Fisheries Committee on Feb. 23rd, 2016

[Mario Pelletier]

Right now, we're looking at the situation. As I said, more and more of those vessels are coming to light right now, perhaps because of awareness. It is concerning, and we're working very closely with Transport Canada, which has some authority under the Canada Shipping Act, as do we, to mitigate pollution. They have the authority to certify ships and clear a presence on the water. We're working jointly on this very topic right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Donnelly.

We have reached the end of the prescribed amount of time for questions; however, we are well ahead of schedule, well ahead of time, as you can see. Since we are masters of our own domain, I would like to make a proposal. We've all had a turn asking questions, even myself at the beginning, and Mr. Morrissey has not. To accommodate Mr. Morrissey, how about we go with three questions. I think in game shows they call it quick snapper questions.

[An hon. member]

A snapper round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

A snapper round, there you go. How about we do three three-minute rounds.

We'll go with Mr. Strahl, then Mr. Morrissey, each for three minutes, and then finally Mr. Donnelly, for three minutes.

May I get everyone's consensus on that?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you.

Let's go to Mr. Strahl for three minutes.

[Mark Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Hope, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I want to follow up on derelict vessels. Perhaps this will be quicker than three minutes.

There was a private member's bill in the last Parliament from Ms. Crowder, and I believe it's been recently reintroduced. It calls for the Canadian Coast Guard to be designated as a receiver of wreck, which would require the Coast Guard to take reasonable steps to determine and locate the owner of a wreck.

What would be the additional cost to the Canadian Coast Guard if it essentially became responsible for derelict vessels? You said it's becoming a much more prevalent issue. I would certainly have concerns with the Government of Canada suddenly becoming responsible for these. Have you done any cost analysis on what that sort of a plan would cost Canadian taxpayers? If you have some other ideas....

I think the current system is failing. I think that's clear. People abandon these things and there's no jurisdiction for the communities that they're sitting beside. They're an eyesore. Government can step in when they present a threat to navigation or when there are environmental concerns, but if it's essentially rotting at the dock, there's not much that can be done.

Can you talk about the cost of becoming the receiver of wreck? Do you have any other recommendations, perhaps even issues, that this committee might study to deal with this issue?

[Jeffery Hutchinson]

Thank you for the question.

The cost is a very difficult one to address, frankly, because it's fairly open-ended, and it depends entirely on what obligations are created on the operational agency. If you took the broadest possible view of the issue on whether the Coast Guard would be tasked with dealing with all derelicts, all wrecks—sunken, historically sunken, about to sink—it really depends on the scoping. I'm not being glib about that; it really does come down to that.

We know there is a list of vessels of concern that are more urgent than others. Where the question is perhaps most pointed for us is the authority to act. Right now, there is a trigger in the legislation for us when there is a reasonable risk of environmental harm of some sort and pollution, but the question really is, what does that mean? What is the trigger point for that? I'll use the word “imminent”. That's from the international law, it's not from the domestic law. What's the trigger point for the Coast Guard to take action? Two things happen when we take action. Well, there are three things. One, we interfere with personal property rights. Two, we interfere with the maritime regime as people understand it. Three, and this harkens back to an earlier question today, we start to incur costs. It's a bit of an odd way to put it, but I'll put it this way nonetheless. We're actually not funded for environmental response; we're funded for environmental readiness.

The system is premised on the polluter paying. If you think of us as a fire hall, we're paid to have the trucks at the ready, but when the bell rings, there's no money because you have to go to the polluter to recover. The reality is that wrecks and derelicts and some other situations fall outside of that best case paradigm, if I can put it that way.

We think there's an authorities question that needs to be clarified if people want the Coast Guard to take action on wrecks and derelicts sooner than we do now. The trigger point will have to be addressed, but we'd be quick to say the financial mechanism to go with it.... And this is not a disguised plea for an A-base injection or something like that. There are lots of mechanisms we could use that don't just increase Coast Guard budgets. There are response funds that could be set up and insurance schemes and things like that. I'm not talking about funding the Coast Guard here; I'm talking about funding a response particularly in a way that makes the polluter responsible whenever possible.

Those are the two issues I'd flag for you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, sir. That was very good.

Now we're going to Mr. Morrissey, before we go to Mr. Donnelly. You have three minutes, Mr. Morrissey.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question is for either witness who chooses to answer.

Generally, we're creatures of habit. We do not like change, and every time change is thrust upon us, we tend to view it as having a negative impact on service delivery. I would like you to expand on this. When you attempt to do technological improvements, you used the term “that enhance safety”. I believe the minister in response to questions in the House used the analogy of the technology you're using today on communication as akin to a rotary-dial telephone years ago and an iPhone today. We as citizens tend to react and say that these changes are going to provide less of a response service.

Could you expand on how the Coast Guard approaches technological upgrades? I assume in each one of these analyses and changes, that the enhancement of safety response and whatever your mandate is in the Coast Guard is going to be enhanced, not retracted.

[Jeffery Hutchinson]

Perhaps because you didn't specify a witness, we'll both want to speak to this question. It's a very interesting question from where we sit.

Changing technology in the marine industry is happening faster, and it's happening in a very broad way. The industry itself doesn't quite know how to keep up with it. I'll give you a couple of examples. There are companies experimenting with ships that will guide themselves. It's a huge step from where we are now, but they're actually on the water experimenting with them.

A little closer to home and maybe a little bit more 2016, Canada—and, I'm proud to say, the Canadian Coast Guard—is a leader internationally in terms of implementing electronic navigation. I made reference to this in my earlier comments. We're really looking at providing enhancements on the bridge of a ship to give navigators and captains the best information possible in real time. It's about changing to keep up with where they are and with what they're facing. Whether that's traffic approaching them, changing weather conditions, or a weather system going through and the changes and the draft they have to deal with, we're trying to give them the best information possible on the bridge so they can make real-time decisions.

That approach to technological change is a little bit like implementing GPS for your car. We didn't get rid of stoplights just because GPS started to show up in most cars, right? Nobody is proposing that we do that—at least not this year. We're trying to find the right way to bring new technology into the mix to increase safety and to increase the ability to make good decisions on the bridge of a ship, keeping in mind that we're going to be running a couple of systems at a time or maybe more, because vessels fall within such a range of sophistication, from small vessels that know their local area very well to the international carriers that know the high seas very well.

We're trying to use enhancements where we can find them to bring them on board, knowing that they'll have to do it with other technology continuing to function. We're doing the same thing with a pilot project to use unmanned aerial craft to look at towers and things like that. Can we do some of our maintenance work without putting people 600 feet up on a tower? It's that kind of thing. We're trying to do that and integrate it, rather than replace it in all cases. I would say that's the approach we're taking generally across our operations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Mr. Pelletier, we've run out of time on that question. I'll just ask you to quickly sum up.

[Mario Pelletier]

My colleague hit all the right points.

I would say that historically the marine industry has been very traditional in nature and the availability of technology is very new to a lot of people. We are making headway and are working very closely with our partners to improve. It's a very interesting journey.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Morrissey.

Mr. Donnelly, you have three minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would love to continue on the MCTS technology question, but I think we'll have to leave that to the study, given that I have three minutes.

I want to go back to Mr. Strahl's questioning on the derelict vessel issue. I think he did bring up a good point. There's obviously a cost to taxpayers that has to be considered, but there's also, I think, an equally valid point that there's a cost to Canadian waters, both environmentally and for navigation, if we leave these there. They're not always small crafts. There are some large vessels that we need to deal with. He referenced Ms. Crowder's private member's bill that has been recently reintroduced by Ms. Malcolmson, so we have the private member's bill that is asking these questions, and I understand there's interest from the Liberal side to look into this issue, which is welcome news.

I tried to ask in the last question about the U.S. Coast Guard and its powers and if we could learn anything from the United States in terms of how it deals with derelict vessels. Mr. Hutchinson, you mentioned “authority to act”. I think that's key. What can we do to look at jurisdictional issues?

Also, obviously, we were talking about the resourcing issues, so how can we better resource our Canadian Coast Guard to deal with this issue?

In two minutes, please.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Jeffery Hutchinson]

I referred earlier to the need for clearer authorities. I would say that's the strongest lesson that I personally would take from the American model.

The caution I would note on the American model is that in some jurisdictions, by having taken aggressive action on wrecks and derelicts, they've created, inadvertently, dumping grounds for wrecks and derelicts, because having a disposal process in place has meant that people have come to rely on it. I think we need to be very careful about that.

I would add simply that we're pushing into a policy area that's led by Transport Canada. We are willing participants in that policy discussion, and we do take the point that we're not just talking about 20-foot sailing boats that people don't want anymore; we're talking about, in some cases, significant risks to the environment.

For us, going back to my very first statement after I said thank you for having me here, our mandate is the protection of mariners and the protection of the marine environment. We see that very much at the core of this issue. Transport will see safe navigation as the core of the issue, and that's fair enough, but our focus is on protecting the marine environment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Donnelly. I'm sorry about that.

That being said, though, may I prevail on the committee for one quick point of clarification on what was said at the beginning? Is that okay?

At the beginning of your opening statement, you mentioned jurisdiction. I'm asking for clarification on this issue, because I want to make sure that everyone is straight on this.

As far as jurisdiction is concerned, there are three elements here. You're talking about monitoring, response, and on-water rescue. Once the response is charged, or in other words, once the JRCC kicks into place, you augment that part of the service. In other words, it's the Department of National Defence that would take the lead on any and all within the federal jurisdiction. Is that correct?

[Mario Pelletier]

For marine search and rescue, we work out of the joint rescue coordination centre, which includes both the Canadian Armed Forces and the Coast Guard. We look at the on-water one and the Canadian Armed Forces look at the air response. We're working jointly. Quite often we will dispatch an aircraft or a helicopter to the site of a marine incident. It's the same thing for an air accident that happens over the water or in the water. We will deploy the Coast Guard assets there. It is a very efficient way to approach it.

[Jeffery Hutchinson]

If I may, on the jurisdiction point, I'd like to add that there is no single minister responsible for search and rescue at the federal level.

The Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard is responsible for marine search and rescue. Pardon me for smiling when I say that title out loud. We're proud to have our name in his title.

The JRCC reflects the fact that we need both mandates present for decision-making. To have that decision-making happen across a room like this means that it's happening very quickly by experts who know what to deploy.

I did want to make the point, though, that our minister has the mandate for marine search and rescue, and that's part of the jurisdictional answer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you very much for that. I appreciate it.

The second part of our program today is committee business, but before we get to that, I would like to thank our guests today, who I thought did a great job.

Thank you very much, gentlemen. You were both informative.

Also, thank you for your service, as was pointed out earlier, and I thank you for today's service, because it benefited us well.

Monsieur Pelletier and Mr. Hutchinson, thank you so very much. We're going to continue on with committee business. You may carry on as you wish.

We're not in camera for this, so we might as well just keep on going.

Let's break for two minutes and then we'll be back with committee business.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Members, we'll proceed with committee business.

I'd like to talk about some of the logistics of getting witnesses together. The study has been passed, and now we need to talk about how we will get witnesses. We want to get moving on this right away, so in no particular order, I'd like to address that first, if that's all right.

You all have your calendars in front of you. For February 23, which is today, we had our briefing session and committee business. On February 25 we will have the second of two departmental briefings.

If you flip the page over to March, you'll notice that we have a break—sorry; we have a constituency week.

[An hon. member]

[Inaudible—Editor]

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Yes. We all have to get used to that.

Then we have March 8. It was brought to my attention that even though Thursday is the deadline for witnesses on our study of the MCTS—this is from the motion that we passed—the committee staff would like to get started on some witnesses. I guess what we're asking is that if there are obvious witnesses who you want to bring in, bring the names forward now despite the deadline of Thursday. This is for the benefit of our folks here, so that they can get working on witnesses.

Agreed?

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

Fair enough.