Thank you.
I want to again correct the record. There are significant habitat protections in the new Fisheries Act, as follows. “Serious harm to fish” is defined as
the death of fish or any permanent alteration to, or destruction of, fish habitat.
“Fish habitat” is defined as
spawning grounds and any other areas, including nursery, rearing, food supply and migration areas, on which fish depend directly or indirectly in order to carry out their life processes;
The idea that the new Fisheries Act has no habitat provisions is clearly false.
I should point out that the mining industry, when they presented to us, were very clear. They said:
...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.
They talked about the increased burden on mining project proponents.
I have also found a document that is the Auditor General's 2009 report regarding the old Fisheries Act. That auditor looked at 23 years of the old Fisheries Act. He or she says that the program's lack of success without sufficient support of science was likewise documented in the auditor's 2009 on the fish habitat management program, which indicated that the fish habitat management program actions over 23 years could not be demonstrated to have adequately protected fish habitat, and, by extension, fisheries.
We had some very interesting testimony—a week or so ago, I think—from the Canadian Federation of Agriculture, which talked about direct experience with the old Fisheries Act. Mr. Ron Bonnett is the president of the CFA. They represent 200,000 farmers across Canada. I will quote him now:
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....
He went on to say:
There are also many accounts of inconsistency in enforcement, monitoring, and compliance across Canada with different...organizations, which led to a confusion and indiscriminate approaches to enforcement and implementation. Even at the individual [farm] level, there were different interpretations of the act based on one's familiarity with agriculture. ... It is CFA's position that a complete revert to reinstate all provisions of the Fisheries Act as they were would be unproductive [and] re-establish the same problems for farmers, and...provide little improvement [in conservation]....
The municipal people I've spoken with right across the country express the same issues with regard to how the old Fisheries Act was done.
I'm asking you, Ms. Venton, given the problems that the agricultural community had with the Fisheries Act, the very grave problems—I represent an agricultural constituency—with inconsistencies, delays in permitting, and a general increase in costs to cash-strapped municipalities, why is it that you want farmers and rural communities to be subjected to what was a very inadequate old Fisheries Act?