Hon. Mary Coyle: Honourable senators, yesterday on the eve of World Oceans Day, I jumped out of bed at 4 a.m. so I could be out at the Arisaig Wharf to go lobster fishing with my good friends Megan and Shaun MacInnis and Shaun’s Uncle Bernard on the Carrie Anne.

Nova Scotia is known as “Canada’s Ocean Playground,” and the moniker is an appropriate one. Have you driven or cycled Cape Breton Island’s — Unama’ki’s — scenic Cabot Trail, gone swimming in the balmy St. George’s Bay waters at Pomquet Beach, enjoyed the Stan Rogers Folk Festival enveloped in mist rolling in off the Canso coast, visited the lighthouse at Peggy’s Cove, explored the Joggins fossil cliffs, surfed the waves at Lawrencetown, toured the Bluenose II in Lunenburg, gone whale watching from Brier Island or hiked Cape Split to see the highest tides in the world roiling below in the Bay of Fundy? Nova Scotia is the perfect place to celebrate World Oceans Day.

Honourable senators, the North Atlantic is rich in so many ways. It is the most intense carbon sink on the planet, and for many Nova Scotians, it is their workplace.

Colleagues, lobster is Canada’s most valuable fishery. Last year, the value of Canada’s lobster exports exceeded $3.2 billion — the best year ever. In Nova Scotia, there are thousands employed in the industry and many more dependent on the income.

Yesterday morning, I had the honour of experiencing firsthand the daily rhythm of the lobster fishery. As I turned off Highway 245 at St. Margaret of Scotland Church and headed down to join the MacInnises on the Carrie Anne, the sun was rising behind the Arisaig lighthouse in the direction of Malignant Cove. The wharf was bustling with action as people prepared their boats with bins to store fresh lobster and fish bait to replenish the traps.

Like a well-conducted orchestra, the fleet motored out to harvest the lobsters from their traps and bait and drop them again for the next day. Our crew worked steadily and with great attention to safety and conservation. When we returned to shore, Bo and Indy, two of Megan and Shaun’s four little boys, were there to greet the boat just as Shaun had done at that age with his late father Stevie MacInnis, a well-respected local lobster and tuna fisherman.

Honourable senators, on this World Oceans Day 2022, let’s celebrate these fishers — the MacInnis family and others — and let’s recognize the ocean as a generous provider of life, food and livelihood and as an important sustainer of families, traditions, communities, our economy and our planet.

Happy World Oceans Day, colleagues. Thank you. Welalioq.