Fisheries Committee on Nov. 8th, 2018

[Todd Russell]

There are capacity issues. In northern and remote areas, I have to tell you, there are going to have to be some major investments to bring some of these facilities up to a standard.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Right. Similar to what we did when we did the NAS airports, the divestiture of those airports—I was part of one, the last one actually—what those local airport authorities got were oftentimes antiquated services. There had to have been a partnership with provincial and federal governments with that local airport authority or that local harbour authority to be able to bring it up to snuff, so to speak, or up to code.

It does require that those who are applying or those who are interested in it have to build a business case for how they're going to be self-sufficient as they move forward, but it is challenging and I fully appreciate that from our witnesses. It is challenging to try to find a steady stream or a sufficient enough revenue generation stream to be able to keep that up.

[Todd Russell]

Yes. We've advocated as well that investments may be made or the funding model by small craft harbours should look at northern and indigenous communities through that particular lens.

I think there are peculiarities, specifics, historical contexts that are important for small craft harbours to understand when they make those types of investment decisions.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Doherty.

We go on now to the NDP.

Mr. Donnelly.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses for joining us today on the small craft harbour study.

Mr. Russell, if I could continue with you, could you give the committee an idea of...? I'm assuming it's almost entirely commercial fisheries that are being serviced by the harbours.

[Todd Russell]

Yes, you could say that. The other big one is subsistence fisheries, which we participate in. But outside of subsistence fisheries and commercial fisheries, there's not a lot of other activity. There are not a lot of, say, cargo ships coming in and using small craft harbours.

There are some ports, I know, where there's off-loading of fuels and things like that, which creates at least some revenue for the port authority or the small craft harbour, but there's not a lot outside of—

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Could you tell us what sort of fishery products are being landed?

[Todd Russell]

Primarily in Labrador it's crab and shrimp. Now cod is starting to rebuild. Other than that, it's herring, capelin, some of the species you would generally associate with Labrador.

Crab and shrimp are by far the most.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

What kinds of changes, repairs or upgrades are you looking at in your area for the harbours to come up to standard or the kind of standard...? Are we looking at dredging, breakwalls...?

[Todd Russell]

All of those things. It would be very harbour-specific, obviously. It would be driven by need and by what the industry requires in a particular harbour.

Again, this is important. Small craft harbours does not have a long history in Labrador. In fact, some of the harbours that we're talking about were only added to the small craft harbours list less than 10 years ago. Some of the investments that are being made are first-time investments in some of these particular places. Some of the other investments are coming after some of the harbours were there for 20 years, for instance. As for local governance of harbours, some have only been configured in the last couple of years, for instance.

There are lots of reasons, I suppose, why there's been a lack of a presence in small craft harbours in Labrador, but we're trying to change that. We're looking to the committee to say how small craft harbours can have a greater impact and have greater investments in northern and indigenous communities. Labrador is a prime place, we feel, to do that, particularly with the fisheries resources that are off of Labrador.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

You spoke about an $18.5-million injection that the government recently made. How much do you think your council needs to bring the level of standard that your council wants to see? What kind of funding are we talking about to bring those harbours up to the standard you're looking at?

[Todd Russell]

Again, it varies by harbour. On the north coast, they may want upgrades to a harbour, in terms of lifting it up, because the tides are having such an impact. If you're in a place like Cartwright, where you've seen some investments, they're also looking for launch pads and things of that nature. If you go into another community, it could be a breakwater. Each of these has their own plans. They do that aligning themselves with small craft harbours as well, using the personnel of small craft harbours, when developing that infrastructure plan.

I can't give you a global figure. The $18.5 million is a big help, but certainly we have a long way to go yet.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

These harbours do have plans, though. They haven't just identified what sort of funding needs they have, and you haven't done an amalgamation of the global need yet.

[Todd Russell]

No, we haven't. Not yet.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Patterson, you talked about a partnership with the federal and provincial governments, and you identified mostly recreational vessels in your harbours. What would your municipality require funding-wise to satisfy what harbour needs you're looking at?

[Alex Patterson]

We're likely looking at about $1 million per party from the federal government. That would involve essentially fixing the assets there that are broken. Then from the provincial government, we would pursue those upgrades that would be beneficial to regional tourism—things like fuel and additional facilities down at our marina site to make it attractive for visitors and encourage visitors to the marina to come into our community.

We're really looking at transforming our site from a historical commercial fishery site, by trying to maintain the economic development but turning it into tourism instead to diversify our economy.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Does the municipality have a business plan or some implementation plan developed?

[Alex Patterson]

Essentially, it's under development, the reason being that we just started pursuing a divestiture process. Within that we're starting to look at this asset as becoming our asset, and at how exactly we would deal with that asset and offset the potential costs via revenue, whether to the community at large or specifically with this asset generating revenue down at the facility.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Is there anything else that you'd like to say to the committee that you haven't said already today?

[Alex Patterson]

I think the only thing is that we're seeing this as one of the untapped markets in our local tourism industry. We feel that these assets are so particularly important in northern Ontario because our economies are so based on resources. Diversifying our economies has been a priority for the municipalities and the provincial government for several years now. We're essentially looking for ways to use existing resources and form partnerships to pursue that diversification.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thanks very much.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Donnelly.

We'll go back to the government side now for seven minutes or less, Mr. Finnigan.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Because I've had a chance to question and to visit the small craft harbours in my region of Atlantic Canada, and because we have the opportunity to have Ms. Jones here and some people from her neck of the woods, I'll transfer my time to her.

Thank you.

[Yvonne Jones]

Thank you, Mr. Finnigan. That's very kind of you, and I appreciate it.

I want to welcome President Russell, Mr. Coombs and Mr. Patterson to the committee. Thank you for your presentations.

I have a couple of questions. I'm going to start with you, President Russell, because I think your area is very much representative of many northern areas across Canada where we've seen a lack of designation of small craft harbours. In your territory alone, of the eight small craft harbours, five have been designated in the last 10 years, and of those five, I think four have been designated just in the last few years. For the three outstanding, I reviewed them and the first investment in one of them was just last year.

I think that represents what we're seeing across the north, where many ports in many communities were not designated. Whether they didn't have the right number of fishers or didn't have the landing value, that should not have changed the fact that they were engaged in a commercial fishery in Canada and they should have been designated.

I have three questions for you, and you can answer them all together.

One, how should the Government of Canada be treating northern and indigenous regions that have been left behind in small craft harbour designations in the past?

Two, in areas where there are abandoned properties—and your area is one of those areas—I have noticed that the Government of Canada is contracting large amounts of money to dismantle certain properties. Should there also be other models whereby local groups can take those over and receive the funding to repurpose some of those facilities? That's just an option. I'm wondering what your opinion is on that.

Last, I know that in your region the landed value for communities is about $23 million annually. One would think it would be easy to generate revenue from that, but a lot of communities are isolated. It's very costly to operate those ports. What model could work in those communities to help support the small craft harbour committees and boards?

[Todd Russell]

Thank you, Ms. Jones.

I just want to give a shout-out to our MP for the fine work that she has been doing with us and for us as well.

We thank you for those particular questions.

There has to be a different funding model and there must be a different approach, I think, to how investments are made. As you've indicated, the northern and indigenous communities should be looked at through a different lens. In the past, small craft harbour designations and small craft harbour investments have been tied to fisheries development. If there has been a lag in fisheries development, there's going to be a lag in small craft harbour infrastructure as well.

The committee needs to take that into account and small craft harbours need to take that into account when they're looking at future investments, because at the same time.... We all say that if you're at a level of investment and you do the same level, you're always going to be behind. There's going to have to be a model that takes into account the history and then provides for some boosting in terms of investment.

From a northern indigenous perspective, I think that needs to be taken into account. It needs to be taken into account in the context of overall fisheries development. Why can't small craft harbours also be a leader in fisheries development and not just a follower of fisheries development? That might be another way to look at it and to approach how small craft harbours make their investments.

In terms of abandoned properties, obviously I think there needs to be a very intentional process that involves indigenous governance bodies in terms of any type of dismantling or divestiture. This does affect land. It does or can affect water rights, we feel. At the same time, we need to be talking about the issue of repurposing. If that is allowable, or if there need to be changes in policy that allow for repurposing, I think that needs to be looked at by this committee. We've discussed with Yvonne and other committee members the need to look at the concept of safe harbours, where some current infrastructure might exist and how that can be repurposed or upgraded.

In terms of landed value, that $23 million might sound like a big number, but when you start to take it down to the community level there's very little opportunity to generate. That is the value, basically, of what a fisher is getting. You have a processor. The fishers go to the wharf and sell their product, and that is the landed value, but that will not generate enough money for even the administration and the ongoing maintenance—such as paying the light bills or doing some basic maintenance work—of any of the small craft harbours that I'm aware of in our particular territory.

There has to be a different way. Again, we're saying that because of capacity issues, the nature of the fishery, the low value in terms of landings in some of these communities and the small amount of traffic, you're going to have to look at a model that invests in what we would call core funding, or some kind of a fund that helps these volunteer boards actually run the harbours themselves. I think that needs to be certainly considered and needs to form part of the recommendations of this committee.