Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for inviting me today and giving me the opportunity to speak. I'm really grateful.
I've been involved in commercial, sport and first nations food fisheries since I was a teenager, so I've been around a few years—at least 10. I've fished from the top of our coast to the bottom, from Portland Canal to Juan de Fuca, and from inside to outside, from Knight Inlet to Rennell Sound. I've seen a good chunk of our coast and have seen a good chunk of fisheries on it.
I want to talk to you today about two sides of this topic. On the one hand, we have an IUU—illegal, unreported and unregulated—problem. On the other hand, we have rampant criminalization of legitimate fishermen.
Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing is a growing concern in Canadian waters, both domestic and foreign, especially in the Pacific. We are not doing enough to monitor and enforce our exclusive economic zones, our EEZs. I fully support increased monitoring enforcement to stop IUU fishing. Unfortunately, our enforcement officers make no distinction between IUU and relatively minor infractions of the Fisheries Act by legitimate fishermen. They are both treated as master criminals. It is much easier to criminalize legitimate fishermen than to catch the illegal ones who drive the IUU fishing in our country.
For me, a few core components of a legitimate fisherman include a person with a licence and a quota to fish, fishing in a sanctioned opening or at least trying to, and delivering to a legitimate, licensed processor. For any fishermen, things can go wrong on the ocean. Tide, wind, waves, weather, unexpected encounters and broken equipment can change your priorities in a heartbeat. Understanding this complexity must come into play for enforcement officers when dealing with legitimate fishermen.
I want to discuss two instances to highlight the issue. The first is regarding the salmon fleet fishing out of Prince Rupert in 2016. The second is regarding a fishing vessel fishing over the AB line with Alaska in 2015.
I will read part of a letter that was sent to you by 15 first nations fishermen in 2016, as follows:
Re: Grave concern for fisheries on our Pacific coast
Dear Minister LeBlanc and Standing Committee Members,
We are writing you as independent commercial fishermen from the Pacific coast gravely concerned for the future of our fisheries on [our] coast. Together we represent over 400 years of fishing experience. With our crews we directly represent 50 fishermen, and we know there are many more fishermen that feel as we do. We are First Nations fishermen, we fish with our families and from our communities. Some of us have 4 generations on board our boats. An incident in Prince Rupert this summer...highlights our concern and is an indicator of a much bigger problem.
On July 29th [2016] some 17 armed DFO compliance and enforcement officers descend[ed] into Prince Rupert to bring the commercial salmon fleet into compliance. We are not certain who ordered this action; in our combine[d] recollection this is unprecedented. Part of this enforcement incident was captured on video and [has been] posted on Facebook....During this altercation 10 officers lined the outside of this fishing [boat], most officers with hands ready on guns, others inside screamed orders at the fishermen on board, while others search through the personal belongings. These fishermen have never been subjected to such intimidation tactics.
The public watching this incident must think us fishermen hardened criminals, deserving of such treatment. This public image is hard to reverse.
We had just returned from a commercial salmon fishery designated by DFO: we were not fishing in a closed area, not fishing at a closed time, not using illegal gear, not poaching fish, nor selling poached fish. We were trying to earn a living under some very hostile conditions.
The intimidation tactics were carried to the fishing grounds the following week causing some of us to leave rather than subject our families and crews to harassment and humiliation, a tough decision given we get very few days a year to earn our living fishing.
The salmon fishing fleet has been drastically reduced over the last [25] years....Fishermen are now being asked to catch and release salmon in mixed stock fisheries. This might sound sensible and easy, and on paper it is.
In practice under adverse weather conditions, with jellyfish blowing into your eyes and [boats] rolling, it is anything but. One fisherman alone estimates releasing $60,000 worth of chum [salmon] in the two weeks leading up to this incident, and was charged for retaining chum as they slipped into the hatch. These specific restrictions have no conservation value: in Area 3 it was hard to set a net without catching 1-2 thousand chum [salmon] (they were in abundance). There was a targeted fishery on the released fish just up the inlet the next week....
As we mentioned [at the] start, this incident is only one example of a much bigger problem.
Our fisheries are filled with conflicts on the water, on the docks and in your courts. We are fully aware of how fisheries are conducted in Alaska, and on Canada's Atlantic coast. Somehow the interests of commercial fishermen here have no value for the DFO. They are managing fisheries for those that do not fish. This must change.
The letter is signed by 14 first nations fishermen.
Why the heavy-handed enforcement? Fifty-one fishermen were charged this day, and so far, 49 charges have been dropped. Every one of these harvesters was licensed and fishing in a legitimate salmon opening. It was a mixed-stock fishery, with the department enforcing zero retention of chinook and sockeye salmon. Both were in abundance, and so were jellyfish.
Of the two remaining charges, since both were non-first nations fishermen, one may think that there's a racial angle to this, and there may be. One is being charged because 0.068% of his catch was non-retention sockeye. The green crew had missed 55 sockeye out of 35,000 pink salmon. They returned over 700 sockeye to the water during the two-day opening, $25,000 worth of fish. They were not trying to sell these fish, only trying to stop them from going to reduction—which is illegal under other aspects of our Fisheries Act—rather than going to food.
In the second instance, one of the pioneers of electronic monitoring—I'll call it EM going forward—in the B.C. fleet was fishing the Alaska border from Haida Gwaii to Alaska. They made 214 sets. Two sets were near the border. No gear was set over the border, and the electronic monitoring can prove this, but the vessel was blown over the border when hauling the gear. It was a quota fishery that was being fished here, so there was no benefit from fishing over the border. In fact, fewer fish were caught in the related sets.
The boat has AIS on it, which is totally voluntary for that size of vessel, allowing it to be tracked by satellite. DFO tracked it when it received a call from the U.S. Coast Guard saying there was a fishing vessel along the AB line. DFO tracked it from the fishing grounds all the way to the wharf. Without any warning, seven DFO officers descended on that vessel at the wharf, 10 days after the incident, to arrest the fishermen, guns ready if needed.
The total value of the fish harvested in the related sets was $6,900. The skipper was fined $30,000. The owner was fined $300,000, and the processor was fined $69,000. Legal fees are over $100,000. We do not know the court costs. We do not know DFO costs.
In the 20-plus years that the vessel has been fishing this area, they were never warned once about that issue.
Why the heavy-handed enforcement?
Maybe the enforcement officers don't have the right equipment to be on the water and stop IUU fishing. Maybe they're overzealous. Maybe they're trigger-happy. We do not know.
With the various electronic monitoring schemes used for catch accountability, enforcement officers don't even have to leave their offices to lay charges. Fishermen send in their electronic monitoring data, which in turn is used to lay charges, sometimes years after the data has been provided.
Over the last 15 years, electronic monitoring has been put in place to ensure accountability in the region. Now it is being used to charge fishers after the fact.
Thank you.
