Fisheries Committee on Feb. 5th, 2019

[Peter de Greef]

As Dan mentioned, there is a proposal where there is more fair share catch, similar to what we have. We used to have a better deal, but it was influenced by [Inaudible—Editor]. You can't expect somebody to take far less money than they can get in the open market. In order to bring those lease prices in, they would be based on a percentage, so everyone is sharing in the risk and everyone is sharing in the reward. I see that as beneficial and I see that as working. It has worked in our case for many years.

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

Thank you.

Joy, you mentioned you represent harvesters and plant workers. One of the comments you made was that most people want out, but can't afford to quit and young people want in, but can't afford to buy in. You talked about the concentration of resources in the hands of a few corporations and investors.

What would the UFAW like to see done with the ITQ system?

[Joy Thorkelson]

It would be an easy answer to say just get rid of it, but that's a facile approach. What really needs to happen is the people in the groundfish integrated fishery need to sit down and talk about what would work for the active fisherman.

I have lots of questions about the fair share agreement, but if that will work then active fishermen are making those decisions.

In the salmon industry, it might be completely different for trollers, for gillnetters and for seiners.

I think that we find a common thread. The commonality of those people who are working for a living is that they don't really want to pay a lot to somebody to access that resource. It was free for their parents to access that resource. Why should they have to pay somebody to access that resource? Peter's paying his uncle, but lots of people are paying doctors and lawyers and people who have invested in that quota.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Rogers.

Now we'll go back to the Conservative side.

Mr. Arnold, you have five minutes or less, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all of you as fisher people for coming in today.

Your testimony is very interesting. The more we hear on this file, the more interesting it gets. It's very valuable towards making our recommendations.

As I understand it, I don't know if the halibut fishery was the first fishery to move under an ITQ system or not. You can inform me of that afterwards. I understand that part of the reason for going in that direction was for fishermen's safety. In the previous system, the first out and first back in basically got the highest value for their catch, so fishermen were going out in unsafe conditions and so on. By bringing in the ITQs they had the ability to go out at any point when the weather was better, safer, under different conditions. Those ITQs were originally established based on the previous catch per harvester, and then they became transferable.

Have I described how we got into that system fairly closely, or is it different from what I have understood?

Mr. de Greef, would you like to start?

[Peter de Greef]

At one point, within a span of about 10 years, the halibut season in particular went from 60 days down to six. It kept rationalizing and ratcheting down, and people were increasing.... During that time frame—I believe it was 1987; I was not fishing that day—there was a big storm. They lost nine boats. Three people lost their lives.

I do think it somewhat precipitated going to quotas because they saw that. However, I think it was more of a conservation and management tool. It was very hard to manage the resource when you had such short openings.

Just as an aside—as IPHC commissioner—there is a fishery that's open access for halibut southwards. They want to move away because they have 10-hour openings. They are finding it extremely unsafe. They are looking at different alternatives.

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

Does anyone else have input on how we got to where we are?

[Joy Thorkelson]

First of all, halibut was divided into quotas, not into transferable quotas. We had quotas also in rockfish. With those quotas, you fish what you needed to fish on a full quota, and then after three months they put all of the unfished quota back into the pot. If you were going out fishing again, you signed up, you went out fishing and you were given another allocation of quota.

The unfished quota went back into the government, and the government distributed it again to the bona fide fishers that were going to go fishing. Nobody got a quota who didn't go fishing.

That was the experience for rockfish. That is an example of a different measure of the same kind of control over conservation and access, but the government controls it, and there's no money floating around. Now, of course, the department changed that and made those into transferable quotas, and then part of the integrated groundfish management.

First halibut was transferred and divided into quotas. There were a lot of issues about how it was because it was the first big quota fishery, although abalone had preceded it. Abalone was a disaster because it disappeared, so you had quotas of nothing. Halibut went to ITQs quite quickly.

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

We've sort of captured how we got to where we are, where all of a sudden those ITQs, which are tradeable and saleable, became worth a lot of money. How do you think we could go back out of that system now into something that is workable? What I'm trying to get at is that we've established how we got here. Now how do we get to where you would like to go?

[Joy Thorkelson]

Many fishermen have come up with many different ideas. Part of it depends on how much the quota is worth. The quota's not worth very much in a degraded fishery. Fishermen say, “Well, let's just buy the quota out, put it in a pool, and work from there.” For other fishermen, take fisheries like halibut, where quota is worth a lot and a lot of investors actually bought in, it might take a 10- or 15-year program, where some of the quota is bought out by the government year by year, put into a pot, and then redistributed to active fishermen.

There are many, many ideas out there. That's why the union hasn't come with any set ideas. A lot of different ideas might work in different ways in different fisheries.

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

Thank you.

We're out of time already.

[The Chair]

Yes, five minutes don't be long going when the topic is interesting.

Now we go to the government side.

Mr. Fraser, you have five minutes or less. That will probably clew up this portion before we get to the next group.

[Colin Fraser, West Nova, Lib.]

Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you all very much for being here. This has been interesting.

Dan, perhaps I can start with you and follow up on a question you were answering regarding ownership, when I guess you were talking about the licensing and the quotas. Do you agree that really what determines ownership is the level of control over transferability of that licence or quota?

[Dan Edwards]

No, I don't think it's that so much; it's actually who went out into the market and bought it. They own it, essentially.

I mean, nothing is really owned in the Canadian context. It's all still a Canadian resource, but it's basically de facto ownership as soon as it's able to be traded in the marketplace. As to those who actually put the money out—I think Peter might know this better—the price for halibut in the open market has gone up to $125 per pound at times. It goes down to $90 and up and down. That's way beyond, as Peter said, what you could ever amortize in the present situation.

So in answer to that, if you actually started a fair sharing arrangement, and the fishermen who were fishing were getting more money, over time you could start seeing the limitation on the value of that as just a straight investment. It would be much more valuable to the fishermen. They would have more money in their pocket. You would see the price start to come down. You would see the fishermen on the water having money that they could actually invest.

Right now, I can't even invest in looking after our vessel, the way it is.

[Colin Fraser]

Okay.

Peter, can I get your thoughts regarding the level of control that someone would have over transferability, which is part of the issue here?

[Peter de Greef]

I wouldn't frame it that way—

[Colin Fraser]

Are there arrangements in place, such as financial arrangements, that you're aware of that basically limit the ability for someone to transfer a licence, perhaps, in exchange for having certainty of supply—a processor, for example, having certainty of supply?

[Peter de Greef]

Yes, that certainly happens.

[Colin Fraser]

Is that an issue, as far as you're concerned, regarding the actual ability of the fisherman to make arrangements for financing?

[Peter de Greef]

Yes. Generally, as processors, you're using your financing tool. You don't have banks that will lend you money. You don't have friends or family.... You have to get the money somewhere.

As to what the cost of that is, I couldn't tell you, but I would say that the cost is the independence of selling your fish on a free market.

[Colin Fraser]

You raised it in your remarks that access to capital is one of the issues, especially for younger people wanting to get into the fishery. I guess that ties into this ability where, in order to get financing, it means you have to enter into arrangements that you otherwise may not, because there's no access to other forms of capital.

In British Columbia, to my understanding, no fisheries loan board has been established by the province, unlike in other provinces. Would you be supportive if British Columbia were to move in that direction, or if there was some other way to allow a fisheries loan board to be established to allow access to capital?

[Peter de Greef]

I would be very supportive of that idea. I think that would help, in conjunction, possibly, with banks; it would take away some of the risk for banks and such. I'd be very supportive of an idea like that, yes.

[Colin Fraser]

I'm sorry that I don't have more time, but thank you all very much for being here.

[The Chair]

Now, we'll move to Mr. Doherty, for five minutes or less.

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

I have just one question for this group right now and I'll likely ask the same of the next group.

Well, no, I have two questions. Sorry.

My first question is, what is a quota worth? We talk about it a lot and our colleague Mr. Hardie asked about it in the previous session. Nobody can seem to tell us. I get that it depends on the fish we are going after and we say it's unattainable or it's out of reach, but what is a quota worth?

That question is for anyone.

Go ahead, Mr. de Greef.