Fisheries Committee on Dec. 12th, 2023

[Melanie Sonnenberg]

As far as CRA goes, we hear a lot in the industry about cash sales. It is important to note that sometimes the cash sales are because there's more money involved. I saw in southwest New Brunswick and Nova Scotia this year in the fishery that cash transactions took place. These folks can offer more money to the harvester. If the harvester takes that money and reports it, let's not make a mistake in thinking that's illegal. It is not illegal, as long as everything is reported through the chain.

That also goes to the buyer. This is where CRA comes in. Perhaps there needs to be some auditing where there are hot spots, and there are hot spots—we know of them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Mr. Kelloway, your time is up by 10 seconds.

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, Chair.

Earlier, we talked about awareness and communication. The Committee has been hearing about one dramatic event after another from witnesses over the past few weeks. Does it seem to you that, in such a situation, actions that remain to be taken are decisive for what happens next, and that they take on a sense of urgency? We get the sense that many efforts are underway, but that nothing is bearing fruit. Meanwhile, we are all worried about the resource, the future of the fisheries and, above all, the future of harvesters.

In our recommendations, can we raise the urgency of implementing some of the solutions you have presented to us today?

Either Ms. Sonnenberg or Mr. MacPherson could respond.

[Ian MacPherson]

Thank you.

Clarity, I think, is what we need. C and P needs clarity. Non-indigenous harvesters need clarity. Indigenous harvesters need clarity.

That's what we're seeking. That will go a long way to diffusing a lot of the issues we have right now: What are the rules? How are they enforced? Are they enforced consistently?

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

What do you think, Mr. Allen?

[Carl Allen]

I would say there is some urgency in all of this, and I think Ian kind of nailed it perfectly, in that clarity is needed as much as anything, and we need it yesterday more than we need it today or tomorrow. It's something I hope the department will move on, instead of taking months to respond to or report on it, because time keeps marching on and the issue doesn't go away; in some cases it amplifies.

Yes, I do believe there's a sense of urgency around these issues.

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

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Madame Desbiens.

Now we'll go to Ms. Barron for two and a half minutes or less.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Sonnenberg, I wonder if you can clarify—I believe you've already touched on it in previous questions, but I'd like you to elaborate a little—that what we need is more enforcement and not more rules and regulations.

Can you expand a bit on what you meant when you said that?

[Melanie Sonnenberg]

Too often rules are introduced—in this case by DFO—when we haven't fully addressed a suite of rules that may previously have been introduced. I think we need to take stock of what we have and how we can do better collectively and move forward from there before we start introducing a new suite of things that need to be addressed. I hope that answers the question satisfactorily for you.

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

Thank you.

Do you have any thoughts on that, Mr. Allen?

[Carl Allen]

I think Melanie kind of hit that pretty well.

If you just enforce the rules and regulations you already have as they are, I think you'll be in a good position.

Often we come up with a new regulation to address the fact that we didn't address another regulation, and it's like saying we're going to come up with this whole system because the e-logs aren't working.

Well, if you went back, worked out and fixed the solution of the e-log, you wouldn't need this next step, would you? I think—throughout the whole process, for any of these—there needs to be sincere consultation with the industry itself, because a lot of times, the department could take five minutes to come and say to the industry, “This is our problem. How do we really solve it?” It's not as though we can come up with things on the spot, but in most cases it's those in the industry itself who will come up with the solutions, because we're the ones who actually understand the industry.

Thank you.

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

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, do I have only 30 seconds left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Yes.

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

I'm just going to let it go. I'm not going to ask another question and try to fill in that time.

Thanks for your questions, and thank you to the witnesses.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you for that, Ms. Barron, because Mr. Perkins was looking for a couple of minutes before I close it off, so he can have his question.

Go for it, Mr. Perkins.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

There's another disconnect in this IUU thing, which is that somebody's paying for the stuff that's illegally caught. We have this jurisdictional issue between federal and provincial, because the provinces license the buyers.

How much of the IUU catch do you think is actually being bought by provincially licensed buyers?

I'll go to Ms. Sonnenberg and then Mr. Allen.

[Melanie Sonnenberg]

I suspect that some is.

The federation has raised this to the provinces with respect to the licensing regime. It's not necessarily under the IUU, but we are certainly talking about how this is being done, what the consequences can be in a number of ways, and how it all comes together.

I would suspect that, yes, there are buyers. I think you're probably aware in your neck of the woods of some who may be—

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

I can name them.

[Melanie Sonnenberg]

You can probably name them, yes.

The same goes for where I live. Definitely we know that it's out there and that where there's smoke, there's usually fire. I think that's where we need to have an opportunity to have, again, those more robust relationships between the feds and the province, and we also need to be following it backwards into the plants and onto the trucks.

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

Mr. Allen, go ahead.

[Carl Allen]

It's a good question.

We had a southern gulf lobster advisory last week, and I kept throwing things on the buyers. They talk about an e-log, and I think there should be an e-slip. I don't know.

In my previous statement I said we shouldn't add too much complexity, but at the same time maybe anybody buying should have a federal licence as well. Maybe there's a role for the federal government there. Maybe there is; maybe there isn't.

I know, because, as it stands, each province has its own set of rules about how those buyers' licences may be issued and who can access them and who may be buying and who may not be.

In some cases, yes, it probably is licensed buyers who are participating in one part of the IUU, because not every fishery has a problem with all three of those letters, right? It may be just one of the three or all three, and then in some cases there are just fly-by-night or fly-under-the-radar buyers who may be involved in this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you for that, Mr. Perkins.

I want to say a huge thank you to Mr. Allen, Mr. MacPherson and Ms. Sonnenberg for their appearance here before committee today and for sharing their knowledge with us once again.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Yes, Mr. Hanley.