Fisheries Committee on Nov. 18th, 2024

[Roberta Bowman]

Yes, I think that a small fee or a tax levy is definitely something that we should be adding to each and every vessel. It could be when the vessel is first purchased and registered with Canadian government, as we discussed earlier. Then that levy is attached to that boat for the duration of that boat. That's a good idea.

I think there might be other ideas through marinas. We could be looking at increasing some sort of tax there that we could put into this fund as well.

Thank you, Mr. Weiler, through the chair.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you, Ms. Bowman.

I just want to pick up on one thing related to that.

I'm not sure how it is in other provinces, but in British Columbia we have liability, for instance, for people who have oil tanks found on their property. It will go back multiple property owners before that. You can ensure that if someone unknowingly is subject to pollution on their property from that, then that responsibility goes back.

I'm curious as to whether you might be supportive of something similar when we're talking about abandoned and derelict boats. You do often have boat owners who will sell or transfer that boat to a new owner, who won't register it. Oftentimes it's difficult to make that polluter pay, if that boat will be wrecked or abandoned.

[Roberta Bowman]

Was that question for me?

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Yes.

[Roberta Bowman]

Thank you.

I totally agree. Start putting the onus on somebody, and maybe that will send a strong message to people who are trying to sell their boats and who are not transferring that registration over. Putting an idea or a process in place such as that, I think, is a great start.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you very much, Ms. Bowman.

The last question I want to ask is for Ms. Dubois. Are there other jurisdictions we should be looking at around the world, whether that's at the national or subnational level, to adopt some of their good practices for how we can approach this issue?

[Chloe Dubois]

At this time, I'm not aware of any other sorts of examples or case studies that we could refer to.

Just to quickly comment, I had an idea while Mrs. Bowman was addressing the other question, in terms of the transfer of ownership. There could be a tax incentive created, or something along those lines, for vessel owners when they transfer their vessels, which they could get or could acquire and which would incentivize them to report such changes, or some kind of incentive model.

I'll leave it there. Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Weiler.

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

[Clifford Small, Conservative, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It's great to have another opportunity to present some more questions to these witnesses here.

My colleague Mr. Arnold questioned earlier about the housing issue as it relates to abandoned vessels.

To Ms. Dubois, how often do you encounter folks living on board these vessels because it's their only option? How has that become a hindrance to removing derelict vessels?

[Chloe Dubois]

We have encountered some of these vessels being lived on or squatted on, as Mrs. Bowman was also encountering and was referring to in today's group. However, it's very challenging to know the frequency of use of some of these vessels, or the amount of support or housing they are providing.

When you look at the example of the Dogpatch, it's very close to the city. The use is very high in circumstances like that. However, when we start looking into more coastal rural communities, without monitoring, we're not sure if people are actively living on these vessels or what's happening with them. Then, when they are reported abandoned, unless they're sinking, there's not much we can really do about it until they've sunk, and then we can get additional resources in place.

It's a challenging question to answer.

[Clifford Small, Conservative, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

To Ms. Dubois again, what would be the solution to the squatter issue on those abandoned vessels? Do you have any suggestions?

[Chloe Dubois]

Yes. I'm not sure how practical this is in this meeting here, but creating affordable housing for people in British Columbia would be a great start. The cost of housing, no matter where you are across this coast, is increasing exponentially, and it's very challenging to afford for the best of us. It's a much larger conversation and issue, I think, but creating low-income affordable housing would be a great start.

Thank you.

[Clifford Small, Conservative, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

The housing crisis is even affecting the ability to remove abandoned vessels.

[Chloe Dubois]

That's correct. Yes.

[Clifford Small, Conservative, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Okay.

I have another question here, Ms. Dubois. How accurate do you believe the count of derelict and abandoned vessels is on Canada's coast, specifically on British Columbia's coast?

[Chloe Dubois]

I believe it is significantly underestimated. Figuring out the unit count of the number and concentration of these vessels is very challenging, especially for submerged vessels. I think there are probably thousands of these vessels that have not been identified through aerial survey work and that sort of thing. I'm personally not sure of the best way to survey the quantity or number of vessels out there right now, but I know that more survey work needs to be done.

[Clifford Small, Conservative, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

With the availability and relatively inexpensive operation of drones, do you think that technology could be deployed, especially given that, from an aerial view, you can see fairly deep down into the water? Do you think that some kind of an aerial campaign would be able to identify more of these vessels?

[Chloe Dubois]

I think it's worth exploring.

Also, combining AI technology and training AI to identify certain characteristics that are common amongst derelict vessels would be incredibly beneficial as well. Performing ROV and subsurface survey work is going to also be critical in the campaign. I think we need to look at it from the sky and from the water to get a holistic sense of what is happening on the coast, and I think there are a lot of data gaps right now, as it stands.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Small.

We will now go to Mr. Hardie for five minutes or less.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Here's a thought: We've been talking about the problem of people finding refuge on abandoned boats. What about the notion of actually formalizing a process by which these boats could be shelter for people who would otherwise be in doorways in your downtown business district, and—here's an additional thought—with federal support through a housing accelerator fund, let's call it, that could provide some of the infrastructure necessary to support that kind of community?

Mrs. Bowman, what do you think of that idea?

[Roberta Bowman]

Yes, absolutely. The unhoused are looking for different ways to find shelter, and these boats are that way. Having an accelerated housing fund would be a great option, and having some of these funds go towards this area would be a good idea to look into.

Thank you.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Dubois, do you have any thoughts on that?

[Chloe Dubois]

I think it's worth exploring; however, I would caution that living on a boat is a lot more complicated than landlocked housing solutions. If we are, potentially, going to be putting people with mental health issues and people who are currently not housed into a boating environment, they will need training.

Also, a lot of these abandoned boats are not suitable to live aboard. They don't have heat. They often don't have any kind of black water containment.

I would say that it's worth exploring. However, if you were to choose to pursue that avenue, there would need to be some pretty strict parameters in place to guide the process.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Yes, it isn't just a matter of getting a whole bunch of boats together, but rather some sort of infrastructure that would support them, and that could be social infrastructure as well as physical infrastructure.

What about the notion—I'm just test-flying some possible recommendations here—of turning vessel registration over to the Insurance Corporation of B.C.? They have the system set up. They could basically apply the same rules on the sea as they do on the road in terms of registration, ownership, etc. If somebody finds a motor vehicle by the road with no licence plates on it, it's abandoned; it's gone. They don't care who the owner is.

Do you think that kind of regime would be something worth exploring in British Columbia, given that's where it seems we have most of the problem in Canada?

We'll start with you, Ms. Dubois, and then Ms. Bowman.

[Chloe Dubois]

That would be a really interesting model to explore. I know it's effective with vehicle management, so I don't see why it wouldn't be effective as well with vessel management. I think that's a great idea.