Fisheries Committee on Nov. 21st, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Hello, everyone. Thank you to our witnesses for coming.

Colleagues, we are here once again to review the changes to the Fisheries Act. I won't go into the full motion, but pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Monday, September 19, the committee is to review changes made to the Fisheries Act.

Normally each group is assigned 10 minutes for opening remarks. Then we ask questions, and we will likely have several rounds. I'd like to remind members of the committee that we're going to have 15 minutes at the end, at 5:15, to do committee business.

I would like to welcome John Oliver from the riding of Oakville. He is replacing Mr. McDonald today. Welcome, sir.

We will go to our first group, the Canadian Federation of Agriculture. We have two representatives, Mr. Ron Bonnett and Mr. Drew Black.

Mr. Bonnett, please proceed.

[Ron Bonnett, President, Canadian Federation of Agriculture]

Thanks a lot, and thanks for the invitation to make a presentation. Some of you might wonder what farmers have to do with fish, but hopefully by the end of the presentation, you'll get a bit of grasp on it.

The Canadian Federation of Agriculture, for those of you who don't know, represents farmers right across the country. We're Canada's largest farm organization and represent about 200,000 farmers through general farm organizations and commodity organizations across the different provinces. Some of these farmers are all too familiar with the Fisheries Act in its previous form.

The experience that many farmers had with the Fisheries Act, unfortunately, was not a positive one. It was characterized by lengthy bureaucratic applications for permitting and authorizations, and a focus on enforcement and compliance measures taken by officials coupled with a lack of guidance or outreach on the purpose of these measures or information on how to navigate through the process.

Many farmers were then relieved when the changes that were made just a few years ago drastically improved the timeliness and cost of conducting regular maintenance and improvement activities to their farms as well as lifting the threat of being deemed out of compliance. That being said, I think we could find ourselves with an important opportunity to look at how protection can be enhanced in a way that works on the ground for those who earn their livelihood from productive natural resources.

Before I get into some of the proposed solutions to enhanced protection, it would be useful to explain a little further some of the challenges that farmers faced before changes were made to the act.

Most farmers interacted with the Fisheries Act and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans during the creation and maintenance phases of man-made physical works such as drainage ditches and irrigation canals. Periodically, these require maintenance to compensate for the sedimentation and vegetation growth that occurs. These features allow for the continued productivity of agricultural lands across Canada, and were never meant to be fish habitat.

Nonetheless, they fell under the Fisheries Act, and farmers found themselves forced to comply with all the rules that also applied to natural streams and rivers that provide quality fish habitat. There are also many accounts of inconsistency in enforcement, monitoring, and compliance across Canada with different empowered organizations, which led to a confusion and indiscriminate approaches to enforcement and implementation. Even at the individual level, there were different interpretations of the act based on one's familiarity with agriculture.

Throughout the life cycle of a physical work like a drainage ditch, regular maintenance requirements often triggered a long process to secure permits and authorizations. That added to the costs for farmers and uncertain timelines led to difficulties in scheduling the work.

With the arrival of phragmites, an invasive species that thrives in drainage ditches and is a significant problem in many parts of Canada, many farmers are forced to conduct maintenance activities more often. It was when these activities for maintaining drainage ditches triggered the harmful alteration, disruption, or destruction of fish habitat provisions, also known as HADD, that significant barriers and costs to farmers appeared.

Many farmers found HADD authorizations to be long and administratively burdensome, with the threat of enforcement overwhelming. Farmers, as well as municipalities, who rely on functioning drainage, were often frustrated by the process, particularly if the ditch did not contain any fish. At the heart of the issue was that human-made waterways were treated the same way as natural streams and rivers. These weren't made with any purpose of providing fish habitat, and in numerous cases had no fish presence.

It is CFA's position that a complete revert to reinstate all provisions of the Fisheries Act as they were would be unproductive, would re-establish the same problems for farmers, and would provide little improvement in outcome for the protection and improvement of fish habitat. Human-made water bodies such as drainage ditches simply should not be treated as fish habitat.

We feel that there are more constructive and efficient approaches that will serve to provide for fish habitat protection, yet also work on the ground so that barriers, costs, and frustrations do not mount in agriculture and rural communities. The current streamlined approach is working far better for all and efforts should continue this approach.

The CFA supports proactive and collaborative approaches to promoting fish habitat conservation and creation, rather than the strict and inconsistent enforcement of regulations. Overall, any changes to the current Fisheries Act should be considered as to how they will support outcomes-based conservation rather than a process-oriented approach.

Farmers are stewards of the land, and they aspire to leave the healthiest environments for their farms to the next generation. Many find intrinsic value in supporting biodiversity and water quality on the land, and the actions that have been taken by many exemplify this fact. At the same time, farmers recognize that they are contributing to the public good and services with little to no compensation provided.

There are ecological goods and service programs that have proven highly successful in meeting local environmental priorities, whether they be biodiversity, wetlands retention, species at risk, water quality, or others.

I'd like to take this opportunity to share just a few examples from my own farm of growing stewardship actions that have improved fish habitat outcomes. Through Growing Forward 2 and species at risk funding, we were able to access incentive programs that contributed to the improvement of fish habitat. More specifically, through the provincially delivered environmental farm plan and the Species at Risk Act, we put fencing in to keep our livestock sufficiently away from water courses, which has increased water quality and fish population.

In order to provide fresh water for our cattle, we installed a solar powered off-stream watering system. This has led to the rehabilitation of the stream that runs through our pasture areas. These are just two examples from a single farm in northern Ontario that illustrate how stewardship approaches have improved fish habitat in agricultural landscapes through means other than a regulatory-based approach under the Fisheries Act.

Ecological goods and service programs offer an excellent vehicle that should be explored further to improve the quality of fish habitat on or near agricultural lands. These can be implemented at the community scale, at the watershed level, or at the province-wide level, as P.E.I. has done. Manitoba has committed to the implementation of the alternative land use services program. In P.E.I.'s case, this program has set out to address water quality issues, and it incentivizes agricultural producers to maintain healthy and biodiverse riparian areas and setbacks from streams.

Farmers have access to best management practices that provide clear guidance to change management practices that have a positive environmental impact, often in response to regional priorities.

One of the potential areas that deserves additional thought is how to better address fish habitat requirements at the landscape and watershed level. In considering the scale of agricultural production and the types of projects that would be implemented on the farm, it is not reasonable to require permits, authorizations, habitat offsets, or other fee-based arrangements for every potential HADD disruption caused by drainage ditch maintenance.

Many small projects can add up to a cumulative impact on the landscape scale, and there should be in place the right incentives and tracking to ensure fish habitat is supported through ecological goods and services, and other programs that work with agricultural producers.

In implementing the Fisheries Act, the department should more clearly look to assess the risk damage to fish habitat by particular types of projects. Currently DFO looks at low-impact and high-impact projects, but the risk of a project disrupting or damaging fish habitat should be a part of that equation.

All of this, coupled with greater distinction between natural and human-created water bodies and the recognition and support of stewardship approaches, would lead to a workable fish habitat protection strategy for farmers. Providing guidance through best management practices and working through incentive-based programs and stewardship for farmers can accomplish significant protection of fish and fish habitat in human-created water infrastructure in a collaborative manner that regulation and the threat of enforcement simply cannot.

Thank you again for the opportunity to present.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Bonnett.

We'll now go to the Ecology Action Centre. Susanna Fuller is joining us. You have 10 minutes, please, for your opening presentation.

[Susanna Fuller, Senior Marine Conservation Coordinator, Ecology Action Centre]

Thank you.

My name is Susanna Fuller. I am the senior marine conservation coordinator at the Ecology Action Centre based in Halifax. Thank you for inviting me here again to speak to you on what I believe may be one of the most important endeavours you do together as parliamentarians and for Canadians.

I say that because the Fisheries Act is an incredibly important piece of legislation to Canadians. We cherish our fish and our aquatic habitats across this country. They are an important part of who we are. You have an opportunity to not only restore lost protections, but also to modernize the Fisheries Act in time for its 150th anniversary in 2018.

I am hoping that Canadians will be able to celebrate a modern and strong Fisheries Act that sets the stage for the next several decades of managing our fisheries and protecting their habitat, that we have a plan and adequate resources, including modern and efficient systems in place to effectively implement this new act, and that our modern Fisheries Act becomes an important part of the work we have to do to reconcile with first nations and Inuit peoples.

My experience with the Fisheries Act includes being involved in the consultations in 2007 and 2008 during previous attempts to modernize the act. Suffice it to say, I know this is not a light undertaking. However, I have to say that this time, from my conversations with other conservation organizations, scientists, industry associations, fishing associations, and first nations, there is considerably more alignment on a broad suite of recommendations for restoring and modernizing the act than the last time this was attempted. Over the past several months there has been active collaboration and discussion on recommendations to this process, much of it culminating in submissions by West Coast Environmental Law.

I sat for five years on the national fish habitat coordinating committee, where DFO and environmental organizations from across the country worked together to address concerns regarding the lack of implementation of the former section 35. I will provide a report of that work as part of my written submission, as there are several very useful and practical recommendations to improve the protection of fish habitat.

Finally, I am the proud owner of several DFO-issued pencils—possibly collectors' items—embossed with the tagline “No Habitat—No Fish”.

I have followed closely the presentations of this committee thus far in your process, and I am in agreement with much of what you have heard to date. I will take this opportunity to emphasize what I believe are the most critical aspects of a restored and modernized Fisheries Act. I will focus first on lost protections, and second on modern safeguards.

I do want to say that there are some aspects of the changes that were made in 2012 that improved the act, and some aspects of the regulations in 2013 that were also improvements. However, the deep cuts to staffing and evisceration of habitat programs across this country meant that any positive outcomes were hobbled at the start because of a lack of resourcing. Even prior to the 2012 changes, DFO was not adequately protecting habitat or reporting on habitat authorizations, as shown by the evidence presented by Dr. Martin Olszynski.

I have nine recommendations.

The first is that the language around “harmful alteration, disruption or destruction” be reinstated. My primary reason for this is that the Fisheries Act has been one of the strongest environmental laws in Canada because of case law. Canadians don't go to court easily, and when we do, we like the results to be long-standing. With the changes to HADD language, we lose those legal precedents. The additions of "activities" was an improvement made in 2012, and should be kept.

In terms of my second recommendation, I fully understand the concerns regarding the number of referrals in the early 2000s—up to 12,500—and the reasons for the 2004-05 environmental process modernization plan. However, I firmly believe there are new ways of working, including making it easy for proponents to request letters of advice and having all approvals added to a publicly accessible database. This will facilitate co-operation around habitat protection, improve monitoring, and manage cumulative impacts for government to be able to make a decision around an authorization when fish habitat is already facing too many threats at the watershed, landscape, or seascape scale.

My recommendation here is to not see a restored Fisheries Act as an impossibility to implement. We have many new tools and new ways of working since the 1986 habitat policy was put in place, and part of implementing a new act would be to use these tools, including the public registry of authorizations, with spatial and temporal mapping of these authorizations.

My third recommendation is to ensure that the impacts of fishing on fish habitat are regulated under the Fisheries Act. Habitat impacts are already being managed through the sensitive benthic areas policy to protect corals and sponges, as an example. Fisheries Act habitat protection should enable this from a legislative perspective.

My fourth recommendation regards the changes made through the aquaculture activities regulations regarding pesticide use in the open-net pen aquaculture industry. These should be considered as part of lost protections. Particularly with the removal of enforcement by Environment and Climate Change Canada, there has been an increase in pesticide use that directly impacts other marine species, including the commercially important lobster.

On modern safeguards, the Fisheries Act has the potential to be a significant legislative tool to help Canada meet its commitments under the United Nations fish stocks agreement, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the sustainable development goals, particularly goal 14, on the oceans.

Fifth, in terms of modernizing the act, we have an obligation to add the basic principles of good management, many of which Canada has championed in international agreements and management of fisheries in areas beyond national jurisdiction, and within some of our own policies. These include the precautionary principle, the ecosystem approach, transparency, co-management, and commitment to science-based decision-making. Including these in the Fisheries Act is important both for continuity with international agreements as well as to enable these principles in our own management of fisheries and their habitats. These principles will help to enable many policies within the sustainable fisheries framework, and therefore provide a legal enabling basis tor these policies.

Sixth, reduce the level of ministerial discretion. Put simply, it's impossible to follow scientific advice or plans coming out of co-management—and I can tell you, there are many instances where our fisheries have further declined because science is not adhered to—when there is such a high level of discretion. It's far too easy to advocate various positions to the minister and have a decision swing one way or the other. We need an act that can withstand the political cycle and lobbying by all stakeholders, conservation groups included.

Seventh, Canada's fisheries are incredibly important culturally, socially, and economically to coastal communities, including first nations, Inuit, and recreational fishers, to name a few. Our country was founded in part because of our abundance of fisheries resources.

I live in Nova Scotia and fisheries were our largest export this past year. Without our wild fisheries, our province and other coastal provinces would be much less self-sufficient and resilient than we are today. A modern Fisheries Act must include provisions that require rebuilding depleted fish stocks, and timelines and targets for this rebuilding. An annual report to Parliament on the progress towards these efforts should be mandated.

My colleague, Julia Baum of the University of Victoria, and I, recently authored a report reviewing the health of fish stocks in Canada and a paper reviewing measures in place to protect at-risk marine fish under the Fisheries Act. Suffice it to say that there are far too many marine fish populations that are severely depleted and designated as either threatened or endangered by COSEWIC, the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada.

For socio-economic reasons, we typically do not list commercial species under the Species at Risk Act, and when they are not listed, they are to be managed under the Fisheries Act. Yet the Fisheries Act does not require stock rebuilding, so more often than not, very little happens to recover these species and they continue to decline.

Both of your other studies on northern cod and wild Atlantic salmon deal with species that are currently considered endangered yet are incredibly important to Canadians. The recent Auditor General report on sustaining Canada's fisheries found that out of 15 endangered marine fish populations, only two had rebuilding plans. Our Fisheries Act should be a tool to recover these species, and currently our legislation lags well behind that of the United States though the Magnuson-Stevens act, and the European Union through the common fisheries policy, two examples of developed fishing nations with whom we share fish populations.

My eighth recommendation concerns the fact that fisheries are a public resource, one of the very few in Canada. As such, they should be managed for the public good, with economic benefits for as many Canadians as possible, and in particular for our coastal communities and independent fishermen. This ensures that the wealth created naturally in our oceans remains in our communities.

My ninth recommendation is to ensure that the new act has a strong and well-articulated purpose. A law of this importance should not be purposeless, as it has been since 1986. This purpose should ensure that current and future policy frameworks are enabled by the act, including those on desired conservation, social, and economic outcomes.

Finally, I know the committee takes its work seriously and that timelines are very tight. There's an incredible amount of information to digest, but I hope you complete your report on this work and the recommendations for a restored and modern Fisheries Act with both courage and ambition.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you.

Finally, for a 10-minute introduction, we're going to the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs.

We'll hear from the vice-president, Chief Robert Chamberlin.

[Chief Robert Chamberlin, Vice-President, Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs]

[Witness speaks in Kwakwala]

I want to also acknowledge that I'm on Algonquin territory, the unceded territories, and I do not take this acknowledgement lightly. It is something that's very serious and dear to us as first nations people.

My traditional name is Owadi. I'm the elected chief councillor from the Kwikwasut'inuxw Haxwa'mis First Nation. Many of you may know our territories as the Broughton Archipelago, or ground zero of the fish farm fight in British Columbia. I've served as the elected chief councillor for 12 years, six consecutive terms. I am finishing my second three-year term as the vice-president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs. I am also the chair of the first nation wild salmon alliance, and I have a deep background in fisheries, especially as it relates to aquaculture, fish farms, and the Cohen commission. I'm really happy that I made some very brief summary notes of the presentation that I was planning on making, so I'll just go through this and touch on some of the other aspects.

The Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs has been in existence since 1969. We take a very strong view, perspective, and stance on aboriginal title and rights. We seek every opportunity to advance the recognition of the inherent right and authority that first nations have in Canada. We advocate at every level possible. That's why you find me sitting here at this table with all of you this afternoon.

In terms of the topic at hand, I want you to understand the background of my people. Wherever I travel, I'm always very proud to say that we are clam diggers and fish eaters, and very proud of both. When you consider that statement, clams are found below the ocean floor and the salmon are found in the watersheds of our territories, so we have environmental concerns that extend below the surface of the ocean to the very tops of the trees at the height of land in our traditional territories and everything in between. When the government takes steps to make changes that are going to affect various industries and activities found within our territories, we are going to demand that we have a great say in what is going to occur.

Of course, now, with the new Liberal government, first nations across Canada, including myself, have taken great hope in the statements of this new government wanting to redevelop a relationship with first nations people, and most importantly, to revisit any legislation, regulation, management practice, or policy that was not properly and adequately consulted with first nations to satisfy the honour of the crown. As first nations people, we live in a world of the Constitution and Supreme Court of Canada rulings, and we are forever pushing the government and reminding them as gently or as strongly as necessary of their very own laws that they choose to abrogate, disregard, or take on with the most minimal of views.

Certainly, this is very much true and what we're here to talk about today with those omnibus bills that changed no less than 70 different pieces of legislation and law within one bill. Certainly, I've read in the newspaper many times over about this being construed as a miscarriage of democracy within the Canadian government. I certainly heard that loud and clear from the opposition parties.

Here we are today looking to what Prime Minister Trudeau included in the DFO minister's letter, where he spoke very much about reinstating all of the things that were less than gloriously ripped out of the oceans act, such as the HADD permitting, making sure that there is habitat ready provide for the sustenance and abundance of wild fisheries across Canada. The omission at the minister's whim to remove tracts of water from this very protection is just unfathomable, when you think of it, from a country such as Canada that has enjoyed a great foundation built upon marine resources. The traditions of our people in British Columbia, coast-wide and well up into the very headwaters of the Fraser, the Skeena, and the Nass rivers, have provided fish for our people's sustenance.

As all of you are probably more aware than most Canadians, I've been privy to various reports on the state of first nations economy and the poverty that many of our communities live in. When this is true, and I know that it is true, then we rely our upon our traditional foods for the very survival of our people through the cold winters. It is not that we happen to enjoy barbequing a salmon or having clams in the winter; it is what we require to make it through life on a daily basis. This is heightened as you go into the most remote communities and as you learn the challenges that they face in terms of economy and of accessing foods to live.

I think about what's happened here with Bill C-38. It went through the phased approach, where it gets royal assent in the first go-round and then we leave the second phase up to the Governor General. Theoretically, the second phase would open up a door for some measure of consultation with first nations, but the problem is that the whole ball of wax has already gotten royal assent, so it's a meaningless consultation. This is not what I see as the crown's duty to uphold its honour.

When I think of this Canadian government now unequivocally embracing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, there are very significant portions of that which relate to the topic at hand today with regard to the environment, our traditions, our cultures, our values, and our traditional food sources. Canada, on one hand, is now embracing the UN declaration, and we are faced with the changes that came through the omnibus bill. All of the safeguards that were taken out of this act need to be reinstated, at minimum, right now. We need to turn our attention to the developing leading-edge science, which is becoming available through the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and other sources, to further inform and guide the management practices of the DFO.

In British Columbia, my focus has always been on wild salmon, and I've learned that the outward migrating salmon are probably the least understood. That component of this sacred resource is not understood. How can we adequately develop management plans when this one very significant piece has no science to validate management decisions?

Of course, when I start to think about the changes in the definitions of aboriginal fisheries and commercial fisheries, it's really offensive to me that the Supreme Court of Canada has defined aboriginal rights and access to fish, yet this bill—taking in all the many components—attempts to limit that to a fishery, rather than a right to fish. The problem that I see with that is.... I think of my dear friend Grand Chief Ed John of the Carrier Sekani people and the early Stuart sockeye run of the Fraser River. They have not touched that run in decades. The reason is that it is so depleted, they can't fathom taking fish out of there for worry about the annihilation of the run. That portion of the Fraser River, conceivably, could be forgotten under this existing Bill C-38.

We have to really take a look at what is an aboriginal fish. We have to reinstate the HADD permitting. When I think about the portions that talk about the agreements with the province to take on pieces of this work in conjunction with DFO, I am appalled that there is no mention of the same arrangement with first nations people.

When it talks about the province being well suited to engage on the management of fisheries, there is nobody in this country who is better suited to participate in the active management of fisheries—certainly in British Columbia and, I would say, across Canada—than first nations people. We are born into this. It is part of our genetic makeup. We understand our lands. We know what's going wrong. What we have is a government that has turned a deaf ear to the things that we express and to what we see as a meaningful path forward to safeguard the resources that we rely upon. The government must pursue a co-management agreement with first nations.

In my experience as elected chief of the Kwikwasut'inuxw Haxwa'mis, I've learned about the HADD permitting in relationship to fish farms. What I found was appalling. There's this one company—I won't name the name—that was able to develop a marine bank, an area where they restored so many hundred thousand cubic metres of underwater environment. That was their bank, so they could destroy that same amount in our first nations territory. It made no sense. It would be like tearing down the arena here in Kenora and rebuilding a new one in Toronto as some sort of way to compensate. It does not make sense.

When I say that I want to see the reinstatement of the HADD permits, I want to know—and I want to advance to each of you—that when mitigation measures are going to be developed and there is going to be a permit, then they will be developed with the first nations who hold the title for the lands where the destruction is going to occur. Anything less is not going to be very successful to first nations.

We must really understand that this bill contemplates looking after fisheries rather than fish. If we're not going to take our greatest minds and learned execution of understanding into the protection of habitat, we are not going to have fish. If we don't have healthy and abundant ecosystems that will lay the groundwork for the fish to be able to produce and survive, then we will have nothing.

I want to impress upon you the catastrophe that I know has happened with the cod stocks in Newfoundland and on the east coast of Canada. We must embrace the principles of the Cohen commission in British Columbia. We must understand that there are a lot of holes in the science that guides management of fisheries in British Columbia, and we must expand on things such as the genome work that Dr. Kristi Miller is doing with DFO.

We must expand on the closed containment initiative of Kuterra, of the 'Namgis First Nation on the north end of Vancouver Island, and we must take the fish farms out of the ocean and put them on the land. If you think about it, we will then be able to provide a greater opportunity for economic development to a broader range of first nations that don't necessarily have to be coastal. It will meet many of the goals that the government has stated to close the socio-economic gap that first nations are faced with.

As we go down the road, it must be done hand in glove with first nations people. We must take a look at all the various sections from section 35, 37, and 38, and understand that we must revisit these with first nations, and I say re-engage, not consult and accommodate. We must re-engage with first nations, consistent with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, so we will accomplish what the Supreme Court of Canada has given direction to Canada to do, to uphold the crown's honour and to move toward true reconciliation of presumed crown title, with the underlying aboriginal title of first nations people in Canada.

I want to ensure that we move forward collectively with first nations and that we reinstate HADD, at a minimum, and build on that with current and emerging science, such as the Pacific Salmon Foundation and their Salish Sea marine survival project. These are wonderful examples of new tools that are consistent with the Liberal government's commitment to do so.

Thank you, Scott.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Chief Chamberlin. I appreciate that.

I'm sorry about the time constraints, but such is the creature we are for trying to fit all of this into two hours.

Nevertheless, thank you, but I'm sure a lot of that can be worked into the questions and answers that are coming up, because we're having the whole meeting on this one group. We've chosen not to break them up, as has been the practice in the past.

We now go to the floor for questions and answers.

Mr. Finnigan, you have seven minutes, please.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the panel for appearing in front of us today to help us make recommendations toward the new Fisheries Act.

I am a farmer myself and I know Mr. Bonnett. I've met him on many different occasions, mostly regarding farm activity, but again here today on this issue of drainage, as you said, or any other activity that then becomes a wetland or becomes environmentally sensitive. I think almost every farm has had that rude awakening.

On the other hand, you could probably fish in some drainage ditches, and when you clean, silt is going back into the rivers. We know that causes a lot of harm to many different species. How do we deal with this? Is the onus always on the farmer or is there a community responsibility? How can we work to provide the right resource when you're going to clean a ditch? You would have resources, but how do you go about it and how do you mitigate this huge expense on the farm?

[Ron Bonnett]

I think there are two things. The one thing I mentioned was conservation and stewardship initiatives to incent farmers to do the right thing. Sometimes this isn't necessarily on the drainage ditches; it's on water courses that are through their farms.

On the drainage ditch maintenance thing, you have to recognize these were man-made facilities to start with. Before they were even put there, there was no fish habitat. They were just trying to get rid of that extra water.

There has to be an understanding that as part of that cycle, they do have to be cleaned out. If you look at it from a pragmatic point of view, you see that you may be destroying one habitat here, but what you're actually doing is creating new habitat for several years down the road. It's almost like a rotation.

I would suggest this goes back to the regional plan. If you look at the regional plans for drain maintenance, you see that drain maintenance should be staggered so you're not all in one place at one time.

The other thing you look at is where that drain interacts with the natural water course. That's likely the area of most risk. With that, when taking a look at developing best management practices for dealing with that drain on the maintenance, it would make more sense to take a look at a number of drains, and say these are the types of things that need to be done rather than have to go through a complex set of approvals and engineering designs for every individual drain, because all that does is adds costs to the system. It really doesn't address the risk.

If you look at the risk where they interact, understand there's going to have to be some maintenance damage done while you're doing those drains, but see if you can get a unified approach to do it that isn't based on every drain having to have an individual design, with all the inherent engineering. It would cut the cost and it would still meet the concerns of dealing with any risk to fish habitat.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Bonnett.

Now I'll move to Ms. Fuller.

In your view, should the HADD or harmful alteration, disruption, or destruction of fish habitat, be restored? Do you believe we should go to that original act? If so, should it be interpreted and implemented by DFO?

For the second part of it, how do you include the agriculture sector or the forestry sector? How do we make this work altogether? Should this be their responsibility? Again, I'll ask the same question basically as I asked Mr. Bonnett.

[Susanna Fuller]

I do believe HADD should be reinstated. I think there's some work to be done under the regulations that can incentivize fish habitat conservation.

One of the things I find remarkable is industries like farming and forestry have more restrictions on fish habitat than the fishing industry, which is interesting.

I'm thinking back to the Species At Risk Act, where there are conservation agreements and there are ways of protecting species at risk across the landscape. I think there can be a lot more work in terms of understanding cumulative impacts, knowing where habitat has been altered, particularly if it's not a man-made or human-made drainage ditch, understanding at that landscape level where those impacts have been authorized. In that way, at a biological level, we could do much more around conservation of freshwater fish, in particular.

I have to say my expertise and my background is in marine fish, so I may not be able to speak as articulately around freshwater habitat, but I do think there's a willingness across many stakeholders to work together. Nobody wants to destroy fish habitat. How do we do it in a way that is not a regulatory burden but is a stewardship perspective? I think that's quite possible.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Chief Chamberlin, in the last 25 years there have been a lot of court decisions that have recognized the rights of first nations to access fish and rivers, and so on. I've asked the question—I can't remember to whom. We depend a lot on the scientific evidence. We're trying to depend on that, but there is a lot of knowledge, as you stated, Chief Chamberlin, that the first nations communities have. The courts have recognized them.

Should that be enshrined also in the act? How can we work together and make sure there are proper consultations with first nations? I have four first nations in my community, and I would like to hear your views on that.

[Chief Robert Chamberlin]

First, I want to say you're fortunate to have four first nations in your riding.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Yes, they are very good communities.

[Chief Robert Chamberlin]

In terms of scientific evidence and traditional ecological knowledge—that's what I gather your question is—how can we advance the traditional ecological knowledge of a first nation without having some measure of management agreement? That was part of my comments about the federal government or DFO looking to pursue something with the province, or the potential. I think we need to turn and look to examples that are in Canada, as well as around the globe, where we have co-management in existence.

One organization that I'm aware of is the Skeena Fisheries Commission. They've made great strides in incorporating traditional ecological knowledge. The path they laid out for us can be replicated, and I think that it needs to be supported and continued. But without adequate resourcing, there is always going to be a challenge in terms of getting through any measure of consultation.

I think—not think, I know—that today, with Canada's embracing of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, first nations have a much stronger perspective on how they wish to re-engage with the Canadian government on all manner of topics. This is something that's entirely consistent with the government's commitment to Canadians and to first nations alike.

We need to think outside the box. We need to learn from the past governments' misdeeds, in terms of ignoring the consultative requirement as well as the absence of resourcing for first nations to participate. TEK is something that I know first nations possess. It's something that DFO has stated it wants to hear. I think the burden is to get it through the bureaucracy that this is more than just anecdotal stories about what we understand of our lands and territories.

I hope that answers your question.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Yes. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Finnigan. Sorry about that, but you may get a chance later on.

I'm going to turn to Mr. Sopuck, from the opposition, for seven minutes, please.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you.

It's very important to make it clear, though.... People talk about lost protections. The amended act said that “serious harm to fish” was defined as, “the death of fish or any permanent alteration to, or destruction of, fish habitat”, with “fish habitat” defined as spawning grounds and any other grounds, and so on. The point that the new Fisheries Act caused habitat protections to be lost is simply not true.

The Mining Association of Canada, which talked to us at the last meeting, said in its testimony:

...the 2012 changes to the Fisheries Act have in practice broadened the circumstances in which the section 35 prohibitions apply and increased the circumstances in which an authorization and offsets are required.

Industry practitioners, who actually had to deal with the new Fisheries Act, pointed out that, in terms of the projects they were involved with, our changes to the act—and I use “our” because I was part of the old government and on the fisheries committee—actually increased habitat protections.

Ms. Fuller, I have a question for you. Can you point to any example of damage to a fish population or a fish habitat in Canada caused by the changes that were made to the old Fisheries Act? I want a specific example.

[Susanna Fuller]

As I said, my expertise is not in fresh water. I will say that one of the difficulties was the closing of some of the habitat offices and the reduction of resourcing. As you would know, we need scientists, enforcement officers, and compliance officers to actually track that information, so we don't know. From the work I did with NGOs between 2006 and 2010, I know that even municipalities said, on a daily basis, that they lost fish habitat.

We saw the authorizations go way down, but there is no information out there. I work quite closely with people who used to be in the habitat branch, who feel terrible that they cannot actually go and do their jobs. I would say that the case of the Atlantic whitefish, which is, I think, now completely extirpated from where it used to be, is a good example of where either we have lost fish habitat or we have done something to the fish. The lack of care around that particular species, if you want an example.... This is one that has essentially gone extinct or been extirpated from where it used to exist.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

But that clearly wasn't involved with the changes that we made to the Fisheries Act.

That's a question, Ms. Fuller, that I have asked of a number of environmental activists who have presented to our committee on the Fisheries Act, and so far I'm batting a thousand. Nobody has been able to point to a specific example of damage to a fish population or a fish community as a result of the changes we made to the Fisheries Act.

Mr. Bonnett, as you well know, I represent a large agricultural constituency, and the farmers of my constituency had the same issues with the Fisheries Act that you so eloquently outlined. I want to commend you on your presentation from the CFA, because you provided us with clear guidance and recommendations, as well as very clear and specific examples, that will help us in our deliberations.

I was very taken, Mr. Bonnett, with your comment that we should support outcomes-based conservation as opposed to process outcomes. I think that's a very important point. Can you elaborate on that for us?

[Ron Bonnett]

I think it's very easy sometimes to get caught up in putting regulations in place that you think may solve a problem, without actually having the hard evidence looking at what will change. Even if I take a look at the work that's been done on our own farm, such as fencing back from those water courses and getting the cattle out of those streams, the bank damage is gone and the water quality is cleaned up. I'm seeing fish in those streams that I haven't seen before. There are geese and beavers. All of this wildlife habitat is coming back, just because of some simple changes that were done on the ground.

However, there might be places where you would end up with a regulation. I put a tile drainage outlet into that area a while ago and it was a difficult case in getting permission for access, even though that's providing more fresh water into that stream. Taking a look at the broad picture of the outcome and if the habitat is being improved in general in the region is more effective than having regulations.

I go back to what I mentioned earlier about taking a look, on a regional basis, especially at man-made drains, and recognizing that some are going to have to be maintained every year. By doing that maintenance, you actually create the situation where you have habitat at different levels of development all the way through that process. You do recognize that, at the end of the day, some of those drains are going to have to be cleaned and there's going to be damage in that local area, but then the overall picture is that fish habitat has been enhanced. That would be a case where, if the regulation says you don't damage the habitat around that drain when you're contacting it, then you can't do anything with it. The drains block up and then, all of a sudden, you don't have any fish habitat at all. You have to really take a look at the broader outcome that you're looking for.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Again, we looked at the testimony from the previous Parliament and the deputy minister at the time who talked about 12,000 applications on their desks under the old Fisheries Act. He implied very strongly that it was clearly unworkable to have all these small projects brought to the department.

I'd like to make a point again that the new Fisheries Act allowed for something called the recreational fisheries conservation partnerships program. There were hundreds of projects supported right across the country, with some very measurable and specific outcomes. That program worked extremely well. I'm pleased that, so far, the new government has kept that program in place.

I'm still staying with Mr. Bonnett. You talked about incentives versus regulations. Should there be a well-funded, environmental incentive program, as part of the new Growing Forward initiative?

[Ron Bonnett]

That's one thing we're asking for, especially on the environmental side. We're looking at investments there, but we're also taking a look at other departments too, where they might make investments in agriculture to meet some of the other objectives. This gets very broad, with not only water quality and fish habitat. It could be taking a look at agriculture's role in reducing the carbon footprint going forward. We have to start taking a look at how we can incent people to do things that are going to get that outcome that you want.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

As someone who represents an agricultural constituency, my view is that farmers respond very strongly to the incentive approach as opposed to regulations and are more than willing to work with conservation agencies, departments, and groups to improve environmental outcomes. Would you agree with that statement, Mr. Bonnett? Just give us some examples that you're familiar with from across the country, perhaps the cows and fish program in Alberta or something else.

[Ron Bonnett]

There are a number of examples. There's the cows and fish program in Alberta. Prince Edward Island's doing a lot of work under the alternative land use services.

Regarding your comment about regulations versus incentives, farmers have been known to be somewhat independent. If somebody comes in with a clipboard and writes you up on regulations, usually that isn't the start of a good relationship. If a conservation person comes in and starts talking to you about things that you could do to improve the habitat and that they have some programs they think you could fit into, then it's a whole different conversation.

I'm going back to what you mentioned about the outcome. Quite often what we see at the farm level is that where there's a win, sometimes, for the environment, then there's also a win for the farmer.