Madam Speaker, there has been a great degree of despair from my riding and from the fishers whom I met today. I did something today that nobody else in the House did. I went into my riding on a charter paid for by the taxpayers of the country and met firsthand with the people who are affected by the closure of cod and 40% closure of crab in my riding. I am the most affected MP in all of Canada. Nobody is more affected than I and the people who I serve in the riding of Labrador.
I went into Port Hope Simpson last evening. I met with the crab fishers and despair was the order of the day. I ask all Canadian friends watching tonight to join with me in showing respect, honour, dignity and maybe something a little better than that, support for the cause and plight of these people.
The people who I met last evening in Port Hope Simpson never got to be in the mess they are now because of their own doing. It was because of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans of Canada, starting in 1997 through to this very moment.
Let me explain a few points. In 1997 the Government of Canada brought in an inshore northern shrimp policy to the tune of 110,000 metric tonnes. We have 17 big boats that fish offshore. We have 400 more boats at 65 feet or less that fish and 60% of the shrimp is caught off the shores of Labrador within 60 to 100 miles.
Let me say to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, to his deputy, his ADM and all those officials in the PMO, the PCO and the P of whatever O, and I do not care what O it is, if they were put into a situation like those little crab that lie on the bottom off Labrador and if they had drag boats rolling over them day after day, I do not think they would have had the breath of day to make the kind of decisions that were made this past week. That is a very fundamental point, and I am not saying it lightly. I am saying it with full heart. My heart is beating very quickly and not because I respect the decision that was taken by the government. It is beating because I have passion for the people who I represent.
I am telling Canadians, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, if they are watching, that the people of Labrador deserve better. I am telling the Deputy Prime Minister, caucus, cabinet, members of the opposition and all Canadians that those people deserve better. We have the resources. Canada has mismanaged our resources time and again.
I am absolutely infuriated with what has happened along the shores of Labrador. We have enough shrimp, if a fair share was given to us, to look after every man, woman and child. Instead the Government of Canada would prefer to give more to its great corporate friends. While they have more condos in Florida and more money, my workers and fishers, supporters and constituents are literally dying on the vine. It is just not good enough.
I would like the minister and his department to get a handle on that. When he comes down with the shrimp plan in the next couple of days he should do the right and honourable thing and recognize the adjacency of Labrador, just like the Government of Canada was forced to recognize the adjacency of Nunavut when Nunavut took it to court, won its case and the government had to sit down in the DFO and negotiate a better deal on shrimp for it.
The same sort of thing is required here. We are adjacent and we are aboriginal. We have Inu, Inuit, Metis, settlers and whoever and they are all good hard-working people. Canadians, please consider these people because they have not been given the right consideration to this point in time.
I promised them last evening that I would bring their plight to the House this evening. I have been on the go. I went to bed at one o'clock, got up at five this morning and went into meetings on cod. I travelled all day and made it here tonight. It has been a long 24 to 48 hours for me.
I care and I would like for others to care. I would like the Globe and Mail and the various other editorials of this country to write the right stuff instead of the garbage they are putting forward on the plight of the cod in Newfoundland and Labrador.
It is one thing to play games about species at risk or have the minister make a joke of it like he did yesterday when he said: “Well I'm going to ask the seals to leave”. That is not a joke for the cod fishers who I met with this morning in L’Anse au Loup at the Labrador fishermen's union. It was no joke. It was a dead serious issue. People were crying. People were begging me. People were saying: “Lawrence what can you do to assist? Our way of life is gone. We don't want to go to Toronto. We don't want to go to Edmonton. We have our homes. We're 50 years of age. What are we going to do? We're not trained for anything else? You are humiliating us with make-work projects. We don't want to build walkways or parkways. That's not what we're used to. We're used to fishing. We're used to working in plants. Give us some dignity”.
I am asking Canadians to support me in giving some dignity to the people who I represent. Also, my colleagues throughout the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and Atlantic Canada need to be respected and I do not feel we have been respected. I do not feel I have gotten the respect. I am absolutely dismayed and those fishers have asked me to bring this back and say “please consider”.
I believe very strongly in the FRCC, the Fisheries Resource Conservation Council of Canada. It is an independent body that is made up of corporate, fishers, unions, scientists and the right people. They do the right kind of public consultations. When they came in with 3,500 tonnes I bit my teeth, but 3,500 for me was better than nothing. Now we have a rock in the pond.
The minister has missed the boat, his science people have missed the boat and his officials have missed it. They did not take into consideration the all party committee. They did not take into consideration the plight of the members of Parliament. They did not take into consideration the FRCC. They did not take anything into consideration and they did it without any consultation, and bang it goes, goodbye, never to be seen again. The government will give us 18 months of make-work and “get away from us”.
That is not good enough. If that is what the Government of Canada stands for, I am very unhappy to say that I am a member of this government. I want to be in this for the long haul and I want to be a member of the government for the long haul. I want to help the government that I am part of and I want to be a full participant and full member of Parliament here but members of Parliament will have to rally behind us. If they are listening at all, if they care at all, they should rally behind us, support us and send a different message or help support our message to the minister so he might end up hearing the actual facts. In my view there is enough fish for our fishery.
I want that to be respected. I know it will not change, or I do not feel it will, but I would like to see the science put into perspective. I would like to see some independent scientists review the science of DFO to ensure that it is proper science. If it is not going to be open this year, which I know it is not, I would like to see proper signs, proper reviews, proper constructive representation and so on and maybe we could get a fishery for next year. I am putting my hope in something beyond this year.
Right now we are preparing for make-work. Make-work is not what we want. If we are going to do anything, let us do some buy out programs again. Let us get back to dignity. Let us do some retirements. Let us do something for those who may be younger and have some hope and passion for getting back on the sea some day. They do not want handouts but we are forcing them into it.
It is the Government of Canada's decision, through the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, that has put the people of our province and the people of the north shore of Quebec and the southern gulf in this situation. I really feel things can be better.
I was there last evening. My folks in Port Hope Simpson are very gentle, quiet people and in many ways very passive people. The sadness displayed was unreal. They took a 30% cut in crab five years ago. They took a 40% cut in crab right now. That is 70% in the last five years. They took a cut in crab in 1995.
When we ask DFO why 2J north and 3K south are not bad but 2J in the centre is bad and when I, my fishers and all the people along the Labrador coast say that it is bad because there is too much activity from the auto trawls of 400 or 500 boats going 365 days a year, DFO says it is inconclusive. In my view, if we are inconclusive on something, if something is a grey area and Canada thinks it is so great on conservation, why not err on the side of conservation and put no trawl zones in place. All we are asking for are no trawl zones where crab is due. Is that not simple? I think it is simple language, simple words, a simple answer and a simple response, but no.
We asked for a caplin closure. Some people played around with that, split weirs and finally came down with a 40% cut. We asked for seals to be taken out. They are going to study seals to the tune of $6 million. It is not study that we want. We want a reduction in seals. We want those seals taken out. I do not care how they are taken out. Every bloody one of them can be killed. I will go in there myself with a rifle and help shoot them. It is not a problem. I would assist. I am a hunter and have no problem doing that because I am doing something far different than what other parliamentarians are doing.
As far as I am concerned, the House of Commons is scared to deal with seals, not only on this side but on both sides. In my view the reason why it is scared to deal with seals is because the international fund for animal welfare may polarize 5% or 10% of a riding or maybe in close swing ridings will change the vote. We are all a little huddled and cuddled back and frightened of it.
I would ask the entire House of Commons to be very considerate of this. I know members may be a little worried in their own little corners. I am not worried because in my riding I do not think anyone believes in having seven million or eight million seals. We have to bring that down.
Believe or not but the other day I was at DFO, and I really have to bring this point out. I was having a discussion about seals with a senior official. He asked me if I had ever stopped to think that it might be mackerel eating the new spawn from the cod which was causing the problem. I said that I never thought about it and that it was a new one to me. I never heard mackerel being brought into the equation before. Now DFO is trying to bring in anything it can to save the seals because it does not want to deal with that issue. However the seals have to be dealt with.
For us to revive the cod in the north Atlantic, we have to get the seals back to the levels they were in the 1970s. I share the views of my colleague next to me and many of my colleagues around me. We all have similar views. We have to put it into a management plan that brings the numbers down so we can allow the equilibrium of the North Atlantic to be balanced and get some things rolling again, such as caplin.
I can promise that when the increase is finished on shrimp, 140 million tonnes by the way, which is a little fish that the cod eat too, we will end up in 10 years or so with that basket empty, as well as cod, caplin, herring and all kinds of fish. It is a case of mismanagement. It has nothing to do with which party is in power. It started 50, or 60, or 70 or 80 years ago and continues. In my view it has nothing to do with stripes of power. It is the total mismanagement of DFO that has caused these problems.
That being said, what are we going to do about it? Let us get real. Stop throwing money around and start taking action. We can throw the money around and take action too if that is what everyone wants. I do not mind. With $6 million people can do whatever they like. However we need action on predation. We need action on rebuilding stocks. We need action on the little fish that cod and other fish eat, like caplin and so on. Some action was taken but it was not enough. In my view the response of DFO to the all party committee report was a very minor response.
That all party report meant a lot to me. Senators, members of Parliament including the official opposition and the NDP, the two committees in the House, the senate committee on fisheries and the commons committee on fisheries and the premier worked collectively with good science.
In my view, we were assisted by a great scientist, a man who is well known in his field, Dr. George Rose from Memorial University. If George is listening, I want to tell him that he is, in my view, the best. I would build a team around him anytime for independent science.
We had the right political mix, the right union mix and the right industry mix. The FRCC came in very close to the right mix. The question for which I and the people I represent beg an answer is how could anybody come in with a decision and not support it. That is the question that is begging inside all those people in St. John's and Corner Brook who are in the office of the minister responsible for ACOA tonight. They can have my office forever because it is not my office, it is their office. If my constituents are listening, they can take over my constituency office and keep it for eternity because it is their office not mine.
I support my constituents first and foremost. I am a people person. I represent my riding. I will take second place to nobody when it comes to the people who I represent in my riding. I do it with a great deal of passion and hard work.
I am absolutely furious and devastated at what I have witnessed over the last 24 hours in bringing forward the plight here to DFO, the PMO and everybody else. To hear the kind of insults that were slurred at me tonight by the Minister of Fisheries is unreal. I just asked the Minister of Fisheries tonight that if he were from Labrador would he have made that decision. I do not want to repeat in public what he said back to me.