Fisheries Committee on Nov. 20th, 2018

[The Chair]

Mr. Fraser, you have three minutes.

[Colin Fraser, West Nova, Lib.]

Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all of the officials for being here.

I want to ask my first question regarding small craft harbours. I am from southwestern Nova Scotia and represent an area where the fishery, especially the lobster fishery, is absolutely critical to our local economy.

We know that the fishery has done extremely well over the last number of years and, as a result of that, there has been a huge issue regarding capacity at our wharves and small craft harbours in southwestern Nova Scotia, like many other places across Atlantic Canada, because the boats are getting bigger, and they're running out of room.

There are also issues at small craft harbours regarding the repair of some of the small craft harbours that haven't had investment for many years. There is also an issue with dredging, and they all come out of the same budget for small craft harbours. A lot of the harbour authorities I represent and I've heard from across Atlantic Canada are saying that the dredging work that happens is just good enough to get you through the year and that there is not enough long-term planning with regard to dredging work so that you don't have to come back over and over and keep doing that same work.

I know you're well aware of this, and I was pleased that in the last budget there was $250 million in B-base funding for increasing some of those capital projects for small craft harbours, but I don't think it's enough to get us there for the long-term planning, and there are a lot of wharves in my area that critically need work. In many ways it's supporting the local economy to ensure that they have what they need, not only to be safe, but to have what they need to keep the economies going in our smaller communities.

I wonder if you can comment on that as far as the importance of these investments in small craft harbours for the long term.

[Catherine Blewett]

I would say your concerns are quite valid and, unfortunately, not incredibly unique.

The issue of dredging is interesting. As the climate changes and as tides change, we see those kinds of imperatives and we see the demand. As you noted, government has made a significant investment of $250 million. We could always use more. It truly is an important program for safety and for economic access on all coasts of the country.

I may turn to Sylvie if she wants to highlight a bit of our plan.

[Sylvie Lapointe]

Just to pick up on the issue of dredging, it is something that we are spending more and more money on every year. As the deputy minister noted, climate change is complicating things, as well as the larger vessels to which you referred, meaning that we have to dredge at a greater depth.

We have more and more cases of emergency dredging that are more frequent and unpredictable, so we are trying to better predict what kinds of emergencies we might be facing, and we have been working with harbour authorities to do a better job of that.

We've also identified contractors to provide services under much shorter service, so it is something we are working on very seriously.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Fraser.

We'll now go to the Conservative side, Mr. Arnold, for three minutes or less.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the officials for being here.

I want to ask a bit more about the funding directed towards dealing with illegal offshore fishing. There seems to have been significant commitment that way.

Is there any enforcement once this illegal fishing has been discovered through the patrols? We hear lots about it being discovered and reported back to the host country. Does anything ever happen after that?

[Catherine Blewett]

Certainly IUU fishing is incredibly challenging at the international level. The current global governance through the NAO really moves the governance back to the home countries, so it is an ongoing challenge.

The minister noted that we are going to the sustainable oceans conference in Kenya next week, and that's an area that Canada's going to focus on. We want to bring some more global attention to IUU and the real challenges it presents to some of our global stocks.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

In other words, you don't know of any concrete enforcement that has been done afterwards.

My next question is whether you have ever witnessed any of this illegal offshore fishing yourself.

[Catherine Blewett]

I had the opportunity to travel to Japan. Through our CMP programming, we have operation driftnet. I have not actually seen it myself, but I had the opportunity to see photographs from previous missions that had been flown out of Hakodate, Japan, and it's quite something. It's pretty compelling when you see great big driftnets that really have captured a lot of resource.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Was there any action taken, and were there any results? Did it achieve anything, or did we just observe it and report?

[Catherine Blewett]

Canada's actions were to observe it and report it in the international forum.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

That's where our responsibility ends.

How does your department manage unreported fishing within Canada? How do they determine other openings and so on, when there's significant unreported catch taking place?

[Catherine Blewett]

I just would like to clarify. When you say domestic, do you have an example that you're thinking of?

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

It's a very touchy question. I can understand why you're so careful with your answer.

[Catherine Blewett]

I actually want to give you a proper one.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

We know that there's significant unreported fishing. I have been on sport fishing advisory boards for years. Year after year after year, the staff were trying to manage a fishery when they had no idea what was being taken in the unreported catch.

[The Chair]

Thank you.

We'll move on to Mr. Donnelly for three minutes or less, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and again, thank you to our officials for being here for round two.

The minister spoke about marine protected areas in his opening remarks. Supplementary estimates include only $870,000 to protect Canada's nature parks and wild spaces. Budget 2018 talked about $21 million in funding, so I'm wondering where the rest of the money is and what is the plan for that money. Also, what specifically is the plan for the $870,000?

[Catherine Blewett]

I will turn it over to the CFO to help unpack the numbers, but I'm happy to talk to you about our plans going forward, as we move to reach our 10% by 2020.

At present, Canada is at 7.9%. We are finishing some of the areas we have said we're going to do, and we're moving forward to close the gap quite quickly.

Jen can probably give us the details on these specific supps numbers.

[Jen O'Donoughue]

Yes. The $870,000 is for the first year of funding. It's related to a horizontal item for the nature legacy for Canada initiative and cost-effective plan, which meets international land and wildlife conservation targets, transitions a species at risk program from recovery planning to protection and recovery action, and contributes to reconciliation with indigenous peoples while delivering conservation outcomes.

I don't know if Philippe wanted to add anything to this. It's related to a partnership we have with the Department of the Environment.

[Philippe Morel, Assistant Deputy Minister, Aquatic Ecosystems Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

This is related to the species at risk programs that will transfer to the department. It's not related to marine protected areas. The programs were previously managed by Environment and Climate Change Canada. We were providing advice to ECCC and it was doing the agreement. Now this money has been transferred to our department, so we manage all of the aquatic species at risk programs.

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

Okay. I think I have a few seconds left for one last question.

I didn't hear much of a difference between the $870,000 and the $20 million, but if there is follow-up perhaps you could send that to committee. We'd appreciate getting that information.

With respect to the indigenous programs, the supplementary estimates (A) allocate $15 million to “advance reconciliation on Indigenous and treaty rights issues”. Could you talk about what the $15 million fund will be used for and what, if any, connection DFO's reconciliation programs have to the Government of Canada's proposed recognition and implementation of rights framework?

[Catherine Blewett]

I'm going to turn that over to Kevin and to Rob Lamirande to give us some detail.

[Kevin Stringer]

I'll start.

There are two significant items for indigenous reconciliation in these supplementary estimates. One is $33 million, which is related to negotiations with first nations on the east coast. That has been ongoing for a while. The $15 million is for the west coast negotiations.

There is a large set of negotiations currently under way. With respect to these funds, the $15 million has actually been moved forward from last year, because negotiations are ongoing. It absolutely links to the rights reconciliation framework and to DFO's effort to contribute to the government's overall efforts around reconciliation and addressing rights.

[Robert Lamirande]

That's good. He pretty much covered it.