The hon. minister just asked if that was a promise. I will take that under advisement.
Clause 15, which again provides a minister with discretionary powers, says, “The Minister may, for the purpose of conducting research” obtain information from any person that the minister considers relevant to conservation, proper management and prevention of pollution of waters. Again, clarification is needed.
The apparent user fee structure in clauses 16 to 17 requires clarification with respect to fees charged for the service or the use of a facility.
There are many other sections in this and a lot of it deals with the first half of this bill. It troubles me greatly that so many people have contacted our office, and many offices of other members of Parliament and DFO, about their concerns on the bill. Again, the theme is very simple, questions, questions, questions. Remember, we are replacing an act that existed for 137 years. We have to ask the essential question. Was due diligence exercised? I do not think it was in this case. There were too many questions and too many people asking them.
Under clause 25, while the minister “must” take into account in exercising the powers the need to conserve the fishery while also securing access to the fishery. The question arises as to how these are prioritized. At the same time the minister may take into account matters such as adjacency and historical participation, which require careful consideration due to the matters arising out of, say, the Marshall decision, which took into account historical attachment and adjacency issues. Do these issues relate to the licence holder specifically or can adjacency and historical participation relate to the historical attachment of fishers from communities? What are we opening up? Again, this a question that needs verification. The law has to be translated for all stakeholders. The law has to be carefully vetted for all stakeholders. For communities, we have ourselves a new concept. Who does that include? We need to ask that question.
Also I will address clause 36. This very important. Clause 36 refers to aquaculture, a very simple little addition that definitely needs more clarification. Under “Leases”, it says, “The Minister may issue leases for aquaculture purposes”.
I am a proud member of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans now. It is a very non-partisan group that gets along very well and it has a great chair. However, if memory serves me correctly, and I was not a member of Parliament at the time, around 2003 the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans took the decision that aquaculture would have its own special unit, or at least the characteristics of its own special unit within the government. From my understanding, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans was a part of that committee in 2003.