Fisheries Committee on April 5th, 2022

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

The reason I ask it that way is that we just went through a study about the flood response in the Fraser Valley and we saw a bunch of volunteers use their own boats and their own gas to really help fix what the response was. What actually really happened was a volunteer effort in essence. They weren't compensated or anything else.

Getting back to my question, though, when we asked the Department of Fisheries and Oceans whose responsibility it was, they kind of shrugged their shoulders and said, “Well, we issued a bunch of permits.” That's all they did. It was really just partially getting out of the way of the people who actually did the work.

If the responsibility belongs to the federal government, I guess I'm a little bit alarmed based on the questions my colleague Mr. Arnold asked you. If you haven't been compensated for some of your cleanup efforts, that kind of begs the question of whether there is a plan in the first place. It causes some doubt around whether there is a plan or not, because I would have assumed that you would have been part of that response plan in your area. If there was a container spill, I thought you would have been consulted and told, “Hey, we want you to be part of this program.”

Are you aware of whether there's any plan like that in place in your community?

[Terry Dorward]

Government is stepping up to support these efforts, but we need to improve these collaborations. We're encouraged by these preliminary efforts, but much more needs to be achieved.

I could pass it off to my colleague Josh Temple.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Mr. Dorward, I'm going to keep asking you, if you don't mind.

I'm familiar with the oil and gas sector. I'm up in northeastern B.C., not in a coastal community, but I'm very aware of spill responses and what's necessary. Typically, if there's an oil spill, there's a stash of equipment that community members can utilize to contain the spill. It's the equipment you refer to, and it's very specialized.

Do you have specialized equipment like that in your area that you can access and utilize, even on a voluntary basis, that's bought by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans but that you can use?

[Terry Dorward]

Putting equipment into remote first nation communities like Tla-o-qui-aht makes obvious sense. We have—

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Is it there now, though?

Is that equipment currently accessible to you, or is it not there yet?

[Terry Dorward]

It's very limited. We need to expand the inventory immediately.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Mr. Dorward, in the last couple of comments I'll make, I would be very curious if you could submit to the committee what equipment you would need in order to respond if you did indeed have a spill in your area. I think it would be a good perspective for us to have, because I agree with you that you're the ones who know that coastline better than anybody and you'd best respond to it too. Please explain what kind of plan you would put in place, if you could. If you could draw it up yourself, what would it look like? Please submit that to the committee, if you could, and we'll see where that goes.

Thanks for your testimony today.

[Terry Dorward]

Thank you.

We'd be happy to submit a fulsome response plan, including inventory and personnel requirements. Let us know how to send it to you.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

You can send it to our chair or the clerk, and they will distribute it to all of us here.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Zimmer.

We will go to Mr. Hanley for five minutes or less, please.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dorward and Captain Temple, for participating and for your really interesting testimony today.

I have a few questions, mostly for you, Mr. Dorward, but feel free to defer to Mr. Temple if necessary.

You refer to the constant incoming of debris, and I'm wondering how much debris is identifiable related to a specific incident, and how much is not obviously known. In other words, maybe elaborate on how constant that is and how relatable it is to specific incidents.

[Terry Dorward]

International debris washes in from across the Pacific, and the Zim Kingston debris washes in daily.

Josh, do you have...? There are over three million pounds that have arrived in Clayoquot Sound so far.

[Josh Temple]

I can jump in quickly, Terry, to give a few more metrics on that.

Since 2017, in partnership with the Tla-o-qui-aht Nation, the Coastal Restoration Society removed over three million pounds of anthropogenic debris from the waters of Clayoquot Sound alone. This amount is increasing exponentially every year as we become the inevitable end of the line for most of the debris washing across the Pacific.

Since the Zim Kingston spill, we've seen a daily influx of debris like Yeti coolers, yoga mats, exercise equipment and children's bicycle helmets, which we're reporting to the Coast Guard on a daily basis. Surveys have been under way, recovery efforts have been under way, but the volume of this debris that is exactly attributable to the Zim Kingston continues to wash in.

So far, the recovery and survey efforts that we've undertaken in partnership with the Tla-o-qui-aht Nation and other nations across Clayoquot Sound have not been supported by either Danaos, the owner of the Zim Kingston, or the Amix Group, the contractor that's been hired by Danaos to support these recovery efforts.

We really need to see a concerted response and a long-term plan to recover the debris from the over 100 containers that are still missing and presumed to be sunk along the waters of the west coast of Vancouver Island, most of which, as indicated by the volume of debris reaching the shores of Tla-o-qui-aht territory in Clayoquot Sound, seems to be nearby.

That's one of the things we'd like the committee to take away from this presentation today, that we need to encourage both the shipowner and the contractor, Amix Group, to direct a lot more resources and funding to the survey and recovery efforts along the west coast of Vancouver Island.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Mr. Temple.

That brings up a whole lot of other questions. One of them, I guess, goes back to the polluter pays question and whether that is adequately implemented and followed. What more needs to happen to reinforce that?

[Terry Dorward]

We're unaware of the metrics of these agreements.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Temple, do you want to add to that?

[Josh Temple]

I'm not aware of the intimate metrics involved in those polluter pays agreements. Certainly, because we're constantly looking for adequate funding, I would anticipate that the details of those agreements aren't providing sufficient liquidity to support large-scale recovery efforts when a situation like the Zim Kingston happens.

Groups like the Coastal Restoration Society, first nations and others up and down the west coast of Vancouver Island have been crying for adequate funding and capacity support to perform the surveys and the recovery of this material since it happened. Although I'm unaware of the details of those agreements or any levies or fines that might come as a result of these incidents, I would assume that they're not sufficient if everybody along the coast clearly indicates that the resources are not adequate at this time.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Hanley. You're right on the five-minute mark.

We'll now go to Madame Desbiens for two and a half minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Dorward, what would you recommended to foster better co‑operation among departments, non-governmental organizations, provinces, territories, municipalities and indigenous communities? Perhaps it would be appropriate to introduce a plan or set of instructions that stakeholders would have to strictly follow. What would be your top recommendation?

[Terry Dorward]

In forming an official committee or a task force, you need to develop and implement a framework for a type of spill recovery.

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

You are recommending a task force with representation from all the stakeholders. You think a group like that should leverage everyone's expertise to develop a plan that would apply consistently to all of the emergency response stakeholders. Is that correct?

[Terry Dorward]

Yes, absolutely. First nations, NGOs and government would have to collaborate to develop and implement an effective framework.

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

Obviously, funding would be needed to follow through on the task force's recommendations.

[Terry Dorward]

Yes.