Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. We can have all the laws in the world, but unless there is an enforcement mechanism they are not useful. They are not even as useful as the piece of paper in my right hand.
That not only goes for the domestic laws but also the international laws. We have UNCLOS, the UN law of the sea, to which we are a signatory. We have not been able to establish, domestically or internationally, an effective enforcement mechanism. We have a judicial mechanism without an enforcement mechanism, which makes the judicial system not useful at all. This is a fundamental challenge of the signatories to international treaties. We get half the equation correct, but we do not do the other half.
In my community on Vancouver Island, we only have one fisheries officer to do all the work on the southern half of Vancouver Island. That is absolutely impossible. We see a lot of poaching and destruction of habitat, and we have a beleaguered fisheries officer who simply does not have enough time.
The government really needs to come to the table to define how it is going to provide the resources to enforce the very laws in this bill.