Fisheries committee  In my organization, we believe that Canada's water should be swimmable, drinkable, and fishable. That's our vision. We're building a network of people around working towards that very goal. We'd like to see the Fisheries Act be very strong in its commitment to restoring fisherie

Fisheries committee  Thank you. I don't think we have much else to add. I think our point is twofold. Under the current act, with the changes, we don't have a lot of tools in the Fisheries Act to look at cumulative impacts. The one tool that we did have under subsection 36(3), the test for “a delet

Fisheries committee  I'm not sure, but if that's factually correct, it's correct.

Fisheries committee  Thank you. It's a great question. The change in legislation to “serious harm” is my point. It's putting the onus on the public to prove serious harm. What does that mean? They don't have access to the information and they don't have the money to actually be there and fight a lo

Fisheries committee  It's a really great question as well. The old subsection 36(3) and the way it's currently worded, if the exceptions weren't given, was to prevent the deposit of a deleterious substance into waters frequented by fish. It did prevent cumulative impacts because it didn't allow the

Fisheries committee  Thank you for a great question. Our top priority would be to protect habitat by switching the onus back onto the proponent to show how and what they're going to do in terms of protecting fish and fish habitat instead of what it currently is now, where it's switched back to the

Fisheries committee  Let me be very clear, sir. This is about Canadians and people. This is a quasi-criminal statute that protects every Canadian. There is nobody who should be ignored just because there are so many people having—

Fisheries committee  —deleterious substances put into their water, destroying their swimmable water, or destroying fisheries and fish habitat. You shouldn't claim that there is too much red tape to deal with those people's voices. It's very important that this quasi-criminal statute protect every Can

Fisheries committee  They are both good questions. We participate in all the CNSC hearings. We've brought in evidence. We've spent thousands of hours trying to bring this to the attention of the public. It's all on the record. It's admitted by the industry. They've done their own cost-benefit analy

Fisheries committee  I don't know about being thrown in jail. The courts are pretty open when you hear the evidence and what happened—

Fisheries committee  You know what? I don't know the facts of the case. Under the old Fisheries Act, if there was a point source and somebody, through due diligence, should have been prepared to not allow that to go into the river and should have expected that there would be fisheries death, the way

Fisheries committee  That's why you need proper land use planning. You need to work hard to ensure that what you are putting on the field doesn't run off. That's exactly what the Fisheries Act is intended to fix, and it was, under the old act.

Fisheries committee  —an equivalency agreement. If they have laws that deal with the same subject matter as the Fisheries Act, the Fisheries Act no longer applies. That's why we say that there is no longer a Canadian law that applies in all provinces across the entire country. As a result of the ch

Fisheries committee  Thank you for the question, because I think it cuts to the whole heart of what we're talking about. Under the old act, killing fish, depositing a deleterious substance in waters frequented by fish, or destroying fish habitat was illegal unless the proponent could prove that it

Fisheries committee  Yes, the 2012 changes made it possible to make new regulations that exempt specific industries under subsection 36(3). Those regulations have come into force since then, particularly for waste water effluent regulations, for sewage treatment plants. That's why there was a lot of