Madam Speaker, coming from the Prairies, I feel very inadequate discussing marine fisheries.
I would like to focus on the minister's comments about codes of practice. I like codes of practice a lot. As a regional fisheries biologist up at The Pas, I saw some horrific examples of culverts that were placed too high on logging roads. People just dropped culverts in.
I do not want the minister to misconstrue anything I have said as meaning that I do not care about fish habitat. I have been involved with monitoring fish habitat for a long time. To my point about culverts in fish-bearing streams, there could be a code of practice that the bottom of a culvert is below the stream bed, where the water velocities are good. I would welcome that approach of codes of practice and standards.
However, we do not need the fish cops coming around every second week asking what is going on, because the level of uncertainty that creates causes great difficulties.
I would suspect that the industry would welcome standards and codes of practice as well. I would be pleased to work with the minister and the department to help develop codes of practice for some aspects of fisheries management.