Fisheries Committee on Nov. 25th, 2020

[Richard Williams]

C and P coverage fisheries officers are important, but they're not the solution to the problems we're dealing with today. We have to move forward on negotiations to resolve the questions around moderate livelihood and to establish a basis on which harvesters in first nations and non-first nations communities can start working together to develop a successful fishery. Yes, C and P is a part of this picture, but the real priority has to be on moving forward quickly and effectively with the negotiation of a new treaty on aboriginal fisheries.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you.

I do apologize for the mix-up in translation for our witness. I did allow for extra time to capture back what was being lost. I hope I was fair on that.

We'll now go to Mr. Johns for six minutes or less, please.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for your really important testimony today.

Back in December 1999, this committee presented a report on the Marshall decision and its implications for the management of the Atlantic fisheries. The report found that DFO was caught off guard and didn't have a contingency plan, knowing that the Mi'kmaq fishers would be on the water and threatened by commercial fishers.

Here we are in 2020 and the Mi'kmaq fishers have been threatened and intimidated, traps have been cut and a building has been burned down. In the last 21 years, do you get the impression that DFO has developed a plan to keep the Mi'kmaq fishers safe when they're on the water, or do you feel that DFO has been caught off guard again?

Maybe I'll start with you, Mr. Clarke, because you talked about DFO staff not even having gas in their tanks and about the cuts. Do you feel they're adequately resourced to protect those fishers from their boats being rammed and from the confrontation that's taking place on the water when they're exercising their treaty and constitutionally protected right?

[Alan Clarke]

I think there are two particular issues with the problem.

First of all, I wouldn't even try to comment on present-day realities, but I've heard from some of my colleagues who are still with the department. That's why I recommended that the standing committee should listen to them, in the field, today, and not look for advice from a has-been who was there 20 years ago, talking about what problems I had.

I've talked to the officers now and there's a lot of frustration within the field staff. I've talked to one recent supervisor, you probably have heard of him, Gary Hutchins from Meteghan, the area that included the complex in St. Marys Bay. He took early retirement because he and his staff were told through the chain of command to stand down their enforcement activities in St. Marys Bay after the minister made her announcement on September 17. I think it would be appropriate for this committee to talk to fishery officers in the field now, and I mean in the field. I don't mean the director general in Ottawa, or the regional director in Halifax. They're part of the problem, in my opinion.

When I was in fisheries, the chain of command was very clear. You had to progress from a fishery officer to a supervisor to a detachment supervisor to an area chief to a regional director and then to the director general of C & P.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

I really appreciate that.

Mr. Williams, I really appreciate that you talked about the economic benefits. The Sipekne’katik we know is the second-largest Mi'kmaq community in Nova Scotia and the community has been affected by centralization, oppression under the Indian Act, and the intergenerational effects of the residential schools. Basically, given these colonial oppressions that have kept their people from entering the middle-class society in Canada, do you support that they must determine themselves what a moderate livelihood is?

And Mr. Williams, I do appreciate that you did speak clearly about the economic benefit and the growth in terms of indigenous participation in the fishery. Can you also speak about what that economic impact has been also on the communities where they live?

[Richard Williams]

The economic impact on the community has been, in a few cases, huge in terms of employment. There are bands like the Elsipogtog in New Brunswick where they have almost 80 fishing boats fishing in the crab and lobster fisheries and 300 people earning more than moderate livelihoods as active fishermen.

There are other communities where, for one reason or another, those kinds of employment opportunities and engagement as harvesters on the water haven't taken place. I think Sipekne'katik is one instance but several other first nations in Nova Scotia have followed different paths in pursuing their objectives.

I hesitate to pass judgment on the choices made by any particular first nation, but I think it is wise at this stage for people in your position and my position to stand back and wait for clear and constructive leadership to develop directions to emerge across the collectivity of first nations in Nova Scotia and in the Maritimes. I think—

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Do you believe that this committee shouldn't be undermining any discussions that the nation is having currently on a nation-to-nation basis with Canada?

[Richard Williams]

No, I think we should be accelerating and supporting moving forward as quickly as possible. I worry about the most militant voices in some instances calling the shots. I think wiser heads really need to prevail in this situation, without passing judgment on anyone.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Berry, you talked about equality. Before Marshall, the Mi'kmaq weren't included in conversations about access to fisheries. Given that there was no equal access for generations, what does equality look like to you now that they're exercising their constitutionally and treaty-protected right?

[Bernie Berry]

It's going to take a while. It has taken 21 years to this point to get first nations involved in the commercial fishery through the Marshall initiative and some other programs.

Moving forward, I think the first nations will get more access, but there are a couple of nuances there. There can only be one regulator here.

What you pointed out earlier about St. Marys Bay and the Shubenacadie band.... That fishery is not recognized. The DFO—the minister—did not issue those licences. This is not an authorized fishery as of yet. There have to be negotiations ongoing to determine what that type of fishery looks like.

I can't see how you can have, in this case, two regulators. Other first nations want to regulate their own fishery also. That simply isn't going to work, because you have 35 first nations in Atlantic Canada. Everybody's going to want at some point to regulate their own fishery.

That's not going to work. You must have one regulator and one set of regulations concerning conservation and stuff like that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you. We have gone way over time.

We'll now go to Mr. Williamson, for five minutes or less, please.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have a couple of questions. I think I'll start with Mr. Williams.

You gave some of these figures on the growth of indigenous fisheries, and the minister alluded to it as well by talking about how the landings have grown from the Marshall decision to today from about $3 million to $120 million. We see, then, increased activity, which obviously would bring about increased economic opportunity and some level of prosperity.

You mentioned that there would be an impact upon the non-indigenous fishing community and fishing families from the changes that are being contemplated.

Could you talk to us about what you think some of those impacts are going to be? I think you were suggesting they would not all be positive.

[Richard Williams]

Fisheries management today, within a conservation regime, is a zero-sum game. If new entrants come into the industry or new fishing effort is brought into the industry, then effort has to be taken out—and maybe people are going to have to be taken out—somewhere else.

Much of the anxiety and the reaction we are seeing happening at the community level right now is because there is no clear direction on that; there's no clear policy or understanding of how this is going to be managed. If we're going to maintain conservation and bring a whole new set of actors into the industry, what is the process for it to take place?

In 1999, in the initial Marshall process, the process was that licences were purchased from retiring harvesters and transferred into first nations communities. People thus understood, as things settled out, how it was going to happen and that the net effect was going to be neutral or beneficial.

In the current environment there is no clear direction or understanding. There's a great deal of rumour and concern about an aggressively expanding new fishery, and no understanding at all about how it's going to take place without severe impacts upon people who are caught in the backlash from it.

That's the lack of current policy and direction that I think needs to be addressed as a priority.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

I think you're potentially right about that. I tried to get some answers from the minister last night on managing the change DFO is considering.

Do you have any recommendations on how it should happen? When you use terms such as that people are going to have to be “taken out”, they suggest...it's pretty dark. You can understand why people are concerned about these decisions, when they're getting so little information from the minister and DFO.

[Richard Williams]

What's missing is a coherent approach. We need to move forward on three different initiatives. One is moving forward with negotiations on moderate livelihood and a new treaty. The second one is creating a structure where non-native industry stakeholders are part of that process and have a way to be at a certain table. They're not part of the nation-to-nation negotiation but they have to be feeding into it. The third thing is that we need to create structures where non-native and native harvesting leaders are working together to answer the kinds of questions you're raising: How would we work together in this new environment, and how would we manage the transition in this new environment?

It's not enough to just push forward on the negotiations. It's certainly not enough just to put more fisheries officers on the water. We need a comprehensive, clear, fast-track approach on all three levels.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Do you think the Government of Canada, DFO, Crown-Indigenous Relations, one of these entities, should be involved in negotiating what a moderate livelihood means? Is that subject to negotiation, do you think?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

You have 20 seconds.

[Richard Williams]

It has to be negotiated. That's the great lack of clarity in the Marshall decision—what that means in practical terms. People in the commercial industry would greatly prefer to see first nations pursue moderate livelihoods through integrating into the commercial fishery rather than creating a separate, siloed, self-managed fishery. That's what has to be resolved.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you.

We'll now go to Mr. Cormier for five minutes or less, please.

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will start with you, Mr. Williams. If I'm not mistaken, you wrote a book called A Future for the Fishery: Crisis and Renewal in Canada’s Neglected Fishing Industry. Is that right?

[Richard Williams]

That's correct. Thank you for the plug.

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Good.

How do you see the future of the fisheries in, say, Atlantic Canada but also in Canada? In terms of what's going on right now and also what's happened in the past couple of decades, how can we make sure that the fishery we have in Canada is not only sustainable but is there for the younger generation, the first nations and everybody who lives in this country?

[Richard Williams]

This fishing industry today is booming. There's every reason to believe that we can sustain that dramatic growth into the future. We are managing most of our commercial fish stocks now on a sustainable basis.

As I mentioned in my introduction, the biggest challenge in many ways is going to be finding the people to keep this industry going in its current structure. You just passed a new Fisheries Act that clearly identifies a policy objective to retain ownership and control of access rights within communities and within the harvesting sector. The really interesting question for me now is this: To the extent that the expansion and development of indigenous fisheries will help meet some of our human resources needs, people in our fishing communities, how do we ensure that it all happens within a framework of a community-based, independent, owner-operated driven fishery?

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

You're talking about managing the resources and managing the fishery. We've talked a lot about the conservation aspect of this whole situation that we are in. Commercial fishermen and first nations communities are talking about the importance of conservation.

If we talk about lobster, we all know that for lobster there is no dockside monitoring where we have an approximation of what the resource looks like. What are your thoughts on having dockside monitoring in the lobster fishery?

[Richard Williams]

I think we are moving gradually; we're slowed down now by the pandemic, but I think we are moving toward full monitoring and coverage in the lobster fishery. Electronic monitoring on small vessels may be a big part of that solution, rather than observers. Dockside monitoring is clearly going to be part of it.

That's part of the infrastructure that will make it easier to integrate first nations into the community. I agree with Bernie on the need to have an integrated system where everything is coming through the same monitoring process.