Fisheries Committee on Sept. 26th, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Is that it?

[Ryan Cleary]

Sure.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Okay, and you're under time.

Thank you, Mr. Cleary. I appreciate it.

Mr. Sullivan, you have up to 10 minutes, sir.

[Jason Sullivan, As an Individual]

I didn't prepare anything so I guess I'm just going to talk from the heart.

I'm the white elephant in the room. There aren't many of us left. I'm under 35 and I'm a fisherman; I'm 33. After spending roughly $2 million to get into the fishery, my brother and I are doing quite well. We work hard and we do what we have to do.

Our shellfish stocks are in decline now—for me, it's mostly crab—so the return of northern cod is very important to me. It's my future and that of a lot of people like me. The trouble is when you make those decisions in Ottawa and you haven't had any input into it. It's disgusting what happened this year with the FFAW not consulting its members. I travelled across the province and we asked everyone, thousands of fishermen, if they had seen this proposal, and they hadn't. We still haven't seen it.

We don't know if this fishery.... We're told it's 15 weeks or so many weeks. We don't know. Now there are rumours on the wharf that it's closing in two weeks and that the total allowable catch is nearly caught. We don't know. We still haven't seen it and it's not right. We want to get it fixed.

I could talk to you today about lots of different things such as the price of fish and stuff like that. But the bottom line is that the price of fish is not your responsibility. The provincial government has us regulated so that we're getting pennies from what we should be getting, so you don't have to worry about that. That's a fight we're going to take up with the provincial government. They have to let us have free markets so that the market dictates the price, not a half-dozen merchants who pay us what they feel like paying us.

I'm going to focus more today on what we do and what you can control, and so on. We're going to form this new union. We really are. After Christmas, we're going to have this straightened away, so I encourage you not to make any major long-term decisions before this is done. We don't want three- or four-year agreements signed before we have input into what's actually going in there. We need to be a part of this process. We can't be left out again. It happened this year, and it can't happen again. This is forcing us back into small boats by taking our individual quotas, which our fathers and grandfathers fought for before my time. It was a monumental slap in the face.

If we had 30,000 pounds of fish, that's roughly $18,000 in today's market in Newfoundland. If we catch that in one week, it's $18,000, but if you stretch it out over 20 weeks, it's still $18,000. We're trying to make a living here. We don't want some sort of social program. To me, a fishery is a business. We like to be able to plan ahead. Maybe we can do something differently, but you can't do everything at once. We want our individual quotas put back. That's something we'll be fighting for.

I heard a lot of talk about Iceland today and everything they do over there, gillnets, and so on. I encourage you to do some more homework on it before you make any decisions about it. I've attended conferences and seminars with people from Iceland, and the gillnet fishery is still the most dominant fishery in Iceland. It still produces good quality fish. It's just that hook and line is obviously better. There's no doubt.

In Iceland, the reason they receive such good money for their fish is that they have a free market. They can market themselves. If I wanted to market myself, for example, take out a TV ad or who knows, in Iceland you have the opportunity to do that. But here in Newfoundland we don't, because we're regulated by archaic provincial legislation. We're going to fix that, too.

The only reason Iceland is successful is that there's no one else taking their fish. I have some papers here. I think you have them. It's a NAFO fisheries management schedule for 2016. When you get a chance, you can take a look at that. It lists the different species such as cod, redfish, and Greenland halibut, which is turbot.

You can see what percentages we get compared with every other country that's in NAFO. The percentage of cod in 3M, which is the Flemish Cap, is a disgrace. Canada is getting 0.8% of fish that are adjacent to us. Come on, boys.

Let's go over to turbot, Greenland halibut; it's probably the most lucrative fish that we have in terms of finfish and here we are with 15% of the quota. Every other country can come here. The EU has 6,400 tonnes. It's not good enough.

We often hear from the union that we can't invent quotas and we can't make fish for people to catch, but the fish are there. It's just everyone else is catching them.

What I noticed just last week on the Georges Bank, where the cod quota is shared between Canada and the U.S., Canada has the lion's share of that quota and we're sharing that bank. We're not sharing the Grand Banks with anyone adjacent and we get nothing.

It's time for people to look at it. I don't know what's going on, if it's with foreign trade or why we're getting sold out, but Newfoundland is getting sold out. The fishermen have been sold out.

Mr. Simms, you've been in opposition and you now have a chance because you're in power.

Mr. McDonald, it's your first term. Why don't you leave a legacy? Why don't you fight for us and make sure you fix this? This is wrong. What happened is wrong. I know you're good people and I know you're going to try. That's all I have to say.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

On that note, I'm not going to throw whether I'm a good person to a vote, so we'll leave it at that.

Thank you, Mr. Sullivan. Thank you very much. I appreciate the comments.

Mr. Etchegary, you have 10 minutes, sir.

[Gus Etchegary, As an Individual]

Thank you, sir.

First of all, thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. We're here on very short notice, as you know.

We made some notes before we came to the meeting this morning, but I have to tell you that I disposed of them during the previous three panels, because many of the statements made are tremendously important statements, and I'm sure you see, not only from the statements of these gentlemen but from others, that the fishing industry in Newfoundland today is one horrible mess. This comes at a time when the fishery, which is so important to the economy, has no real indication of recovery, despite what they say. Yes, there are some indications here and there, but by and large there is not an awful lot on the horizon, unless some miracles occur.

This discussion and your terms of reference have been on the northern cod stock. The northern cod stock is a very important resource. We've fished it for many years. We know the migration pattern, which begins with spawning on Hamilton Inlet bank off Labrador, to a large degree, and finds it way over its migration path and pattern down the Grand Banks to the nose of the Grand Banks, which is outside 200 miles.

By the way, I have listened over the years to tremendous arguments on that between Canadian scientists and foreign scientists in ICNAF and NAFO. In the case of the Canadian scientist, he says that only 5% of the northern cod go outside 200 miles, while in the case of a foreign scientist, it's up to 25% and 30%. That's important. I'll come to it later.

The fact of the matter is that I have appeared before this committee many times in the past. Obviously, practically all of you are new faces to me. I would imagine that in many cases this industry and what you've heard today are somewhat confusing in many ways, but I'm sure that somewhere along the line you're saying to yourselves, “What in the hell ever brought this once huge industry to the mess it's in today? How did it come about?”

I came into this fishery in 1947, two years before Confederation. At that time, there were three things occurring in the world. One was the end of the world war and the tremendous damage that was done in Europe. The second was the transition that was taking place between the traditional salt fish industy and the new and developing fresh fish industry. Third, we joined Confederation. The day we joined Confederation, Canada was elevated from fourteenth place in the world to sixth place in the world as a fish-exporting nation.

That was the value of the fishery that Newfoundland—not eastern Canada, but Newfoundland and Labrador—brought to the Confederation, from 14th to 6th place in the world. This was one of the largest and most diversified fisheries in the world: groundfish, in the form of cod, flounder, turbot, and other species; pelagic, with mackerel, herring, capelin, and so on; and crustaceans, shellfish. It's huge.

The transition from the salt fish industry began, and I was fortunate enough, at a very young age, to be manager of one of the first four frozen fish plants in Newfoundland, on the ice-free south coast, which was very important, particularly in those days. We eventually built a company that employed 5,500 people over the years, men and women, in plants and on ships. About 4,000 of those jobs were 50-week jobs, and the others were seasonal because they were in areas where ice was a major factor.

For the first 20 years, from 1950, let's say, to 1968-69, we developed a fishery and our own particular company. We built the first marketing organization in the United States, with offices in Trondheim, Norway; Cuxhaven; and London to serve the European markets. We associated ourselves with a very large company in Japan to gain access to Japan. For 20 years, and very.... It was annoying to me today to listen to people saying that the fishery prior to 1992 produced cod blocks. It just goes to show, well, a generation has passed since the moratorium, so many of the people who are contributing to this discussion today.... By the way, much of it was very good. Some very intelligent comments and suggestions were made, and I compliment them all, but the fact is that we brought into this country one of the most diversified and strongest fisheries—you might even term some of it “virgin fisheries”.

What happened? Well, here is what happened. By the way, I might say to you that one of the main factors in what I call the demise, almost, of the fishery was the fact that at the end of the war in Europe, the millions of starving people who were left had to be fed, and the agricultural industry had been just about destroyed. In the meantime, in most of those nations there were enormous naval shipbuilding operations, so they turned to fish protein as a source of keeping the people alive in Europe for the next several years.

The Marshall plan by the U.S. took care of the industrial regrowth and redevelopment, but they were hungry. What happened? Well, over the next 20 years, 1,400 freezer vessels and factory freezer vessels descended on the resources adjacent to Newfoundland and Labrador, with 60,000 fishermen, and for the next 30 years, until 1978, they carried on a totally uncontrolled and unrestricted fishery, right in front of a country, Canada, to which we had transferred one of the greatest fisheries in the world to do one thing, sustainably manage it. Remember, it is a common property resource—not owned by a union, not owned by the Fisheries Council of Canada, not owned by any government in Canada or in Newfoundland. It is a common property resource owned by the people.

What has happened has been a catastrophe. I was a commissioner in ICNAF and NAFO and was sent for a month every June to listen to 20 nations sit down and decide what they were going to take, when they were going to take it, and how they were going to take it. Let me say to you this. A science council made up of scientists from all these nations, including Canada—by the way, we had some of the best scientists in the world as part of that group—sat down during the year, carried out their assessments on the various cod stocks, and made their presentation to the plenary session of ICNAF, in the first week of those meetings. I am talking about 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, and so on. I was in it for 20 years. In each case, they made recommendations.

Incidentally, I was one of 50 commissioners who accepted the scientific council's recommendations for quotas and so on. The fishery, which was supposed to be conducted on the basis of, what they called FO.1 level, which was roughly 18% of the biomass. In other words, you could take 18% of the biomass and have a sustainable fishery.

Every year, contrary to what most people say, the scientists warned the participating countries that you're not fishing at 18% to 20%, but closer to 30% to 35%. At the rate you're going with your fishing; it's going to go. This is in 1965, 1966 and 1967. I can guarantee, I have the official proceedings as a result of my presence in that organization.

Our own Dr. Templeman, from Newfoundland, one of the best fishery scientists that I know, supported a presentation that we made as a result of our experience in ICNAF, and with the uncontrolled and unrestricted fishery. He spent a lot of time on research vessels, on the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, so we made the presentation with his backing. We went and sat down with Mitchell Sharp, Don Jamieson, and Jack Davis, who was minister of fisheries, for two and a half days. Twenty-five of us from here, in October of 1971, made a presentation that showed them documented evidence, scientific evidence, that a continuation of the fishery, at the level that it was taking place, would mean the end. It would virtually become a cottage fish industry.

I'll give them full credit, these three ministers were shocked. During the presentation we made, since I was chairman of the group, they asked, could you have this presentation abbreviated for the Prime Minister? The following morning, we found ourselves sitting down with Pierre Trudeau and eight of his senior cabinet members. During the presentation, some of these people were agog, particularly those from the east coast. They had no idea in the world that the situation had reached this far. This is 1971. This is not 2002.

At the end of our presentation to the Prime Minister, they were shaken by it all. It was at a time, of course, that everybody was talking about extension of jurisdictions to get some protection. This is what we were after, some kind of protection for the resource. Within 24 hours of our presentation, Premier J.R. Smallwood received a telex, a copy of which I have, telling him that Canada was shocked, the Canadian government was shocked, and they were going to take action to extend jurisdiction to cover the total Canadian shelf; in other words, give the fishery on the continental shelf on our east coast full attention and full protection from the pirates from across the water.

Seven years later, they extended jurisdiction to 200 miles, leaving two of the most productive areas of fisheries on the nose and tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap at the mercy of the foreigners. I was shocked today to hear the representative of DFO answer your question, “Did the foreigners have any impact during the moratorium?” He said, no, they didn't.

I'll speak about Spain. I don't know if you people are familiar with an organization called the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. I don't know if you're familiar with it or not, but they have carried out studies on these fisheries and on the subsidies received by participating nations in NAFO. Spain alone received $8 billion U.S. in subsidies to conduct foreign offshore fisheries.

For him to sit and make a statement like that is typical of what has happened to DFO's attitude toward the Newfoundland fishery since 1970.

I realize I'm coming to the end of my time, but this is off the cuff, and it's not entirely what I had in mind. Nevertheless, I felt it necessary to make you people aware that the collapse of this fishery is due to one thing and one thing only, and that is the fact that the Government of Canada has failed to do its job in terms of what the fishery was transferred to Canada for, and that was to sustainably manage the resource.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Etchegary, for that. I appreciate it.

Mr. McDonald, you have seven minutes.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Jason, Gus, and Ryan, for your attendance here today and the presentations. I know each one of you has certainly shown your passion when you spoke about the various aspects of the problems, not just for the cod fishery but the fishery as a whole.

This is a little bit off topic, but with regard to FISH-NL and the formation of a new union, I know we won't resolve those issues here today, and we probably won't be the ones to decide on it, but as we say in Newfoundland, before it's all over, there'll be the scattered fellow that will probably get a smack in the mouth, but it might be well deserved. But the best of luck to all of you trying to do what you're doing with the best interests of the fishery and the fishers in mind.

The first question is to Mr. Etchegary. I've heard you talk on this different times through different media outlets, your feelings and your views on the establishment of a joint management of our fishery with both Canada and Newfoundland.

[Gus Etchegary]

Of course, this has been on the agenda for quite a long time, and many people have felt that should happen.

You have to remember that this fishery that we delivered to Canada is unique with respect to other fisheries on the east coast. For example, when the moratorium occurred we lost 20,000 jobs and 80,000 people moved out of the province to Alberta, where they were fortunately able to get employment.

In the case of the Maritimes, Nova Scotia, if you looked at the value of their exports prior to and after the moratorium, it would be exactly the same. The reason was it was 85% to 95% crustacean, shellfishers. In our case it was basically a groundfishery. Admittedly, one of the valuable fisheries, but unique in the sense that not only were we impacted by this but we were the only province in the fisheries on the east coast that had international implications in our fisheries. They were at our doorstep. They are at our doorstep today. They're fishing on the migrating stocks that are going over that imaginary 200-mile line on the tail of the Grand Banks and on the nose of the Grand Banks and on the Flemish Cap. Let me say to you that in the southern cod fishery, there are five main cod stocks. They're all very valuable, but the one on the southern Grand Banks has been exposed to foreign fishing ever since 1978 and the extension of jurisdiction.

By the way, one of the statements by the DFO man was correct when he said that the Barents Sea is greatly affected by the Gulf Stream current. He didn't say it, but the same applies to that resource on the southern Grand Banks. That yielded 100,000 to 110,000 tonnes of cod every year prior to the overfishing. Today it is as barren as that table because of continuous overfishing by foreign fleets, especially the Spanish and Portuguese, and the Russians to some degree.

You might ask, how in the hell can Spain and Portugal today, in the financial strain that they're under, send a $20-million vessel over 5,500 miles to fish on the Grand Banks with 60 men on each vessel? It's done because the European Union subsidized it to the hilt.

Another point I want to make reference to before I forget it is that the DFO man said, and rightly so, that the scientific capability of the White Hills organization today, is down here. He said we have fewer ships and fewer people. He also said that when you ask about capelin, which by the way hasn't been assessed, not for two years or three years but for nine years, and it's the most valuable fishery out here because it is the main food of a lot of the groundfish, he said problems with boats was one of the reasons it hasn't been carried out.

I can tell you that in the last 20 years the DFO capability has gone down to such a level. Beginning in 1995, Paul Martin reduced the budget to the White Hills science capability by 50%. We have documented evidence that shows that incrementally since then it has been lowered to a point where the WWF now is almost taking over from DFO. We're beginning to wonder who is running the show. DFO has lost control.

How did they lose control? Let me say to you that it all began, not necessarily the loss of control but the dictatorial attitude of DFO, in 1974, when the then minister of the day dissolved the federal Fisheries Research Board. Remember that name, the federal Fisheries Research Board. It was an organization made up of membership from every sector of the fishing industry.

Its job was to develop, along with scientists who were members of the organization, science programs, projects, for the continental shelf, which is almost one million square kilometres, and to develop a budget and deliver it to the minister. Not once during the time that I was involved did the minister ever change it, because of the calibre of the people who were involved in the federal Fisheries Research Board.

Then he dissolved it in 1974, transferred that responsibility on his desk, and thus became the dictator of fisheries for eastern Canada. From that day onward, you can trace, without much difficulty, the demise, the lack of control, and a reduced capability of DFO, and it went down and down.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Mr. Etchegary, sorry, I have to stop you right there. Your seven minutes is up with Mr. McDonald. You may want to finish your thoughts in the next question or beyond.

Mr. Doherty, you're going to split the time starting with Mr. Arnold. Go ahead, for three and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Again, thank you to the panellists who have come out this afternoon on I think relatively short notice. I really appreciate some of the honesty that's coming out here.

I have a quick point of clarity. Mr. Etchegary, you referred to the cod stocks on the southern tips of the Grand Banks. Just for clarity, for the group here, are those still northern cod that you were referring to?

[Gus Etchegary]

No, the northern cod is from Hamilton Inlet back down to the nose of the bank, but down on the southern part is the tail of the Grand Banks. It's a separate stock.

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

Because we are doing a study on northern cod. Correct?

[Gus Etchegary]

Yes, you're doing it but....

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

I know there is some interaction there but I just want to be sure of what we're covering here.

Mr. Etchegary, you've been involved with this for a long time. I had stated earlier that I'm surprised at some of the mysteries that are out there in relation to predator and prey, interaction with the cod, and so on. In your opinion, do you think some of the science has been there but it's been lost between the water and the decision-makers?

[Gus Etchegary]

I can give you an example. Since I retired, I and other retired scientists as well were invited by the director general here in Newfoundland to attend a session by 25 scientists who were doing an assessment of St. Pierre Bank, just about 10 years ago. We sat with them for about seven or eight days during which time these scientists presented the information they had as a result of their at-sea research efforts and so on. They debated and argued and so on, but finally came up with a consensus. There were three men out of the group assigned to the job of putting together their consensus for presentation to the management.

My friend the scientist and I were asked to sit in while these people decided on the.... We sat there and we felt they had done a hell of a good job on it. It really reflected what had taken place over the past 10 days. So there was some message.

About a week later that was sent back to the same group for change. They came back three times before it was accepted for presentation to the bureaucrats and the minister, by which time it had been watered down quite a bit.

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

Where were the requests for change coming from?

[Gus Etchegary]

That I don't know, but it came from above so it had to be.... You have the scientists who are making the presentation to the managers, and then it goes into the bureaucratic system, I guess, and on to the minister. Somewhere in there, these recommendations....

What I'm saying is that many of the policies that have been applied to our fisheries particularly in the past 25 years have been politically motivated. We can't avoid saying that. It's true.

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

Mr. Cleary, you looked as though you felt some urgency to make a comment there.

[Ryan Cleary]

I just wanted to add on to that by saying, you would think that, since 1992, after the moratorium was introduced and the northern cod stocks collapsed, the science would have increased to understand exactly what happened and to make sure it doesn't happen again, but the exact opposite happened; the science decreased. Mr. Etchegary used a figure a little while ago, 50% or more, and as older scientists retired, they weren't replaced. We had a scientist right here a few minutes ago who spoke about surveys being carried out when the boat is not broken down, and he wasn't joking. Most of the Canadian Coast Guard vessels, for example, that do carry out research are on average about 30-odd years old. I think there was a report carried out a little while ago to show that our vessels have actually no book value. They aren't worth anything anymore.

You had witnesses here today from both FFAW, the fisheries union, and provincial fisheries. They both said they were doing science that's within the jurisdiction of DFO because it's not being done. One of our main points for being here today is that instead of FFAW or provincial fisheries doing the job of DFO, we have to do a better job ourselves of holding the Government of Canada, DFO, to account, to make sure they carry out their responsibilities under the terms of the union.

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

Thank you.

I'll turn the rest of my time over to—

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

He can continue to answer my question.

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

Okay.

Jason, you kind of ran out of time on your presentation. I just wondered if you want to add anything more as a harvester, a fishermen. I'm assuming you've invested your life and your future into this. What do you see as important in moving this forward so you have certainty, and I would assume, so you will be able to pass that on to your children in time?

[Jason Sullivan]

I'm proud of what I do, so I definitely want to pass it on.

I'm really fearful that with the way things are going, there's going to be nothing to pass on. You spoke of milk quotas earlier and the stability that quotas gave you and stuff like that. When we had them taken from us, I can't even describe the feeling. It's just anger everywhere.

There was an article in The Telegram today about the guys from Port de Grave that really feel this revolt had to do with not being consulted and everything else. It did, but there's more to it than that. There's the lawsuit; the fishermen had to sue the union about scallop grounds and stuff like that.

Being consulted is so important and we had guys doing the sentinel program that the union talked about. Those guys have been taking part in that for 20-something years. They're the guys on the water, so you'd think they'd be the guys they would have hauled into the room.

I asked what's going on and what you think we should do going forward, but again, there was no consultation. The only fisherman I heard about seeing that proposal was Tony Doyle and you should not have one person making the decisions for the entire industry, especially a person at the end of his career. You should look at it from the point of view of a new guy with 30 years left to go, and you should get his input.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Sullivan. We've run out of time on that question.

Mr. Johns, go ahead for seven minutes, please.