Fisheries Committee on Dec. 9th, 2024

[Jesse Zeman]

It doesn't seem that way.

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

Ms. Strobel, not long ago, you were at the B.C. Women of the Year Awards. Congratulations. You came very close...and I'm sure your work around this table is a feather in your cap. Keep up the good work.

There, you said, “I think certain voices just haven't been heard.” How do you think this applies to the construction of the current Fisheries Act?

[Sonia Strobel]

That's a great question.

Consultation, right now, happens in advisory boards, which are largely made up of licence owners, so we have the perpetuation of a system where DFO consults with those who own and control access to the resource. Those are, generally speaking, not active harvesters or people working in coastal communities. The more licences you own, the more say you get, so this is a self-replicating system.

The act talks about these advisory boards. We really need to modernize that so the department is consulting with people in communities who are actively engaged in harvesting.

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

You're saying that the advisory boards are failing because of the composition of the boards.

Ms. Strobel, I'd like you to submit something in writing about the precautionary principle affecting your business.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

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

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

Thank you, Chair.

Dr. Mordecai, I captured your thoughts about separating science from DFO. What level of confidence do you have that, whoever provides it to DFO, the science is passed along objectively and in an action-oriented way to the minister?

[Dr. Gideon Mordecai]

There are a few ways for me to answer that question.

One is that I've reviewed internal science advice within DFO, and I have no confidence in the quality of it. I know it's not in line with the international science research on those topics. I don't have time to go into detail on that right now.

The second aspect is that, even when I was involved in work with DFO scientists themselves, I had no confidence that results would be communicated up the chain towards the minister. For that reason, we sought external ways to provide that information.

The short answer is that I have low confidence. I think having an external body might help some of those issues, because you'd cut out some of the ladders of hierarchy where that information might get blocked.

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

Ms. Strobel, we're going to hear from another witness, Jennifer Silver. You probably know her. She's going to make the point that the Fisheries Act needs to be more engaged in the whole social and cultural background of the fishery.

Do you agree with that? Do you have any comments on that?

[Sonia Strobel]

I agree with that.

Through working with the Local Catch Network in the U.S., I have a lot of contact points with community-based fishers there. Their interaction with their department, the NOAA, is significantly different from what's in Canada. I think that stems from the relationships our department has. It is very much a top-down, policing, absolute-discretion entity. In the U.S., it feels very different. It comes from things in the act.

I agree that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans needs to be looking at social and cultural ties to fishing in the communities. That's going to come out of collaboration and true consultation with people in communities and actually listening, rather than this top-down dictation we see.

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

I don't know which of you would like to answer this one.

Canada is a big country. We have the north coast, the east coast and the west coast, and we have one department that is supposed to reflect everything going on. Do you think we should break up DFO into three separate departments—north, west and east—or devolve the whole function to the provinces?

Mr. Zeman, I'll give you a shot at this one.

[Jesse Zeman]

That's a loaded question. We always say to be careful what you wish for, and we've seen that go in both directions.

I can speak provincially. Right now, the Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship is suffering probably from even worse budget cuts than DFO is.

I don't have a good answer, but I will indicate that there is definitely a feeling out west that, first of all, our fisheries are different from those out east. That's 100% true. There is a major attachment across the country around fish, but there's definitely a perspective that the folks out west get managed the same way as the folks out east do, but our fisheries are very different on this side of the country.

On the question about DFO, yes, there is definitely, among our membership, discussion about whether the organization is structured for success. It clearly isn't. Would there be interest in moving it to a B.C.-based or Pacific region focus? Yes, I absolutely think so.

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

That's it. I'm good.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Hardie.

We'll now go to Madame Desbiens for two and a half minutes or less.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It's all very interesting. There's even some momentum towards the resumption of self-determination. I love this provincial principle.

That said, at the fisheries symposium held in Caraquet, we again raised the fact that, even if Quebec were to become a country—which could happen in the next few years—we will always have contact, a deep and sincere relationship with the entire fisheries of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the river, the estuary and everything that lives there. It binds us together, against all odds, to the end of time.

I'd like to address any witnesses who would like to respond, even though we don't have much time. Would it be interesting to have an umbrella body for all this, within the department or elsewhere, that would perhaps consider the western sector in one way, the eastern sector in another way, with the Maritimes, and the northern sector in another way, too? Of course, we'd still need the support of environmental mediation, because, as we know, everything is infinitely interconnected when it comes to nature.

[Dr. Gideon Mordecai]

I'll jump in quickly. I don't know if I'm going to answer your question, but I think about what policies will ensure that independence is really independence and that it's not tied into any other types of influence. It is just a scientific body.

The other thing I'd draw upon, which came up in the discussion, is about being careful what you wish for with the province versus the federal government and who's in charge. I think the thing to think about is what happens when things go wrong and when decisions are made that aren't fair. In B.C., we have an ombudsperson who can independently judge if things are fair. There's no such federal ombudsperson to investigate those kinds of things within DFO, so that might be something to think about.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Madame Desbiens.

We'll now go to Ms. Barron for two and a half minutes or less.

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

Thank you, Chair.

First and foremost, thank you to my colleague Mr. Small for bringing to my attention the incredible accomplishment that you received, Ms. Strobel. I don't know how I missed that. I'm talking about you being named runner-up in the BCBusiness 2024 Women of the Year Awards for change-maker in natural resources. That's an incredible honour, and I want to reiterate that it is so well-deserved.

I was so honoured to tour Skipper Otto and see the incredible work happening there. I'm very impressed, to say the least.

I would love to get an answer from you to the previous question, just as a reminder of what you feel would be the best way to move forward with the protection and equitable distribution of benefits to Canadians.

[Sonia Strobel]

Thank you so much for the question and for your kind words.

The most important thing we need to do is embed into the act protections for harvesters, local community members and Canadian consumers. That can come in some of the forms I've mentioned so far, but certainly, embedding consultation into the act is another important point. The ways in which community members are consulted in the management of fisheries, whether that's through advisory boards or round tables, is important.

The minister's discretion on shared decision-making can be looked at in the act. That can help ensure community members are consulted, not only licence owners. That's really important. There's also ensuring that owner-operators and the protection of licensed active harvesters are embedded into the act. Those are some of the critical things we need to see here.

I thank Mr. Hardie for bringing up the question about how fisheries should be managed. As we face climate change and further uncertainty, our fisheries need to be nimble. They need to be able to respond to the crises that are continuing to unfold.

Globally, locally managed fisheries tend to fare better with managing and being more nimble. If we look to our neighbours to the south, where fisheries are managed by the state, we see them being better positioned to hear from local constituents and active harvesters and to make changes to protect fisheries.

Those are some of the important things we need to see to protect community-based harvesters.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Barron.

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

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to address my question to you, Ms. Strobel. Thank you for being here today and for your incredible accomplishments. Skipper Otto is a truly remarkable story. It's inspirational, to say the least.

Obviously, I'm speaking to the Fisheries Act, but I want to take it to a broader level and get your input and insight on this. From the various witnesses we've heard from throughout my time on the committee, anytime we're talking to those closest to the ground and those who are actually in the harvesting business, they say they're seeing areas of incredible opportunity and potential within their sectors that don't seem to be recognized at the government level, and that adaptation is not happening nearly as quickly enough to pivot and take advantage of those opportunities. I was wondering if you could speak to that.

So many times, we've heard about what's wrong in the sector, what needs to be addressed and the challenges we face. There's a plethora of that. However, I would be interested to hear where you see opportunities if the fisheries in Canada were repositioned better to take advantage of them.

[Sonia Strobel]

Our fisheries don't feel nimble. We don't feel that the Fisheries Act allows for rapid enough change to address climate change and changes in abundance.

We don't feel on the west coast that there are mechanisms for west coast harvesters to feel heard. We don't feel that those mechanisms are there. On the knowledge of fish harvesters and the people based in communities, there isn't a mechanism to share knowledge or for knowledge to be respected. We hear harvesters all the time commenting that fish are returning to one river or another, but there are no officers monitoring those rivers anymore. That knowledge isn't even getting back.

We feel the Fisheries Act was written at a time, initially, before British Columbia was even part of Canada. Really, considerations aren't in place to recognize the knowledge of the people on the ground and to feed that back to decision-makers to have quick decisions made.

We'll continue to see those changes. As water is warm, we will have species coming up from California and have no fisheries for them because we're not acting in a way that's nimble enough. The act needs to be reconsidered at a high level in light of respect for the knowledge in fishing communities from harvesters and from people who are on the ground.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

We need to get it closer to the ground so that those closer to the ground have more decision-making authority.

I know on the east coast, Atlantic Canada, there's more stuff under provincial jurisdiction than there is on the west coast. They're often quite emphatic about making sure we understand that jurisdictional distinction. Sometimes there's nothing worse than someone who's further away making decisions that have massive consequences for those living in fishing communities, whose livelihoods are dependent upon fishing.

Based on the input from the harvesters and people in your area, do they feel, under the current construct, that they have direct access or that their concerns are being heard? Do you want to comment a bit on that?

[Sonia Strobel]

I will definitely say that the harvesters in our community don't feel there is a mechanism for them to be heard, particularly because most of the young harvesters are leasing licences. They don't have a seat at advisory board tables because they don't own the access. It's very difficult for them to be heard. Even right now with the round tables that are happening, they refer to people like me as one community and then refer to the industry as the people who own licences.

We as active harvesters find it challenging that we're not even considered part of the industry because we don't own the access. The entire language is set up for there not to be a mechanism for our voices to be heard, so we hear that frustration.

When I call harvesters up to say that I'm going to Ottawa and I have an opportunity to speak to the Fisheries Act, I hear the despondence. I hear, “Why even bother? They don't listen to us. We don't have a say.” To me, that's a crisis of democracy. If people—Canadian citizens—don't feel that it's even worth trying anymore, that's a real problem.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you.

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

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm listening with interest, and it concerns me, Ms. Strobel, when you say that fishers on the west coast have given up. Could you give one recommendation to this committee on one change to the act that would allow us to begin the process of structuring the west coast fishery more along the lines of owner-operator? The coasts are very different. Could you give an opinion on that?