Thank you.
I'm the president of the United Fishermen and Allied Workers' Union, which is also known as UFAW-Unifor. Our union represents some, although not all, fishermen in all the wild fisheries in British Columbia.
Our membership is made up of active fishermen only. Those of you who are from Newfoundland and Labrador will know of the FFAW, the fishing union in that province. We are both Unifor and therefore the FFAW is our sister union. We both represent fishermen and plant workers at opposite ends of the country. That is where the similarities end.
Our fishermen's earnings are trending down while the FFAW fishermen's incomes are increasing. Part of that difference is the added costs our fishermen bear. Some 80% of the landed value in ITQ fisheries is taken out of B.C. fishermen's pockets; that income remains in the pockets of our brother and sister fish harvesters on the east coast. A community difference is also evident: B.C. rural coastal communities' processing capacity is diminishing, while in Atlantic Canada, significant processing capacity resides in rural areas.
I have worked for the union for 40 years and I've seen many changes in my career. I'm old. In fact, the majority of people in the B.C. fishing industry are old. The industry was very good to participants and we were able to make a great living, so that's why we all stayed. Now it's too late to leave with economic dignity.
We have a crisis. Old people want out but cannot afford to quit and young people want in but cannot afford to buy in. When I was young, most skippers owned their own licences and vessels. ln 1985, 20,000 fishermen took out personal fishing licences. By 2015, we had lost 15,000 fishermen and only 5,700 were left in British Columbia. The 2015 figure is the latest one published by DFO.
ln 1969, corporate ownership of the fleet was at 13.2%. Fifteen years later, processor and investor ownership of the seine licences, for example, had increased to 40%, and 20 years later, it was 55%. ln 1993, 39% of herring roe licences were owned by processors and investors. By 2012, processor and investor ownership increased to 51%.
ln 1993, one processor owned 27% of the processor-held herring roe seine licences. Now, due to corporate consolidation, this processor, 20 years later, holds 95% of the processor-owned landings. The influence of processors on individual active fishermen can't only be assessed by these ownership numbers. lt also has to be viewed through the lens of processor control.
The major salmon processor owns 37 licences that are attached to 20 non-fishing vessels—vessels that don't really exist, in many cases. They are called “stick boats” because they could be floating sticks. The company can and does lease these licences off their vessels to salmon vessels that need a licence to fish in an additional area.
ln a salmon ITQ fishery, this company can transfer the quota attached to these non-fishing licences to another vessel that is fishing, thereby stacking quota onto this boat. It can catch its own fish and the quota from the stick boat. This binds fishermen to the company. If they want future increased quota opportunities, thereby increasing their income, they will have to continue to fish for this processor. This not only happens on salmon, but it is worse on roe herring, with DFO rules requiring stacking of a minimum number of gillnet licences in order to fish. I can remember a couple of years when active fishermen, forced by DFO to lease licences, lost money because the lease price exceeded the value of the roe herring.
The union did a survey in 2016 of the salmon fleet. Out of 234 respondents, 84% did not think they would benefit from ITQs; 89% thought their costs would go up under an ITQ system and 86% didn't want ITQs in their fishing areas.
ln 2018, two years later, we conducted another study. We expanded it to include all fishermen and all fisheries, and we asked similar questions: “Do you think west coast licensing policy should benefit active fishermen?” Of course 94% polled yes; 91% supported owner-operator policy created to meet the needs of B.C. fishermen; 88% supported a fleet separation policy in British Columbia, and 66% thought the consequence of no change to licensing policy would be that rural coastal communities would continue to decline.
I have heard the RDG list the Pacific region's priorities: conservation, compliance, sustainability and economic viability, equitable distribution of benefits, and data collection. I heard Ken Hardie later on list the DFO's target, but he must have been mistaken, because he included sustainable livelihoods, regional economic benefits and sustainable communities. Those may be Atlantic coast targets, but they're not Pacific region targets, I can assure you.
In the Pacific region DFO separates licence-holders from fishermen. They want fishermen to self-adjust to changing times and to pay for the management of their fishery. There are no social objectives to have sustainable livelihoods for fishermen or regional economic benefits or sustainable communities. These are not in the Pacific region's lexicon.
The real truth is that DFO Pacific is consulting with fewer and fewer active fishermen. They consult with quota owners and licence-holders, who increasingly do not fish. Last spring I and our staff did a six-week coast-wide tour. We visited 21 communities. We walked onto over 800 boats asking fishermen what they wanted changed, if anything, in their fishery. Only a few were satisfied with how things are now. Everyone else wanted changes that would benefit working fishermen.
Not all agreed on the solution, but most agreed on the problem. Money is being siphoned out of working fishermen's catch and into the pockets of those who don't fish. Processors are gaining control of almost every fisherman through their control of quota movement.
Fishermen on the Pacific coast believe it is time for a change. We recommend that the minister hold an external licensing review in the Pacific region with the goal of creating viable commercial fleets and coastal communities, including first nations communities, that include as the foundation the basic principle that the fishery is a public resource and belongs to all Canadians. Licences provide privileged access to the common property resource. There should be fleet separation and owner-operator principles. The benefits of the fishery should go to fish harvesters and their communities, not to those whose involvement is in owning or controlling licences and/or quota. Licensing policies should encourage intergenerational succession, and adjacency principles should govern processing so that the value flowing from our fisheries, including processing, remains in local communities.
We support the social and economic goals in Bill C-26 for active fishermen, fish harvesters and their communities.
That is my presentation.