Fisheries Committee on Feb. 29th, 2024

[Claudio Bernatchez]

Firstly, it's not so much about adding redfish quotas to independent fishermen as it is about the first part of the quota allocation that needs to be given to fishermen. We can't have a disastrous allocation key, like the one announced on January 26. This will be the first part of the solution, which will allow bankers to tell our shrimpers to be a little more patient before giving up.

As for other solutions, it's unfortunate that the Canadian government didn't discuss them beforehand, as early as 2016 or, more importantly, as early as 2018. People now have a knife to their throat and are being asked to find solutions. I haven't been in the industry long, but I know that several letters have been sent to previous ministers.

It seems that the Government of Canada is not taking the fisheries seriously. In the last eight years, it has appointed six different people to head this department, which is so important to many coastal communities. However, we have to take it seriously. When the government says it wants to consult the industry, it has to listen and come up with real solutions.

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

For the committee, the government or the minister, are you going to present—perhaps for the fifth or sixth time, as you said—your needs in the context of a transition plan to help shrimpers?

[Claudio Bernatchez]

I can already tell you that, in order to rationalize Quebec's shrimp fleet, we would have to spend $26 million to buy back half the licences. Does the government really want to reduce the number of fishermen? We have to ask the question and get a clear answer too.

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

Okay.

Look, I only have six minutes and I want to make sure my message is understood. You have to say what you need. I understand that, as you said, buying back licences won't necessarily solve all the problems. We want to keep these people in the industry, such as deckhands and plant workers. We have to take everyone into account.

Mr. Robert, you mentioned that the minister would have had difficulty making a different decision, because she had to respect the historical shares. I think you also know very well that ministers have a certain amount of discretion.

I want to put things in perspective and I want you to know, Mr. Bernatchez and Mr. Spingle, that this is in no way an attack on shrimpers. I just want us to paint a broad picture of what might happen in the future. Let's suppose that the shrimp fishery closes and that, in 15 years' time, it comes back with a vengeance and hundreds of thousands of tonnes of shrimp are fished, if not more. Could the future Minister of Fisheries and Oceans say that he will respect the historical shares, but that he will also give 10% of the shrimp quotas to crab or lobster fishermen who are in difficulty, as we have just done for redfish with the shrimpers?

[Dr. Dominique Robert]

These are certainly decisions that can be made. At present, the person who holds the position of Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has the power to make any decision. However, based on what we've seen in the case of other species, historical shares are an important factor. That's what I said. Of course, I have nothing against the idea of leaving a share of quotas to fleets that are at risk, quite the contrary.

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

Should priority be given to inshore fleets when the resource has to be shared?

[Dr. Dominique Robert]

In the case of inshore fleets, we're often talking about people who have a fishing licence for a single species.

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

I meant shrimpers.

[Dr. Dominique Robert]

Yes, absolutely. We agree on that. If their resource runs out, they don't have a safety net. That's the big difference. So, for that reason, I would say yes.

However, I would invite the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans to look at strategies to increase the resilience of coastal fisheries in the long term. It's a major challenge, and other fisheries are at risk of finding themselves in the same situation.

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

Thank you, gentlemen.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Thank you, Mr. Robert. Thank you, Mr. Cormier. That's your six minutes.

We'll move on now to MP Desbiens for six minutes, please.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our valued witnesses.

Mr. Bernatchez, I found your portrait of the situation since 2016 very interesting. We've been seeing the various elements of the crisis facing fishermen for a long time now, particularly in Quebec, but also in the Maritimes in some respects. We can see the extent to which the way the Department of Fisheries and Oceans operates no longer works, whether it's the current quota allocation system or the way the department factors in local measures or knowledge. We are faced with this reality. In this respect, Mr. Robert's comments were very interesting. He said that we absolutely must build on resilience, particularly among inshore fishermen.

In the light of what some scientists have said, I wonder whether we don't need to do some fundamental work on the quota allocation system, the criteria and the historical shares, when we are in a context marked by major changes, particularly with regard to climate, biomass and predators, some of which apparently cannibalize each other, because there are so many of them.

In this context, to save the fisheries, to save the boat, isn't it necessary to look at a new way of doing things?

[Claudio Bernatchez]

If we don't, we'll all be contributing to the decline of the fisheries sector in Canada.

The general culture in this sector is the same as it was before Jacques Cartier, when the Basques came to Canada to fish as much as they could in order to fill their boats before returning with their cargo to Europe. This culture of quantity still exists today: we want to bring full boats back to the quayside to fill plants, then containers, and ship the products of our fishery all over the world. We haven't learned from the past. We're repeating the same mistakes.

Right now, issuing licences that have been given value has become the main problem for fishing companies. Here, along the coast, some licences are being sold at ridiculously high prices. It doesn't make any sense to have to pay such sums to practice a trade. What's more, I'm hearing things today that lead me to think that we're not even bothering to take a global view of the situation.

Earlier, we were talking about recovering ghost gear and saying that it would be a good idea to send shrimpers out to do this type of work. We could do that, yes, but some fleets are already doing this work as part of existing programs. So we're saying that we're going to try to solve one problem by creating another.

Let's take the time to stop and look at the big picture and take an ecosystem approach to fisheries once and for all. This will enable decision-makers to embrace the concept of integrated management. Similarly, let's listen once and for all to science and industry, and let's get politics out of the decisions that are made in the Canadian fisheries world.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Mr. Bernatchez, what you're saying is music to my ears. I don't know what else to tell you.

To make their voices heard by the government and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, fishermen demonstrated last Tuesday. I was at the Salon Fourchette bleue, in La Malbaie, with my leader, Yves-François Blanchet, and a few members. We heard their rout.

Not only is an entire economy being undermined, but so is an entire socio-economic existence which, I know, is not always quantifiable. Has the government been made sufficiently aware of the fishermen's rout? In your opinion, has the government understood the repercussions of its decisions on coastal populations?

[Claudio Bernatchez]

Ms. Desbiens, I'm a bit confused about this.

We were happy when our current Minister of Fisheries and Oceans was appointed. She's from our region and she knows the fishing industry well, having grown up there. I liked to say at the time—and Jean Lanteigne could corroborate this, as could Jason Spingle—that she was going to favour coastal communities in her announcements. However, even today, I can't believe that the announcement she made on January 26 was hers. That's how bad it is.

To answer your question, I think some people understand. However, when the time comes to make decisions, what interests are taken into account? Are they economic or social interests? Do we want to continue to occupy the land of these communities scattered across the eastern part of the country? Are we focusing on the various colours of Canada's electoral map, red, blue, yellow or other, with a view to the next elections? Where do we stand in Canada in this respect? How seriously are we taking the real impact of fisheries on our communities?

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Bernatchez.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Thank you, MP Desbiens.

We'll move now to Ms. Barron for six minutes.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

First of all, welcome to the witnesses. Thank you for being here.

My first question is for Mr. Spingle.

Welcome, Mr. Spingle. It's nice to see you again.

I want to ask you about the shrimp plants in Newfoundland. We know that they deliver huge benefits to the municipalities. I am wondering if you can share whether these plants have the capacity to process redfish.

[Jason Spingle]

They absolutely do. I've talked to processors. These plants have the capacity, with some reasonable investment in the machinery in the plants, and the workers have the expertise to work on either shellfish or groundfish.

We have these plants, like one in Port au Choix, which was probably the first shrimp plant in Newfoundland and Labrador. There are over 100 workers there. Redfish could really be there, I would say, for August, which is really the primary time, right up until January or February. We're talking about almost full-time work for most of the year here, with redfish in particular.

I really appreciate the question. I also want to say that we did have the experimental fishery in one of our plants—we don't represent members in every plant—and we had a call just a couple of days ago from a chairperson at Beothic Fish Processors Limited on the northeast coast. Their plant bought some of the experimental redfish in December of last year. That was a real benefit to some of the workers, with the crab fishery being delayed and everything that happened this year.

We have the plants, we have the boats, and we have the expertise. What would be very, very difficult here is looking at Port aux Basques, because we don't have to go hundreds of miles here. We're talking about three or four hours of steaming, as we call it. That's travel in these boats, travelling at about 10 knots. We're talking about being on the fishing grounds. To stand up near Port aux Basques on a clear day and have to see factory freezer fishing is going to make this very, very difficult.

Further to that, my fear is—I wouldn't be a bit surprised, and we have to get this changed—that the people who are going to fish in the offshore are going to look to not use one of the factory freezers that are already fishing in Atlantic Canada. They are going to look to get one built or buy one overseas at $150 million, and furthermore, be probably looking for government money to fund that.

If you go to Port au Choix or Rivière-au-Renard or Caraquet, you'll see the boats that are there and ready, with some minor investments or a reasonable investment in gear—a new net, maybe some sounding equipment, or, as was said previously, some minor on-deck adjustment—to bring in this quality fish to these plants and really be a transition from the shrimp.

The final point, I would say, is that it may not be as much a pound. I appreciate that. I think Dominique had a good point there. That's why we need a transition plan of the kind they had for the auto industry a few years ago. I thought, listening to the television, that GM and Ford—not to pick on either one—were done if they didn't get the government investment. They deserved it and they should have had it, and they got it, and they got back on the right track, and things went forward again. That happens in major industries.

My understanding is that this is what our governments are here for, but why reinvent the wheel? We have everything in place to do it properly, as was outlined very clearly by Claudio. Other than to say you don't see a future for these communities.... If that's what they're saying, they should say it, the people who are making these decisions. If not, let's work together and make a transition that will allow us to continue with a good economy and our way of life.

Thank you.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Spingle.

You just answered a lot of my questions there in your response, so that's great.

Could you just reinforce what the impacts would be to municipalities if these plants are not processing shrimp and if they're not processing redfish? What would be the impacts on local communities if that happens?

[Jason Spingle]

These plants are often the sole source in these communities, anyone would say, contributing hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in revenue and in tax revenue through the work that they do. What you will see is a diminishment of not only the community the plant is in, but also the surrounding area as well. It's a deterioration in all infrastructure and in tourism, and I agree that tourism is so important.

We went up to the demonstration. I've been on the south shore of the Gaspé Peninsula before, but we went around the northern tip. I was told by my colleagues how beautiful it was, but I have to say it's right up there with parts of Newfoundland, for example. If you take Rivière-au-Renard or Port au Choix out of the picture, and many others, are you going to have a vibrant tourist economy? I would say you won't. It'll be a diminishment.

It's all part of a package. It's all part of a way of life. Without being too philosophical, I think our cities are great, and I love to visit them, and I know there's going to be some transition, but we're a better country because of our rural communities. Some of them fish. Some of them mine. Some of them do forestry. We're a much better country in that way, and we cannot lose that. This decision points to something different here, and I'm not sure that some people see it.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Thank you, Mr. Spingle. Thank you, MP Barron.

We'll move on to the next round with Mr. Perkins for five minutes.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Just a second. I have to get my clock going, Mr. Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

We have one here.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Yes, I know, but I tend to go on, so I like to keep track myself.

Thank you, witnesses.

Mr. Spingle, I'll start with you. Is there any way to manage or to work in the fishery unless you have stable quota allocations that allow harvesters, regardless of their size, to make investments to fish?