Fisheries Committee on Nov. 8th, 2018

[The Chair, Mr. Ken McDonald (Avalon, Lib.)]

Good morning, everyone.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we are doing a study of the current state of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans' small craft harbours.

I'd like to welcome our guests this morning. By video conference, we have Mr. Alex Patterson from the community services and tourism division of the Municipality of Wawa. Here in person, from the NunatuKavut Community Council, we have the president, Todd Russell, who, of course, is no stranger to the Hill as a former MP for Labrador. As well, we have Mr. Robert Coombs, a consultant.

Welcome, gentlemen.

We will start off with NunatuKavut for seven minutes, whether you're splitting your time or one person's doing all the talking. We're good to go when you are.

[Todd Russell, President, NunatuKavut Community Council]

Good morning, Mr. Chair. Thank you for the invitation to appear at the committee.

Good morning to all of the members.

I represent the NunatuKavut Community Council. I have with me Rob Coombs, who joined our team a few months ago as an adviser and as a consultant. We're proud to be here to present to you a little bit of context for what the NunatuKavut Community Council is, and also to speak more specifically about small craft harbours and how they fit into that particular context.

I'm going to take you through a fairly quick and, we feel, concise presentation. Of course, then we'll be available for questions.

In terms of the NunatuKavut Community Council, “NunatuKavut” means “our ancient land”. It's an Inuktitut word. It is the territory of the Inuit of NunatuKavut, the southern Inuit who reside, primarily, in central and southern Labrador.

Our traditional territory covers the entirety of south central Labrador and the adjacent marine areas, and also extends westward to the Labrador-Quebec border. As you can see, it's a vast area, and like most indigenous territories, it is the land that our people are in relationship with. It is the territory our people—traditionally and currently—use and occupy.

The NunatuKavut Community Council is the representative government of approximately 6,000 southern Inuit who belong to this territory. Do you see this lady here? People ask, “Why do you put her there?” Women are strong in our culture. They're the culture carriers. This is a woman who was obviously the head of her household. In our tradition, she would be fishing and she would probably do a little bit of hunting at the same time, providing for her family, and in some regards, for her community. That's what we want to do as a government—provide for our community.

We have a vision to be self-governing. We will provide and care for one another, our families and communities, while nurturing our relationship with our land, ice and waters. We try to keep that vision firmly in front of us as we do our work on behalf of our people.

The NunatuKavut Inuit are a rights-bearing people, and we have a responsibility to ensure that the land, sea and ice, and our water rights and titles are recognized and respected, as our ancestors taught us.

July 12, 2018, was a historic day. The Government of Canada announced a renewed relationship with us that will recognize the indigenous rights and self-determination of the southern Inuit. That was a day to celebrate, and one that we engaged in with the Government of Canada. Talks are moving quite well with the Government of Canada. For as long as we have existed, the people of NunatuKavut have also been dependent upon the resource industry and the resource partnerships that contribute to community sustainability.

In this context, I now want to move towards small craft harbours. Here's a map. We have a vast coastline. We want to talk about the marine infrastructure, but in order to talk about that, I think it's important for the committee and for members to also know the importance of the marine resources off our shores and how important they were to us for subsistence, travel, economy, recreation and our culture, of course. We're all linked to the sea.

There's another Inuktitut word—sikumiut. It means “people of the sea”. We are a people related to the sea, to the marine environment. All NunatuKavut communities touch salt water, either figuratively or literally. Port facilities and small craft harbours are certainly culturally significant as well.

The Labrador Sea is also critical for the ecological, economic and societal health of the North American and European ecosystems. The Hamilton Bank, which is right off NunatuKavut, is one of the most productive areas in the northwest Atlantic. The fishery, we can say with some confidence, has been such a vital part of our past, is still a part of our current way of being and is certainly part of our future. It is the lifeblood of our people.

In terms of core fishing harbours—and this is quite telling—there are so many resources off our coast, but just look at where the port infrastructure is. There is very little port infrastructure within NunatuKavut or within Labrador generally, and it is crucial and important.

There have been some investments this past summer of $18.5 million to seven small craft harbours. I have to tell you, this is more catch-up than it is the forerunner. There is much need. They're long overdue investments. While we appreciate them, there's much more to do.

What we have heard when we reached out to our small craft harbour organizations was that further investments are required. A funding model is needed that looks through the lens of indigenous and northern communities and fisheries development. Basic operational and administrative funding should be made available for northern and indigenous small craft harbours, and issues of governance and capacity development need to be addressed in order for small craft harbours to work more efficiently and to bring more value to the fishing industry and to our communities.

We also want to talk about safe harbours. It might be a different concept. We have 4,000 miles of coastline in Labrador. The fishery, of course, is adjacent to all of that territory, but where are the safe harbours? There are vast distances. With global warming, storm surges, more severity when it comes to storms and the changes in the ecosystem, people are feeling that there's a great need, for small craft harbours, to look at the infrastructure that they may not be utilizing as much in the current situation, and ask if they can keep the infrastructure up and designate them as safe harbours. It is very important. It is something that has certainly been an issue raised by our fishers and by those in the fishing industry. It's a concept we also want to bring to the committee.

By way of conclusion, we want to again thank you. We want to say how important the commercial and subsistence fisheries are to our culture, our way of life. We also want to say that small craft harbours can play a fundamental role in fisheries development. We should also look at how this program plays out over the next few years through the lens of reconciliation.

I appreciate your time, Mr. Chair. I look forward to the other presentations, and I welcome questions.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Russell.

I'm sure that anything you didn't say in your presentation will probably come out in the line of questioning.

Now we'll go on to Mr. Patterson, for seven minutes or less, please.

[Alex Patterson, Director, Community Services and Tourism, Municipality of Wawa]

Thank you very much for having us. We certainly appreciate the opportunity to be consulted.

For those of you who don't know where Wawa is, we're the small town with the big goose on Highway 17 in northern Ontario.

We have some history in our community with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and specifically small craft harbours. Originally, the marina, which is what we're really concerned about today, was built as a partnership between private organizations and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. It was originally intended for the commercial fisheries of Lake Superior. After that was devastated from various reasons, mostly with sea lamprey but also overfishing, the marina transferred from a commercial fisheries' marina to a recreational marina.

That's where I think a lot of priorities were dropped because a lot of these commercial facilities come first and our recreational facilities come second. This marina was leased to the municipality several years ago as one of two options: either lease it to the municipality to continue to run it, or stop running it completely.

We've had several issues going forward with the marina specifically related to how this asset is maintained. As it's not a municipal asset, we've had a lot of difficulty in having the resources to maintain this asset, and we also have different contractual obligations with this asset that prevents us from maintaining it. For us, it's a very critical piece of infrastructure in our community, not only for recreation but also for tourism.

If you look at a map of Lake Superior, you see there's one key leg missing in going all around the lake to get fuel and safe berths, and that is Wawa. The whole north shore, except for Wawa, is essentially covered. There is a great deal of boat traffic and potential tourism traffic that we're missing out on. Part of that is because we're lacking the support or the resources to really get our facility running again, but we're not lacking the willingness to do so.

We've undertaken some investment, approximately $150,000 over the past three years, to address specific concerns at the marina. That's the municipality putting municipal tax dollars into a federally owned piece of infrastructure.

What we're essentially looking for in the recommendations we're making here is going to surround how we approach resources like this in the future. I think I speak for a couple of other municipal marinas around Lake Superior and in Ontario when I say these pieces of infrastructure that end up being extremely important to smaller, local communities like ours have essentially been left to rot. As we move forward and realize the importance of tourism to our communities, these pieces of infrastructure get more and more important as we try to diversify our economies.

Looking to the future, specifically in regard to the lease agreement, small craft harbours has actually been extremely helpful to us in pursuing divestiture. But this is where we're looking for a strategy and some funding to ensure that these resources can continue to operate in our communities. Our community, in particular, has decided that this resource is particularly important. We would like to continue to operate it. However, given the state of the resource and the lack of maintenance it has received over the past 10, 15, 20 years, we're in a situation where we cannot afford to take on this asset in its current state.

However, we would like to partner with both provincial and federal organizations to make sure we can continue to have this asset, not only for the betterment of our community but also for the betterment of our regional communities in trying to create that link between some of the northern and southern communities via Lake Superior.

In speaking with a couple of operators, boaters and within the municipality ourselves, we came up with some recommendations to small craft harbours that we would really like to see pursued. We believe that small craft harbours cannot just abandon these assets in their current conditions. So many of these assets are in such a state that no municipality of our size would ever be able to take them over, given how much liability is associated with the disrepair of these assets.

We believe there are really two options for these assets. The first one is that small craft harbours maintain these assets and upgrade them as necessary so the community can continue to use and benefit from them. The second is that small craft harbours provide some funding to these communities to ensure that we don't leave small municipalities with large liabilities.

We certainly appreciate the current process where you have essentially come to us and asked us for some recommendations, our opinion, and given us the ability to present on these topics, but we'd like to see a more developed process where local stakeholders are able to really give their input into small craft harbours when we're deciding the fate of these organizations.

I know that distance is often an issue. It's very difficult to come to all of these communities and talk to all of the people involved, so certainly, there can be a process developed that helps people get their input known and helps decide the future of these assets.

We also believe that municipalities have a role to play. We must also pursue small craft harbours if we want to continue to have these assets in this community, and that's what we've made efforts to do. I would applaud the small craft harbours staff. The ones I've dealt with over the past several years have been extremely sympathetic and helpful, but they're also aware of the resources that they have and they seem to be quite constrained by those resources. For small craft harbours to really do a proper job of off-loading these assets, if they've decided to off-load them, then it's key that, along with those assets comes a little bit of help from municipalities that wish to continue in their operation.

At the end of the day, we're looking for a holistic solution for our particular site that incorporates not only the recreational value of the site but also the understanding that there's a great deal of economic development that can be had, and not just from commercial harbours but from recreational harbours, as well, specifically, looking at tourism development. For our particular facility, we've talked to both provincial and federal partners to try to make sure that we can continue to operate this asset. The primary function that we really run into is the condition of the asset and how much capital investment it needs to really operate properly.

What we're really hoping to see come out of the recommendations of this particular panel is a really good funding model that understands that these assets have been under-maintained for a great deal of time and that needs to change one way or another and that not only the federal government needs to be at the table but the provinces and the local municipalities as well. They need to all come together at the table to make sure we continue to have these particular assets in our communities.

I appreciate your taking the time. We're open to any questions.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Patterson.

We'll go now to the government side.

Before I do that, I'll welcome Ms. Jones here today, who is the member of Parliament for Labrador. Welcome.

[Yvonne Jones, Labrador, Lib.]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

On the government side, we have Mr. Rogers, for seven minutes or less.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. T

hank you, witnesses, for appearing before us today to give us the benefit of your personal experiences from the communities in which you live, especially for you, Todd, since the region in which you live is vast, as you suggested. It's a pleasure to be here today to ask you a few questions.

Labrador has such a strong fishing industry with the engagement of your people in the fishing industry for a long time. One of the things that you made reference to was that you had received the announcement of $18.5 million in August, with seven harbours to be dealt with for the long term, but you referred to that as catch-up.

In Newfoundland and Labrador and around the country, many of us see that there is a lot of catching up to do. Do you have any suggestions for this committee or for government, as to how to try to accelerate that process, either through small craft harbour funding programs or...?

[Todd Russell]

Thank you, Mr. Rogers.

I also want to acknowledge our member of Parliament, Yvonne Jones, who made the announcement on the $18.5 million, over the last few weeks in some of our communities.

If you look at the map we drew showing where there are small craft harbours in Labrador, you see there are only a handful of them. The reason why we talked about the great fishery or marine resources off of Labrador is that these resources have had little fisheries development, and that I could attribute probably to quota allocations, to licensing, historically, and to the lack of participation of indigenous peoples in that. If you correlate that with the number of small craft harbours, which are supposed to support fisheries industry development—at least in our particular context, that's one of the primary reasons we have it—you can see how the two are together.

As to the lack of fisheries development, some of it comes down to access, licensing and these types of things, and how that correlates to what has been a lack of investment, historically, in small craft harbours in Labrador, in NunatuKavut and in Nunatsiavut in particular. You can see that correlation and I think that's important. That's one of the reasons why small craft harbours have had such a small impact in Labrador and a small investment overall.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

I want to get to a couple more questions. How do you describe your relationship with the department and small craft harbours people in the province? To my understanding, a dedicated program officer was installed in Labrador just a couple or three weeks ago. Have they been helpful? Are they hearing you?

[Todd Russell]

As an indigenous organization, we've had a good relationship with the personnel in the region. We've also had a good relationship with small craft harbours authorities. My understanding is that, for the most part, small craft harbours authorities have a good relationship with DFO personnel in that particular directorate or in that particular program.

There are also issues of governance, which I've touched on. I believe people in small craft harbours will talk about this. Small craft harbours are run by volunteers. In a lot of our harbours and a lot of our ports the revenue you can generate as a small craft harbour is minimal so we talk about the need for capacity building in communities so that they work more closely with small craft harbours.

We are happy with the additional personnel. For the first time ever we've had a small craft harbours representative in Labrador in our vast region and in our territory so that's a positive development as well, but we need to concentrate on the small craft harbours authorities themselves. How do we get revenues going in to them for operations and administration? How do we build capacity?

I think these are necessary investments and important ones for the overall health of the program, to make sure we get the most out of the small craft harbour program itself.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

Some of the things we heard when we were on the west coast, the common theme of the small craft harbour tour we did in B.C., was that people who had good, strong harbour authorities, well-organized, well-coordinated and so on, seemed to be doing much better than harbours in communities that were struggling with having that kind of capacity in place.

In Labrador, you're saying that's a challenge, and you need to improve on that.

[Todd Russell]

Yes. One of the things we heard back from small craft harbours was that they were volunteers and most were already involved in the industry with their own enterprises, doing their own activity. As well, some of the responsibility for harbour operations can be quite onerous, quite technical and sometimes very legal. They need that kind of capacity to be able to efficiently run these facilities and that infrastructure. I think that small craft harbours has a fundamental role to play in that.

The other thing is, in our own self-determination process, we will also have to work out what our relationship as an indigenous governance body is going to be with small craft harbours over time.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

I appreciate that.

Mr. Patterson, you mentioned a lease with the small craft harbours authority. Do you find these kinds of leases to be challenging?

[Alex Patterson]

Yes. The lease terms are fairly favourable toward the government. Fundamentally, it's not the cost of the lease as much as it is the regulations and the liabilities put on small communities.

In our particular lease, all the liability for the small craft harbour we operate is on the municipality. However, we have no ability within the lease to perform the upgrades we feel are necessary to make sure that liability is mitigated. I think that's one of the most challenging parts.

That being said, the staff at small craft harbours in Ontario has been very good at working with us. For the recent upgrades we've done, we essentially said we had to do this and we had to get x, y, z approvals from them as small craft harbours to do those upgrades. However, again, those are all on the municipality.

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Rogers and Mr. Patterson.

Now we'll move to the Conservative side, Mr. Doherty.

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

Thank you to our guests.

Mr. Patterson, is your harbour listed as an asset in your capital management plan?

[Alex Patterson]

No, it's not, because it's not a municipal asset under our asset management regulation.

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

Then you couldn't plan, or you couldn't assign funds to any upgrades for that.

[Alex Patterson]

That's correct. Essentially, the only upgrades we've been able to do are what we've considered emergency upgrades—the difference between shutting down the facility or not based on health and safety concerns.

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

Does part of your management plan also include staffing on that part?

[Alex Patterson]

Not at the current condition, no.

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

Okay.

Who manages the operational safety of it?

[Alex Patterson]

Essentially, I do. Community services is just a different way to say parks and recreation, so it's fallen under our banner as parks and recreation to try our best to manage the asset.

What we're allowed to do within our contract is essentially minor repairs to the facility.