Mr. Speaker, what the parliamentary secretary just said sounds great, but we have actually talked to fishers on the water who are trying to implement some of these projects. I will list one. So far, the South Vancouver Island Anglers Coalition has successfully reared 1.87 million juvenile chinook through its Sooke sea pen project since it started in 2017. That has been achieved with 100% private funding. They have raised in excess of $300,000 to cover project costs, and DFO has not put up one single dollar, which is a shame.
Members can guess where these fish go. This year, fishers have seen the chinook return to the fishery, the southern resident killer whales feeding in the Juan de Fuca Strait near Sooke in late August and early September and double the number of fish in the Sooke River. It all indicates that the success of their efforts is real.
The parliamentary secretary talks about all this as being a great effort. The bottom line is that our fishers are so frustrated. They want to demonstrate areas for selective fishing where populations of salmon are sufficient. The recreational fishing industry can survive, and they can use these techniques to keep fishing. They are so frustrated that DFO is not listening to their concerns that they are protesting and demonstrating to say to DFO, “Look what we are doing.” They can really save these fish. They can catch the ones that are plentiful and not catch the ones that are having problems.
All I ask the minister and the parliamentary secretary to do is simply listen to these recreational fishers and truly listen to what they have to say. They have some great advice.