Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank all of the witnesses for being available today, as we get close to winding down our parliamentary session.
I first want to state that it's disappointing that I don't recognize any of the witnesses from the Conservative list of requests that we sent in. We certainly had some very pointed questions we were going to ask of DFO staff and former staff. Unfortunately, I don't see any witnesses here today who can probably speak to the amount of unreported, unregulated, illegal fisheries that are taking place offshore on the high seas.
We have seen millions spent—and I mean millions spent—year after year, supposedly to combat unreported, unregulated, illegal fisheries offshore, yet in any inquiries that I've ever taken a look at, there have never been charges laid.
There have been investigations. There have been allegations, reports going to the home countries and home ports of the vessels in the infractions, but no reports ever come back. Millions of dollars have been spent in this area that could have been spent within Canada, possibly making a difference here.
I also want to touch on balance. How do we find a balance in enforcing the Fisheries Act and fisheries violations?
When I talked to fisheries officers in my riding back home about some of the 2012 changes that were made to the Fisheries Act, they said that some of those changes were actually very beneficial. The changes gave them the ability to assess the situation. Instead of going through months and possibly years of investigative work to gather evidence in order to take the case to court, and then laying charges against communities, against contractors, even against the province for work that was done, and then spending months and possibly years as the case worked its way through the courts, the DFO enforcement staff were simply able to assess the situation, state that the work was done without permit, and immediately order the work to be repaired or mitigated.
These kinds of changes were taking place. These were big issues on the ground that could have tied up fisheries officers for days, weeks, months and possibly years on a case that was simply cleaned up with a few days of work. Issues were solved that way.
Getting back to some of the questions here, how big an issue is the illegal, unreported and unregulated fishery in each of your areas?
Ms. Morton, I know you are on the west coast. The other witnesses are from the east coast.
Ms. Morton, are you available to answer first?