Fisheries Committee on Feb. 8th, 2024

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

It's for four hours, basically, yes.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Go ahead, Mr. Morrissey.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

You made a valid point about the CBSA. I wasn't looking at it from that context, but I agree with you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

I believe we're still waiting for the translated amendment to be distributed, but it's very close.

Ms. Barron, you have the floor.

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

Thanks, Chair.

I want to apologize to the clerk and the translators for the amendment that needs to be translated on short notice. Thank you for that.

Once this amendment is decided upon, to make sure we're all on the same page, will we be agreeing to add the specific number of meetings that will be allocated to this at the end? I'm assuming we won't need to get that translated; that's pretty simple to add.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

That could be done as an amendment, to make sure it's in the motion, if you prefer.

It depends on how the committee wishes to go about that.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Can we unanimously agree on two meetings, as we articulated, Chair?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

We can if it's noted in the minutes, so that there's no dispute afterwards....

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Would you assess as chair the unanimity regarding the two meetings?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Is there agreement with all parties that two two-hour meetings would be sufficient for this? Are we all in agreement that four hours total would be sufficient?

Mr. Hanley.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

My only qualification—not to disagree with my own team—is that Mr. Perkins said to get the number of hours.

An example might be extending our existing meetings by an hour each. One of my worries is that delays in the Yukon salmon meeting might lead to more difficulties getting our witnesses. It's been a lot of work getting our witnesses lined up.

I totally understand the urgency of this. I want to get going on it, but some flexibility—

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

That's what I was trying to do.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

—in other words, around the number of hours, according to whatever schedule we can agree on....

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Is there consensus that four hours of meeting time for the committee would be sufficient?

I see agreement all around the room, so I'll ask that that be noted in the minutes.

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

I think we all agreed on the motion, too.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

It would be good to read it back, but it sounds good from our side.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Mr. Cormier, I see your hand up.

I'm sorry, but I have to move my head to see your hand up on the screen,

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

I'm sorry. I should have intervened before, Mr. Chair.

I just want to point out something before we go too far. I think there's some kind of agreement between all of you on two meetings, but it's just regarding CBSA.

Look, I think all of us want to get to the bottom of this. However, regarding CBSA, if you recall, Mr. Chair, in lots of meetings, I and my colleague, Mr. Perkins, asked lots of questions already to CBSA on the elver issue. They basically told us what they were involved in and how it was working with the shipping and everything, so I'm not sure we need to have them in some of those meetings to see what's going on with the situation. With all of the witnesses we've had in the last couple of months, Mr. Perkins, other colleagues and I have already asked some questions regarding the elver situation. I personally think that one meeting is enough.

I understand that you guys were thinking about maybe two, but if we can get one meeting with everybody at the table at the same time, I think we will get a good result in terms of seeing what the problem is with the situation.

Those are just my thoughts. It's hard for us—for me and Mike. We're away, so we're not in the room, but I think one meeting will be enough to tackle this issue.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

I think we've gone around the room, and there was consensus on four hours total, but if it requires less, then I think the committee could make that decision as we proceed.

Mr. Morrissey.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Chair, could we suspend for another moment or two, while we sort through where we're at?

I think we're close.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

We'll suspend for a few minutes.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

We are back.

Ms. Barron, go ahead.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Through discussion with my peers, I want to seek unanimous consent to withdraw the amendment, keep the original version and focus our attention on the number of meetings we'd like to move forward with. That way, we can get on with this.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Mel Arnold]

Do we have unanimous consent?

(Amendment withdrawn)

Is there any further discussion on the original motion?

Mr. Hanley.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

It looks like, in terms of the Yukon salmon study, we only had DFO scheduled for Tuesday. I'm happy to devote Tuesday to this meeting and just get it done. Maybe we can do it in one meeting.