Fisheries Committee on Nov. 14th, 2016

[Marc Allain]

I have to be Solomon.

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

Remember, I have three minutes.

[Marc Allain]

We would take a sustainable development and a holistic approach, so we would say that you have to protect the social and economic development and coastal communities by also protecting the environment on which their economy rests.

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

Thank you.

I'll go to the Lake Ontario Waterkeeper for your top priority.

[Mark Mattson]

Thank you for a great question.

Our top priority would be to protect habitat by switching the onus back onto the proponent to show how and what they're going to do in terms of protecting fish and fish habitat instead of what it currently is now, where it's switched back to the public to show why they shouldn't get the permit.

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

Thank you. Now I'll ask the WWF.

[Elizabeth Hendriks]

I think we would go with a preamble, to make sure we have guiding principles to ensure that all decisions in the act follow suit within those guiding principles.

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

Thank you. Now I'll ask the Mining Association of Canada.

[Justyna Laurie-Lean]

It would be capacity and guidance. You can write the most beautiful legislation in the world, and if the department does not have the capacity to deliver it, it's not going to be delivered.

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

Great. Thank you very much. I'm sure I'm pretty close.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

You have a minute.

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

I have a whole minute. Fantastic. Look at how co-operative the witnesses can be.

I will only ask a question that I'm going to run out of time for, but it will be the preamble to perhaps a longer amount of time. It's on how the Fisheries Act can be improved to deal with cumulative impacts. I'll probably ask Waterkeeper to start and WWF, and then open it up to others who want to provide comment. Perhaps Waterkeeper could start off until the gavel comes down.

[Mark Mattson]

It's a really great question as well.

The old subsection 36(3) and the way it's currently worded, if the exceptions weren't given, was to prevent the deposit of a deleterious substance into waters frequented by fish. It did prevent cumulative impacts because it didn't allow the proponent to sample from the receiving waters. It had to sample from the actual discharging waters.

The idea was the precautionary principle was built into it. As long as no one put in deleterious substances—those that kill fish in 96-hour acute lethality tests or whatever else you want to use, such as Daphnia magna—and you didn't discharge water that was acutely toxic, then there wouldn't be a cumulative impact problem.

Now, with the new changes to the act, the government is going to have to find new ways to take into account cumulative impacts, how it's going to measure it, and how it's going to monitor it. With self-regulation it's going to be even harder, because the government somehow needs to be in charge to keep an eye on what's happening generally, aggregating that information and ensuring that the laws are put in place to prevent real destruction of fish and fish habitat. We shouldn't wait until that happens before we act.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Okay. Thank you very much. I'm going to have to cut it there. We do have time, as Mr. Donnelly pointed out, for a round of seven minutes each, as has been our custom. Each party will get seven minutes to end this off.

However, given the math, we will be approximately three or four minutes over time. Can I have consent from the entire committee that we can go over time by about three or four minutes?

Okay. Let's start with Mr. McDonald for seven minutes, please.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have a couple of questions, so I'll share my time with Mr. Finnigan.

My first question would be to Ms. Hendriks.

In your opinion, should rebuilding plans for depleted fish stocks be legally required by the Fisheries Act, and why?

[Elizabeth Hendriks]

Yes. I will flesh this out in our final submission. Can you just repeat the question, because I want to make sure I'm answering it? Plans for depleted...?

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Should rebuilding plans for depleted fish stocks be part of the Fisheries Act, and why?

[Elizabeth Hendriks]

Yes, because I think that's the role of mitigation and trying to address what has been lost, which should be a cornerstone of the Fisheries Act.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

How should requirements for stock rebuilding plans be incorporated into an amended act?

[Elizabeth Hendriks]

Again, please repeat it, just to make sure.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

How should requirements for stock rebuilding plans be incorporated into an amended act?

[Elizabeth Hendriks]

I'm going to give you a half-answer, because I want to make sure I consult the oceans experts. I would say again to go back to those principles. If we have guiding principles within our act, that would be half the answer. How are we including sustainability and precautionary principles into any recovery plans?

Then the specifics, I believe, would have to be in consultation with locals. Canada is large, and every fishery is slightly different. You would want to make sure you are consulting a broad range of stakeholders.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you. My next question would be for Mr. Gawn or Mr. Allain.

Being from the east coast, of course, as far east as you can get, I keep hearing—and even people around this table will hint—that we have an owner-operator policy that works, but I believe it doesn't. The west coast MPs will say that they want the east coast, what Newfoundland has, what Nova Scotia has. It doesn't work.

Why is not working? I know of instances of licences being held by the fish plant, by major corporations, or by someone who sits in a condo in Florida. Why is not working, and what do we have to absolutely do to fix it?

[Graeme Gawn]

I'll answer that.

Clearly it's not working because the policy that prohibits those corporations from owning those licences has not been enforced. That's why we're asking for those to be enshrined into law or regulation. These policies came out and they worked for a little while, but you'll find out that as the areas that don't have this problem yet start making more money in the fishery, these corporations will be targeting every place where there's money. It's about money and it's about control.

Owner-operator fisheries have worked exceedingly well for generations. That's been the traditional way. That's why fishermen are so in tune with their environment. It's because they're owner-operators. They've handed it down through generations, and that's what's missing.

It's about the ability of officials—not the Government of Canada, not this committee, not the minister of fisheries. It's the officials in the region who are able to bend those policies. That's what they've done in every case when these corporate interests have been able to gain control.

Fleet separation and owner-operator only protects one sector. The offshore sector has already gone privatized. Foreign companies own them today. Mink farmers own part of the herring allocation in our area. A Scottish company owns part of the herring allocation in our area. We're only talking about the inshore sector that's protected under fleet separation and owner-operator. That inshore sector is the lifeblood of hundreds and hundreds of communities along the coasts of the Maritimes and in Newfoundland, so that's why it's important that these policies become regulation.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Go ahead, Mr. Allain.