SoVote

May/30/22 9:35:56 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, with respect, that is exactly the minister's job. It is to manage the fishery, and she simply is not doing that. In July 2020, the minister's predecessor, Minister Jordan, committed Canada to the United Kingdom's global ocean alliance agenda to zone 30% of Canada's coastal waters as “protected” by 2030. This is in addition to the existing government commitment to zone 25% of Canada's waters by 2025 and the extension into terrestrial public lands. The proponents of this European agenda advocate elimination of all extractive use of these regions, including recreational and commercial fishing. What is the minister's plan to conduct a transparent science-based process that includes regional and national stakeholder interests before declaring vast areas of public waters off limits to public access?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:36:53 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, the marine protected areas prevent certain industrial activities that affect the seabed floor. Otherwise, there are no constraints that have already been defined in the negotiated MPAs that we are involved with.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:37:16 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, what specific actions is the minister's department taking right now to implement the Cohen commission recommendation number 30 for a mark selective fishery?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:37:25 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, we are considering a mark selective fishery. Part of the budget was to increase the supplies needed and the trailers needed for that fishery.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:37:42 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, for more than one and a half decades the public fishing community, especially in B.C. and especially in the lower Fraser, has been advocating selective sport fishing regulations that would allow recreational fishing that was selective for certain types of salmon while avoiding endangered salmon and sturgeon. The technique is known as bar rigs, which has been known to be highly selective. Under the federal Fisheries Act, the 1996 British Columbia sport fishing regulation 137 has amendments for such things as herring jigging and sturgeon gear, but it requires an amendment that would allow selective salmon fishing. Will the minister work with the British Columbia sport fishing community to amend the British Columbia sport fishing regulations so that Canadians can enjoy this important family activity and support the key economic sport fishing sector, at the same time as protecting stocks of concern?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:38:38 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, the protection of stocks of concern are, of course, the number one priority, but my officials are developing a discussion paper on this matter and will be consulting with interested parties.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:38:53 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, we hear that mass marking trailers have been purchased and are currently in use in B.C., but only to apply coded wire tags, not doing their intended purpose. Will the minister's department in 2023 begin the critical process of mass marking all hatchery chinook production that is designed to contribute to fisheries in southern B.C. in order to provide increased opportunity for mark selective fisheries and to assist hatchery managers in distinguishing between hatchery and wild chinook in brood stock selection?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:39:25 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, what we will do is prioritize the conservation of the wild Pacific salmon while making opportunities available to the sport fishery in such a way that it does not undermine the conservation of wild salmon.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:39:45 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, the minister has had ample opportunity to address this issue. The Cohen commission has been around for 10 years, yet the government is still planning to delay the process, putting many of our anglers at risk. How many full-time equivalent positions are there at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:40:04 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, there are close to 14,000 permanent positions.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:40:12 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, for everybody out there, that was 14,000. Total spending for Fisheries and Oceans Canada increased by 42.3% between 2016-17 and 2020-21, yet we have heard across the board that service levels are at all-time lows. Why?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:40:32 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, the complexity of DFO's mandate is only increasing, especially with the potential pipeline and tanker traffic. We have invested a lot in protecting the oceans through the oceans protection plan.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:40:52 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, over that same period we have seen full-time positions at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans increase by 30%, and the minister has already acknowledged the 14,000 positions, yet we see very little in effective enforcement in British Columbia, which is the reason gillnets are still catching threatened stocks in our waters. Why?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:41:14 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, we are looking into the matter the member has just raised.

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Mr. Bob Zimmer

May/30/22 9:41:27 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, further, we have seen full-time staff in the department in the Pacific region balloon, according to estimates, from 617 since 2016 to 1,949 individuals, yet we saw recently that DFO did nothing with respect to the floods in British Columbia. It was the volunteers who did the work while the executives of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans sat on their hands. With all the additional staff in Vancouver, why did DFO not lift a finger?

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Hon. Joyce Murray

May/30/22 9:41:59 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, I am very proud of our government's response to the floods and the slides. DFO was there to ensure that the damage to the hatcheries was understood and corrected and to assess the impact on salmon—

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The Chair

May/30/22 9:42:20 p.m.
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Continuing debate, the hon. member for Whitby.

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Mr. Ryan Turnbull (Whitby, Lib.)

May/30/22 9:42:25 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, it is a great pleasure to rise in the House tonight and participate in this discussion. Canada is, without a doubt, a proud maritime nation that relies heavily on its oceans as a source of food, jobs, energy, raw materials, maritime trade, tourism and recreation. We are particularly proud of our robust, sustainably managed and well-regulated commercial fisheries, which are important to our economy and coastal communities, but as with all industries, there is room for improvement. While we strive to understand just how pervasive marine pollution is, we know that a major contributor is lost, abandoned and otherwise discarded fishing gear, also known as “ghost gear”. Ghost gear is one of the deadliest forms of plastic debris found in the world's oceans and has a damaging impact on marine animals like whales and turtles, the coastal and marine environment, and global fish stocks. It is estimated that between 5% and 30% of harvestable fish stocks are captured by ghost gear globally, which poses a major threat to human health, livelihoods and global food security. It also poses a navigation hazard and breaks down into other forms of pollution, such as microplastics. Gear loss is rarely intentional. Ghost gear is primarily caused by gear snagging on the sea floor, entanglement with other fishing gear, severe weather conditions and gear being incidentally cut or dislodged by marine vessel traffic. Intentional discard by harvesters is less common and could be a result of potential endangerment of the safety of the crew or vessel. Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing can also contribute to ghost gear. The good news is that our government is working closely with the fishing industry to raise standards across Canadian fisheries to promote innovation, so that sustainable and economically viable fisheries can thrive, along with healthy ecosystems and marine species. A key component of the program is working with stakeholders through the ghost gear fund. This fund is central to the Canadian approach, one that has focused on industry engagement and involvement in the solution to the decades-old issue of lost gear. It focuses on four key areas to address ghost gear, including retrieval of existing ghost gear, building responsible disposal solutions, acquisition of new fishing and retrieval technologies to support prevention, as well as international leadership to support sustainable fisheries practices in areas of high gear loss. A challenge in ghost gear retrieval is ensuring that adequate disposal facilities are available for proper collection, storage, recycling and disposal of retrieved gear. Fisheries and Oceans Canada is addressing these challenges through the disposal pillar of the ghost gear fund. For example, the Pacific net recycling initiative, which is led by Steveston Harbour, recycled 28,525 kilograms of nylon and poly end-of-life fishing nets in one year, diverting this plastic waste from potentially entering the oceans and landfills. This initiative benefits the fishing community, as it employs commercial fishers to strip the nets and package them for processing, with the proceeds received used to pay wages for fishers in the off-season. This provides much-needed income and supports industry buy-in to the recycling program. Additionally, this project developed a business plan that could expand the current net recycling program to all of British Columbia's coast. The ghost gear fund also supported the development of Ocean Legacy's first two ocean plastic depots to collect and process ghost gear and other marine plastics. In 2020, these depots diverted 85 tonnes of waste from landfills. Building on their success, the second phase of this project supported the establishment of localized nylon-processing capacity within British Columbia. This initiative provides critical infrastructure to capture plastic waste, diverting it from landfills and responsibly recycling items. It also furthers the implementation of pragmatic solutions to grow the Canadian plastic circular economy. Additionally, program funding has allowed 36 harbour authorities to participate in the program, creating secure storage areas for gear that could be returned to its owners when identifiable markers are still attached. The most effective way to address ghost gear is to prevent gear loss in the first place. The third pillar of the ghost gear fund works to prevent future gear loss through supporting the acquisition and piloting of fishing gear technology. The issue of lost gear is not one unique to Canada. Through the fourth pillar of our fund, Fisheries and Oceans Canada demonstrates its leadership role by providing support for initiatives that further reduce, reuse and recycle fishing and aquaculture gear on a global scale. We have supported the Gulf and Caribbean Fisheries Institute's development of a regional Caribbean fisheries management and ghost gear action plan, and extended baseline analysis and hot spot mapping in the Caribbean. Another successful project that Canada has supported is led by the Stand Out for Environment Restoration Initiative, which engages coastal communities in Nigeria to assist in the development of policies for the prevention and mitigation of ghost gear. They have implemented a ghost gear recovery program with a focus on offshore recovery, as well as installed six end-of-life gear recovery centres for collection, sorting and analysis of retrieved ghost gear in Nigeria and Cameroon. The collected gear is then used to create economic opportunities for fishing communities through educational workshops, using end-of-life ghost gear to produce secondary products. The ghost gear fund has seen great success, but it is only one component of the greater strategy to address ghost gear in Canada. In 2020, Fisheries and Oceans Canada implemented mandatory lost gear reporting requirements in all Canadian commercial fisheries. In 2021, the department implemented a user-friendly reporting system for harvesters to report lost gear. This reporting requirement allows the department to quantify the extent of lost gear in Canadian waters and identify priority areas for targeted gear retrieval projects. The additional data on the location, fishery type and incidence of gear loss will enable Fisheries and Oceans Canada to identify other long-term measures to address ghost gear and provide a more robust understanding of the issue in Canada. Through the initial two years of programming, harvesters and other experts have provided a great deal of feedback on how to prevent and mitigate the impacts of lost gear and ways to encourage a shift to a circular economy approach for the industry. Going forward, Fisheries and Oceans Canada will use the feedback to help inform changes to fisheries management practices, such as the need for enhanced tagging and marking regimes in selected fisheries. Additionally, knowledge gained will support regulatory changes required to modernize the industry and implement best practices in our domestic fisheries. These actions will change how Canada's fisheries operate. This is not something that can be done overnight, requiring forethought, research and consultation with harvesters, fishing industries and experts. It is the actions currently being researched, developed and piloted in Canadian fisheries that will result in tangible, long-term solutions, allowing Fisheries and Oceans Canada to implement the tools needed to address abandoned, lost or derelict fishing gear in Canadian fisheries. All of this work is a culmination of homegrown innovation and support, further demonstrating Canada's leadership role in addressing ghost gear. Fisheries and Oceans Canada's commitment to the health of our oceans and marine life is unwavering, and the department is committed to continuing this important work with the support of Canadian fish harvesters. The continued programming made possible through budget 2022 is good news for all Canadians.

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Mr. Ryan Turnbull

May/30/22 9:51:01 p.m.
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As I mentioned, through the ghost gear program, Canada has become a leader in the global effort to eliminate and prevent ghost gear in our oceans. The program supports harvesters, environmental groups, indigenous communities, the aquaculture industry and coastal communities to retrieve harmful ghost gear from Canadian waters. Can the minister explain how approved projects are funded, which are eligible, and for those interested, when they should apply by?

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Hon. Joyce Murray (Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, Lib.)

May/30/22 9:51:36 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, that brought me back to a time when I was in opposition, in the opposition lobby, visiting with some representatives from an oceans conservation organization who told me about ghost gear. It was the first time I had heard about it and the idea that this fishing gear is trapping and killing fish and even whales endlessly, because it was abandoned in the ocean. I am so pleased to say that our government is taking action on that. The member did a great job of laying out how important that is. We have a ghost gear program. The results of this program have been very impressive so far. Approved projects are funded based on activities under four pillars: abandoned, lost or otherwise discarded fishing gear; responsible disposal, like the one he saw and I have seen at Steveston Harbour; acquiring and piloting innovative technologies to do these things; and international leadership. This will be available for a wide range of individuals, companies, businesses, not-for-profits, indigenous organizations, research institutions and other levels of government. I really encourage interested parties to apply. The applications are due by June 6 this year at 11:59 p.m. Pacific time.

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