Fisheries Committee on June 5th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Madame Desbiens. It was right on time.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I need to use the two and a half minutes wisely here.

I just want to follow up, Mr. Waddell. I know I'm spending a lot of my time focused on this survey, but it is a key component of the work that we're doing. My frustration is that, when you're describing the process of how the survey was constructed, you identify that one of the pieces was to have the lightest administrative tasks associated with it.

If we want to actually move forward with a survey that is accurate and useful, would it not be the number one focus to ensure that accurate, up-to-date information is being accumulated, regardless of how that looks, to ensure that you can move forward with that information and implement the strategies required to ensure that local communities and local fishers are seeing the benefits of our public resource in fisheries?

[Mark Waddell]

We still feel that the survey results will be accurate. They're certainly statistically relevant, and in conjunction with the information that our forensic audit colleagues are able to provide and glean from publicly available sources—business registries and the like, not just domestic but foreign as well—it provides a common information base that will allow us to have an informed public discussion.

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

Thank you.

I guess the most important next question I'm going to ask is around.... We heard from many indigenous fishers about the process of the PICFI licences and some of the problems with the licensing system, and that indigenous people are losing their livelihoods and traditional knowledge.

What work is being done, specifically, to work alongside or in partnership with first nations to ensure that the benefits of their connection with the fisheries from time immemorial are not being lost?

[Neil Davis]

I can maybe offer a response.

I think there are a few main themes I would mention. The first is that we do have a team within the region that works specifically with the PICFI program to support first nations and the way those licences are administered and delivered, etc. I think that's an important source of operational support that is worth mentioning.

More broadly, we hear very consistently about the importance of fisheries to many first nations communities and have relationships developed or developing with them in a variety of contexts. There is an operational relationship or a program-level relationship that relates to how we deliver fisheries access. We have staff who are point people for relationships with individual communities. In a number of instances, we also have reconciliation agreements that are being negotiated with first nations and that set out a longer-term vision for how they would like to participate and the kind of relationship they want with the department and/or treaty-related negotiations that are doing very similar things.

Those are a few of the ways the department is trying to build those relationships and support first nations' aspirations for participation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Barron.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Waddell, I want to explore a little bit in the next few minutes the beneficial ownership survey.

For those watching on the Internet, as some people tend to do, it's just so folks understand that what that means is who ultimately benefits from the ownership of the licence. Who owns the licence and then who benefits from that?

Presumably in British Columbia a number of the corporations that own these are numbered or unidentifiable companies. You have to trace back through a complex corporate web as to who might ultimately be the beneficial owner. Is that correct?

[Mark Waddell]

That is correct. The purpose of the beneficial ownership survey was to identify the natural persons, the humans, at the very end of those flows of benefits.

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

I believe that work began, according to Mr. Davis' speaking notes, about 17 months ago. Until that work is completed, it's fair to say that DFO doesn't actually know who the beneficial owner of any fishing licence is on the west coast.

[Mark Waddell]

We know who the title-holder is in terms of who holds that licence, who is on record as holding that licence, but in terms of the flow of benefits derived from the licence, you are correct.

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

That would be like a numbered company or something like that. You would know what the numbered company is or perhaps a named company, but not the corporate structure that leads to the ownership.

[Mark Waddell]

That's correct. It's through the beneficial ownership survey that we're getting back to those natural persons.

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

To that point, we've heard testimony that said—and I think it's been referenced earlier, but I'll try to be perhaps a bit more specific—it was directed to licence-holders and not to licence owners. Is that a legitimate distinction? In other words, a person who holds the licence could be somebody leasing it, because licences are leased, and they hold it and are fishing it. They're not actually the ultimate owner.

Did the survey go to the company that may have been leasing it or holding it rather than the actual owner?

[Mark Waddell]

For the benefit of all, including myself, the Crown would retain the ownership of all licences. The Crown is ultimately the owner. All parties are holders of licences, not owners of licences.

To your question, yes, the question would have flowed to the holder of the licence. The subset of questions that were also provided as part of the survey would be seeking to identify if they had arrangements in place that would see beneficial ownership for benefits derived from said licence flow to other parties. That cuts to the lease arrangements.

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

How would you ask that question? In the case of a lease holder, the lease holder would share with you the name of the corporate entity that they were leasing from or fishing for, but they may not know anything beyond who owns that entity.

[Mark Waddell]

In the interest of time, I would suggest we provide this committee with the survey itself and the questions therein, so that you can see what we asked.

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

Thank you.

In the study that we have ongoing now, we've had a claim made in one of the written presentations that the Pattison Group, through several corporate entities, owns about 50% of all the licences in British Columbia. Do you know whether that's true or not?

[Mark Waddell]

I am familiar with other pieces of work that certainly have provided a similar indication. We're anticipating the results of our own survey in the next few days, and then getting back out to stakeholders and making it publicly available within the next couple of weeks. We'll determine through our own survey if that's further validation of that perspective.

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

DFO has policies on corporate concentration in particular fisheries and particular areas, does it not? That is to try to ensure against monopolistic practices. For example, the Competition Bureau looks at 30% or more, basically, of any industry that is owned by one single corporate entity as being an issue.

[Mark Waddell]

Here, I would draw upon my regional colleague. We do in fact have corporate concentration limits in terms of the number of licences that can be held by a party, or the extent of quota that can be held by a party, detailed within the integrated fisheries management plans on a fishery-by-fishery basis in the Pacific region and elsewhere in the country.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Perkins.

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

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

Mr. Chair, I'm giving my time to my colleague, Mr. Hardie.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Well, he's going to owe a lot of people smoked salmon.

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

I know. It's getting onerous, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Waddell or Mr. Davis, I wonder if you're aware of Bill C-42, which would amend the Canada Business Corporations Act to basically require beneficial ownership in Canadian corporations to be identified.

[Mark Waddell]

I am aware of that requirement and of it being a priority of the government to bring that in.