Fisheries Committee on Nov. 8th, 2018

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

Some harbour authorities have said that before a new member can get a new vessel, he should go before the board of the harbour authority and request an actual size increase.

We don't have that at our facility because we only have a small number of users, but there are larger facilities where that mechanism had to be put in place. They didn't know how else to handle the situation.

West Nova, Lib.

Colin Fraser

These boat shops employ an awful lot of people in these local communities, don't they?

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

Yes, they do. It's a very vibrant industry. As the fishing industry goes, so goes the rest of the economy in certain areas.

West Nova, Lib.

Colin Fraser

Thanks very much.

Mr. Ken McDonald (Avalon, Lib.)

The Chair

Thank you, Mr. Fraser.

We will go back now to the Conservative side.

Mr. Arnold.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you both for being available today.

I have a question for Mr. Wentzell.

I'm going through the document you provided to the committee. Thank you for doing that.

The national harbour authority advisory committee was established in 2001 as an adviser to the small craft harbours program. How long before the creation of the advisory committee had the small craft harbours program been in existence?

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

To my knowledge, the small craft harbours program has been in existence since right after the war. Small craft harbours managed all the harbours, and in 1988, they started to do the harbour authority model, where they turned the running of the actual harbours over to local users. You have input from the local users on how to manage the facility and what kinds of upgrades they need, instead of someone coming in and more or less deciding from the outside what you need in your community.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

That's the direction I was going with this.

Part of what we've heard in testimony so far—maybe to you as a representative from this larger body—is that there seems to be a disconnect between the local users, the fishermen and the harbour authorities, and the people who are making the decisions on how a project is engineered and actually implemented.

Can you comment on that?

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

There always was some of that in the past. It has been better, because the users have more input now.

At the end of the day, most of the volunteers around the communities who are running the harbour authorities are not engineers. They may have knowledge of a facility and how they're going to do that, but they're not engineers as such. They don't have the knowledge to input things in regard to how the project should be handled in certain ways.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

Thank you.

I want to move to page 10 of your report now, where you talk about more dredging being needed. It says, “Deeper basins and channels are needed—mainly due to larger vessels and climate change which is causing increased sedimentation.”

Would you be able to provide any evidence that climate change is the cause of the greater sedimentation?

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

I'm just going by what I've heard in other parts of the country. I know that on Prince Edward Island the representatives on the committee have made the comments before.

Wharves in P.E.I. have to have periodic dredging, because it's mostly sand in their facilities around there. Sand moves rather quickly through water as tidal currents increase and wind increases, and you get a big storm surge and so on. Storm surges are higher than they ever used to be around the areas, and therefore, you're getting more erosion around the beaches. As that happens, you get more sedimentation within the harbours.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

That's the only proof of the sedimentation being from climate change.

It's a distinct statement here. I'm just looking for the backup behind it.

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

We've had presentations at the national level on the worsening effect of climate change on the facilities and how they're going to be maintained in the future.

When you build a facility now—anything, new repairs or new structures—they build what they call a hundred-year structure that would withstand a hundred-year storm. Once every hundred years, you'd get a storm that severe. They do notice that the magnitude of those storms is more frequent than they used to be.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

I'm certainly not denying that climate change is happening. I'm just looking for the evidence that is affecting the sedimentation.

Another question I have is regarding icebreaking operations. We hear the icebreakers are often up and down through the gulf opening up the sea ice, the winter ice, early. The icebreakers are also going into the ports and opening up the ports, freeing them of the winter ice that has built up.

Do you believe that those activities could be adding to the climate change effect by breaking up that ice earlier, allowing a lot more sunlight to penetrate the water?

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

This is a time I wish my colleague Osborne were here because he's from the gulf, in Cape Breton, so he knows a lot more about the ice factor than I do. To be honest, I don't know much about the ice factor. I just know that I've heard the comment from people in different harbours in their area that the less ice protection in the wintertime has left the wharves more exposed to the frequent storms and tidal action in the wintertime, instead of just having the ice there for protection.

As the ice decreases.... I can't say it's tied to the icebreakers, as such. I do know that it's been mentioned that the lack of ice coverage in the gulf has left a lot of the facilities more exposed to the climate and the weather conditions.

Conservative

Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC

Thank you.

Mr. Ken McDonald (Avalon, Lib.)

The Chair

Thank you, Mr. Arnold.

Before I go back to the government side for five minutes, I would ask committee's approval of the budget for M-154 so that we can get our witnesses reimbursed for their expenses. I don't want to run out of time. It will be another two weeks before we can get this through if we don't deal with it now.

Now that everybody has a copy, can we go ahead and approve this amount?

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Mr. Ken McDonald (Avalon, Lib.)

The Chair

Thank you.

Now back to the government side, to Mr. Finnigan for five minutes or less, please.

Liberal

Pat Finnigan Liberal Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB

Thank you for being here by the way.

We talked about the size being a factor. We've done a tour on the Atlantic coast and in almost every harbour, there are bigger boats, and like you said, square rigs, and they're taking a lot of the space.

It's one of the major issues, and I'm not suggesting anything but I just want to know. The small boat pays the same fee as the large boat. Have you ever looked at that side of it? Should the larger boat pay a higher fee? I'm just curious to hear your knowledge on that. Thank you.

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

Each harbour authority, in their guidelines, sets their own fee structure depending on the harbour authority and what's going on in their facility. I do know that a lot of the larger vessels do pay more but it's not a uniform approach. One size doesn't fit all. Each harbour sets up their own individual fee structure in accordance with their own needs.

I can't say that it's one fee, but I know the larger ones do pay more, as an overall picture.

Liberal

Pat Finnigan Liberal Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB

I know we've been divesting of a lot of harbours because at one point every small community had a harbour.

What about even more concentration? Would that provide a lot more resources? Could you do a lot more with probably less money?

Again, I'm just asking. I'm not suggesting anything, but if you had a super-harbour where we would concentrate more into large harbours.... People might have to drive a hundred miles, but a lot of people drive to work an hour every day. I'm just asking if that has been looked at.

Committee Representative, National Harbour Authority Advisory Committee

There have been different harbours that have amalgamated issues around the area. They've incorporated six harbours to make one harbour authority, and they actually got rid of a facility that was one of the divestitures in the program. I do know of that issue, but a lot of these communities....

You talk about driving an hour to work. A lot of these wharves are in remote communities, and you have fishing gear to take. You just don't hop on the boat and go. You may not have property in the vicinity to store your fishing equipment and so on. You have to get to that wharf, and you can't just load it on a vehicle and travel that distance to get to the sea because you're dealing with weather conditions and so on. You don't know when you're going to be able to go for sure. Our weather is very unpredictable.