QUESTION PERIOD — Ministry of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard
Fishing Industry in New Brunswick
June 4, 2024
Welcome to the Senate, minister.
With respect to the balance between protecting right whales and protecting the interests of the workers and commercial fishers, you told my colleague, Senator Cuzner, that fishers use a calculation method different than the one used by your department. That seems quite astonishing to me. How can you reassure fishers and the industry that the Technical Advisory Committee on North Atlantic Right Whales that you’re creating truly takes account of the realities of fishers and the industry, particularly in my region, the Acadian Peninsula, in northeastern New Brunswick?
Over the next few weeks, the advisory committee will meet again. When measures are put in place and they don’t affect us personally, no one minds because it makes no difference to them. However, when the measures hit close to home, suddenly they might not be everything that was hoped for.
It’s an evolutionary process. How can we ensure that we make our calculations in the same way with the same units of measurement? Fishers measure in fathoms, but that makes it a little more difficult for Fisheries and Oceans Canada to get a full image of the seabed.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada calculates based on lines: no fishing between such and such a line, hence the importance of using artificial intelligence and the Mer numérique tool. Fishers are already aware of the policies implemented to avoid situations like the one that happened two weeks ago.
I’m surprised that the department calculates in this manner. That brings me to my second question. A recent article in Acadie nouvelle raised some very important concerns expressed by experts and industry stakeholders regarding your department.
The language used was quite powerful, with references to decisions that are out of touch with reality, the ultra-centralization of power over all issues, operating in silos, and so on. The article even used the term “bunker” to describe your department.
Minister, what do you intend to do to alleviate these recurring frustrations, which are discouraging the fishers of our region? How are you going to restore, or rather establish, I would say, a climate of enduring trust between your department and the fishing industry in my region?
What matters to me is that the Technical Advisory Committee on North Atlantic Right Whales include fishers as well as industry representatives. As far as the processing industry is concerned, processors have advised fishers that if they don’t comply with MSC certification and whale protection rules, processors won’t buy their seafood. No processor wants to build up a stockpile of seafood in their freezer.
Products need to be imported and exported. For products to be exported, rules have to be followed, and this includes whale protection rules, in order to keep the markets open, both on the American side and on the side of—
