Fisheries Committee on June 7th, 2016

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. If I have time, I'll split it with Ms. Jordan.

I want to clarify something.

A number of the witnesses have made reference to the east coast with regard to rules of adjacency, operator-owner, and fleet separation. Being from the east coast of Newfoundland and the riding of Avalon, which has a strong connection to the fishery, I know it may be a policy of DFO on the east coast that there be owner-operator and fleet separation policies, but that's not always the case, because I know it to be a fact that some of the larger fish companies do own quota and own vessels that fish the quota.

With regard to adjacency, we argue for adjacency every day. We argue that the fish should benefit our rural fishing communities first, before it goes anywhere else, but that hasn't always been the case and it's still not the case today, especially when it comes to many of our fisheries, the shrimp fishery in particular. I wanted to set that straight. The east coast doesn't have the ideal situation when it comes to those rules as well.

The processing of the product in Newfoundland is controlled provincially. The quotas are given from the federal department. Is it the same in B.C.? Does the province control processing licences and the federal government control the quotas?

[Joy Thorkelson]

Yes.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Okay, so to keep any plant going, whether it be the plant in Prince Rupert or anywhere else, wouldn't the right thing be to lobby the province to not allow the processing of the fish, which historically took place in a community, to be transferred not just out of the province, but out of the country to Alaska?

[Joy Thorkelson]

We have been speaking to the provincial government. It believes that capital should be unfettered, and therefore it believes that if Jim Pattison can make more money by transferring that fish to his non-union plant in Vancouver or China or the Philippines or Vietnam, it is the unfettered right of capital to be able to do so.

We've expressed to the provincial government that instead of paying welfare to a bunch of first nations people who used to work and make enough money to provide for their families, they would be better off negotiating adjacency with fish plants. We know that we will never be able to process every last fish that comes in, but we think that we should be able to process a good deal of it to keep our workers employed at Canadian Fishing.

The reason we're asking the federal government to do this is that when the federal Liberals were elected, mandate letters went out that said that they're supposed to have a look at social concerns, not just economic concerns, and consequently we're here talking to a committee dominated, we hope, by members thinking along those lines.

We know that the position of the federal government is that it can't deal with fish plants because they are provincial. We believe your responsibility is to talk to the provincial government and say we need to solve this problem together.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you. I'll pass to Ms. Jordan.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Thank you so much to all of you for attending.

Ms. Thorkelson, you mentioned earlier that at one time, under former minister LeBlanc, only 12% of licences should be held by—

[Joy Thorkelson]

That was a policy, yes.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

It was a policy. Now you're saying that roughly 40% are held by Pattison.

[Joy Thorkelson]

They are owned outright.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

They are owned outright. Who holds the other 60%? I'm asking because the first video we saw said we can't land fish. If 60% of licences are being held somewhere else, I'd like to know who holds those licences. Where are they?

[Joy Thorkelson]

Some licences are held by individuals, some by first nations bands, and some in joint ownership. One of the problems is we say “owned or controlled by”; most of those licences on the B.C. coast are controlled.

That's why there's only one cannery in British Columbia. It's because the licences are all controlled by Jim Pattison. For example, a friend of mine fishes for Aero Trading on a quota fishery. He has to go to Jim Pattison and guarantee his first quota to Jim Pattison to get a second or third or fourth quota. He fishes for a company that can't provide him with another quota, so therefore he is only able to fish one quota, even though he's a very good fisherman and in the fishery he could catch 10 quotas. He can't catch those 10 quotas because he will have to sell his own first quota to Canadian Fish at a lower price to be able to lease other quotas.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Ms. Jordan. Thank you, Ms. Thorkelson.

Now we will go to Mr. Donnelly for three minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In my three minutes I'd like to ask Mr. Nagy a question.

It seems that we're talking about a fundamental issue here of ownership of fish. It's about who owns, who has access, and most importantly, who controls. We're looking at the possibility here of no more manufacturing, no more processing of this fish, on the west coast. That is a reality. We're moving away from that. We're now outsourcing to China and to Alaska and to other places.

In terms of processing Canadian fish in China and Alaska, how much fish that was caught in B.C. was processed outside of B.C., and how much salmon caught by the Jim Pattison Group was processed in B.C.?

[Arnold Nagy]

I can't give you the exact numbers because a lot of the information that the province used to put out in regard to canning of fish was stopped a while back because they needed three plants, three canning operations, to be going so that they could get an average. Giving out that information.... They would perceive it as unfair to Canadian Fishing just to release their numbers.

What I can tell you is that last year I ran the iron butchers, and pretty much every pink salmon that we got into the plant last year was headed, the eggs were removed, the fish was gutted, then it was sent into fibre totes to be shipped down to Vancouver and then to China.

As for the inland fishery, when there were fish for us to be able to pursue a commercial fishery on the Skeena, we were denied that opportunity. That fish came back down from the inland fishery. It was not very good fish, but the roe was taken out and the fish were once again headed, the eggs taken out, the fish were gutted, and then that was shipped down for freezing and also for shipment to China.

I want you guys to understand how it used to be up here when we were allowed to fish and we were allowed access to the resource. We used to can a million pounds of salmon a day in that fish plant. A million pounds. That fish would come into the plant and it would be in the can within half an hour. By going two shifts around the clock, we were able to do that. Because of all of the changes....

Back then, we used to have almost 1,400 people working in that plant. It was the largest salmon cannery in the world. Now we have nothing.

I still say, with regard to adjacency, that we have always stated as workers in the plant that we are willing to sit down with the companies to come up to some solutions to be able to process that fish. We're highly trained, experienced fish workers. If you want to fillet and freeze them and cryovac them, we can do it. There are all these missed opportunities. If they're not going to can here, we can use them to keep that attachment to the industry here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, sir. I appreciate your time.

I want to thank our guests for being here. Mr. Lewis, Mr. Nagy, Mr. Boyes, thank you for joining us from a distance. Ms. Thorkelson, thank you for joining us here.

We're going to have to recess for a few minutes to do some business. We'll try to make this very quick.

Thank you very much.

[Proceedings continue in camera]