Environment committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. The 100,000 individual anglers and hunters and 670 member clubs that make up the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters membership and subscribers are among the most committed fish and wildlife conservationists in C

Environment committee  Thank you for the question. Yes, you understand our submission. Our submission is fundamentally that, 10 years ago, Canada chose to follow the existing American model, which is really a litigious, highly bureaucratic model. We believed, based on the track record of the United St

Environment committee  Thank you. Firstly, geographically, the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters has dues-paying members in all corners, so to speak, of Ontario--in other words, right across the province. I mentioned 100,000 members, subscribers, supporters. We have approximately 85,000 dues-

Environment committee  --bad experiences we've had with reference to endangered species legislation, both provincially and federally in the province of Ontario, and they include species such as lake sturgeon, bobwhite quail, snapping turtle, and, unfortunately, the American eel.

Environment committee  They are diverting our time and resources, we think, from more productive avenues of restoration.

Environment committee  Hello, Mr. Hyer.

Environment committee  Yes, and thank you for the question. I'm a research scientist by training. Biology is my specialty, but I fully acknowledge the veracity of the sciences of economics and sociology. Those are every bit as legitimate branches of science as biology and ecology. We would say to the

Environment committee  Yes, sir, you get it. One has to be extremely careful not to let scarce resources, whether human or financial, be spent on anything but the most important areas. If, for example, the province of Alberta generally speaking has an overall healthy walleye or pickerel population and

Environment committee  I would fear waiting for a regulatory or legislative change. I think if the government will were there, then the appropriate departments would make it policy to make sure they picked up the phone with Trout Unlimited or the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters or Ducks Unlim

Environment committee  Sorry, I thought your question was directed to Dr. Whoriskey.

Environment committee  Absolutely, sorry.

Environment committee  Thank you. The latter point I would agree with. The consequence is one of ineffectiveness and certainly inefficiencies when those kinds of contacts and relationships aren't built. I would say that ultimately our point remains, regardless of the government of the day, that hea

Environment committee  Yes, thank you. A short, concrete example: if you review our nine recommendations, among them you will see that we'd appreciate an invitation.... The species has to be appropriate, geographically and from a knowledge base that we have. We'd appreciate an invitation to participate

Environment committee  Yes, sir, those are among the types of contributions we could make. I prefaced it by saying it's species specific, it's site specific. Quite frankly, it would depend on what the recovery plan that was finalized called for. Yes, we would want to contribute, as examples, in those w

Environment committee  Yes, sir. Our recommendations do not include throwing it out the window. We have to work with what we have.