Fisheries Committee on Dec. 2nd, 2024

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

Thank you.

What's taking place on the west coast? You've talked about how they're finally moving forward, but really it only seems they're looking at.... Are there changes needed? I know this committee has done two reports that clearly said changes need to be made.

Can you elaborate quickly on that one? Then I have questions for someone else. Thank you.

[Richard Williams]

You have these converging forces in the B.C. fishery, the demographics—the aging out of the baby boomer generation who are the majority of licence holders, working fishermen, boat owners and crew—and then economic conditions. As I mentioned, the leasing costs and so on are so bad for working harvesters that the young people are not coming in or staying in the fishery.

I think a large part of that story about the loss in employment is about just simply you can't get people to work in the sector. As more and more people age out, we're going to have a really serious crisis about who's going to catch the fish.

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

I can echo that. I was contacted by a prawn fisherman off the west coast who this year had to buy his quota at approximately $110,000 for a 34- or 38-day opening. He didn't know how much he was going to catch, but he had to invest that $110,000 just for the licence on top of having the vessel, the gear, the crew, the bait and everything else. It seems to be high time something was done on the west coast.

Ms. Fuller, I'll switch to you now.

In response to one of the other questions this morning, you mentioned that Oceans North is not able to change laws in other countries. Who can?

[Susanna Fuller]

That would be the government of other countries.

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

Would that be achieved through diplomatic work by Canadian officials to encourage other countries, or is it simply left up to other countries?

[Susanna Fuller]

There have been lots of diplomacy with our closest trading partners, including the U.S. and European Union, on the seal harvest, for example. That was the issue that was raised.

We recently saw our Canadian government trying to make sure that tariffs don't go into place. Other countries absolutely can have a role, particularly when it comes to trade. When we're talking about fisheries, about 75% of our fisheries are exported, so absolutely....

Specific to seals, there's some work to be done. There are some trade barriers from a legal perspective. There are also not a lot of markets. I think we face that with other fisheries, such as redfish, as well. It's usually never just one obstacle in fisheries.

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

There could be a market if the diplomatic work was done. Is that correct?

[Susanna Fuller]

Potentially. When you look at redfish, they're too small for the commercial market, so trying to figure that out is complicated. Seals have other issues in terms of markets, but, for sure, more work can be done.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Arnold.

We'll now go to Mr. Kelloway for five minutes or less.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Hello to the witnesses. There has been some good conversation today. I hope to get to the three of you in terms of your testimony, but also your focus on recommendations.

I'll start with Dr. Morissette, knowing my time is limited.

You made a really good point in terms of focusing on science and the importance of having industry, fishers' knowledge and science involved in the mix in terms of making decisions and trying to find that ecosystem.

If you were to open the page of a forthcoming study that we complete and you look to the recommendations on that very topic, how would it read to you? What would you want to see?

[Dr. Lyne Morissette]

We really need to call on people who have real-life knowledge and expertise acquired in the field. Knowledge doesn't necessarily come from university studies. The knowledge that first nations and fishers acquire on the ground must be recognized as being just as valid as that of scientists who have acquired expertise on ecosystem protection matters provided for in the Fisheries Act.

Stakeholders and experts should be consulted equally about problems with the Fisheries Act and things that should be included in the act, regardless of whether or not they have a degree, and regardless of the common perceptions in society.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Thank you very much, Dr. Morissette.

Mr. Williams, I want to drill down around the owner-operator model on the east coast, in the Atlantic. In your testimony, you talked about the need for an owner-operator's fleet separation, which I totally agree with, and we need to land the plane on that. I'm looking for a better analogy related to fisheries, but we'll forgo that.

[Richard Williams]

Dock the boat.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Dock the boat. There you go.

When we're looking at the model on the east coast, are you looking at a complete replication of that on the west coast, or are there nuances that would need to be made in a British Columbia model?

[Richard Williams]

We've done a great deal of work on this over the last couple of years with industry people on the west coast, and we've come to a strategic approach that we think is very workable.

When you look at the evolution of owner-operator licensing on the east coast, there are two major steps in the process. One is the introduction, in 1979, of fleet separation, which was a decision made by the minister and imposed with minister's authority on the overall industry, dividing up all of the east coast fisheries into inshore and offshore sectors. Everything that's happened since then in terms of owner-operator rules—who can fish the licences, how different fleets are managed, whether they have stocking or leasing, all these things—was not done by ministerial fiat; it was done by fishermen's organizations, advisory committees, etc. We see the same process in British Columbia.

Change the whole structure of the industry, the same as on the east coast, by bringing in fleet separation. Under section 9.1 of the Fisheries Act, the minister has the authority to do that. It's a ministerial order to say licensing will [Inaudible—Editor]. Use the PIIFCAF process to allow a transitional period of time for that to take place through willing selling and willing buyer. It will need support in terms of access to capital for fishermen and so on, but bring it.

Then let the owner-operator rules, the specific ways in which, in each fleet, you have stocking, leasing, all of these different things...and, because B.C. is made up almost entirely of multispecies enterprises, there probably will need to be much more flexible owner-operator rules, leasing systems and so on, but under a fairer structure. The thing that fleet separation will do is bring licence prices down to be affordable for working fishermen, and it will put working fishermen enterprise owners at the table and, as the people who control access to the resource, it's therefore their responsibility to solve these problems, as happened on the east coast.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Kelloway. There are two seconds left.

Now we go to Madam Desbiens for two and a half minutes or less, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Dr. Morissette, I want to talk a bit about the human factor. I could obviously go on and on with stories about distressing situations that fishers, particularly mackerel fishers, are experiencing. For example, a young man got himself a boat, a licence and all the rest. He spent a fortune a few weeks before the mackerel fishery closure was announced. People have committed suicide. We actually heard of a suicide in Chandler recently.

With the way things are done now, should the human factor be a fundamental consideration? We need to eliminate this idea that fishers are evil opportunists. Fishers must become an ally in modern ecosystem management.

[Dr. Lyne Morissette]

Over the past few years, I've had the opportunity to work with the Réseau Québec maritime, which funded a very interesting interdisciplinary project. We worked in Chaleur Bay, in Gaspé, with a professional fishers group called the Regroupement des pêcheurs professionnels du sud de la Gaspésie.

It was a four-part project. We started with an ecological study of the state of the fishery and species at risk. We also did a sociological study, and we learned that there is no next generation of fishers, because fishing is too complicated. It's a high-stress, financially risky, problematic job. The situation is very worrisome.

For that part of the study, we worked with a leading sociologist at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi, an expert in analyzing crisis situations. She worked with the people of Lac-Mégantic, who were in shock following the tragedy there. She analyzed the fishery-related crisis with a view to helping the community mitigate the shock associated with such a volatile job.

There was also an economic analysis and a sustainable development analysis. Successful sustainable development absolutely has to involve all these experts. An interdisciplinary approach means integrating social science professionals into our action plans and our situational analyses in order to find solutions.

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

Dr. Morissette, thank you very much for coming to talk to us about your scientific field with such generosity and open-mindedness. You are an important part of our study.

[Dr. Lyne Morissette]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Madam Desbiens.

We'll now go to Ms. Barron to clew up the first hour of testimony and questioning.

Go ahead for two and a half minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Chair.

My first question is for you, Mr. Williams, and I'm going to be quick on this.

Regarding the survey and the engagement process that we were talking about, I found the recommendation. It's recommendation 3 in the recommendations that we put forward as a committee in 2023 around owner-operators.

Recommendation 3 not only points out the flaws of the survey that was put forward, but also talks about how the timeline for a “full transition to Canadian ownership should be seven years or less”.

Can you clarify if you feel that we're on track to meet that recommendation put forward by this committee?

[Richard Williams]

We're not on track at all, because the decision hasn't been made to go in this direction.

If you think about a PIIFCAF kind of process where the minister makes an announcement that this will take place in terms of the control change in the ownership structure for access rights, that hasn't happened yet.

Until that happens, no, there isn't anything at the moment happening that's taking us in the direction that the FOPO committee recommended.

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

It's interesting that we heard from witnesses when we did this study that the only thing of the recommendations from 2019 that had really been acted on was a petition, which was highly flawed, and now we're in a position where we are finding out that the petition is basically being redone.

Anyway, I'm not going to use my whole time talking about this. I appreciate this information coming forward, and I hope that we can see some solutions to this problem as we move forward.

My next question is for Ms. Fuller.

Ms. Fuller, I don't have a lot of time.

There was a letter sent to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans by you and other conservation and environmental NGOs from across the country that worked with the Liberal government for over four years to help modernize the Fisheries Act. One of the recommendations you talked about that was put into place was around the precautionary principle and an ecosystem approach in the consideration for decision-making.

This is something I've brought up before with other witnesses. Can you clarify what needs to be done to more clearly identify how these precautionary principles are more consistently applied through the act?