Fisheries Committee on Dec. 5th, 2016

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

I know you wouldn't, but I was asking the question.

[Kate Lindsay]

I would say it's appropriate to have relations with local and regional DFO staff to set those appropriate buffer distances.

Essentially, we have implemented what we call riparian area buffers adjacent to the watercourses, such that we don't want the temperature of the stream to increase. They really shouldn't feel the effects of forestry. It should be a distance that they wouldn't feel any warming impacts from a removal of vegetation.

I would say it was helpful. We had constructive relationships with regional DFO staff, and through the operational statement program, it was a notification system. If we were undergoing a clear-span bridge or a pretty routine activity, we would notify DFO of that. It gave them the opportunity to essentially spot-check or to audit. They could come out and check to see if all of the operational statements or mitigation measures were being implemented according to what we had set out to do.

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

Mr. Sullivan, regarding aquaculture, depending on what type of aquaculture, it is sometimes not well regarded, but I know you guys are doing mostly oysters and mussels.

You also do some finfish on land. Is that viable?

[Matt Sullivan]

Yes.

In terms of finfish, as mentioned, there is about a handful of companies, and really only one of them is doing the grow out on their land-based facility. Most of them are hatcheries and just egg production.

On P.E.I., they may be stage one, and then they'll be shipped to do the later stage development. It's a piece of the puzzle, I guess. Except for one company, it's not vertically integrated or the full process.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

You have a half a second, if you would like to say goodbye.

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

Thanks.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

You nailed it. Very good, sir.

Now we're going over to the opposition.

Mr. Arnold, you have five minutes, please.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all of the witnesses here today. Your testimony is certainly appreciated, and your time.

I guess my first questions would be for Mr. Gibson and Mr. Irving, and anybody else who wants to jump in. You talk about hydro dams and the high-head issues that are connected with those.

We've recently seen some changes on the Columbia River system, which flows initially out of British Columbia down through the U.S. They've made some significant changes to fish passage there, to where we now see a significant return of sockeye salmon in the lower Okanagan system.

I'm wondering if mitigation improvements to existing structures to allow better fish passage would be considered part of the offsetting requirements for new projects. Can you tell us if those types of improvements on an existing or a grandfathered system would be considered?

[Dan Gibson]

I think the field of fish passage is an interesting one.

To answer the question that came up earlier about the fish passage facilities at hydroelectric dams, I think in an anadromous sense, where you have saltwater fish returning to fresh water, we're much more often seeing fish passage at facilities on our coasts than there would be inland. The concept of fish passage is an interesting one, because that is an area where industry and Fisheries and Oceans have been able to develop some level of partnership and a lot of dialogue since 2012.

There have been a lot of advancements. There have been advancements, even on perhaps sturgeon passage at some facilities. Whether that equates to an offsetting method that goes into an authorization, I think those are table discussions that we are happy to have with DFO. However, as technologies advance, those would obviously be things that we look to incorporate at our facilities as we go through refurbishments and changes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Mr. Arnold, I have to interrupt for one second, and I sincerely apologize.

Mr. Bloomer, are you able to hear us?

[Chris Bloomer]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Your video feed has stopped here. I wanted to make sure you were still there. The only thing is that if you wanted to weigh in on the question, we would have no way of determining that. You're going to have to speak freely.

I'm not taking any time from you, Mr. Arnold.

Mr. Bloomer, if you're still with us and you can hear the proceedings, I'll ask Mr. Arnold to proceed.

[Chris Bloomer]

Yes, I can, sir.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Go ahead.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

That's relevant, because I want to pass part of this question on to Mr. Bloomer as well as Mr. Gibson and Mr. Irving. We've heard more than once now in these hearings that there was inconsistency in interpretation, application, and enforcement, both prior to and after the changes in 2012. Can you identify any specific areas where a better definition or intent within the act would be beneficial?

Maybe, Mr. Bloomer, since we can't see you, I'll allow you to answer first if you would.

[Chris Bloomer]

I'm fine on that question. I don't have any comment.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

No, I was asking if there are any specific areas you could identify where a better definition is needed.

[Chris Bloomer]

I'll go back to Ms. Lindsay's question around best practices. In respect of the pipeline association and the pipelines, there are a lot of best practices that have been put in place over a long time. A lot of the definitions in place, a lot of the guidances, are pretty straightforward so I wouldn't recommend any changes in that regard.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

You'd recommend just accepting some of those best practices rather than trying to define them in the act. Is that what I take as your recommendation?

[Chris Bloomer]

Yes, there's a long history of those practices. Just ensuring that they are being used is important, but I don't think we need to specify each and every one of them.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

Mr. Gibson.

[Dan Gibson]

It's a great question. I believe that the one-window service approach implemented through the new Fisheries Act was something that held great promise for our industry, whereby you weren't necessarily calling your certain bio that you worked with well; it was going into the triage unit, it was going to a certain bio, and then it was established. That was something that was welcomed, but just to reiterate, it's very young in the implementation phase of this act.

We're tripping on things like “serious harm” where we're not seeing what we thought would be a consistent definition and interpretation. We are still seeing a bit of misalignment in terms of understanding. We would hope those things would be codified or clarified through the review. Serious harm is where it begins, and then it trickles down through the rest of the implementation of the act. That would be our desire.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

I see Ms. Walmsley has a comment.

[Jay Walmsley]

Thank you so much.

I think one of the other areas that could be used is fisheries management objectives under section 6. Those clearly need defining at a regional level. We're really struggling with working out what that means, without having a clear definition.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Arnold.

Dr. Walmsley, thank you very much.

We're now going to go to Mr. Morrissey.