So as a scientist who condemned our government for the changes to the act, you're telling me that you cannot find one example of a fish population or community that was harmed because of the changes we made to the act? I find that absolutely astonishing.
I should point out that in 2014 the sockeye salmon run in the Fraser River was over 20 million fish—the record in history. While I'm certainly not bold enough to take credit for that, that fish population surge occurred under the new Fisheries Act. To opine as you did—and I am referring to Mr. Olszynski as well—in very non-quantitative testimony in terms of fish.... You simply can't prove that there was any significant harm to fish production.
I should make the point as well that our new act focuses on fish production. I know it sounds very strange, but we're actually having an act based on fish. In prairie Canada for example—and I'll ask Mr. Olszynski this, because he comes from prairie Canada—we have a number of dams and reservoirs that made very significant alterations to fish habitat, such as Lake of the Prairies in Manitoba and Tobin Reservoir in Saskatchewan. Those particular major habitat alterations caused fish populations to explode and to do extremely well creating significant recreational fisheries.
Was the construction of those dams beneficial to fish or not, Mr. Olszynski?