1
SPORTFISHING
DEFENCE
ALLIANCE
P.O. Box 2477
CHILLIWACK, BC. V2R 1A8
Ph. (250) 378-4489
February 18, 2006
Honourable Loyola Hearn, Minister
Fisheries and Oceans Canada
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0E6
Dear Mr. Minister
The February 16th article in the Vancouver Sun by Scott Simpson detailing another 2 million missing Sockeye in 2005 quotes both yourself and Prime Minister Harper as committing to a judicial inquiry into the operations of Pacific Region of Fisheries and Oceans Canada.
Minister it is our considered opinion that such a move would be counter productive and a foolish disposition of public funds. We say this for a number of reasons.
The first being that the expenditure of $5 or $10 million of public money on looking into a system that has been looked into to death makes no sense in the face of current plans to eliminate 34 Fishery Officers and 47 Habitat staff from this Region and continue cuts to the Salmonid Enhancement Programme.
The second reason being, this past spring a very knowledgeable and experienced body of representatives from every sector of the fishery in B.C. made 47 specific recommendations for improving operations in the Pacific Region. These recommendations were put forward following a very in-depth series of hearings and inquiries, with evidence taken under oath, in all the major centers in Southern B.C. This group, again, all representatives from the various fishing sectors, chosen by those sectors to participate in this Review, made specific recommendations for improvement. Those recommendations mirrored many of the recommendations made by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, a committee of which you were an active member. Almost none of these recommendations have been put into place. Prior to these recommendations there were those from at least three other Inquires and Reviews, virtually none of those recommendations have been put into place in any effective manner.
Our members would respectively suggest that a rational move would be to implement the recommendations currently on the books. Once this has been done, and done on a real basis and not a one time shot as has been the practice up until now, then a proper assessment could be made.
If you are bound and determined to have a Judicial Inquiry, then we strongly suggest you direct it towards the bloated bureaucracy that sits just outside your door, DFO Ottawa. This Ottawa group eats up a major portion of the total Fisheries and Oceans Budget and produces not one fish or fishery. We would also ask you to make one of the specifics of the inquiry, if you are so set on having it, to look into the rationale and decision process that came up with the current policy of no longer protecting the critical habitat our fish depend upon. We refer here to the totally irrational “Environmental Process Modernization Plan” under the Habitat section of the “Wild Salmon Policy”. We would point out that in past 30 years there have been at least 5 inquiries, reviews and Royal Commissions relating to the Pacific Region of Fisheries, but not one review of the Ottawa operation. It is a task long past due.
For the PacificCoast however Mr. Minister we strongly recommend that you move immediately to cancel the current planned programme and staff cuts for the Pacific Region and put fully in place the recommendations of both the Williams Review and those of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.
Failure to take this action will doom our west coast fisheries to the level of those of a third world country.
Yours in conservation.
Bill Otway, President
Sportfishing Defence Alliance
P.O. Box 326 Merritt, B.C.
V1K 1B8
Phone 250 378-4489
Cell – 250 315-3583
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