Fisheries Committee on June 21st, 2022

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

Thank you, Mr. LeBlanc.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you.

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

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

Thank you, Chair.

I'm going to change up my question here, last minute. I hope this wasn't already answered.

I'm wondering, Mr. LeBlanc, if you can expand upon.... In your opening statement to us, you mentioned that DFO's decision to close the herring and mackerel fishery this spring without a science-based rebuilding program bewildered many in the industry.

Can you expand a bit on the importance of the science-based rebuilding programs when making decisions within fisheries?

[Leonard LeBlanc]

From my perspective, everything should be science-based when it comes to a natural resource. That's where it should come from, not the amount of money a fisherman should or shouldn't make. It should be science-based. I've always said, if you take care of the fish, the fish will take care of you. That was my basis for how I approached going to meetings.

When the decision came down on both the herring and mackerel, it came down at the eleventh hour with very little notice to industry. In fact, it was probably minutes before the decision came. We asked, “Where's the rebuilding plan?” They said, “We'll meet in the fall and talk about a rebuilding plan.”

If you have a crisis in a fishery, you don't wait. If you get sick tomorrow, you don't wait six or seven months to go to see your doctor. You go immediately. You go as soon as you're sick. It should have been the same thing for these two resources that they were closing. They should have brought industry together immediately to say, “We have a problem. Let's acknowledge it,” and then say, “We need to have rebuilding now and we need to have it now,” not in six months.

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

That's a great example. Thank you.

Continuing on, Mr. LeBlanc, you spoke about the collaborative work that happened. You used an example of the harvesters and DFO, and you spoke about the process with the Pictou Landing First Nation, the provincial government and DFO.

Can you share a bit about how DFO can help promote such collaborative approaches and the benefits of these approaches? This is expanding on Mr. Hanley's question.

[Leonard LeBlanc]

I think DFO should use examples of where it's working and build on that. It seems like the department, when it's planning to have a scientific exercise with industry and first nations, wants to reinvent the wheel. There are processes that have been there, like the lobster node in the gulf, for example, that have had great success.

We have first nations as members of our association. When we did our plan and took our fishery from 9,000 pounds of lobster to 55,000 pounds of lobster this year, they voted with us. They were part of the entire process and analysis. That's how you have inclusion.

I think DFO sometimes gives itself more work, when the work is already done and the process is already there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Barron.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses.

I'll start off with Mr. Prevost, if I can. In your opening comments, you mentioned that it's challenging to try to assess the size and scope of the bait industry, and that there are likely significant underestimates in the mackerel used for bait.

Could you elaborate further on that and describe where the gaps may be in the assessment of the catch?

[Mark Prevost]

I'm not 100% certain. The gaps in the accurate data.... I got that from DFO. As far as the undeclared catch goes, I know it came at the eleventh hour when they were shutting it down. A lot of people saw it coming. The freezers are full, including ours. There was a pretty big heads-up.

Because we don't have a real process pertaining just to bait, this opens another market for undeclared catch. Whatever the fishermen catches, as long as they're using it for bait, it's not recorded. If we're using 700 million pounds for bait, that's a pretty big gap, as far as I know.

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

The gap in the recording of catch that's taking place for bait.... It's not recorded as being out there, basically.

[Mark Prevost]

Exactly.

I'm not sure how a lot of the.... I'm a pretty simple guy. A lot of the stuff coming in from other countries and imports from the U.S.A., I don't know how it's declared there. If it comes to Canada as bait, we wouldn't know what species it was.

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

Thank you.

To you and Mr. LeBlanc, to what extent are illegal, unreported and unregulated fisheries affecting how science is determined or directed, and then used within the department?

I'll start off with Mr. LeBlanc. Perhaps you could answer that one.

[Leonard LeBlanc]

I'm sure it's a problem when you have unregulated fisheries, and it's happening in a few of the fisheries that I know of.

Since we're talking about bait, there's no problem with unregulated herring bait fisheries now, because there are none. They've been closed, so that's not an issue. Mind you, there are still unregulated and illegal activities happening in some fisheries that, I'm sure, DFO science has to apply a percentage to when they do their calculations. They've given estimates in the past. I think that's their scientific approach.

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

They open with what they consider to be the allowances or the allocation for IUU fisheries.

[Leonard LeBlanc]

That's correct. They have a percentage that they'll apply to their formula.

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

Thank you.

Mr. Prevost, do you have anything to add?

[Mark Prevost]

No, thank you.

I think a chain of custody, when it comes to bait, would probably eliminate a lot of the undeclared catch and help DFO gather more accurate data.

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

I'm going to pass the rest of my time to Mr. Perkins.

Thank you.

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

My question, Mr. Chair, is for Mr. LeBlanc.

Without a robust seal harvest management plan and with the decision to close the mackerel and herring fisheries, are we facing yet another 30-year-plus moratorium on that fishery as well? That's in the absence of any kind of management plan for mackerel and any kind of management plan for seals.

[Leonard LeBlanc]

I was there when the minister made the decision to shut the groundfish fishery. I was on the water, fishing. Back then, they said they'd close it for five or, maybe, 10 years max, and then it would rebound and come back. It didn't, because they didn't control the seal population.

Now the seal population is so high that it's very likely that the southern gulf cod will not come back. The seals have been allowed to eat fish for so many years. In fact, for quite a few years, they've been fishing a bigger biomass than we've ever fished in any given year. That's a problem.

Now with the cod not being there, the target is going to be mackerel and herring. Yes, I agree with you. If we don't do something immediately with the seals, the rebuilding plan for the herring and the mackerel is going to be very limited.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Perkins.

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

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

Actually, Mr. Chair, Serge Cormier is going to take my spot.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Okay. We'll go to Mr. Cormier.

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

Thank you, Mr. Kelloway.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Prevost, my dad was also a fisherman all his life. I went out fishing with him a lot. He's retired now, but I still enjoy it, every time I have a chance to go with my cousin, who now owns the boat.

I want to go back to what Mr. Arnold was saying. You said that 694 million pounds is the estimate for bait needed in Atlantic Canada, including Quebec. Do you know what percentage of that amount—just an estimate—comes only from herring and mackerel from our waters? Do you know what I mean?

[Mark Prevost]

I would be guessing. I would say half or more.