Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to private member’s bill, Bill C-237, an act that would amend the Fisheries Act. As a Labradorian, I know how important the fishery is to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, Atlantic Canada and Quebec, not just for the livelihoods of harvesters and workers in our province, but also for our economy.
As Labradorians and Newfoundlanders, the recreational food fishery is essential to who we are as a province and as a people. It is more than a tradition; it is a connection we share to the water and those who came before us.
My biggest concern with Bill C-237 is that it ignores fishers and was created without meaningful consultation with those who have invested the most. Our recreational fishers have already spoken up. They have serious concerns with this bill and were not consulted. Why did the member opposite ignore those who would be directly impacted by this particular bill?
In the coming days, the Minister of Fisheries will launch the Newfoundland and Labrador food fishery consultations. This was a commitment she made when announcing the food fishery this year. Newfoundlanders and Labradorians deserve to have their say. These planned consultations will offer all recreational fishers the opportunity to share their thoughts on how we can improve the recreational food fishery.
On this side of the house, we listen to fishers and believe in the scientific stock-based management of our fisheries. Scientific stock-based management works and has led to a reopening of the northern cod fishery in Newfoundland and Labrador for the first time since the cod moratorium in 1993. The moratorium is a hurt that everyone in my province still feels deeply, and we cannot risk making that mistake again.
Bill C-237 would create one fishing season across all of Atlantic Canada and change the management of fisheries to species-based rather than stock-based. This would create a potential situation where total allowable catches and bycatch levels for commercial fisheries could be seriously affected.
Bill C-237 threatens the entire commercial fishing industry in Atlantic Canada and, yes, in Quebec, risking thousands of Canadian jobs and billions of dollars to our economy. Let us look at some examples where this is the case. On the west coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, fishers have sacrificed to help rebuild the NAFO area 4R northern Gulf cod stock, which remains under a commercial moratorium today. That moratorium also applies to NAFO area 4S adjacent to the vast Côte-Nord of Quebec.
Bill C-237 would increase fishing pressure on that stock, removing more fish from the water than we currently do. That is a slap in the face to commercial harvesters in Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec, who have not been able to fish these past number of years. This bill would take away the ability to balance the opportunities for recreational fishers and commercial harvesters. It uses a one-size-fits-all approach that would have serious consequences for our commercial fishers who earn their living from the ocean. For a commercial fishery like Atlantic halibut in the province of Quebec, Gulf cod is caught as bycatch in that fishery. This bill would increase the fishing pressure on that bycatch, and the only place to take it from would be from those commercial fishers.
What would that mean for the $100-million halibut fishery in Quebec and Labrador? This member’s bill does not care about that, because it is one-size-fits-all, according to the member for Terra Nova—The Peninsulas. The bill is an existential threat to the fishery and the harvesters in the coastal communities it supports.
Let us also talk about the emerging redfish unit 1 fishery. Northern Gulf cod are also caught as bycatch in that fishery, so like the Atlantic halibut fishery, which is worth $100 million, we would increase pressure on northern Gulf cod, and our redfish unit 1 fishery would also be impacted. This would also certainly impact my colleagues from Quebec in the Bloc Québécois.
The issues that Bill C-237 would create around bycatch for our commercial fisheries cannot be overstated. At a time when Canadians are looking to their government to grow our economy to help Canadians, Bill C-237 risks one of the largest economic drivers in Atlantic Canada, our commercial fisheries.
By changing to species-based fisheries management and singular seasons across Atlantic Canada and Quebec, Bill C-237 would affect the ability to simultaneously support advancing indigenous fisheries alongside the recreational and the commercial fisheries. That would mean worse outcomes for both indigenous fishers and non-indigenous fishers.
Bill C-237 would create more and new red tape, and its administrative costs would be downloaded to the recreational fishers. It would put those burdens solely on the recreational fishers themselves. The bill would demand an entirely new monitoring system just for recreational fishers, and it would force Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and all Atlantic Canadians to record their catch from the recreational fishery.
How would the bill look to offset these administrative and red tape costs? Fees on the fishers would be passed from the bill and downloaded to the recreational fishers. The bill clearly says that to offset these costs, the government would cover “the administrative costs of the monitoring system by fees and penalties that are required to be paid under the Fisheries Act”. That means licence fees, plain and simple. The bill would be a Conservative tax on food. There are no two ways about it: It would be a Conservative tax on those who are simply looking for a fish to feed themselves and their family, as they have done for generations.
This year, the food fishery in Newfoundland and Labrador, in Atlantic Canada and in Quebec had no licence requirement. There was no licence fee, and there were no reporting requirements. Fishers could just follow the rules, be safe on the ocean and fish for food. After all, it is a huge part of our culture. Under the Conservative “tax on food” bill, food fishers in Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec and the rest of Atlantic Canada would now need a mandatory licence, would pay a fee to cover the costs of the bill and would be required to report every fish they catch through an unspecific system, which would also cost them money to use, almost like the ELOG system.
While our government is providing tax relief to millions of Canadians and working to build a strong economy, Conservative members are putting forward legislation that would threaten the economy for every Atlantic Canadian and would make Newfoundlanders and Labradorians pay to participate in the food fishery. For those reasons, I cannot support Bill C-237, and I urge my fellow members in the House to vote no to the bill and say no to a Conservative tax on food.