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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, May 6, 2003

0830

The Chair (Mr. Tom Wappel (Scarborough Southwest, Lib.))

0835

Mr. Ghislain Cyr (Fisherman, “Regroupement des palangriers et pétoncliers uniques Madelinots”)

0840

0845

0850

0855

The Chair

Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance)

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

0900

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy (Matapédia—Matane, BQ)

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

0905

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing, Lib.)

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

0910

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer (Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore, NDP)

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

0915

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

The Chair

Mr. Loyola Hearn (St. John's West, PC)

0920

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

0925

The Chair

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

The Chair

Mr. Ghislain Cyr

The Chair

0930

Mr. Gilles Champoux (Technical Adviser, “Association des capitaines-propriétaires de la Gaspésie”)

The Chair

Ms. Gabrielle Landry (Director General, “Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec”)

0935

0940

0945

The Chair

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

0950

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

0955

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

The Chair

Mr. Loyola Hearn

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

1000

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Gilles Champoux

The Chair

Mr. Sylvain Samuel (Director General, “Association des capitaines-propriétaires de la Gaspésie”)

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

1005

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

The Chair

Mr. Sylvain Samuel

The Chair

Mr. Bob Wood

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

1010

Mr. Bob Wood

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

Mr. Gilles Champoux

The Chair

Mr. Reed Elley

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

1015

Mr. Reed Elley

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

Mr. Reed Elley

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

The Chair

1020

Ms. Gabrielle Landry

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné (Director General, “Association québécoise de l'industrie de la pêche”)

1025

1030

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

1035

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Reed Elley

The Chair

Mr. Loyola Hearn

1040

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

1045

The Chair

Mr. Bob Wood

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Bob Wood

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Bob Wood

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Bob Wood

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

1050

Mr. Robert Langlois (Owner, “Pêcheries Rivière-au-Renard inc.”, Gaspé Cured Inc.)

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Robert Langlois

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

1055

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Robert Langlois

The Chair

Mr. Réginald Cotton (Fishermen's Representative, “Groupe de travail sur le poisson de fond”)

1105

1110

The Chair

Mr. Réginald Cotton

1115

1120

The Chair

Mr. Réginald Cotton

The Chair

Mr. Loyola Hearn

1125

Mr. Réginald Cotton

The Chair

Mr. Bob Wood

Mr. Réginald Cotton

1130

The Chair

Mr. Bob Wood

Mr. Réginald Cotton

Mr. Bob Wood

The Chair

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Réginald Cotton

1135

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

1140

Mr. Réginald Cotton

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Réginald Cotton

1145

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Réginald Cotton

The Chair

Mr. Hercule Ruel (Secretary, “Les morutiers traditionnels de la Gaspésie”)

1150

The Chair

Mr. Reed Elley

1155

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Reed Elley

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Reed Elley

The Chair

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

1200

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Peter Stoffer

1205

Mr. Hercule Ruel

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Peter Stoffer

The Chair

Mr. Loyola Hearn

Mr. Hercule Ruel

1210

Mr. Loyola Hearn

The Chair

Mr. Hercule Ruel

The Chair

CANADA

Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans

NUMBER 032

2nd SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Tuesday, May 6, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¾ (0830)

[Translation]

The Chair (Mr. Tom Wappel (Scarborough Southwest, Lib.)): Good morning everybody.

This is the agenda: pursuant to standing order 108(2), we are carrying out a study on Atlantic fisheries issues.

¾ (0835)

[English]

Before we hear from our first witness, I want to make a couple of announcements for the benefit of the members.

As I understand it, there will be no need for members to check out until after we conclude our hearings this morning. Right now, we're scheduled to go until 12:15, and it's unlikely we'll go beyond that. It's possible we'll end a little earlier, depending on the level of questioning. But you are not to worry about the bags. We'll check out after we conclude the evidence in the morning, and then I presume we'll bring the bags down to the front and they'll be taken care of for us. That's the first thing.

The second thing I have to say is that each morning I will start us off with what I think are a couple of interesting things. You may not agree, but at least we'll start with something so we can get going in the morning.

I wanted to let you know that on this day--and I'm going to try to make it somewhat relevant, on occasion, to the fisheries committee--in 1954, Roger Bannister broke the four-minute barrier for running the mile. On this day, the Zeppelin airship Hindenburg exploded.

A voice: Not a good omen.

The Chair: And speaking of not a good omen, on this day Maximilien Robespierre was born, and of course Sigmund Freud. And more to the point, in 1959, in a case of David versus Goliath, Iceland fired on British trawlers on this day in 1959 in their cod war. And since we will be talking about cod, I thought I'd mention the cod war.

So there's your trivia this morning.

[Translation]

I'd like to welcome our witnesses.

[English]

I'd like to say--and I'm going to say this each morning so that everybody understands it--we are here on behalf of the fisheries committee. There are many more members of our fisheries committee, but there are only a certain number of us allowed to travel because of the budgetary constraints of the House of Commons. I have one member from each of the opposition parties on my left and I have a member of the Liberal governing party on my right. Of course, I'm with the Liberal governing party as well.

I also want to tell you that your own member of Parliament, Georges Farrah, had every intention of being here, but he called me yesterday to say that because of the situation with the crabbers in New Brunswick he's had to stay with the minister in Ottawa to deal with that situation. He will try to be here, but if he can't make it, he apologizes in advance and wants me to assure you that he will be reviewing the transcript so that he knows what his constituents say to us.

With that, I'd like to welcome Mr. Ghislain Cyr, who is the secretary of “Regroupement des palangriers et pétoncliers uniques Madelinots”. I hope my pronunciation is not too bad. We'd like to ask you, Mr. Cyr, to give us your evidence please.

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr (Fisherman, “Regroupement des palangriers et pétoncliers uniques Madelinots”): Good morning, everybody.

I should start by saying that I am not the secretary for the “Regroupement des palangriers” [Longliners' association]. I am a fisherman through and through, a longliner with a single-purpose licence. I represent about a dozen fixed gear fishermen with single-purpose licences from the Magdalen Islands. These are people who, from the very outset, at the time of the 1993 moratorium, were recognized as single-purpose licence fishermen under the Atlantic Groundfish Strategy. Today, as you know, our situation is no picnic, quite the opposite.

You will have to excuse me for not having prepared any documentation. As I said at the beginning, I am a fisherman. My current situation means that I can't spend all day at the office. There is not much fishing available, all that we have left is a little bit of herring fishing under very difficult conditions. We have to seize any chance that we get to fish, even if it doesn't amount to much. As a fisherman, I get up every day at 3 o'clock in the morning, and these days, I go to bed at 10:00 p.m. I was, therefore, unable to prepare any documentation for this meeting. My apologies, but that is the way that it is.

If you are in agreement, I have a list of points that I would like to deal with concerning our situation.

Firstly, there is the issue of the reaction to the minister's decision on cod fishing. When the first cod moratorium was announced in 1993, it was a real blow for us, it was a shock, we were in a state of despair, because we found ourselves in a situation where we had nothing.

The Atlantic Groundfish Strategy was introduced but, personally, I feel that measures such as the recovery pogram or compensation keep people inactive, and being inactive is bad for a person's physical, mental and financial well-being. I think that a good fisherman, a true fisherman, has the motivation and the desire to be out there fishing. He does not want to be on the shore sending other boats out fishing. That is simply not true. Fishing is in the blood, and a fisherman needs to be out in the water.

At the time of the first moratorium, all sorts of measures, including licence buy-back, were introduced. We believed what the department told us. We believed that if real downsizing were to take place, those who remained in the industry would, one day, perhaps have better fishing conditions; by that I mean the opportunity to get involved in other fisheries. We did what we had to do. There was real downsizing. We went from 32 to 12 fishermen. In other words, there are 12 of us who are part of this program and who are still fishing even though we do not have lucrative licences such as lobster, crab, or shrimp.

When the buy-back took place, people such as ourselves, who are very active, were affected. It also affected those who were active and who also had other lucrative licences, for lobster for example, allowing them access to a second fishery. There were also some inactive licences. We asked that the department distinguish between the different groups in order to give the cod a chance.

When fishing started up again, we realized that, in spite of the downsizing, the number of active cod fishermen had increased. Previously, there had been many inactive fishermen. There were 3, 4, or even 10 times as many active cod fishermen as there were before the moratorium in spite of the fact that, in my opinion, the fishing conditions put the fish at risk.

¾ (0840)

What is more, in recent years, we have been allocated 24, 36, or 72-hour windows for fishing. The fact that there have been so many fishermen in competition with one another, particularly fixed-gear fishermen, has meant that there have been very extensive and damaging harvests in some areas where cod stocks were very concentrated.

Today, there are far more active fishermen than there used to be. People were fishing up until 2001-2002. In our port, on the Magdalen Islands, we used to fish in springtime but we are no longer allowed to and now have to start fishing in June or at the beginning of July. We no longer have access to our primary fishery, which was a spring fishery. Just so that you can see how ridiculous the situation is, allow me to draw your attention to the fact that on the 21st of May 2001, we were informed that fishing would be starting on the 15th of May 2001. That is quite something. How can we be expected to work in such conditions?

Let us come back to the minister's decision on cod fishing. We were half expecting a moratorium, or rather we were expecting that fishing be curtailed and that much tighter restrictions on equipment and fishing seasons would be imposed. That was what we were expecting, a total moratorium was a shock for us.

Even though we had heard the rumours, the day that the announcement was actually made, our stomachs started to turn. We were very stressed because, in order to fish in the way that we have been in recent years, the gear has to be prepared in advance. All the gear has to be prepared so that we are able to cope when groundfishing gets underway. That is what we have been doing for the past ten years.

The announcement always comes late and this year was no exception. Fishing should already have started, but we still do not know what is happening. I have my longline gear. I have 10,000 hooks. I have 5,000 hooks for halibut, 60 nets for winter flounder, and crab traps for temporary fishing. I have no idea where I stand at the moment, and I am not alone. It makes no sense to keep people in a state of uncertainty.

After the announcement was made, we requested a permanent crab licence, and I have no qualms about telling you that. We did not ask for 100,000 pounds of crab, we asked for a small crab quota to give us the stability that we have been waiting for since the 1993 moratorium. It is now 2003; we have been waiting to find out what is going on for ten years now.

Everything is always at the last minute. It is impossible to live like that. As I said earlier, if you want to do well, you have to be ready to go and to go hard. You get yourself prepared. Even at the last minute, we are still waiting to find out if we can fish.

This year, there is a cod moratorium. I do not expect cod fishing to start again anytime soon. What am I to do with all my gear? Who is going to buy it from me? My shed is worth a fortune, it is full of gear. What am I going to do with it? It is a real problem for me. I am going to have to take it out or do something else. It does not make any sense.

Others are going to raise the issue of cod later on, but I just want to point out that a total moratorium on cod also means that I can no longer be a watchdog for this species. I have always said fishermen are the eyes and the ears of the ocean. We are used to keeping an eye on the fish, watching them, noticing their size, assessing quantities, watching where they go, watching where the juveniles go. There are many things that we would be able to monitor if it were asked of us. If we are asked the right questions, we are often able to give good answers, but I am not sure if our answers are always heard on the other side.

I would now like to turn to the issue of issuing licences and fleet separation. In 1994, at the time of downsizing, given that there was a serious problem, we requested that the department not allow the separation of licences or the entry of more people into cod fishing.

¾ (0845)

But the opposite is what happened. Normally, there should have been 10 of us fishing, those of us who were affected in 1993. Today, there are 19 of us, because some people got licences after that. They separated lobster licences from groundfish licences. We did everything we could. We got licences for the Lower North Shore, the North Shore and the Gaspé in order to carve out our territory. Anyway, we got organized. There are a lot more people to satisfy today. It's not right; both the groundfish and the people who fish for them are in crisis.

Another major issue is seals. I hunt seals and I've given more seal samples to researchers than a lot of people. I have given some to Fisheries and Oceans Canada, to people from Texas and to Germans. In 15 years, I have seen every species of seal. There is a lot of talk about hair seals, grey seals, harbour seals and harp seals. I can tell that in our zone, grey seals are the big problem.

In 1983, when the Europeans issued an embargo on the seal hunt in eastern Canada, there were about 10,000 grey seals in the entire zone. Today, there are some 300,000 grey seals, and I can tell you that they eat a lot of fish. Some of you have probably seen, in Pêche Impact, photographs of a bunch of halibut on a ship's deck that have been eaten. They were mine. I can tell you that I went there again last summer and it is still mine that are being eaten; 300 or 400 pounds of halibut are gobbled up every day by seals in that zone. We're talking about the exclusion zone, the same zone as in 1993 to 1994.

I am curious enough, even if there is no fishing, to take my boat out from time to time and to go see how the fish stocks are doing. I have seen zones of juvenile cod, small cod from 20 to 25 centimetres long. They were sticking to the rocks. They were staying near some rocks, or the rocky bottom, in shallow water, where the water was warmer. That is where they were concentrated. Some evenings, the seals would come through. Not many people have seen that. I didn't film any of these scenes, but it is here in writing. There were 100 or maybe 200 seals. It is called a “raid”. A seal “raid” is a group of seals that swoop down. They are side by side and they all dive together. The next morning, there is nothing left in sight. They have eaten all of the bait, the halibut, the cod, everything on the seabed from six to 15 fathoms in the area. All of the schools of young cod are gone. Had it been elsewhere, in deeper or colder water, I don't know what would have happened, but the cod were in places where they were at greater risk of falling prey to predators, of being eaten.

That is the kind of thing we see. No one could say that nothing is happening. This year, we will be told again that there will be exclusion zones. If I were a seal and I got shot at one day, I would tell my buddy and we would take off. But at night, however, we would come back. How are you supposed to create exclusion zones? It is not easy to shoot at a hair seal or at a grey seal under water; anyone who knows anything about it will tell you that. Things move. Everything moves. The boat is moving. The seals are moving, Everything is moving. I can tell you you have to be a really good shot.

Since 1988 or 1989, I have been telling everyone that something more is going to have to be done about grey seals. The problem has just kept on getting worse. And today, I'm telling you, it's a real nuisance. People have to understand that sooner or later, there is going to have to be a huge cull. They will have to take that into consideration, because if nothing is done, it is not just the cod that is going to disappear. I have seen schools of herring, and you should see what the seals to them.

If there is a school of herring on the seabed and 50 seals start swimming around them, what do they do with the herring? They pack them in tighter and then force the herring to the surface. When you are below, you can clearly see what's happening on the surface. I don't know if you have ever been under water and looked up. Even a little fishing line...[Editor' Note: Inaudible]. Imagine what the fish look like. They force them up to the surface. The gulls get them from above and the seals eat them from below. They go through tons of herring, mackerel and cod that way. The more of them there are, the more they hunt in packs.

¾ (0850)

It's becoming difficult to fish under these conditions. I don't even want to fish in certain sectors any more, because all the fish get eaten, my rigging gets destroyed and the flounder gets eaten as well. Last year, a seal made off with a 100-pound flounder. The flounder was still on my hook, but the seal forced it to the surface while he was still eating it. I had to pull in my line as quickly as possible. We were both fighting over the flounder. A 100-pound flounder is worth $400, which is a lot to make in one day. There are many other such stories.

Sooner or later, something will have to be done about the seals. It's all very well and good to protest. In fact, for several years I was also intensively involved in protest activities with the “Association des chasseurs de loups-marins des Îles”. I took my case to the media. If the situation is explained clearly, many people understand, but politicians are going to have to do something in defence of this idea and to get the message across. We can think of ways of decreasing the number of seals, but it has to happen quickly and drastically, because you won't only lose cod, but other species as well.

Take the situation of mackerel fishermen in the islands, to the north, last year. Every time a vessel came on the scene to hunt for mackerel, the seals swam underneath the vessel and ate the fish. This went on for three days. Our guys couldn't fish for mackerel anymore. Seals are like dogs; they get used to people. I sure hope you take this into consideration.

Let me come back to conservation. In 1993, a moratorium was imposed. Fishing activities started again in 1999 and, in my view, it started the same way, but also in a harder way, not for us, but for the fish. I remember that in 1993, we were using fixed gear and hardly any gill nets. But when fishing started again in 1999, everyone rushed to make interprovincial fishing history, which led people to take the easy way out by using gill nets instead of trawl lines. People fished in areas with a high concentration of fish, like at Miscou and elsewhere, where the large spawners were located. Two hundred and fifty or three hundred fishermen arrived at the same time with some times 15 or 20 nets. Just imagine how many spawners were destroyed. Today, you hear that there are not enough spawners. I understand why. We let it happen.

How is fishing concentrated? It was concentrated in very specific periods, that is, periods of 24, 36 or 48 hours, as I was saying earlier, with fairly efficient gear and boats. All this happened suddenly, and as a result, the spawners were destroyed. But we had told the department that it was better to save the spawners and catch smaller fish. It was important to let the spawners go and not affect their habitats in the interest of saving the fish. But that is not what was done. We did the exact opposite. We used square mesh to catch large fish. Since that time, everyone has wanted to catch large fish. Today, we are experiencing the repercussions of those actions.

We told all this to the department, but of course people didn't really listen to us, because we are few in number. In our area, the voices of ground fishermen are drowned out by other types of fishermen. There are 325 lobster fishermen and the rest are crabbers. So our little group gets lost in the crowd. Lobster fishermen also have groundfish licences. It's hard for us to play ball with these guys. It's hard for us to get our message across and to be heard.

Of course, we will have to work at conserving the fishery. The first thing to do is to fix the seal problem. Since we are not playing the role of protectors of fish stocks anymore, we will have to keep a particular eye on that situation.

As for the economic and social context, as I was saying earlier, the uncertainty of fishing plans, which are only revealed to us late in spring, taken together with the other factors, make us nervous today, very nervous. Believe you me, I've got lots of adrenaline, but it's not the good kind, since I'm reacting to a situation I never wished for.

¾ (0855)

We feel this is healthy adrenaline when we are out on the water and challenges lie before us. When we are out in the water, and the weather is bad, then we experience healthy adrenaline. But all the adrenaline and stress that we have at the moment is not the good stuff. It is not right that we have had to put up with this for 10 years. I think that this year is the worst that I've ever seen. Things are not getting better, they're going from bad to worse. We have no idea what is going to happen to us.

There is a problem in terms of viability. How can we manage our situation when nothing is permanent? Even in 1999, 2000 and 2001 when there was no moratorium, cod fishing was not easy. Nevertheless, I did manage to harvest fish during this period. I was one of the most successful fishermen in Quebec amongst those using boats smaller than 35 feet, but I will not go in to all that I had to do to make that the case. Yet today, in spite of all my efforts, all the rigs that I set up, all that I learned, all that I studied and all that I changed, I now find myself facing another moratorium. What am I going to do with this second moratorium that I've had to deal with? I can tell you one thing, it is certainly not easy.

How will we survive? How can we help the community? The way I see it is that being active helps the community. I do not want to rely on an employment insurance cheque. I hate that. I hate working to get my stamps. I cannot stand that word. I would not want to be sitting on my backside with a cheque in my pocket, even if it were a cheque for $3,000 per week. I would not be proud of that, not at all, I belong out on the water, and that is the same for all groundfish fishers. We have to be on the water, not on the shore.

Last week, the department announced compensation to the tune of $325 per week for cod fishermen forced to stay in the wharf. I can understand that for those who are really in a difficult position, but with the possibilities that are available to us, I do not want to end up with a $325 weekly cheque when I have just come to the end of a period where I got $347 net from employment insurance. I would rather be able to earn an equivalent amount fishing. I cannot accept this. It is really not for me.

[English]

The Chair: Excuse me.

We want to be able to leave some time so the members can ask you some questions. Perhaps you could make some of your further comments in answer to those questions.

Members, notwithstanding our formal agreement, I'm wondering if we could agree to keep our questioning to five minutes each. That way we'd each be able to have questions, and if no one has questions the remaining time could be given to the witness to wrap up. If that's agreeable, I'd like to start with Mr. Elley for five minutes.

Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance): Thank you very much for coming and sharing your story with us today.

I represent the official opposition in the House of Commons, the Canadian Alliance. Many of our members from British Columbia, and I am from British Columbia, come from maritime ridings. I represent a maritime riding and I hear the same story from our salmon fishermen, the same story exactly. So this is a disease that goes right across the country, from coast to coast.

I also am a sports fisherman, and when I am out salmon fishing, I know how I feel when I have a good salmon on and it comes up halfway and it's only half there because a seal has had it. I know how I feel. I can't imagine how you feel when you see all the seal out there after your fish, after your livelihood.

I would like to ask you a question particularly about the seal problem. What do you think the answer is on this, and how do we arrive at acceptable levels for seal? How do we manage that seal problem so that it's not a problem for conservation and fishing?

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: I talked a lot about the grey seal, which is causing major problems in area 4T in the Scotia-Fundy region all around Cape Breton. There are 300,000 seals and right now they have no predators. Moreover, there is no market for them. You have to wonder whether we can let this seal herd continue to grow.

I remember that in 1991 or 1992 about $1 million was spent on a seal contraception study. I was paid $35, I believe, to kill females and provide their uterus for the study. I took the money, but I told them that it was crazy. What was that study going to prove? Were they going to be able to give contraceptives every year to the seals, spending $30 a head every year to keep the females from calving? It is completely ridiculous.

Sooner or later, they will need to be killed. I do not know what is going to happen. They will have to be killed to get rid of them or there will have to be a bounty. There is nothing wrong with studying seals, but they are being studied to death. I can tell you about seals. I can tell if they have a malformation when there is a swelling, since I have opened up so many. What is the point of these studies in the long run? We know that seals eat cod, but how much do they eat? We do not know. No one knows, but you would have to watch how much they eat to believe it.

I believe the herd needs to be reduced. In 1983, when there were only 10,000 seals, there was a bounty given for each jaw brought in. We are going to have to eventually get back to that. I do not know what can be done with them. Maybe they can be made into fertilizer. Who knows? There are huge concentrations of them and they need to be dealt with. Otherwise, not only cod but a lot of other species will be gone as well.

The quotas for Harp seals have already been increased, which is a good thing. The weather conditions over the past few years have caused the situation to stabilize somewhat. That would have two beneficial effects: the herd would be stabilized and fishers would receive income. Those would be two benefits.

Where the grey seal is concerned, some of the solutions proposed would stir up public opinion, but I do not see any other way. This has to be dealt with.

I told the department and the FRCC to come to see us when they are ready to do something. We are prepared to talk about it, to do something and to act. Of course, this is a difficult announcement, a very difficult one.

¿ (0900)

The Chair: Mr. Roy, the floor is yours.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy (Matapédia—Matane, BQ): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Cyr, for coming from the Magdalen Islands. I want to point that out, because some people do not realize the effort involved in terms of transportation.

I would like to say as well, Mr. Chairman, that this morning, as I was told a little earlier, a major demonstration took place by crab plant workers in Chandler. There are some 500 people employed in crab processing, and they are in a difficult situation. As someone was telling me, they have absolutely nothing to lose. So they decided to demonstrate today. They will no longer be eligible for employment insurance, and they will not be eligible for anything. I understand why they are demonstrating today.

Mr. Cyr, you have raised the viability issue, but you have not really had time to talk about it. I would like you to tell me what the cod fishery represented as a percentage of your income. You fish a number of species. Could you give us a bit of a breakdown, as a percentage of your income, of these various species and approximately how much time you spend on each?

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: Well, during the first part of the moratorium, I had to work as a fisher to be eligible for employment insurance benefits, and I hated that.

Then I managed to develop what is called the inshore gill net fishery for winter flounder. I developed that. It is not so bad. It is extra income, but not a steady income, because it is unpredictable. We fish along the coast. There are winds, this and that...

¿ (0905)

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Is this species abundant in your area?

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: I would not say that it is abundant; in fact, I am fortunate to be the only one fishing it.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: All right.

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: I am fortunate to be in a sector where I am all alone. There is no mobile or fixed gear. I am the only one to have developed this and I am still alone. That is a big advantage for me.

Over all these years, there have been small compensations. We have also had crab, for instance last year, which added to our income.

On the other hand, in 1999, 2000 and 2001, there were 70,000 to 80,000 pounds of cod per season, with an average of around 100,000 pounds of winter flounder. Since that represented 80 to 90 per cent of my income, I do not have much left today.

Last year, of course, the cod situation was more difficult. Storms and other things kept us on shore. Last year we faced bad fishing conditions and we also lost the spring fishing season; during that period, people catch between 30,000 and 35,000 pounds of cod. During our summer period, those who work under a competitive quota, such as lobster fishers, and others, had a difficult time because there were only small concentrations at certain spots. After one or two days of fishing, there was nothing left.

So in 1999, 2000 and 2001, I had to go fish off Cape Breton for a month. That meant I had to be away from my family for 30 days and work day and night without stopping.

As for the cod fishery over the past few years, I can tell you that when the fishery was opened for 72 hours, that meant 72 hours of continuous work on the water for me, since we could have 2,000 hooks or 10 nets for some people. That meant 2,000 hooks that had to be put out and taken in all day long. I would come home at 11 o'clock at night, go to bed at midnight and then get up again at two in the morning. There was hardly time to get into bed, relax my muscles a bit and then go out again. I can tell you that it is hard to do that three or four days in a row. When you tie up, everyone is there with their hand out: Res-Mar, Biorex, Fisheries and Oceans, the weigher. You have to look after the bait and the men. All that means that after three or four days, you are dead tired. You cannot think about anything. You are finished.

The problem here is that about 90 per cent of my income comes from cod and groundfish, that is, flounder. That might be cut back this year, and the licence conditions are changing on May 14. In the case of cod, it all depends on the status that it is given: endangered, threatened or some other designation. We will have to see.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: And will the crab quotas being announced give you more this year? That would not really compensate.

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: We still do not know how much we will get. If I get 17,000 pounds of crab, it will not compensate for the cod that I used to get. It also does not compensate for the time. I do not dare hire any helpers. We are not the only ones affected; there are others as well.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Basically, my question is this: even if you were to be allocated a small crab quota, it would not make you a profit this year. Am I right?

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: That would depend on the quota. With last year's 17,300-pound groundfish quota, I can't say that I can't make ends meet. Even though the quotas are not huge, we get by.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: But in light of the announcement made by the minister, and given the number of fishers who are affected, it will not change much, will it?

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: Let me tell you something. I think that our request was very reasonable. We asked that the quota be stabilized at 40,000 pounds. That would allow us to get some gear ready and, what is more, we would be in a position to get ourselves organized for the other small fisheries that may be available. We are only talking about 14,000 pounds, we are not asking for 100, 000 or 200,000 pounds. I think that it is a very reasonable amount for those fishermen who exclusively harvest groundfish.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: But this year...

The Chair: Mr. Roy...

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you very much.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In your opening remarks, Mr. Cyr, you said that as it stands right now in the fishing industry in this particular area, it's not workable. I want to hear from you what you think is workable, so that we can get an idea of what would be workable that is not happening now.

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: There are very few fishers remaining in Quebec, New Brunswick or elsewhere, who only harvest groundfish. This is because of the instability that we have been facing for the past ten years, since the moratorium was introduced in 1993.

We thought that there would perhaps be room for us in crab fishing. We never wanted to deprive crabbers from the major part of their catch. We never wanted to undermine stock regeneration. We never wanted to kill off the resource in the way that groundfish were killed off. That is why we want to have quotas which would be based on the type of boat used or a person's dependence on groundfish. It would be a major improvement for us to have a certain stability, a certain permanence in the crab sector, to be able to rely on something, come spring time. We have not had that sort of stability for 10 years.

I think that the fact that many new people enter the industry has muddied the waters. Many people have joined the ranks of groundfish fishermen in order to have access to crab. That muddies the waters.

Another issue which further muddies the waters is the fact that at the time of the first moratorium, when we were making certain demands, aboriginal people also joined the fray. This has to be mentioned. It was costly for us. We were sort of put to one side. I do not blame them. Whether we like it or not, the Marshall plan was set up and the government is bound to implement it. However, because of the way in which things were done, I feel that we have been sidelined. The possibility of having a quota and some stability has been taken away from us.

Ten years later, another moratorium has been imposed upon us. Even if we knew that it was coming, it is a bitter pill to swallow because we do not know what it will lead to.

That is why we asked for permanent access to crab when we made our presentation in Quebec. If not, we are going to have to ask for temporary access every year. Nobody can spend their whole lives without anything being permanent. At some point, people need to have stability because they have boats and people to support. There comes a time when a certain permanence is required.

¿ (0910)

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Do you have any other questions, Mr. Wood? Okay.

Mr. Stoffer.

Mr. Peter Stoffer (Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore, NDP): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Merci, Monsieur Cyr.

You have asked for a crab allocation, a small amount, to help you out. I would assume you're speaking on behalf of other fishermen as well. But if DFO is right, and there is a certain amount of crab out there and they're already allocated to permanent crab fishermen, are you asking for additional quota on top of what's already there? Where would that crab quota you're asking for, even though it's a small amount, come from?

There are only so many crab in the water. The permanent crab fishermen have their quotas, and when they and DFO get together and DFO says okay, this is your quota, and anything extra goes to the temporary guys, if there is no extra or it has been proven that they're going down, where indeed would that extra quota you're asking for come from?

What DFO just announced in New Brunswick, as you're aware, made a lot of people very angry. I guess it's cold down there, and they have a little fire going. We don't want that to happen in the Gaspé, or anything else. So what would you advise the minister, or what would you advise us to advise the minister in how we would go about doing that?

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: We have never been in favour of increasing quotas in order to give more to some people.

We have found over the past few years that part of the overall quota has been used to help the fisheries. At the beginning, it helped people affected by the moratorium, those in the groundfish sector who were in difficulty. Then the formula was changed; there was talk of supporting fisheries in difficulty and the affected people. Then people started talking about mackerel, herring and scallops, which were side fisheries for everyone. Everything was lumped together and everyone was suddenly equally poor. There was a huge increase in the number of people affected.

I am sorry, but it seems to me that the fishers in our area that take an average of about 14,000 pounds of lobster at $6.40 or $7 a pound and who also want some of the crab are complicating things for a lot of people. And there are a lot of people to think about.

When I see lobster fishers from our area, the way they work and the way they live, I can see that they are enjoying a steady income. They are doing well. The same is true in New Brunswick. It may be that in some parts of certain regions there are some small problems, but not everyone is affected.

We have been urging the minister not to allocate crab to the big associations; for example, we are asking him to identify those in difficulty, the people who are really in crisis in the fisheries sector and to provide the assistance directly to the fishers.

Over the past number of years, there has always been a percentage of the overall quota set aside to help fishers in difficulty. I think we should stick with that formula. There is the 15 per cent figure, of course, but in our case, we have to face a moratorium this year.

Unlike other years, the minister has really respected the historical allocation for each province this year. So New Brunswick, Quebec and the other provinces have received their respective shares, and the crab will get to the processing plants at the proper locations, as it would normally.

In my opinion, traditional crab fishers, given their quota, would be in a position to share. If it is to be a percentage, then so be it.

¿ (0915)

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: I have two short questions for you.

How is the relationship in Îles-de-la-Madeleine with the fishermen and the local DFO officials? Are you able to communicate your message to them? Is there a good rapport back and forth? Are they listening to what you're trying to say to them?

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: As I have already mentioned, 325 of the 350 fishers are lobster fishers. So they get much more attention than if there were just 10 fishers. When the lobster fishers go to the Snow Crab Advisory Committee and ask for 20 per cent of the overall allocation, it is difficult for us. They have a much stronger lobby. It goes without saying that they have a lot more political clout as well. There is stronger pressure on us because for lobster fishers, cod is a side species. They make some money from it; some of them actually fish but others just play at it. It is not their main source of income. That is the difference. So Fisheries and Oceans does not listen in the same way.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Hearn.

[Translation]

Mr. Loyola Hearn (St. John's West, PC): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Cyr, I am pleased that you are here with us this morning.

[English]

I come from a fishing village and I represent a lot of fishermen. My family is a fishing family, so I fully appreciate your position.

A couple of things concern me. I believe you hit the nail on the head. But before I ask a question, I think we should point out that the committee is not just here because we wanted to get out of Ottawa for a couple of days; if you've been following what's happening in the House of Commons, you will probably notice that more attention is being paid to the fishery recently than for perhaps years and years. A lot of this is due to the people around this table, who have constituents who have the same problems you do and who are sick and tired of seeing nothing being done. Every chance we can get, we've been pushing to draw attention and build support across the country for people like yourselves, and to convince government that this is an issue. It's a renewable resource that can provide a tremendous amount of employment for people throughout this country, if we protect it.

I have a couple of things I'll just zero in on. You talk about a blanket response. Even within regions, there are different problems in each little area, and there are also different solutions. In Newfoundland right now, we have the closure of the cod fishery in most of the province. Instead of giving fishermen make-work programs, we can have all of them back on the water doing different things. It might be a reallocation of crab resource in one area, or it might be research on seals, which is a major problem in all of Atlantic Canada, particularly in Newfoundland and Labrador. Our seal herds have gone from one million to eight million, so you can imagine what damage they are doing. It's an area we must concentrate on and push. I don't care how we get rid of them any more, we just have to get rid of them. We can find solutions if government is willing to look.

I'd like your comments on what I am finding, that more and more benefits from the fishery are going into the pockets of people who are not directly involved—not the fishermen or perhaps the plant workers, but the harvesters. The processors who own the big plants are now starting to buy the boats and the licences, and they now own the fishermen like the merchants of years ago did. Many of the benefits are going to them. We even find that some of our more powerful unions are starting to find ways of capitalizing on this. The money is not going into the pockets of the person out catching the fish, as it should.

I'd like your comments on that, if you would.

¿ (0920)

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: Of course, each community is different. But I do know Newfoundland quite well, especially the seal hunt issue, through the Canadian Sealers Association, among other things. I feel that every place can find solutions, as long as people have the opportunity to have a say and give their views.

Some problems are general in nature. Cod, for example, is a national problem, when it comes down to it. But every location, as long as people are given a chance to express their views, can probably find little solutions.

In our area, for example, exploratory fisheries for crab were requested for those with a single-purpose groundfish licence, when the moratorium came down in 1993. We managed to place a number of our fishers that way who were financially strapped; other fishers, who had a borrowed licence, managed to get in also, a lobster fisher, among others.

There have also been developments with rock crab around the Magdalen Islands. It has been difficult because the lobster fishers strongly opposed our getting into that fishery. Rock crab was not to be touched.

But we have been able to get a few fishers into that sector. They are taking 100,000 pounds at 30¢ or 40¢ a pound, which amounts to an income of between $30,000 and $40,000, which they can earn over three or four weeks in August. That is substantial support. Of the 14 fishers who hold this type of licence, 8 are lobster fishers.

Finally, with respect to licences being bought by people other than fishers, I feel that there will be a terrible impact at some point on the communities. None of the fishers will be owners, and I do not believe that fishers who are only employees—often underpaid, to boot—have the same respect for the resources as fishers who depend on the fishery for their living.

We have already seen this and we will see it again, but at some point we need to be very vigilant about this. Every time an owner buys one, two or three licences, a number of boats will be affected. The new owner will not really be a fisher, but it will be a matter of who has the deepest pocket. People will be trying to make a quick profit. I think that this will do a lot of damage.

¿ (0925)

[English]

The Chair: Merci.

I'm sure you know there have been many scientific studies in relation to seals, and they never seem to come to a conclusion. You said that fishermen are the eyes and ears on the water. I just wanted to know if you felt that those eyes and ears are listened to in terms of what they see, and the kinds of things you mentioned about how the seals hunt, what they do, and what types of species of fish they eat. Do you feel that the eyes and ears on the water are being listened to by the decision-makers?

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: As I told the FRCC at the last meeting on the islands, I have been saying the same thing over and over again for the past 10 years. How many seals have been born since then? How many? We see the damage. We saw it coming. I have the impression that we are always looking ahead four or five years. I am not a scientist, but I consider myself a very good observer on the water, whether we are talking about pollution, birds, fish or seals. I am not very good at driving a car through traffic. I am hopeless. I do not like that. I never drive in Montreal because I hate it. But when I get on the water, I see everything. No bird flies over my head that I do not see. When it comes to the licences, seals or cod, we have always told the department four or five years ahead of time what would happen if given situations were not corrected.

The first time that I talked about spawners, in 1991 or 1992 in Moncton, there was no reaction. They came back five or six years later saying that they had discovered that big fish had more and bigger eggs. That is what we were saying. I have always told the FRCC that if there were things that it did not know, it should let us think about them for one fishing season. When we are out on the water fishing, we forget the land. We have time to think. We have time to observe and notice things. Ask questions, and we will work on them and think about them. When we are bombarded with questions during a meeting, it is difficult to answer them.

I would like the scientists and other people to listen to what we have to say, because we live on the water. I have always said that back home, we have one foot on the ice, one foot on the land and our butts in salt water.

[English]

The Chair: Well, on that note,

[Translation]

thank you very much for your testimony.

[English]

We appreciate it. I think you were very candid in your evidence. Thank you.

[Translation]

Mr. Ghislain Cyr: Thank your very much for listening to me, and perhaps we will meet again.

[English]

The Chair: Could we have the next group up, please?

Members, if you're following along on your programs, we have a small change to make. From the Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec, we have Gabrielle Landry, directrice générale. We also have, from the Association des capitaines propriétaires de la Gaspésie, Sylvain Samuel, directeur général, et Gilles Champoux, conseiller technique.

Who's going to begin the presentation?

¿ (0930)

Mr. Gilles Champoux (Technical Adviser, “Association des capitaines-propriétaires de la Gaspésie”): Madame Landry will.

The Chair: Elle est partie.

Members, the witnesses have given out a brief in one of the official languages, in this case en français. Is it all right if it's given out?

Some hon. members: Agreed.

The Chair: Madame Landry, vous pouvez commencer.

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry (Director General, “Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec”): Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.

First of all I would like to thank you for giving us the opportunity to speak to you. This was probably unintentional, but your visit is taking place at quite a difficult time for the fishing sector. Today we will therefore also be talking about the crisis that we are currently experiencing with respect to several fish species.

I will begin by introducing our organization. The “Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec” is an umbrella organization that brings together four regional associations. Two of these associations are located in the Gaspé, one on the North Shore and the other in the Magdalen Islands. The various fishermen's associations are active in the snow crab fishery in zone 12, which we hear a great deal about these days, in the shrimp fishery in the Gulf and in the groundfish fishery. We also have a group of cod fishers who have been affected by the moratorium. The federation is managed by a board of directors composed of fishers. They are all captains. We represent about 150 captains who hire 600 dockhands, bringing the total to about 750 people.

Today I would like to cover three particular issues. As I said earlier, we cannot remain silent about the crisis that is currently rippling through the commercial fishery. First of all, we are going to give you our feelings about Minister Robert Thibault's decision on the cod fishery. We will then deal with the issue of fishing licences and fleet separation. Finally, I would like to comment on the current management of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and on the Atlantic fishery policy review process. These are subjects which, we hope, will give us an opportunity to apprise you of the most pressing problems we are facing.

Our organization does not agree with the cod fishery moratorium decree. It has always disagreed with Minister Thibault's plan to call for a total moratorium on the cod fishery in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence. The federation would have liked to have seen minimum cod fishery activities maintained for several reasons, one being that this would have allowed us to continue collecting data which is so important in order to understand what is going on in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence, and also because the cod fishery is still an extremely significant economic activity for our fishers and the communities in which they live. The various fleets depend from 50 to 100 per cent on groundfish.

Our fishers work in the northern zone of the Gulf, in 4RS, 3Pn, and in the southern zone, in 4TVn. These two stocks were affected by the first moratorium, one in 1993 and the other in 1994. We often forget about the redfish fishery in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but it has been under a moratorium since 1994. Our fishers were very active in this fishery; they had always fished in this area.

I would say that the first moratorium did not yield the expected results. We were extremely disappointed, after completely halting fishing for several years, to learn that the stocks were not rebuilding at the desired rate. In our opinion, that proves that the problem will not be resolved simply by ceasing commercial fishing. We need to take much more comprehensive and diversified action. We do not think that a total moratorium, like the present one, without any compensation, without a buy-back program of our fishers, without any opportunities for our communities and our fishers to diversify, will resolve the problem.

¿ (0935)

Moreover, this is a decision that was made public late, perhaps a week ago; there are so many late decisions that we no longer know what decision we are talking about. The fishers waited several months for a final decision from the minister, a decision that arrived late, a decision that hurt and which is not accompanied by any real rebuilding or diversification program for the industry.

This issue alone is worthy of the ten minutes that you have given to us, but I know that you are going to be meeting other groups today who will be talking about cod. I will let them deal with this issue at perhaps a more in-depth level, but we wanted nonetheless to provide you with our views today on the fact that we should have maintained a minimum fishery and been offered support and compensation programs for the fishers. All of this should be part of a true strategy for rebuilding the stocks and diversifying our local community.

The second point that I wanted to discuss today pertains to the captain-owner-operator principle. During the course of the discussions pertaining to the Atlantic fishery policy review, discussions that our organization participated in, we took a firm position in favour of maintaining the principle of the captain-owner-operator. All of the eastern Canada fisher associations and the Canadian Council of Professional Fish Harvesters are ardent defenders of this principle. Moreover, the CCPFH was very vocal about this issue in its previous meetings with your committee. I am simply pointing out the importance of maintaining this model for the fishers and for future generations.

We are afraid that, during the course of the Atlantic fishery policy review process, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans will be opening the door wide to policy change, thereby increasing the shortcomings that currently exist in the policy.

The owner-operators in our communities, in the Gaspé, on the North Shore or on the islands, are now business owners. They employ several people on their boats, create a lot of jobs in the plants and are perfectly capable of adapting to change in the resource, providing they are allowed to do so. They are perfectly capable of providing high caliber products. They provide a great deal of employment. In our opinion, this model has proven itself and should stay. We do not want the fishing licences to be issued to processing plants, which would result in the fishers eventually becoming, instead of entrepreneurs, mere employees of the big shipowners. Nor do we want to encourage, in any way whatsoever, the creation of monopolies and the concentration of licences amongst a few individuals. This would create an extremely serious imbalance and would have terrible negative consequences in the communities.

If there is to be a new Atlantic fisheries policy, it is, in our opinion, important to retain the model of the captain-owner-operator. This issue has been under study and discussed for many years now but things do not seem to be changing as quickly as one would have thought. If there is to be a new policy, we will put up a proper fight to ensure that this model is retained. It is the cornerstone of our communities and their economic independence.

Before we go to questions, the third point that I would like to cover pertains to the way that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans is currently being managed. If I may, I would like to quote an excerpt from the document on the strategic framework for the management of the Atlantic coast fishery. This is a Department of Fisheries and Oceans' document that came out of the fisheries policy review process and deals with the departmental vision. I think that it is really worthwhile paying special attention to it given the current circumstances.

¿ (0940)

The Atlantic fisheries will become a biologically renewable resource supporting a fishery sector that is dynamic, diversified and self-sufficient, that effectively involves all stakeholders in appropriate fisheries management processes, that is viable and profitable, that contributes to the economic well-being of coastal communities and that protects aboriginal and treaty rights guaranteed by the constitution. In order to achieve this vision of a renewable resource supporting a viable and self-sufficient fishery sector, the government will continue to progressively replace strict top-down management with co-management.

That is the sentence I have been concentrating on lately. So I would like to draw your attention to this point, since we feel that Fisheries and Oceans has not begun to replace top-down management with co-management. At the present time, management in the department does not reflect that intention at all: 2003 is living proof of that. The decision-making process in the department is criticized by everyone. What we see and hear are unhappy fishers. In 2003, there are many demonstrations of dissatisfaction.

All our mid-shore fleets are well aware that Fisheries and Oceans is having difficulty managing the marine resources effectively.

I have used an image that came to me suddenly a few days ago, in light of the events that have taken place. Of course, we cannot condone violence such as we have seen in various places this year. We can only try to understand what is behind that violence. I will make a comparison that may be a bit stretched, but I felt that the image worked. In our democratic system, the inability to manage, when it is recognized, can justify certain actions. We have seen hospitals placed under supervision because the administrators were unable to manage effectively. We have seen the same thing happen in the education field because administrators did not manage effectively and there were crisis situations.

So that made me wonder. Even though I know that a department cannot be put under supervision, I wondered whether that was not what should be done in the case of Fisheries and Oceans Canada right now. Is it not true that decisions are too centralized in Ottawa? Should the decision-making power not be reallocated to coastal communities? The situation in 2003 should be looked at very closely, in my opinion.

Let us look at things more closely. When I began in the fisheries sector, in 1992, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans announced fisheries plans in December. When we received these plans between Christmas and New Year's, we were very unhappy, because it was too late. Now it is May 6, gentlemen, and we do not yet have a fisheries plan for shrimp; we do not have a plan for any groundfish other than cod and we have been given a snow crab plan that has had the consequences that you are aware of. We have a problem.

The shrimp fishery is already underway with an interim plan. We do not have a final fishery plan. In the case of the cod fishery, despite all the pressure and the FRCC's recommendations, Minister Thibault announced a complete moratorium, without a buy-back program, without any indication of sentinel fisheries or side fisheries. What will the fishers do this year, those who want to fish American Plaice, Witch Flounder, Yellowtail Flounder, etc.? Will they be able to go fishing? Will they have enough cod as a by-catch to get into those fisheries?

Fishers who depend on groundfish are waiting at the docks. The boats are ready. Right now we have a fleet that is very dependent on groundfish in our organization. The fishers are waiting at the docks. It is May 6.

With respect to the snow crab fishery, Minister Thibault has announced his plan. You have seen the results. We will not get into that. The fishing activities are all behind schedule. The plant workers are in the streets and there are many demonstrations.

¿ (0945)

When one tries to understand recent events, when one looks at the full picture, it is clear that the way in which the fisheries are managed has driven fishermen to despair.

Last night, I heard Mr. Nadeau from the Lower North Shore Fishermen's Association on Radio-Canada talking about the problems faced by the villages in Quebec's Lower North Shore region, whose economies are dependent on cod. They too are waiting for something, but they do not know what.

The reactions that we have seen this year are the result of longstanding frustration with the way in which DFO manages the fisheries. We have asked the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, time and time again, to create true partnerships with fishers. It has never happened.

In our view, the situation is unacceptable. Some people think that fishers are afraid of losing their power. But what power, I ask you? Fishermen have no power at the moment. The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has all the power. At the time of discussions on the Atlantic fisheries policy review, we asked that the minister's powers be clearly set out in order that we know exactly when and how he can intervene.

Our fishermen who own businesses employ hundreds of deckhands and generate hundreds of jobs in processing plants. They are at the heart of our regions' economies. It is unacceptable that the fishing plans have not yet been unveiled at this time of year.

Although the department extols planning, sustainability for the fisheries, and shared management, it is unable to give us the necessary information in winter, in January or February, to allow us to plan for the upcoming fishing seasons. Even if we were to get them in March, we could work with that.

We believe that the department must develop a true vision which it must then respect when making operational decisions. The decision-making process has to be brought closer to fishers and their communities, and fishers have to be considered as partners in the true sense of the word.

That brings me to the end of my presentation.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Landry.

We will now hear from the “Association des capitaines-propriétaires de la Gaspésie”.

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: I ought to have stated at the outset that the different associations come under our umbrella organization. My presentation was made on behalf of these associations. Mr. Samuel is an expert in shrimp fishing and Mr. Champoux is a ground fishing expert. They are here with me to answer any of your more technical questions.

¿ (0950)

[English]

The Chair: Wonderful. That gives us more time for questions, so that's excellent.

If it's okay with members, I'd like to switch around, so that everybody gets a chance to go first. I'd like to call on Monsieur Roy first.

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In fact, I find your brief to be very clear. What always surprises me, as it does you every year, is that the season should be underway and you do not know the plans. You said so more than once. How can you work under those circumstances?

I agree with you fully. It is something that I have been saying for two years, since I became a member of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans. What we are told every year is that there are negotiations between the department and fishers, and that those negotiations drag on every year, and that every year, the parties can't agree. That is the answer we are given. We are told that there are meetings and consultations and that people are listened to, but that an agreement can never be reached.

I have never taken part in the meetings held here, in the Gaspé, because we are not allowed to. You have to understand that we are not allowed to participate. Only representatives of fishermen are allowed at those meetings. Even individual fishermen are not entitled to attend that kind of meeting. I would also like to know how the department can say such a thing when you are telling us the exact opposite.

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: Mr. Roy, I'll give you the first example that comes to mind: shrimp. Oddly enough, this year, we came to an agreement on the shrimp fishery. Our fishers submitted a co-management memorandum of agreement in March. Since March, we have had an agreement, but we have no fishing plan.

If you ask me today how it is that we have no fishing plan, I can tell you what I think. I don't know if it's true, but I think that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans wanted to announce all of the fishing plans at the same time. There was the moratorium on cod, crab had to be shared, and the department wanted to come up with some kind of package deal and announce everything at the same time. Even if the negotiations were going better in some sectors than others, and even if there were some agreements, the department held up the announcements and waited to see what was going to happen with the other groups. That way, if resources were scarce in some sectors, some could have been taken from others. That was probably the problem for 2003.

In 2002 it may have been a different problem, for example the issue of the moratorium announcement and the programs announced by Canada Economic Development. The people from Canada Economic Development came and met with us and told us that they had been working on these programs since September 2002, and asked us whether we were satisfied. I said that there was no program. If they had come and consulted us earlier, we would have told them that they were not heading in the right direction.

It's extremely difficult. There may be negotiations, but if a manager makes decisions in March or June, when the fishing season starts in April, that's not right. The decisions have to be made earlier. Our fishers negotiate in the fall and winter, not in April or May.

There is an issue of people's availability, but even when there is an agreement, the process seems to be extremely difficult, complicated and laborious. The discussions are very often regional, then national, and then there are reports and briefings. It has to go all the way up to the minister, who might not like one or two sentences. Then it has to start all over from the beginning. It goes back down, starts over again, goes back up, and starts again.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: In fact, the process ends up being meaningless. That is why fishers feel like they are not being listened to, basically.

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: There are a lot of consultations. I don't think there is a single fisherman here who would say there are no consultations. There are a lot of them, but they do no good. It costs us a fortune to participate in the department's consultation process, but we feel like we have very little influence over the final decision, which is very often made in advance.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: You are saying that, regardless of whether or not there is any consultation, the results are the same, and even worse when you are consulted because the process takes a lot longer.

¿ (0955)

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: Indeed, in some instances, you could say that the results are the same regardless of whether or not there is any consultation.

[English]

The Chair: Merci, Monsieur Roy.

Mr. Hearn, do you have any questions?

Mr. Loyola Hearn: Just one, Mr. Chairman.

All the points you made, we could be in Newfoundland today hearing the very same thing from fishermen themselves. The story is common, right across the board.

I'll concentrate on the part about keeping people on the water during a moratorium. We're suggesting the same thing, that the moratorium is one thing, but to tell people, “We are closing your fishery, here are a few dollars for make-work programs”, just kills the pride of fishermen. Many of ours pack up and go to Alberta or wherever, as they did in the past. We have lost 30,000 people in 10 years, so we don't want to see that happen again.

We have met with the minister and with his officials and we have said that within the fishery there are many things fishermen can do. There's research, you mentioned research. Just keeping your eyes on what's happening.... We have seals with which we have to deal. We have underutilized species, which fishermen on their own can't afford to go out and experiment with, because it's expensive to buy gear and develop markets.

If they're going to put money into letting you move rocks, isn't it better to pay you to do some experimentation and sometimes a reallocation of resources can keep fishermen in the boats, with the same income? So there are many things that can be done with a little bit of vision and a little bit of planning.

I wonder, are things like that possible in your area? Because you seem to indicate that, yes, there are things that can be done to keep fishermen in the boats.

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: As for the fishers who were affected by the cod moratorium, we feel that, first of all, it would have been great had there been a fishing licence buy-back program. We have to take a look at fishing capacity. That's the first thing: there should have been a buy-back program.

There should also have been a diversification support program. Earlier, Mr. Cyr examined the issue of diversification at present. An individual who harvests groundfish who decided to purchase a shrimp or crab undertaking, for example, in order to diversify, and who would be prepared to invest in order to buy it—believe or not, there are some people who would do this— would often run into problems finding resources. Indeed, we would say that, for a good cause, the federal government has given priority to the aboriginal bands in the purchase of these quotas, and at a relatively attractive price. So right now, when a crab fishing licence is for sale, it is purchased and redistributed amongst the aboriginal bands, thereby reducing our opportunity to buy into the fishery.

In my opinion, I think that the fishers who were affected by the moratorium should be able to participate, as the gentleman was saying earlier, in all of the scientific fisheries, regardless of which ones they are, and they should also be receiving financial support to develop projects that may be of interest from the research perspective. We should therefore be providing the communities, the regions that have been affected, with a type of toolbox, because one measure alone will not resolve the problem. We need a whole series of measures that include the buy-back of fishing licences, and diversification.

I have spoken very little about the seals, but they are of concern to our fishers. We know that there is a resource. It is an abundant resource and we need to develop it, but that takes money. People in the groundfish sector do not have the means to invest, but if there were assistance programs, they would do so. If we took more of a regional perspective, we could say that, in a given region, there is such and such a number of fishers who can diversify in the following way. There are so many people who would sell their licences, who are near retirement, or who may take early retirement. If we were to adopt this regional approach, we would have much better results than we do right now under the current approach, which is more general in nature. This is clear to me.

The other aspect is that, in our opinion, keeping a minimum fishery is part of this comprehensive vision, this vision of what we will do with our groundfish fleet, with a few fishers in the cod fishery, some buy-backs, diversification, licences withdrawals, etc. This would be part of a comprehensive vision. When we find ourselves with only one tool, not much can be done. Everyone is fighting over the tool and no one can use it.

À (1000)

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Stoffer, do you have any questions?

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I have a couple of questions, Madam.

[Translation]

The Chair: Do you wish to say anything?

Mr. Gilles Champoux: I would like to add a few words to what Gabrielle said. There is a misunderstanding between the scientists and the fishers, be it where you live, in Newfoundland, or elsewhere. Fishermen generally do not believe what the scientists say. If they used our fleets more often to conduct their research, perhaps both sides would come to a better understanding.

There is another element, and that is the fact that scientists conduct their research over a long period of time. Each year, they carry out spot checks in the same places. But at the same time they tell us that fish migration patterns may have changed. You have to look for where the cod are moving today. If you always check the same places, but the cod has moved because of changing water temperatures, of course you won't find it.

Our fishers can help us with regard to this type of issue, but it seems that we have not yet been able to bring together the work done by scientists and fishers. More needs to be done on this issue. It's all very well and good to impose a moratorium, but it would also be nice to find out where the fish have gone and how we'll get them back. To find out, we need to rely on our fishers, because they are closer to the fish.

The Chair: Mr. Samuel.

Mr. Sylvain Samuel (Director General, “Association des capitaines-propriétaires de la Gaspésie”): With your permission, I would just like to add something for your information. It's true that everyone is talking about cod, but Gabrielle also talked about the redfish problem. No research is being carried out on the state of redfish in the gulf. Nobody knows how redfish stocks are doing.

Scientists cannot even make out the genetic differences between redfish in unit one and redfish in unit two. Unit one is the Gulf, which is under a moratorium, and unit two is the entrance to the Gulf, where there is still commercial fishing. But scientists cannot find any genetic difference between these two species. This goes to show that the management of the resource is not exactly exemplary.

Lastly, I just want to touch on the issue of seals. We were at the press conference given by Minister Thibault and Minister Drouin in Rimouski. The big announcement with regard to seals were the exclusion zones. You may not like this, but we just don't buy it. We don't believe in them, but the government has earmarked $6 million to manage them. In our language, creating an exclusion zone means telling a seal that from now on it is not allowed to enter this zone, or telling a codfish that it may not leave its zone today. We don't believe in this system, although $6 million are being spent on it.

In our opinion, taxpayers' dollars would be better spent on doing research. At the same time, we are told that there is no money for a permit buy-back program. This is so paradoxical, that all you can do is throw up your hands in despair.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Stoffer.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you for your presentation.

I have three quick questions for you.

So far you're the second person who has a group who has disagreed with the decision. Is there anybody in your circle who agrees with the decision the minister made? Secondly, in your discussions with the owners of the plants, do they agree with the fleet separation policy that you described? Thirdly, do you believe that Minister Thibault made the decision, as he said, “with the best available science”, or was that science flawed?

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: On the question of the cod fishery, obviously there is not much cod in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence. The situation is very precarious in my view. It requires particular attention, a prudent approach. You asked whether there were any groups that agreed with Minister Thibault's decision. I think that many scientists agree with it.

Based on what we have heard, everyone concerned in Quebec, both the coastal fishers and ourselves -- we represent the mid-shore fishers -- as well as the processing industry, unanimously opposed the decision. Obviously, people wanted a minimal use of the resource, not an extreme one, but a minimal fishery with minimum quotas. That is the answer to your first question.

Your second question pertains to separating the fleets. The processing plants would be in a better position to answer than me. I can understand that for a processing plant, it might be good to have a fishing permit. They certainly want one, but I think that it would be a serious error, because granting fishing permits to the processing plants would completely change the coastal fishery model in Atlantic Canada. If there is any movement in that direction, our communities would suffer the consequences.

I think it would be a fundamental error. The fishers that are now heads of companies would become ordinary employees. Let me give you an example. In the Magdalen Islands, Madelipêche is a processing plant that holds a redfish fishing licence. When the redfish was hit by the moratorium, all of the captains from that company, who were captain-employees, found themselves out on the street, without compensation, and they had to get by. They were never recognized as core fishers. They were completely dependent on the firm and they lost their job, end of story.

During the first years of operation, that plant belonged to interests outside the province. When the company owner decided it was no longer viable, he left and the firm was left there with the quotas and permits. Someone had to pull up his sleeves to try to save it. Those are not very attractive models. There are vested interests for firms that already have some, but if that spread to the rest of Atlantic Canada, it would be a major change that would have very negative impacts, in our view.

À (1005)

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: And I have a last question, Madame.

Minister Thibault said that his decision was based on science, but we've heard other people say that science was incomplete and that they didn't have all the information. Do you agree that the science may have been flawed in his decision?

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: You know there is huge margin of error in scientific data. I think we should be cautious, but if we want to improve our knowledge, some fleets must be kept active and there should be even more sophisticated research projects to have better information and to be able to make better decisions. It is not by closing a fishery that you will get additional information, even if the scientists have pulled the alarm. There are claims that a minimal fishery would not have a very negative impact on rebuilding stocks and that it would have positive impacts on the gathering of data and the understanding of fish behaviour.

[English]

The Chair: Again for Monsieur Samuel.

[Translation]

Mr. Sylvain Samuel: The CCHR report was very clear. Even though there is a base of scientific knowledge, the fact remains that even with a complete halt to the fishery, according to experts, the stocks would continue to decline. So why not take advantage of this situation and keep some fishing units and observe the migratory pattern or the state of the cod? We all know that the greenhouse effect is increasingly evident and that it causes glaciers to melt, which in turns cools down the water. All these aspects change fish behaviour.

With an annual report, we have just lost a fundamental data base that would help us better understand the stocks. So it is not really the ideal solution.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to go maybe in a little different direction for a second or two, because most of my other questions have already been answered.

I noticed in the document on the working group that you put together you made some observations about sport and recreational fishing. They also have considerably diminished the resources, I believe, so I would like you to elaborate on that for a second or two.

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: In 2003, Minister Thibault announced the closure of the recreation or sports fishery. There will be no recreational fishery this year in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence; that is good news for us. Our fishers had been wanting better control over recreational fishery for a long time. The fishery was closed to commercial fishers, and it would have been even more damaging to leave the door open to recreational fishing. We think that is a positive side to Mr. Thibault's announcement.

À (1010)

[English]

Mr. Bob Wood: I'm curious about how that really affected the business. Is it going to have a major effect on the fishing business closing this, or is it just a goodwill gesture by the minister?

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: I think that could have an effect because to my knowledge—Gilles can correct me— the cod catches in the recreation fishery in Atlantic Canada are huge. So it seems obvious that closing the recreation fishery could have a major impact.

Mr. Gilles Champoux: There was no way to control that fishery. In Newfoundland, for example, 15,000 licences were used and we were never able to know how much was fished when. So it is useless in terms of the resource itself. You can't take data and include them in the mathematical models or whatever. Furthermore, there was probably overfishing. All of the witnesses who saw that mentioned 800 metric tonnes, but it could be two or three times that. We can't control that fishery and it is useless on the scientific front.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Elley.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you again for coming and sharing with us today.

A previous leader of our party, Preston Manning, used to say that we ought to listen to the common sense of the common people. We come to these meetings, we hear a lot of common sense, simply common sense, and then we hear what DFO is planning to do and we all scratch our heads, and we wonder at what point does this break down.

So I want to ask you a couple of questions, and I hope you'll be able to give us your honest answers about this without fear of any kind whatever. I have two questions. Why do you think DFO really pursues a policy that moves away from fisher-owner? What is the reason for it?

The other question is on co-management. For a long time in the Alliance Party we have advocated co-management of the fishery. Why do they not pursue co-management? What prevents them from doing that?

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: You are asking me a huge question. The co-management approach was adopted around 1995, if my memory serves, with the snow crab in zone 12. In our sector, that was the first resource to be included in a co-management agreement.

The purpose of those accords was basically to develop a true partnership between the fishers and the department, to design control tools, to discuss the question of the state of the stock, to check whether additional research could be done and to check whether new events that occurred in the fishery could be further documented. It was also a question of managing the activities, the methods and fishing periods, the creels, etc.

It was also a way for the government—let's be clear here—to get money from the fishers. Indeed, the fishers made a significant financial contribution to scientific research. So it was a way of developing a real partnership.

The real problem started when the sharing of the resource came up. The sharing of the resource and access to it are a very delicate and complex issue. The moment discussions got heated or the minister wanted to push the sharing formula further—especially when he wanted to impose the way everything was going to be done— the problems started.

In the case of the crab fishery, two of our fleets were affected by the co-management agreements: the snow crab in zone 12 and the gulf shrimp. In both cases, sharing formulas had been pre-established. The first co-management agreements took time to negotiate, but once in place, they were enforced from year to year.

The aboriginal issue then came into play, which created another shock zone since that required additional sharing with the aboriginals. Those are two co-management agreements that had supporters and opponents, but they generally worked well. They occurred at the same time as the cod fishery moratorium and the decline of some other stocks.

I think that generally speaking, people are aware that fishers are in trouble and that they need help. That is a fact. However, we must be careful in the way we proceed. If we are not careful and if we do not adopt a conservation approach, we will imperil all of the fish species in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence.

What went wrong? In my view, the minister's discretionary power is huge. The fishers have the impression they sit around a table where they have a say in matters, as long as the minister agrees with them. However, as soon as there is a disagreement, thanks very much, you take back our decision-making power. That led to a lot of mistrust on the part of the fishers. They never know exactly how far they can go. In my view, the rules should be clearer.

Let me give you another example; I will tell you about the co-management agreements like the one for the crab and shrimp fishers, to broach the topic of administrative agreements.

As far as we are concerned, our fleets fish with individual transferable quotas. This means a fisher, a captain, dockhands, a licence and a quota: one for the crab, one for the shrimp and one for the cod. We reached an administrative agreement to manage the cod quotas; it dated back to 1989-90, was set for 10 years or so, was accepted and signed by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans as well as Industry Canada.

But one year, the department decided that one aspect of the agreement did not suit it. Well, believe it or not, it disregarded the agreement and applied its own decision. We only found out after the fact. We were never consulted. When we expressed our disagreement and indicated that the administrative agreement did not allow the transfer of an individual groundfish licence using mobile gear into a competitive individual fishing quota using fixed gear, the damage was done.

We were told that in extreme cases, the minister could decide otherwise. In that case, why sign an agreement? As for the relations between fishers and the department, the climate has moved from one of confidence to one of mistrust.

À (1015)

The current situation is extremely difficult for the fishers; it is due to incidents such as those that have occurred over the past few years.

[English]

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you. I appreciate your answer on that.

We haven't gotten to the question about moving away from fisher-owner, which I think is another real problem for your industry.

It's interesting also, as Mr. Hearn said, that we could have this discussion in my riding on Vancouver Island and we would have the same questions raised. Perhaps the only advantage of DFO's policy is that it brings some kind of unity to the country from coast to coast with fishermen. That's about all it does, in many ways.

However, what would you say is the real reason that DFO is moving away from the fisher-owner policy, why they're allowing other organizations, other parts of the industry to own licences?

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: Since all coastal communities are requesting the same thing, the only reason the department would want to open the door to that would be, in my view, because the interests of corporations are at stake and they are exerting extreme pressure on the department. To me, that is nearly a political issue. We can't get away from it. The message the fishers are sending is unanimous: it is a question of money and political pressure.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you. That seems to be a true and plausible answer.

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: Was my answer the one you wanted to hear?

[English]

The Chair: We very much appreciate your evidence this morning. Thank you for giving us those candid answers.

À (1020)

[Translation]

Ms. Gabrielle Landry: Thank you very much.

[English]

The Chair: For our next groups, we have Jean-Paul Gagné, from “l'Association québécoise de l'industrie de la pêche”; and Robert Langlois, from Gaspé Cured Inc.

Bienvenue.

Gentlemen, I want to apologize. As chair, I have not been watching the clock as carefully as I should, and we're running a little bit behind time. We don't want to take any time from you, because all witnesses are interesting and important, but I wonder if I could ask you, if possible, to keep your presentation to approximately ten minutes so that we can get questions in. Then, if there's time at the end, if you have forgotten something or want to add something, we'll give you a chance.

[Translation]

Who will speak first? Mr. Gagné or Mr. Langlois? Mr. Gagné, please.

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné (Director General, “Association québécoise de l'industrie de la pêche”): My name is Jean-Paul Gagné and I am the Executive Director of the “Association québécoise de l'industrie de la pêche” [Quebec fish processor association]. Our association represents all the seafood processing companies in Quebec handling the various species, whether we are talking about cod, lobster or crab. We are the only association representing processing plants in Quebec.

You said that you are a bit behind schedule, but that does not bother us because we coordinate our efforts with the “Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec” and the “Alliance des pêcheurs professionnels du Québec”, and there is a groundfish task force. Quebec also has an advocacy committee. We have to work together and exchange views on all fisheries-related problems in Quebec and we do so regularly, perhaps once a month.

We will obviously not repeat everything that was said by the federation, but we simply would like to answer a few questions. In particular, there is no doubt that the cod moratorium will have a huge and devastating impact on Gaspé Cured, which concentrated on producing salted and dried cod. They have markets in Europe and the US. Of course, the cod moratorium announcement has enormous implications for those companies.

Second, the moratorium announcement was accompanied by news that some kind of program would be set up to help the affected fishers. We were told at the outset that there would be assistance for salt-cod processing plants. After a number of meetings with CED, Canada Economic Development, which is involved in this, we have come to realize that there is very little eligibility for our plants under this program. Since the moratorium was announced so late, people have been caught off guard this year. Of course, we are aware that governments will not step in to help the processors for the whole moratorium period, which may last five to ten years. But it seems to us that since the announcement came as late as it did, there needs to be a program for this year to enable the processors to continue to supply their clients abroad and to try to develop new activities and find new species to process this year. I can tell you, gentlemen, that because the announcement was made so late, these companies are having a hard time now. From what we understand, relations between CED and these companies are not very good.

So we are in a difficult situation. Quebec has other groundfish processing plants, perhaps two, that handle cod in particular and are affected, but to a lesser extent because they do process other species as well. That gives you a bit of an idea of the impact that the cod moratorium is having.

We have a concern to express this morning, which is that the fishery plans are always announced very late. One of the consequences—I'm speaking on behalf of the plants—is that for four weeks now there have already been plant workers in Quebec that have no income. Their employment insurance has run out, they have exhausted their benefits, and that creates very difficult situations in our coastal regions, which tend to be economically weak already.

We cannot understand why this happens year after year. This is my tenth year with the AQIP, and every year we call for fishery plans to be announced earlier so that we can react accordingly and better serve our plant workers and our communities as well.

That is basically what we wanted to tell you about groundfish and the impact of the moratorium on our processing plants.

There is something else that I would like to draw to your attention.

À (1025)

Quebec has virtually always had 20 per cent of the Northern shrimp species quotas. For some years now, because of a financial transaction, it has had less than 5 per cent; it may have 2 per cent.

Year after year, we put forward proposals and we make demands, and every year, we don't seem to make any progress; we are treading water. We would like to draw your attention to that fact. I do not know what measures will be taken after we have appeared before your committee, but we wonder if some day our voices will be heard in some real way.

Quebec used to have 20 per cent of that quota. It's no laughing matter today. That could be fairly useful for our processing plants in the current circumstances, but we can't have access to or benefit from that stock.

If you can put pressure on anyone—I don't really know how your committee works— it would be important for you to stress that point. We also deal in gulf shrimp. We have good operators for shrimp, but we find the current allocation totally out of balance. In Quebec, we are penalized by that.

That's what we wanted to tell you right at the outset because we didn't have a chance to table a full brief. Everybody was busy. Also, everybody was waiting for a fishery plan. That resulted in additional work and we did not have a chance to table a brief. However, that does not mean that we don't have anything to say on fisheries. Indeed, we have lots to say about fisheries in Quebec.

À (1030)

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Gagné. Mr. Langlois, do you have a presentation to make or anything to add? No? All right.

[English]

Mr. Stoffer.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, gentlemen, for your presentation.

Sir, how many plants do you represent?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: I represent around 40 plants.

[Translation]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: And how many employees?

[English]

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: We have 5,000 employees.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: You say you work with other groups. Since the Marshall decision, do you work with aboriginal groups as well?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Yes, but we started working with them because we invited them each year to our annual meeting. Until now, they have normally worked directly with the plant.

We have no problem, actually, with the decision, because they deliver shrimp to the plants in Quebec, and they deliver crab too.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Sir, was your organization allowed to have any input into the decision made by Minister Thibault, before it was made? Was your advice sought? Were you consulted? Did you have opportunities to express your opinion in a timely manner before he made the decision?

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: I am going to answer in French. We have had the opportunity to make representations. A lot of things happen every year. First, scientists deliver their reports. Then, there are the advisory committees where you can voice your opinion.

Now, on the groundfish, there wasn't any advisory committee this year. A moratorium was announced. An advisory committee was expected to meet in Moncton on April 4^th and 5^th, but that did not happen. Therefore, we were not able to clearly and directly express our points of view to the minister. We did write to him, however. When the FRCC came here to Gaspé, representations were made, and the AQIP presented a brief.

We were nevertheless very surprised by the minister's decision to impose a moratorium following the recommendations of the FRCC; the council had told us that of the three options put forward, that is the maintaining of the current TAC, a 3,000-tonne reduction, and the closure of the fisheries, the latter option was the worst.

We've known that there were problems since last year, since the release of the FRCC's 2002 report , but we were very surprised by the fact that a moratorium would be imposed with so little notice. We did not have an opportunity this year to make our case to an advisory committee from Fisheries and Oceans. However, we did so before the FRCC.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Here is my final question for you, sir.

With all the resources available to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, we hear on our committee travels across the country that decisions on fishing seasons are always at the eleventh hour, at the last minute. With all their resources and all the people who work for DFO, why do you think DFO consistently makes those types of decisions, either good or bad, at the very last minute, without giving you or your employees or the people you work with an opportunity to at least react or to change something in order to meet the new criteria of whatever decision they make?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Maybe I will answer you with a question. Is it a scientific decision or a political decision? That's what we think right now.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Right on.

Merci beaucoup.

The Chair: With that Socratic answer, we will now go to Mr. Elley.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you very much. Again, that's common sense from the common people--absolutely.

You talk, sir, particularly about the problem you're having with northern shrimp. You said you used to have 20% of the quota, and it has gone down to 2%. Would you like to share a little bit why that has taken place?

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: I'll give you a little history. The processing plant of Matane was owned by Clearwater. At a certain point, Clearwater decided to sell the plant to the employees and to a group of investors in Matane. But it kept the two large boats that harvested shrimp in the north.

However, Clearwater kept an address in Quebec. So, we are told in Ottawa that we have two major permits in Quebec. But the shrimp is not destined for Quebec. Clearwater left with its boats and its permits. Even if it has an address in Quebec with a p.o. box, the company is not supplying the Quebec market since it left with its boats.

That started with a transaction that we tried to correct in recent years. We made a request this year again. I did not see the plan for Northern shrimp because it was not available to us. If it was made public, that must have happened yesterday or today. I do not know if we will have any access this year. We were very cautious in our request for access. We asked for 3,000 tonnes in the area to meet our needs. Shrimp could have been harvested in part by the fishers who are affected by the cod moratorium and in part by the traditional fishers. That would have improved the situation and the employment period in our plants.

So, it all started with the transaction between Clearwater and “Les Fruits de mer de l'Est du Québec”, in Matane. Clearwater held the permits for those two big boats.

À (1035)

[English]

Mr. Reed Elley: Was this a political decision?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: No, it was a private transaction, but since then, each year we've asked the government to correct that, because we are in the same market as Newfoundland and it is the same shrimp--pandalus borealis--as we have in the gulf.

We are very small now in relation to Newfoundland in shrimp. Sometimes we were the leader, but now we're following Newfoundland, since they decided that.

Mr. Reed Elley: It seems to me incredible, then, that a decision like this that has to have government approval to take place, I think--correct me if I'm wrong--would not have some political overtones.

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: No, but to be correct, both governments have to be blamed for that, because, yes, they probated that transaction because they need a permit to process in Quebec.

Mr. Reed Elley: Yes. So I think, quite honestly, this happens lots of times in DFO dealings, that we have political interference that often gives advantage to people who know people. If this is what happens, then it has to be stopped.

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Yes, that's what we've asked for, but now it's done; the private transaction has been made.

We hope DFO understands at some time what we lost there--and we don't ask for 20% now; we ask for a share in that stock. It's a very small share, because if you ask me, they have a big quota. Atlantic Canada is one of the biggest producers of shrimp in the world, so we need our share in that.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you.

The Chair: Mr. Gagné, you said you were behind Newfoundland, so let's ask Mr. Hearn if he has any questions, since he's from Newfoundland.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a couple.

I won't talk about shrimp. Yes, I will, actually, because a lot of people involved in the shrimp industry, whether it be Newfoundland or elsewhere, are very concerned about quotas, about how they're allocated and about the principle of adjacency and how it should apply. I'd certainly like your views on that.

You also mentioned the FRCC. We had the minister in front of our committee last week during discussion of the estimates, and the last question the minister was asked was asked by his own parliamentary secretary, who sometimes sits on our committee. I think it was a set-up question. My colleagues may not agree, but he was asked how, in light of the fact that the FRCC recommendation on the stocks.... In fact, as they suggested, the gulf stocks is in such shape that we could have a limited fishery there in the southern gulf. He was asked how he could look upon the fact that the FRCC recommendation was different from his scientific advice, which he says he used to close the fishery, and basically is there any need for the FRCC?

The minister referred to the fact that the chairman was soon going to retire and we might have to look at whether or not we need such organizations. I'd like your own opinion on the FRCC as a semi-independent body, I guess, and also your comments on the whole shrimp issue, because we do have a large stock. However, I'm hearing this year in many areas the shrimp is much smaller, maybe because the stocks are growing to the point at which they can't feed properly, or whatever. And I'm hearing that a lot of larger shrimp, perhaps by tidal movement, seem to be moving farther afield. I understand 3L has a very lucrative stock this year of large shrimp.

I'd like your comments on those points.

À (1040)

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: I'm not sure that I understand the question.

As far as the shrinking size of shrimp is concerned, certainly the scientists had warned us of the fact that that was their main concern for the years to come. Given that last year the quotas for Northern shrimp were filled, the total allowable catch was fished, and that shrimp is still abundant, we believe that generally speaking the quotas could be increased, but there's an economic issue also, especially if the size of shrimp is shrinking. We feel that a 20,000-tonne increase in Northern shrimp would swamp the markets. That is our main concern. Also, we haven't been able to complete our marketing agreement for shrimp where there is a joint plan in Quebec. Everybody is waiting to see if there will be a 20,000-tonne increase or not. We know that if there were to be a 20,000-tonne increase, we will be subject to antidumping measures at the end of this year or the beginning of the next. As you know very well, the Americans made an attempt early last year to adopt antidumping measures against shrimp from eastern Canada. If that were to happen, it would not be a good thing. Clearly we want to have access to Northern shrimp, but in terms of economics, we would be willing to give up that access so that the industry does not end up in a slump because we would no longer be able to sell shrimp.

As you know, we're living under a capitalist system, and currently, supply is higher than demand. Consumers benefit from it, and that's normal. That is why we are telling you that we have the right to have access to Northern shrimp, but we would prefer that there be no increase in quotas. We would be willing to sacrifice the 3,000 tonnes that we are entitled to. It is an economic issue for shrimp fishers as well as for processing plants.

The Chair: Do you believe that the FRCC has a role to play?

[English]

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: I'm not sure about that.

[Translation]

Normally, shrimp stocks are huge. But the processing plants are significantly fewer than was the case with cod processing plants. The FRCC has a process, and it is a rather long one. In our case, shrimp fishing in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence always begins on April 1^st and we never stray from that. I do not think that we can go through the FRCC's consultations, unless they are carried out a lot earlier in the year. The late start of the fishing season is already causing us problems. We don't want an agency to further delay the start of the fishing season for shrimp because consultations were not completed.

À (1045)

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Wood, do you have any questions?

Mr. Bob Wood: A quick question, sir.

With the 40 plants that you oversee and all the employees, I guess I might ask, with all the changes in the fishing industry in the last little while, how have you had to change or diversify to really stay in business?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: It's because here in Quebec the plant owners made a choice. They wanted to specialize. We have a plant for shrimp, a plant for crab, a plant for cod, and so on. Some have two species. But we have to check for a new species. Some started in rock crab three years ago--two in the Magdalen Islands and one on the Gaspé coast. There's something we can do with those species, but we need a bit of time. That is why I mentioned that it was too fast for our plants to organize new production this year without cod. That's why they asked for help, to continue in cod with Russian cod or something like that. It's too fast for this year, but before, they wanted to do some things with some new species that we discover year after year.

Mr. Bob Wood: When you talk about help, are you talking about monetary help? What kind of help are you talking about?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Yes, because we know the cost of the Russian cod is very high. We don't ask for money directly, because I think Canada can do that because of the Mondial organization. But they can do something, as Quebec has done sometimes, to help them. We had a plan of helping them with manpower, so that could be a way to help them to have money to get Russian cod for this year.

Mr. Bob Wood: How much money are we talking about? Do you have any idea?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Yes, $2,500 per metric tonne. It's very high. It's around double the price they paid for local cod last year.

Mr. Bob Wood: All right, thank you.

The Chair: Monsieur Roy.

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to thank Mr. Hearn for acknowledging that Fisheries and Oceans should normally provide the people nearest the resource with access. I hope that he will say the same thing tomorrow in St. John, Newfoundland. Normally, even though there has been a financial transaction, the basic principle at Fisheries and Oceans is to give access to the resource to the people who are nearest to it. It is difficult to understand why the government has done this, something that is counter to the policies it had adopted.

I would like to come back to the assistance plan announced after the moratorium was ordered. Mr. Wood referred to it. I would like to know your opinion on the assistance plan. Ms. Landry mentioned it, and said it was completely ineffective. It is very different from what a genuine assistance plan should be.

You represent the employees in 40 plants. At this time, how many jobs in those plants are in jeopardy? Do you think the assistance plan will be helpful in the short term? This is an immediate problem. If we wait six or seven months, it will be too late. For plant employees, it is already too late. It is as simple as that. These people no longer have access to employment insurance, and there is nothing for them at all. Most communities are already having problems because the unemployment rate is 22 or 23 per cent here in the Gaspé. Obviously, people from the plants will not be able to find other jobs.

I myself have some views on the assistance plan, but I would like to hear yours.

À (1050)

Mr. Robert Langlois (Owner, “Pêcheries Rivière-au-Renard inc.”, Gaspé Cured Inc.): First of all, I would like to thank you for that question. I was going to come back to this later in any case.

In the Gaspé, five plants will be severely affected, and two others somewhat less affected. According to Mr. Simoneau, who runs the CDE office here in the Gaspé, the assistance program was formulated on the assumption that plants would close. Plant employees were to work 35 hours a week for 14 weeks, at $325 a week, to qualify for employment insurance.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: At the minimum wage?

Mr. Robert Langlois: That's more than minimum wage, but with a reduced number of hours, they end up with $325. They get a little more than $9 an hour, but for 35 hours only. At the time, there was no question of assistance for the plants. We fought hard to get assistance so that they could work in the plants, and they must continue to work in the plants. With assistance, we could make their work weeks longer, and they would have reasonable employment insurance benefits.

When people earn $325 a week, their gross employment insurance benefit is $170 a week. I would like to know how anyone can support a family on that. I could not. At present...

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Sorry to interrupt you, but I have a quick question. This is only for next year, isn't it? There is nothing in the works for the medium term?

Mr. Robert Langlois: This is for 18 months.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Eighteen months. You work, then you are entitled to employment insurance, and then that's it.

Mr. Robert Langlois: I think so.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Please go on.

Mr. Robert Langlois: They also say that it's impossible to do this in order to help the plants get cod. They are ready to help us if we can find other species to process. At this time, they would pay 50 per cent of the costs for required labour, up to $325. But we cannot process cod. I process scallops as well, but not very much, because it is a difficult area. If I could provide 10 weeks of work for the people who spent 5 weeks processing scallop last year, they would be prepared to provide assistance for the 5 additional weeks.

If I can find another species to fish, they will help me. However, it cannot be just any species. I cannot fish for crab, shrimp or any other lucrative species. I have to fish for mackerel, herring or sea cucumber.

If anyone can support a plant on those species, I'd like to meet him. I have a great plant measuring 300 feet by 50 feet. I will help him buy it to process those species.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Basically, they are telling you that if you process lucrative species, you enter into direct competition with other plants.

Mr. Robert Langlois: Yes, that's quite natural. The decisions we made in the past have led to a situation in which plants were viable because each one could process a certain species. To process cod as we did at Gaspé Cured, you need qualified people. To process shrimp, you need people with different qualifications.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: So with this assistance plan you are up against a brick wall.

Mr. Robert Langlois: It puts people in a difficult position. If I cannot provide them with work, that would be one thing. But are people going to be happy earning $325 a week cleaning ditches and painting picnic tables? Can they get through the winter with $170 in employment insurance benefits? And what do I do with the plant? I will just leave it there. But the employees are something else again. It's unbelievable for them to get only $325.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: How much is your plant worth?

Mr. Robert Langlois: Now, it is worth nothing at all.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: How much was it worth?

Mr. Robert Langlois: Normally, it would be worth $500,000 to $1 million. The building and equipment are worth at least $500,000.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: And now, you end up with nothing.

Mr. Robert Langlois: Almost nothing.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Roy.

Mr. Stoffer has one last question.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: With the downturn of the ground fishery, are the plants and the fishermen in the communities looking at aquaculture as a viable alternative?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Not right now. Some plants are trying aquaculture, but it's not something that makes money right now.

I have something I want to tell Mr. Roy,

À (1055)

[Translation]

something I would like to add. What we are asking the Gaspé Cured plants to do is not business. We are telling them to start up with a new species, knowing full well that it will not be profitable in a number of years, and to take the profits of that operation to buy cod. We know, at the outset, that it won't be there. That's not what people are saying. For this year, we needed a continuous supply from the outside, and fairly imaginative solutions were required to avoid having the federal government take the blame. A solution was suggested, and it does not seem to be working. Gaspé Cured has been affected to some extent. In the Magdalene Islands, some plants used to process cod and have been affected differently. There is another plant in the Gaspé which has been affected as well.

The short-term solution for this year is to have all employees continue working in cod processing plants. They are conserving their market. They have orders to fill right now, and they will have to fill them somehow. There are agreements and a market. They have signed agreements with companies in the U.S., in Italy and other places, but will not be able to fulfill them.

A number of solutions have been suggested, but with the current legislation, it is difficult to provide effective assistance measures. We are always being told that the WTO or some other organization is going to prevent us from doing one thing or another. Wherever we look, our hand are tied. Solutions have been suggested to help the community, plant employees and the plants—which now have to look to other species—but these solutions cannot be implemented in a single month. We have to understand that.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: You mentioned the World Trade Organization. Is the Gaspé Cured method used in any other country?

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: No, not the method we have had for 250 years.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: So we cannot be accused of unfair competition with another country if we have a unique product.

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: Exactly.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Right now, there is nothing to prevent us from helping the plants. When you compete with another country, then the World Trade Organization...

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: For the same product, yes.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: But at present we are not talking about the same product.

Mr. Jean-Paul Gagné: That's right, but they are still saying that the WTO is preventing them from providing direct assistance to Gaspé Cured. This is something that should be checked.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Well, in my opinion, they are wrong.

[English]

The Chair: Gentlemen, thank you very much for taking....

Oh, Monsieur Langlois, un dernier mot.

[Translation]

Mr. Robert Langlois: I would like to come back to the aquaculture issue. In the Gaspé, some people have started up small mussel farming operations. We are trying it ourselves, but we also want to diversify with scallops and other species.

In 2001, I asked for authorization to collect spats near Gaspé Bay. Last week, I got my answer from Fisheries and Oceans. They said no.

During the same period, the Maurice-Lamontagne Institute—which by the way does excellent work—helped us find better locations for spat collection. The Institute was very open to our efforts, but the Department of Fisheries and Oceans told us that we should not collect spat beyond the bar. They decided that we should do our spat collection within Gaspé Bay, and that we had no access to other areas. I cannot collect spat where there is none. I could take the spat to the bay and raise scallop there, but how can I raise scallop in the first place if I cannot collect the spat? That's all I wanted to add.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Gentlemen, thank you for taking your time today to be with us. We appreciate your testimony.

Could I call on Monsieur Réginald Cotton, s'il vous plaît?

À (1059)

Á (1102)

The Chair: Bienvenue, Monsieur Cotton.

Mr. Cotton represents the “Groupe de travail sur le poisson de fond”.

I know you've given us presentations in English and French: Vision of Quebec Groundfish Industry, and Vision de l'industrie québéçoise du poisson de fond. Then there's a summary.

Merci beaucoup.

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton (Fishermen's Representative, “Groupe de travail sur le poisson de fond”): Good morning, everyone. My name is Réginald Cotton, and I am a fisherman. These days, one might say that I am a poor groundfish fisherman, because I have a single licence.

I sent you the report on the work done by the Quebec Groundfish Task Force. You received the report in advance, and I believe you have had it translated into English, since you appear to have an English copy. You have the complete report.

First of all, the Groundfish Task Force would like to thank the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans for giving us this opportunity to share our vision on the future of groundfish and the Atlantic fishery as a whole with managers of the resource.

The Groundfish Task Force, established in August 2002, brings together representatives of the groundfish industry from the “Fédération des pêcheurs semi-hauturiers du Québec”, the diversified fishers of Old Fort and Blanc-Sablon, the “Regroupement des palangriers et pétoncliers uniques Madelinots”, the “Morutiers traditionnels de la Gaspésie”, and the “Association québécoise de l'industrie de la pêche”.

I have been here since the beginning of this morning's meeting. I am part of the follow-up committee for the group I represent. We have worked a great deal on this issue since August. The people who have testified here this morning have all participated to some extent in the report prepared by the Groundfish Task Force, which we sent to you. This means that the people for whom I speak today genuinely represent the groundfish industry in Quebec, including processors, fishermen, fixed-gear and mobile-gear fishermen, inshore fishermen and mid-shore fishermen. Our group includes them all.

Recently, the Groundfish Task Force learned with dismay of DFO's decision to impose a moratorium on cod fishing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

I was in Rimouski when Mr. Thibault announced the moratorium two weeks ago. This is not going to be easy for us. This morning, Mr. Cyr, who is also a member of our group—spoke at length about fixed-gear fishermen. I am a mobile-gear fisherman. Quebec's mobile-gear fishermen are going to have a lot of difficulty, because they fish for a single groundfish species. We are just coming out of a moratorium, we have not found a solution, and now we're going to into another moratorium. This is going to be really difficult. It's not easy when you're a mid-shore or inshore groundfish fisherman, and fish for a single species. All you've got is cod, and now, for the second time, you can't get any cod.

This controversial decision did not take into account any of the recommendations that our task force formulated for your government in its report in March. You have a copy of the report. That's the same report I mentioned a few moments ago, the report which has been translated into English. The task force suggested that cod quotas in the north and south of the Gulf of St. Lawrence remain unchanged.

Today, people have come from all over to express their views. We have a gentleman from Newfoundland, and certainly people from other provinces. For years now, I have been working with people from different provinces, from the Maritimes, from the Magdalene Islands, from the Lower North Shore, and from Quebec. Generally, we all agree, I think. There is not a single fisherman who agrees with the way the resource is being managed, and there is not a single fisherman who agrees with the way in which the department inventories stock. There are reasons for that. All these people—our task force and everyone else—have done a lot of work and have come to the same conclusions we have. We do not agree with the way in which DFO inventories fish stock.

We have gone much further than that, saying that DFO should allow a completely independent body—a body independent of both the fisheries and DFO—to inventory stocks. The work should be done by an independent company. Here in Quebec and elsewhere there are people who just like me fail to understand what DFO is doing. We completely disagree with the department's assessment. We completely disagree with the department's figures.

I am not alone in saying what I am saying here today. I am sure that when you go to Newfoundland tomorrow morning you will see that there is a reason for all the uproar there. People have reasons for what they are doing. They are angry because they know that fish stocks are much higher than the department will admit. Stocks are not as high as they were in 1975 or in the early 1980s, but they are still much higher than the department will admit. That is what they are upset about.

And that is why we are asking the department to maintain the status quo and continue to allow a small fishery.

Á (1105)

We do not believe the department's assessments. When the fishers are not there, it will be easy for them to say that there is no cod. We were calling for a minimum fishery so that we could check the stock assessment and observe any changes.

I have had personal experience with the department. I have to tell you about it. It will not take long. One spring, the department needed a fishing boat and crew to do sampling off the west coast of Newfoundland, in George Bay, in May. I told them that with my fishing experience, I knew that it was out of the question to go into George Bay in May to find cod. I told them to forget that idea, because it was like trying to find strawberries growing in January in Quebec. They told me that it did not matter, that they had to try, that they had money and people for that and that they were going to go anyway. I went with them, with my fishing boat and my crew. They followed me with a lab boat. After three days of trolling we had not seen any cod. I was sure that there were no cod there. At one point, I told them that I knew where to find cod. They had to call Ottawa to say that the captain knew where there were cod. We travelled for two or three hours and found cod.

That is the problem. When I tell you that we do not agree with their management methods and how they inventory the stocks, there is good reason for that. I am quite sure that if you go around the Maritimes, everyone will tell you the same thing. I am not the only one saying this. I am around the fishers, and we all say the same thing.

The working group was extremely upset when it heard about the moratorium, which will have very serious consequences for inshore, mid-shore and off-shore groundfish fleets, as well as for processing plants. There are 1,150 fishers and crew, plant operators and employees in Quebec coastal communities that will be seriously affected by this total closure of the gulf cod fishery imposed by your department.

That is a lot of people. I know that the situation is bad in Newfoundland as well, because I have friends in Newfoundland that I talk to often. But for our coastal communities in the Gaspé region, the Magdalene Islands and the North Shore, it is terrible. People cannot go to work in the Murdochville mine because the mine is closed. People from the Gaspé cannot go to the Chandler pulp mill because it is closed and I do not know if it is going to reopen. On the North Shore, people cannot go crab fishing, because the crab fishery has been closed along with the cod fishery. Whether you are from Newfoundland, Cape Breton, Prince Edward Island or Quebec, when you fish, depend on the fishery in the same way, no matter where you live. It is the same for everyone. It is a really bad situation.

Moreover, the group was very disappointed that the federal government has no licence buy-back program to rationalize the groundfish industry, despite the group's strong recommendation to that effect. Overcapacity will remain a major obstacle to optimal restructuring of the industry.

In 1994 or 1995, I met with Mr. Tobin at the Maurice-Lamontagne Institute. I was on the other side of the issue from Mr. Tobin in the Labrador turbot crisis at Black Tickle. I do not know if people remember that. He told me that the fisheries problem was going to be resolved through rationalization and licence buy-back. I told him that this was good news.

Á (1110)

The Chair: I would ask you to please speak a little more slowly and

[English]

a little quieter.

Merci beaucoup.

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: I met with Mr. Tobin at the Maurice-Lamontagne Institute, and he told me then that there was going to be a licence buy-back. I told him that this was good news for us, since everyone knows that there are too many fishers. I warned him at the time to make sure to handle it right if he wanted to do a rationalization by ensuring that the people involved in the buy-back were active fishers and not predators. I am sorry to say this, but 10 years later we are now in another moratorium. They did not handle this properly, in that the people whose licences were bought back were not putting any pressure on the biomass. They were not guilty of predation. The moratorium that we just had was extremely difficult for communities. We do not agree at all with this moratorium, since there are probably other solutions. Everyone has talked about those solutions this morning.

Ten years after the first moratorium, we have been told that there is going to be another one. In 5 or 10 years, yet another one will probably be announced, since the right steps are not being taken. That is what I want to emphasize.

I would like to point out that after the first moratorium, we ended up with the same number of fishers, including those who practice predation. We are again heading in that direction.

I think that there is only one solution to the Gulf fisheries problem, whether we are talking about Newfoundland, the Maritimes, the Magdalene Islands, the Gaspé or the North Shore of Quebec. I feel that there are too many fishers.

In the past, especially here in Quebec—I think that it was the case elsewhere as well—when someone was not good at school, he went fishing. When someone was working somewhere and the work ran out, for example, if a mine closed, then he went fishing.

The federal government has a responsibility toward these people, since it opened the door wide open and let everyone in. We are dealing with the effects of that today.

Now a second moratorium has been announced. Go figure! After the first moratorium was announced, I was one of the people in Rimouski who said that the worst thing that could happen in the fisheries sector would be to impose a moratorium and prevent fishers from going out.

In the early 1980s, the Gaspé region had huge numbers of cod. I was a fisher at that time—I still am today—and I was catching a lot of cod, just like everyone else. It was easy to take fish because it was there.

We did notice one thing, however. When we met with scientists at the committees, we told them that something was happening to the biomass, since we could no longer fish the usual spots. We had to go where we had never fished before. The scientists told us then that it was just chance, that this was the way things were, but I think that it was an early warning sign. Something happened.

That is what I was talking about, when I told you that we did not agree with how the resource was being managed and the stocks inventoried.

As fishers, we believe that the migration patterns have completely changed. It is not happening the way it used to. But the scientists do not want to consider any other way of evaluating the stocks. They have been doing it the same way for 50 years.

It is ridiculous. This should not be happening because here, like further north on the Newfoundland side, a lot of shrimp is being taken and shrimp is abundant.

I was there at the start, when the Gaspé fishers began to take shrimp off Anticosti. Go to see them today. Twenty years later, they are no longer fishing the same areas because there are no shrimp left. I do not know why the stocks moved, since I do not have all the answers and I am not a scientist, but I think that the scientists do not know themselves, since they are not directing their efforts to the right places. There are a lot of fishers who think like I do.

The group's representatives find it hard to understand that DFO cut the budgets for sentinel fisheries by 30 per cent at a time when the condition of the stocks need to be monitored more rigorously because of lower volume and the scientists need more data in order to be able to get a better understanding of why cod stocks are not being replenished.

When news like this accompanies a moratorium announcement, it is hard to swallow. Everyone knows that Ottawa has big surpluses, and we wonder why...

Á (1115)

I will give you an example. It is as if a member of my family were ill and I just left him alone in a corner without doing anything or calling the doctor and just watched him die. It is as if I let him died because he was ill. That is kind of like what the managers and the federal government are doing with the resource.

In my opinion, we need to take advantage of the moratorium to try out new fishing methods. I had the opportunity to go to Copenhagen, Denmark, last fall, to take part in the ocean science meetings, where about 20 countries were represented. A lot of research is being done in the North Sea.

We can compare the Gulf with the North Sea, even though it is smaller. I think that the department should take advantage of the current situation and the cod fishery moratorium in order to invest new money in research, including sentinel fisheries. I was saying that people do not believe at all in how the stock assessments are done. That is an example.

The budgets for the sentinel fishery should be increased instead of reduced, because that is where the need is. Budget cuts are unreasonable, and we do not understand that attitude at all. More emphasis should be put on that. Since there is no fishing going on, it would be a good time to get new data for research. The sentinel fishery would be one way of getting through this period.

Moreover, the compensation measures proposed by the government to the Quebec stakeholders affected by the moratorium are inadequate and too limited, since no assistance is planned, including for owners of fishing companies and processing plants. Furthermore, the framework does not include plans to create economic development projects, and its short-term objectives will do nothing to help solve the long-term problems of the groundfish industry in coastal regions.

When Minister Thibault announced the new moratorium last week in Rimouski, he was accompanied by a CED representative, who told us that $14 million was set aside to help fishers. I asked him what was available for boat owners, like those who were there before me, and for processing plant owners. I asked him what they had for people with infrastructure and boats.

I told him that insurance for the kind of boat I had costs between $15,000 and $20,000 a year. The CED people met with the fishers and told them that they might eligible for $300 or $350 a week. If I received $350 a week for 52 weeks, it will not even be enough to insure my boat. A boat takes money. We all owe money to the Quebec government through the banks. Who is going to pay the boat mortgage? Who is going to pay the insurance? This is no picnic.

The fisheries announcement came out late, but people still kept their trust in DFO and they were saying that there would surely be a cod fishery, but there could not be another moratorium, since the one that just ended had not done any good. That is what people believe. They have all invested $25,000 to $30,000 to charter their boats for the spring fishery. Then it is announced that a moratorium is to be imposed. Who is going to pay the bills? Something is going to happen soon.

We just need to think about what is happening with crab. You may think that I am jumping all over the place, but it is a bit like that. We do not condone the things that have just happened in Shippagan. We do not condone those actions, but it is not often you have people out in the streets, including plant workers and people who work on the boats.

Of course, some people have done unacceptable things, like burning boats and processing plants, but those really responsible are the resource managers. I am in the groundfish fishery and I have been living with temporary shrimp allocations for a few years now. The shrimp biomass is in good condition, and the federal government is giving temporary shrimp permits to cod fishers. It is not very much, but it at least allows us to keep our heads above water.

Á (1120)

[English]

The Chair: Monsieur Cotton, you may as well have a drink of water while you're keeping your head above the water.

We very much appreciate that you've given us a written submission. Maybe we could ask you to stop here, so that we have a chance to ask some questions. D'accord?

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: All right. I did not want to read you the whole text without making a few comments, since we are the ones in a precarious situation right now. We are the ones that are living through this, Mr. Chairman. This is really what is happening to us, and that is why I am talking to you about it this morning. My brief is a paper document. I am happy with what I have been telling you this morning, since these are really the emotions that we are feeling.

As you know, we are getting by thanks to the temporary shrimp allocations. The shrimp fishery began April 1st. We are not traditional fishers, but some of the traditional fishers in Gaspé and New Brunswick have caught nearly half of their quota. But there is still no fishery plan. We are in the Internet era with a lot of bureaucrats and all sorts of advantages. We do not understand why the department does not issue the fishery plans. I have my own suspicions, but they do not matter.

There are other countries, such as New Zealand and Australia, which have changed the way they manage the fishery. There is still a fisheries minister, but he is assisted by a sort of committee made up of people from all sectors of the industry. I think that we are going to have to take that approach at some point because what is happening makes no sense. Those people are taking our livelihood away; it is unacceptable.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you. It's nice to see someone who cares.

Mr. Hearn, please.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Cotton said that he had listened to all the others. I'd like to know if he feels as I do, that everybody is basically saying the same thing from different perspectives.

I haven't heard anything with which I disagree this morning, so how can it be that everybody here is wrong and the minister is the only one who is right? I asked him that in committee last week. He said a very interesting thing, that he had heard presentations from a number of people, or from every politician regardless of stripe in Newfoundland, including all parties, the premier, opposition leaders, the minister of fisheries, senators, MPs, and that they all agreed on a certain approach: to keep the fishery open to a point, or to keep a minimal fishery, for the same reasons we heard here today, and to involve people, rather than just shoving them out of the fishery. He said he had heard the presentations, but had then talked to several people individually afterwards. And I asked him, “Oh, did you get a different spin from them?” He basically said “Yes”.

Are there more influential people than any of us who are getting to the minister and his chief officials and influencing decisions? How well are we represented by our unions, for instance? Sometimes I question that. The ones who are directly involved—we who are representing you, the fishermen, and you, the fishermen or processors—are not the ones with the minister's direct ear. Who do you think has that ear? Why is there a difference between all of this accumulated knowledge that we should have and the advice that the minister is getting?

I have one other little point. You mentioned that there are maybe too many fishermen. We had a buyout after the last moratorium. In fact, I believe we had four in Newfoundland—all of them taxed at different levels, which is another issue. But then when people shifted to the crab fishery, they realized they didn't need four, five, or six people in the boat—they maybe only needed one. So each fisherman brought his son, daughter, or wife into the fishery, which doubled or tripled the number involved. So I agree with you.

But could you comment specifically on who has the minister's ear, and perhaps give us your spin on all of those new entrants who are really going to be saying “If you close the fishery, I want something too”?

Á (1125)

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: I do not know all of you, but I think that you are all members of Parliament in Ottawa. You are asking me who has the minister's ear. You probably know that you are closer to the minister than the fishers are. For years now, it seems to us from all the meetings we have attended in Quebec City, Newfoundland or the Maritimes, that the department was encouraging friction among the fishers groups in sectors such as crab, cod, shrimp, in-shore fixed gear or mid-shore fixed gear. It seemed that the departmental officials were encouraging this friction in order to create divisions and then say how things would be done without ever taking into account the primary stakeholders, who are the fishers. That is how I see it.

You may not like what I am saying, since you are all in politics. That is what you do. Politics has its place, but politics can also be sneaky and nasty, which is something we see from time to time. We think that this is how things are. You might not like that, but I have to say it. There are groups that are much bigger and stronger than others, and probably those people have more influence on the minister or the minister's entourage. That is why there are unhappy people in every group of primary stakeholders everywhere. I think that this is where it comes from.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: In your submission, Mr. Cotton, one of your observations was that “Quebec fishers estimate that the controls to which they are subjected are more severe than those in force in the Atlantic, specifically Newfoundland and Labrador.” Can you elaborate on that a bit?

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: Here in Quebec, mobile-gear fishers were the first to be subject to quotas and deal with that system.

There are two fleets in Quebec: fixed-gear and mobile-gear. I have heard that some groups do not have exactly the same system as ours. There are not many fixed-gear inshore fisheries in the Maritimes and even here in Quebec that are subject to observation and monitoring at sea. We in the mid-shore fishery are about the only group affected, among those fishing for crab, shrimp and groundfish. The other groups in Quebec elsewhere are not involved. I think that this is a shortcoming.

How can you control people over whom you have no control? That is what they are telling us. We paid for a police force. We are the ones who have to pay the observers on our own boats. It is enormously expensive for us. We pay for our landings at the dock. We pay for a police force to apply the monitoring system. That is also very expensive for us.

In the lobster fishery, for example, there are no controls. There are no controls in other fisheries either. That is why we say that we have been targeted more than some groups. If all the fisheries in the Gulf were subject to these regulations, the stock assessments might look different.

Before the individual vessel quotas came into effect, it was difficult for resource managers to compile all the data. There were no observers or anything else.

Not very long ago, there were 80 boats at one point fishing off Cape Breton at Chéticamp. When we got to the dock and landed our fish, I decided that it was criminal to throw the small cod back in the water. One of my Cape Breton friends and I decided that we would set an example and keep the small cod. Small cod made up 14 per cent or 15 per cent of my catch. Our two boats were the only ones with small cod on board and the only ones penalized, even though those in the wrong were actually those who threw the small cod overboard.

In the spring, at a meeting in Halifax, resource managers told me that there was a 35,000 tonne hole in the biomass. I got up and said that I knew where the missing 35,000 tonnes were, that it was all the cod that they made us throw overboard and did not want to know anything about. Nobody is taking those stocks into account. There are a lot of things like that. That is what we mean when we say that people are not all subject to the same regulations.

If you want to tighten things up in the fishing industry, for every category of fisher and every type of fishery, you will need to put a system in place to regulate everyone the same way. That is what we are talking about.

Á (1130)

[English]

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Bob Wood: Also, in going over your paper I noted in recommendation 5.3 what was an interesting line to me. It says “Evaluation of the state of stocks in the Gulf of St. Lawrence should be assigned to an independent group trusted by the industry”. Who does the industry trust to do something like this, an independent survey?

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: The resource managers in Ottawa, Moncton and Quebec City went to the same universities. To get these jobs, they went to university. There are still universities today. So there are people in the universities who are taking the same courses as these people. There are companies. For example, there are people working on krill at the University of Sherbrooke. I do not know them, but I have heard about them. These people are able to assess stock the same way that people assess the number of wild animals. It is the same thing. I do not have any particular person in mind, but all I am saying is that we need to look at the situation differently because it has changed, whereas their approach to stock assessment has not.

Take the sentinel fishery. We were told at one point that there would be a sentinel fishery, and the protocol was produced on a computer. Fishers were told where to fish. There are all sort of things, I would give you an example. Even people with more experience than me had never fished cod in the gulf in 300 fathoms of water. As I was telling you earlier, if I went into the field behind my house to look for strawberries in January, I would not find any. In July or August, though, there might be some.

The department is going to have to change the way it sees things and does things, because the migration pattern has changed completely. It is ridiculous.

There is something else. As long as we are talking about this, one of the measures proposed by the department to offset the moratorium is seal exclusion zones. Mr. Samuel talked about that this morning. I will make a very simple comparison. I find the idea of setting up seal exclusion zones ridiculous. It is like sitting on an ant's nest, getting bit and then trying to figure out which ant did it. It is as stupid as that. It makes no sense.

[English]

Mr. Bob Wood: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Mr. Elley.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you very much, Mr. Cotton. You're a very passionate and good spokesman for your profession.

When I meet with fishermen in my riding on the west coast, I often hear from them that they believe the federal government in general, and DFO in particular, view the fishing industry as a sunset industry, that somehow eventually it will just fade away. I wonder if that feeling is on the east coast also among you. And if this is the case, I'm wondering if your recommendations for further buybacks and then some kind of assistance of rationalization of processing plants for groundfish if necessary doesn't just fall into their plans.

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: I spoke earlier about the first rounds of licence buy-backs. If we have to deal with another moratorium today, with the same number of people engaging in predatory practices and the same number of people actively fishing, I do not think we will be any further ahead 5 or 10 years after the other moratorium.

For this reason, as a groundfish fisher, I can assure you that transferring the problem from the cod fishery to the crab fishery or the shrimp fishery is no solution.

Let me explain what I mean. As fishers—and there are other fishers here today—this spring, we need some sort of compensation. We can say that for this year, that is the equivalent of a Band-Aid solution. We need a bandage, because it is simply too late. However, in the longer term, we should not be transferring the problem we experienced in the cod fishery to the other fleets.

Personally, I can foresee what will happen. I think there are too many crab, shrimp and cod fishers. The federal government issued all these licences and opened its door to a large number of people, but at some point, it will have no choice but to rationalize all the fleets. That is inevitable.

We need only think about what happened in a number of countries that fish in the North Sea to realize that we must avoid a similar situation here. We do not have many industries, and we cannot change industries overnight: the fishery is all we have. As Mr. Gagné was saying this morning, the problem facing both the processors and the fishers in Quebec, is that they are specialized in one species only. I and others like me, the people I represent, fish only species. I have a licence for cod and nothing else. So when there are not many cod, we have major problems; everyone knows that.

If the cod fishery problem is transferred to the crab or shrimp fishery over the years, people specialized in these species will have to deal with the same problems we are facing in the cod fishery at the moment.

For this reason, I think it is inevitable that at some point, the department will have to do its homework. It has a surplus. What we are asking for will not cost billions of dollars. We are not talking about the kind of sum that was spent on the Marshall plan—we are far from that. What we want is to reduce the number of fishers in our fleets by 75 to 80 per cent. The fishers are ready to leave; some are about to retire, others have no one to take over for them and still others are simply fed up with the situation.

These people are ready to retire, provided they can do so with their head held high, with a minimum of dignity. Whether we like it or not, even if there has already been one moratorium, a second one has been announced. The people I represent and myself have played a role in the economy of Canada and Quebec. We have created many jobs: for our crews and for plant workers. For this reason, we should be treated with some decency and the department must realize that the problem has to be solved, otherwise, we will just go from one moratorium to the next.

In 1993, I was one of those who maintained loud and clear that a moratorium under these conditions would be ineffective. Now it is 2003, and another moratorium has just been announced. If I am still alive in 10 years time, I will be able to tell you that this moratorium was ineffective as well, because people are not doing the right things at this time.

The reason the cod stocks are not increasing is that the cod are being eaten. It is not complicated; everyone agrees on this. In the Gulf this year, seals will eat another 40,000 metric tonnes of cod, when all we were asking for was 6,000 tonnes. Investing $6 million to try to understand the relationship between seals and cod is something we do not need—we are well aware that seals eat cod.

There are so many seals that last year they were even found in the Matapédia River, 100 miles into the woods. They didn't get there by hitchhiking. There is a reason they were there: there is an overflow of seals.

Á (1135)

[English]

The Chair: Thank you.

Monsieur Roy.

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I will not be asking any questions; I will simply make a comment, because for me, the translation was direct; I understood everything. It worked very well.

Á (1140)

Mr. Réginald Cotton: Even though it was fast.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Even though it was fast.

Thank you very much. Clearly, you are in a situation that is both quite unique and difficult.

I have seen the number of licences issued for each species and each province and region. Our researcher provided us with this document, among others. I noticed that in the year 2000, the number of groundfish licences issued by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for Quebec was 979. The number issued for the Atlantic region was 10,783.

Of course, that number includes the sport fishery licences and others—these are not just licences for vessels—but the fact remains that your message is that the fishing fleets absolutely must be reduced in size. We must ensure that people who can retire may do so with some dignity. They must be able to go home and cut back on the pressure.

Your other message is that, during the first moratorium, to all intents and purposes the licences of people who were not going to be fishing were bought back. That is what you said, is it not? I did understand you correctly.

I would like to thank you for your presentation. Even though it was fast, it was very lively and interesting. Thank you.

[Applause]

The Chair: There is another person on the list. You have the floor, Mr. Stoffer.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Cotton. This isn't the first time you've appeared before this committee. I remember seeing you before, and you were just as passionate then as you are now.

You said something that Mr. Wood picked up on, and to me it's a very disturbing sign of what's going on in the fishing industry of Canada when fishermen themselves are starting to seriously distrust DFO's science branch. We know they don't have much of a science branch because of the cuts in the resources, but when fishermen themselves start putting less and less faith in the science aspect of their decisions, to me that's a very worrisome sign. It's okay to not like the minister and his department, but to go after scientists as well and their information I think sets a dangerous tone. So I'd like your comments on that.

Also, sir, you had talked about, in one of your recommendations, protecting your resource using fishing gear that is selective, ecologically sound, and respectful of the resource. Are you saying then that we should be eliminating the gill nets, the seiners, the midshore, and go back to a hook-and-line fishery in the old traditional ways in order to protect the resource, or are you advocating that at all?

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: That is not up to me to decide. I am a mid-shore fisher and I use mobile gear. I don't think any fisher would like to see the end of gillnetting or fishing using mobile gear. I do not think that any fisher would say that. What we are talking about here is not the gear or the tool that is used. It is the person who works with the gear. It is the way of working.

When you use mobile gear, obviously if you fish with a codend that does not meet specifications, you are in the wrong. If we leave gillnets in place for weeks, we are in the wrong. It always depends on the way in which the gear is used, and not the gear itself, in my opinion.

It is unfortunate, as I was saying earlier, that the department does not introduce other measures when it cuts programs. We think that if the department cuts a program for the sentinel fishery, for example, it should do research on the sentinel fishery. I think the department should take advantage of the current situation, with the moratorium, to try to find other approaches, other ways of fishing and it should be investing to try out some new techniques.

I mention this for a specific reason. I went to Europe last fall. Let me give you an example of what I saw for myself. The Europeans have developed a sort of grid for fishing cod that lets all the young juvenile cod through. They take absolutely no young cod. It works very well. All the countries that fish in the North Sea are trying to get this technology.

Let me tell you about my personal experience. I am fighting with the department. We spoke yesterday in a conference call. There will be no money available to establish such a system here in the next few years. That's why I say that nothing has been learned.

We have just completed one moratorium and now there is going to be another. However, nothing is done. If the department does not do its homework as regards research, it should at least help those fishers that are prepared to do this work themselves. It should be given them a little quota, if it does not have any money to allow them to carry out such experiments and to prove to people that when the fisheries reopen, we will have another tool that will save the juvenile fish and ensure the sustainability of the stocks.

About 10 years ago, the department spent millions of dollars. I took part in an experiment that was carried out in Newfoundland and throughout the Atlantic region on selectivity. It produced nothing. Despite all the tools available, this produced nothing. So the department abandoned the effort.

The technology I mentioned was produced by the Danes. They developed this technology which is comparable to the Nordmore grid, which is used in the shrimp fishery. I think that if the Nordmore grid did not exist, the shrimp stocks would be depleted. There would no longer be a shrimp fishery, because shrimp is a species that is found with cod and turbot. Consequently, the shrimp fishers are in no way harming the cod and turbot stocks. If we could find a device that would work that well, that would mean that all fishers using mobile gear would leave the young cod in the water when they go off shore, we should make this our priority. In this way, people could at least try out the system and when the fishery reopened, we could at least say that we learned something during the moratorium.

Á (1145)

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: I have one last question, Mr. Chairman.

It was Mr. Elley's point of view, and I would tend to agree with him.... One of the fears I have is that a lot of people have bought into the argument that there are two many fishermen and not enough fish.

What happens with the buyback program is you eliminate those pesky independent fishermen and their families and then you turn the resource over to the large corporate sectors. I firmly believe that is what's happening, and I'm concerned that some fishermen may reluctantly get into the buyback program because they know there may not be a future, they see no other way out, but in the end the government gets what it wants, which is to turn over a common property, a public resource, into the hands of a few. Would you agree with that statement, or would you disagree?

[Translation]

Mr. Réginald Cotton: There may be a danger here. I am quite sure that it will not work that way in Newfoundland. I know the Newfoundlanders well. Cod fishers who are in their 30s or 40s and have someone to take over for them are not interested in leaving.

In the case of Quebec, our task force will be recommending further buy-backs, even though Minister Thibault told us that the last round of buy-backs had taken place and that there would not be any others. We know, as do all the other stakeholders who came here, that we cannot get through the ordeal of the moratorium without that.

I do have someone to take over for me, and do not want to give up. However, I am prepared to work for the people who do want to leave. Not everyone will want to leave, because there has always been a cod fishery and there will always be cod in Newfoundland, in the Gaspé region and in the rest of the Maritimes. There will always be cod and cod fishers. Many people agree with me and are convinced that something can be done to retain this resource, provided the government listens to the main stakeholders—namely, the fishers.

As a fisher, I would have a hard time catching the last cod in the Gulf. I don't think there is a single fisher in Newfoundland, the Gaspé or anywhere else that wants to catch the last cod in the Gulf. That is not what we want.

We want the department to listen to us. That is what is missing: they are not listening to us. Discussions are fashionable these days, and the department is constantly organizing one consultation process after another.

We do not even want to take part in these consultations anymore, because we know there is no point. Everything is decided ahead of time. These people have their own approach and they impose it on us. As long as there is no radical change in this regard, we will have one moratorium after the other.

There will be other moratoriums that will get us nowhere. In my opinion, we did not learn from the first moratorium, and now a second is being imposed on us.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Cotton, for your passionate evidence. We appreciate the time you've taken.

We now have Hercule Ruel, secrétaire, Les morutiers traditionnels de la Gaspésie.

[Translation]

Please keep your presentation to 10 minutes.

Mr. Hercule Ruel (Secretary, “Les morutiers traditionnels de la Gaspésie”): My presentation is not long, and in any case, Mr. Cotton described the situation very well. However, there is something I would like to tell you.

If we were to try to sum up in one word what is happening to us, the fixed-gear groundfish-dependent fishers, that word would be “catastrophe”. The imposition of another cod moratorium has demonstrated that the federal government did not take the steps required to rebuild the cod stocks.

None of the advice provided by fishers since the last moratorium has been listened to. Seals are the reason the stocks are not recovering. The seal herds have tripled since the 1970s—going from 1.8 million in 1970 to 5.2 million in 2002. And these figures are just for the harp seal. The grey seals increased from 15,000 in 1970 to 65,000 in 2002. They eat approximately 39,000 tonnes of cod a year, which is much larger than the amount of cod we fish. And this is not hearsay, these figures were provided by scientists. This figure is six times higher than the amount cod fishers were allowed to catch in 2002.

The department does not realize that this mammal, all by itself, is destroying the groundfish stocks, and, at the same time, the entire related industry.

There must be a round of groundfish licence buy-backs, because there are far too many groundfish licences compared to what the resource can provide. As Mr. Cotton was saying, there are too many fishers. There are more now than there were at the time of the first moratorium. It makes no sense. In Quebec alone, 850 fishers hold groundfish licences, not to mention all those in the other provinces. This is far too many. Groundfish fishers must be treated with dignity and respect. A lump sum must be provided to fishers who wish to withdraw from the fishery, either to retire or to help them get established in a different field.

The government has changed the data. In addition, it has added more fishers. Every year, new fishers are getting licences to fish cod. These licences are reactivated for two years. For two years of fishing and $10,000 worth of fish a year, people can be recognized as fishers and operate as such. This makes no sense. This decision was made by the government, not by the fishers.

There are also some dummy names used in all this. Some crab and shrimp fishers are buying up licences left and right and registering them in other people's names, because there have been crab quotas available for a few years. They do that to get access to these quotas. It is completely ridiculous.

Á (1150)

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Elley.

Mr. Reed Elley: Thank you, Mr. Ruel.

I want to talk with you a bit more about the buyback program. During the first moratorium they bought back many licences. Now we have another moratorium. Why in the world, between the first moratorium and the second moratorium, did the government allow more licences to be bought? What's the answer to that?

Á (1155)

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: You would have to ask the government that, but we do know that it is because the government changed the data. At the end of the moratorium in 1999, there was a partial reopening, but at that time, the data were changed.

As I was saying earlier, there were licences that had been hanging around, that had not been active for years and that were added to the core fishers' herring licences. After fishing fish for two summers with a minimum value of $10,000, someone could be recognized as a fisher, as a cod fisher.

[English]

Mr. Reed Elley: No, no.

Has the Marshall decision and the introduction of more native fishermen to the fisheries been part of the increase in licences?

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: I do not think that is what caused the increase. When the cod fishery opened, there were shrimp quotas in 1999 and 2000. Subsequently, temporary quotas were added to help out the fishers. In order to get this assistance, some fishers bought licences to reactivate them in order to get the temporary crab allocations.

As I mentioned, these people included crab, shrimp and lobster fishers. These people already had a resource for their livelihood, and they were buying other licences and putting them in other fishers' names, because they were not allowed to have two licences. So they used dummy names. When the crab and shrimp allocations come out, they are entitled to allocations on the boats.

That is why the number of fishers has increased so much. It is incredible that we have had two rounds of licence buy-backs during the moratorium. Today, the number of fishers is higher than it was before the moratorium.

[English]

Mr. Reed Elley: It doesn't make sense.

The Chair: Monsieur Roy.

[Translation]

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I will continue along the same lines as Mr. Elley. From what you say, if there was another round of licence buy-backs, the problem would not be solved. What actually happens is that the licences will be transferred to lobster and crab fishers. If ever the groundfish, including cod, were to recover, the licences would simply be transferred to the lobster, crab and shrimp fishers.

Mr. Hercule Ruel: The government would have to buy back the licences, because there are too many of them, but there would have to be a ban on the further sale of cod licences. At the moment, everyone is buying cod fishing licences and the situation is worse than before.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Does that happen only with cod? Does it also happen with other groundfish species?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: Yes.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: It happens with other species as well?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: Yes, but particularly with cod.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Why is that?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: As I was saying, it is because people wanted to have the temporary shrimp and crab allocations that were given out every year.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: The department is actually encouraging this process this year, by granting small quotas to crab fishers that are having trouble.

Mr. Hercule Ruel: I discussed this with some officials from Fisheries and Oceans, who are trying to find a way of offsetting that. But it is not easy. The people who have these licences are people who have sea time available.

Â (1200)

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: I'm going to ask you a very personal question, Mr. Ruel. What sector are you from?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: From Grande-Rivière.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: I see. What is the average age of fishers in your region?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: In our group, the average age is 40 or 45, I think.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: How many of them would retire tomorrow if there were a licence buy-back?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: We do not know that, because we have not gotten that far. But we do know that some fishers are very fed up, as Mr. Cotton said, and would retire if their licences were bought back.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: I do not want to ask your age, but what would you do if you were offered that?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: I am 65 years old.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Would you retire?

Mr. Hercule Ruel: My licences are in my son's name; they are not in my name.

Mr. Jean-Yves Roy: Thank you, Mr. Ruel.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Roy.

Mr. Stoffer.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Sir, you had talked about seals, and we've heard some debate in our meetings regarding a seal cull to eliminate two million, three million, maybe four million seals, simply to eliminate them. Other people have exercised caution on that, because if we culled the seals and did a mass slaughter of them, worldwide opinion would be very negative against Canada, and of course communities like Gaspé, for example, and tourism and other industries would be hurt by that. What would your suggestion be?

We recommended that the government actively pursue markets worldwide for seal products in the various seals that we have. Other people are saying we need seal exclusion zones, although they don't really define how a seal exclusion zone would work. How do we create one? I think it would be very challenging to do that. Others are saying we should have an outright cull, eliminate as many of them as you can. What would you suggest, sir? If you were the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, how would you personally deal with the seal problem?

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: First of all, there would have to be a market for seals, because we cannot kill them and leave them to die there. That would make no sense. But, a market would have to be established, and seals killed. Are we protecting seals or citizens?

So that means we have to make some choices. We are not talking about killing seals in a barbarian manner. We want there to be a seal hunt, but we want the seals to be used for research and markets found. Something can be done. There are so many people who are dying of hunger in Africa and in under-developed countries that surely something could be done with seals.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Monsieur, nobody on this committee is saying protect the seals. I don't think anybody is saying we should protect these cute little animals. What we're saying is we supported the minister's decision to increase the harvest on the seals in Atlantic Canada. We supported that. Other people are saying we should have increased it even more. Other people are saying just kill them, get them out of my face, as many as you can get rid of the better. You're saying that we should develop markets.

Nobody on this committee is saying we should protect the seals, but we can't have a wholesale slaughter of a predator species like that, because the ramifications worldwide would be quite severe for Canada. Again I ask, what is the best way to increase the seal herd in terms of marketability worldwide for those products? How can we reduce the size?

The Chair: Mr. Stoffer, in all fairness, I think the witness answered the question by saying we have to develop markets, that there are people starving around the world who could use that protein.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Yes. I'm just reconfirming that.

The Chair: I think that question has been answered.

Mr. Peter Stoffer: I was only reconfirming that statement.

The Chair: Do you have any other questions?

I think you answered the question--

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: We do not want to kill seals in a barbaric way. We do not want to go off shore, and start shooting seals and leaving them there. We want markets for seals. We are not scientists, but we know that there is a way to find markets for seals to reduce the size of the herd, but no eliminate it all together. We do not want to eliminate any species. We do not want to eliminate seals, but we do want to reduce the number of seals so that the cod stocks can recover and fishers can earn a living. That is what we are asking for.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: My final question, sir.

The minister indicated he would like to see seal exclusion zones. If you were advising the minister on that, what would you say to him? How do you create a seal exclusion zone?

Â (1205)

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: I'm wondering what we will do in these seal exclusion zones. We cannot draw a line and tell the seals that they cannot cross it. What is meant by a seal exclusion zone? We cannot stop the seals from moving from place to place. Some come up right to the wharf in Grande-Rivière. No one wants them there, but they go there any way. We cannot stop them. We cannot put up a sign and tell them that they are not allowed to go to this area.

[English]

Mr. Peter Stoffer: Mr. Chairman, there isn't one fisherman we have ever spoken to who said this is how you create one, because they don't know. They don't understand the definition of a seal exclusion zone, yet the department and the minister seem fixated on this idea of seal exclusion zones. Yet when you ask them how to create one, you get a blank wall. That's very frustrating.

The Chair: Mr. Stoffer, realistically, the only way you could do that, I think, would be to have them in enclosed areas like fjords, where there would be some way of blocking off the entrance. But even that's not reasonable, I think, in most circumstances. In the open ocean, there's no way.

Have you any other questions, Mr. Stoffer?

Mr. Peter Stoffer: No, I'm fine.

The Chair: Mr. Hearn.

Mr. Loyola Hearn: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you again, Mr. Ruel.

To follow up on the seal issue, I asked the minister how he would create such zones, and of course his answer--and many of you have heard it, I'm sure--was “I will ask them to leave”. I hope he is that powerful.

The department has set aside $6 million to study seals, two more years to study. If that $6 million were used to develop markets--

An hon. member: Hear, hear!

Mr. Loyola Hearn: Seal leather is an exceptionally good product. I've seen chairs, seal coats, you name it. It is very strong, very durable, very, very good.

We have a world where many people go hungry. Seal meat is very high in protein. You buy dog food at the store; it's over a dollar a can right now. Certainly there have to be markets. Why don't we try to develop the markets?

Secondly, you talked about some people having more than one licence, other people's names, manipulating the process. Isn't it about time we got back to the fact that if you want to fish, you have a licence, you have a boat, you fish in your boat and you catch your fish? You're not owned by some big company. You're not getting, as we used to say, “a shareholder's salary”. You are the owner; you are the operator. You catch the fish, you get the benefits. The benefits go to the fishermen, not to somebody else who takes the profits outside, like the salmon fishery.

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: The Department of Fisheries and Oceans should also establish some very strict criteria regarding transferring fishing licences from one person to another. We would have to prevent such situations from happening again and make sure that people with money can no longer get licences in this way. After two moratoriums, we find ourselves with too many fishers; it is incredible. Every time I meet with representatives from Fisheries and Oceans, I speak to them about this. It bothers them, but what can you do, it is the truth.

We are facing the same problem. As Mr. Cotton was saying earlier, we have already lived through one moratorium, we will be seeing another and there will be more in the future, if things go on in this way.

The first moratorium did no good. There were two rounds of licence buy-backs, which did not reduce the number of fishers; in fact the opposite happened, the number increased. Here we are today facing another moratorium; will there be another in 10 years? Things will be no better then?

The scientists said that even this year, there would be no fishery. The cod stocks will continue to decline. We were fishing a minimum of 6,000 tonnes. Will we leave the fish for the seals to eat—they eat 39,000 tonnes of it—while we are forced to stop fishing? It is not logical. It makes no sense at all.

Â (1210)

[English]

Mr. Loyola Hearn: I have a little comment. When fishermen in Newfoundland talk about seals, they use the same language as you do, but different contexts. The words are similar, but they're not necessarily speaking French.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

The Chair: I was listening very carefully, to figure out where you'd go.

[Translation]

Mr. Hercule Ruel: I understand what you are saying, but in French the word “phoque” does not mean what it means in English.

[English]

The Chair: Mr. Wood, do you have any questions? None. Okay.

Merci beaucoup, Monsieur Ruel.

I'd like to thank our witnesses this morning.

We will adjourn now and return at 1:15, approximately. Thank you.

The meeting is adjourned.