get them buying into the Fisheries Act, understanding the Fisheries Act—
1 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rodney Weston
Thank you very much, Mr. Olson. I have to interrupt you there. I appreciate your comments.
I want to say thank you to all of our witnesses for appearing today before our committee and taking the time to make presentations and answer questions from members. We certainly do appreciate your time.
On behalf of the entire committee, I want to thank you.
There being no further business, this committee now stands adjourned.