Environment committee  At the end, we will need to have some umbrella that says this is a marine protected area and those who violate will somehow be sanctioned. The systems are in place, but I don't believe that Parks Canada, DFO, Environment Canada, Natural Resources, or any department would be against, or try to impede, citizens, scientists, aboriginal groups, from saying, “I think this area is worthy.

Environment committee  I'm hopeful we will achieve that. We shouldn't just give up, but it's a process of working through it. If it takes 30 years, 40 years, it doesn't matter. The issue is for Canada. This is the common domain of Canadians. The common heritage of Canadians, all forms of Canadians within this federation, is to be serious about protecting our biodiversity, the habitat and so forth.

Environment committee  I see a legal entity in the context that Canada will have declared this to be a marine protected area, and both levels of government—in the case of Nova Scotia, the Government of Nova Scotia and the Government of Canada—have declared a specific marine area to be a marine protected area.

Environment committee  Well, yes. All stakeholders and rights holders would have to agree that yes, this will be a marine protected area.

Environment committee  Well, obviously, yes, it would.

Environment committee  The Gully is a prime example. The Gully was not brought about by governments. It was academics—university scientists and so forth—who said they thought we should protect this area, and it went upwards.

Environment committee  Finally it was given sanction by the federal government. The provincial government didn't object to it, but said, fine, we'll have it as an MPA.

Environment committee  When Dr. Peter Lawless reviewed the situation happening in Canada through looking at and discussing things with a range of persons, including us and DFO, he realized that here it seems to be that we're looking for the government itself to put forward a view saying it wants a particular area to be a marine protected area or a terrestrial area, which is really not the experience worldwide.

Environment committee  Thank you. The ESSIM is the eastern Scotian Shelf integrated management plan. Nova Scotia has a large shelf. That was a plan to look at the overall area and at an integrated plan whereby you could then have various components, MPAs, included within that area. That was shelved because basically of provincial and federal misunderstandings of where we would want to go.

Environment committee  The issue is not just picking out hectares of water or hectares of land. We must remember that we are looking at unique ecosystems, biodiversity, and habitats. That is what we are trying to protect, not just a land mass. That is the key. Otherwise, you could pick a lake. You could pick all kinds of things.

Environment committee  It's just like the song: a hunka-hunka—

Environment committee  Thank you, Madam Chair. Our presentation is fairly lengthy. We did hand out the presentation, so I will not read it throughout; however, I will comment on some paragraphs—it's produced in paragraph form—and I'll leave the rest for you to read during your leisure. Again, on behalf of the chief and president of the Native Council of Nova Scotia, the chief and president of the New Brunswick Aboriginal Peoples Council, as well as the chief and president of the Native Council of Prince Edward Island, and on behalf of Joshua McNeely, the executive director of Ikanawtiket, and Jessica Seward, who is our species at risk specialist, thank you for inviting us to this important panel.