- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- South Shore—St. Margarets
- Nova Scotia
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $136,927.65
- Government Page
- May/27/24 9:50:00 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the speech by my colleague from Nanaimo—Ladysmith, with whom I serve on the fisheries committee. I know that she has a deep understanding of the region, since she was born in Newfoundland and raised in Newfoundland.
I would like to ask her if she is aware of the projects that are going through the IAA process in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia right now, and the fact that most have taken more than seven years and still have no end in sight, and how she thinks applying that process to offshore wind is going to get any offshore wind built in any timely manner in the next decade or two in Atlantic Canada.
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- Feb/13/24 3:17:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today the Minister of Fisheries threw 300 elver harvesters out of work. I am sure you will find unanimous consent in the House to condemn the government for that.
Some hon. members: No.
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- Dec/8/23 8:52:25 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, lobster fishermen in my riding are asking to axe the tax, and as a result, they want a recorded division.
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- Dec/1/23 11:05:54 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, last weekend I had the honour to take part in a tradition that goes back through generations of Nova Scotians. Steaming out of New Harbour, I joined my good friend Vincent Boutilier on board his vessel for the setting of his lobster traps for this season about 15 miles offshore.
All along the southern and western shores of Nova Scotia, the men and women of the lobster fishery set out to sea, in the face of winter weather, to fish their traps for the best quality lobster in the world, in LFA 33 and LFA 34, until the end of May. The dangers involved in the lobster fishery in winter are well known, and the lobstermen accept these challenges to catch food and support their families and communities. However, now they must deal with the challenges to their livelihoods brought on by the Liberal government, with its unwillingness to enforce the law and stop the illegal poaching harming the sustainability of this fishery.
To lobster harvesters in LFA 33 and LFA 34, I hope for fair seas and bountiful catches this winter season.
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- Oct/6/23 12:47:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, that is a little ironic coming from that member, who has voted 24 times to increase the cost of everything for all of his constituents.
On the issue of storms, we have had multiple storms every decade since the 1700s. He should look up the history. Yes, I had fires, man-made fires, that were started in my riding that were not started by climate change. They were started by individuals.
Perhaps he would like to explain to me why he disagrees with his colleague from Avalon and with the commitment from the minister of fisheries through the member that said she should correct the problem to make sure it is right. Will he stand up and agree with the Minister of Finance and the member for Avalon that the carbon tax needs to be fixed as it is hurting people in Atlantic Canada?
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- Jun/5/23 11:55:13 p.m.
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Madam Chair, what the hon. member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue's community and that of the member for Manicouagan are going through right now is very similar to mine.
One of the experiences I had, and it was not a good time but a very difficult time in the community of Shelburne, was that, when the lobster season was ending, I asked the government if it would extend the lobster season to get the traps out of the waters because the lobster fishermen were most of the volunteer firefighters, and they were also evacuated from their homes, so they could not get to their boats and could not get on the water. The government accommodated that and continues to accommodate that.
I was behind the lines with the volunteer firefighters. Most of our firefighters in rural Canada are volunteers. They are putting in 18-hour days around the clock to try to deal with this, and for the rest of the day, they are sleeping at the fire station where they are.
I am wondering if the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue could share with us any of what he is hearing about the role of the volunteer firefighters in his community and that of Manicouagan and other communities in Quebec.
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- Apr/21/23 11:06:42 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, elver licence-holders wrote DFO in January, stating, “Over the last 4 years we have heard every excuse in the book why C&P can’t enforce, including Covid-19, staff shortages, safety concerns, and the ever popular 'we’re working behind the scenes'. We see zero change in the enforcement strategy.”
These Liberals ignored the pleas of legal licence-holders for years about poaching. Now, of the few DFO arrests of the thousands of poachers on the rivers this year, all have been released by DFO without processing because DFO enforcement staff are on strike, leaving no enforcement of any fishery in Canada.
Hardware stores and Canadian Tire stores in my riding are telling me that the last few days they have sold out of nets, buckets and bubblers, which are all needed to poach elvers.
The Liberals bragged about increasing patrols. Observing is not arresting. Now DFO is not even observing. I know the Liberals failed math, so let me help. Zero multiplied by any number is still zero. Lawlessness is on our rivers. Legal harvesters are paying the price. The Liberals are as effective as washed-out bait.
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Mr. Speaker, I enjoy sitting on the fisheries committee with the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith, as well as her thoughtful interventions during the fisheries committee work we do together.
From our perspective, what we do is respect provincial responsibility first of all. Open net-pen farms or aquaculture in Atlantic Canada is a provincial responsibility in licensing. In British Columbia, it is a federal responsibility. The government has lost several cases in the B.C. courts over its handling of it. It committed to consulting with the industry, which it did not do. The fisheries minister previous to this one, whom I happen to have defeated, also promised, when she made the decision to remove the Discovery Islands fisheries, that there would be transition programs for the industry and the employees, and now the current government, of course, is silent on those promises.
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- Apr/17/23 3:06:01 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, elver poachers are still fishing on the rivers in Nova Scotia, even though the minister shut the fishery down on the weekend. DFO enforcement, for two years, has been told not to arrest, just to observe. Shockingly, the government was surprised that thousands of poachers showed up instead. It is beyond ridiculous that the minister shut down the fishery because the poachers caught the quota, not the licence-holders, while DFO stood by and did not enforce the law.
Why are the Liberals supporting criminals continuing to fish elvers while stopping legal harvesters?
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- Feb/17/23 11:09:16 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, while we were all enjoying Boxing Day, the frigid North Atlantic Ocean claimed the life of a 27-year-old lobster fisherman from Nova Scotia.
Christian Atwood was lobstering off Cape Sable Island, setting the last trawl of traps, when he was pulled overboard. He has not been found.
Christian leaves behind his beautiful 16-month-old son, Colson; his loving partner, Kristen; his siblings; and his parents, Carmella and Ralph.
Everyone who knew Christian remembers him as a fun-loving, cheerful guy and a great father. He was the light that shone in every room when he entered. His father, Ralph, told me that he did not want his kids to go fishing because of the danger, but the draw of the ocean gets in one's blood, and fishing was in Christian's soul.
The vast unmarked grave of the ocean is no consolation for those family members who have had people lost at sea. Christian's family is asking us in this place to do better to make our fishermen safer at sea and bring them home.
May Christian rest in peace.
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- Feb/9/23 3:07:35 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, after eight years of the Prime Minister, the Liberals have found a new strategy to kill jobs, and that is to protect mud. The Liberals are proposing to shut down the critical halibut and swordfish fisheries off Browns Bank with a new marine-protected area by the end of next year. More than 95% of the ocean floor that the Liberals are planning to protect is mud. Apparently, a fishing line 12 feet under the surface of the water is a danger to the mud 270 feet below.
Will the Liberal who wants to kill fishing jobs to protect the scarcity of mud—
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Madam Speaker, I really enjoy sitting on the fisheries committee with the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith. She brings a lot of good value to that committee, as does the member for Cape Breton—Canso.
That is an important question because this is below the threshold. The fisheries industry, which is a strategic food industry for Canada, is not, in any of the lists I have heard from the minister, generally listed as an industry that should be protected. Our food industry is below the threshold for review because these acquisitions are smaller companies that are way below the review, whether it is from China or the United States.
We are seeing more and more on the B.C. coast that many of the fisheries licences are owned by Chinese state-owned enterprises, and on the east coast we are seeing the processing side of things and the fish-buying things in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia being acquired by countries from all over the world, but primarily China.
I understand there is nothing in this bill that would stop those types of things coming. I would like to explore this a little more in committee. Perhaps the only thing would be, at this stage, if the minister put fisheries as part of the food strategic investments on his list.
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- Nov/28/22 2:05:57 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, from Halifax, down the south and western shores of Nova Scotia, is Canada's most lucrative fishing region, where the lobster season will open this week. It is dangerous work fishing in the North Atlantic in the winter. This year, fishermen are facing more challenges. If the howling winds, frigid temperatures and unpredictable waves were not bad enough, the Liberal government's taxes are making it more difficult for fishermen to fuel their boats and make a living.
The government's unscientific closures for the bait fishery have made it tougher and more expensive for fishermen to set their traps. The men and women who make a living on the sea feed Canadians and, in southern Nova Scotia, the lobster industry is the main economic driver. Families depend on a thriving lobster season to pay the bills and put food on the table. I hope everyone in the House will join me in wishing all the fishermen in lobster fishing areas 33 and 34 a safe, successful and prosperous lobster season.
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- Nov/1/22 10:33:52 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member went through a litany of Liberal failures, excessive spending and corruption.
In the last three years, as the Canadian government has grown in size, and people have lost their jobs, we have seen examples such the Department of Fisheries and Oceans growing by 4,300 net new jobs in the last three years, 1,000 of which are in finance and HR. I guess they have a lot of HR problems in fisheries.
The only place in this economy that seems to be growing is government jobs. I wonder if the member could comment on that.
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- Oct/5/22 3:08:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Atlantic Canadians need help now, not two years from now.
The Prime Minister's sad, inadequate hurricane relief program would not even cover the cost of rebuilding wharves. If the Prime Minister had a fisheries minister, he would know that the most immediate problem is income lost for lobster fishermen in the Northumberland Strait.
That is because the season is over now and they cannot fish again until the winter fishery. Why is there no immediate emergency income relief support for fishermen in Nova Scotia, P.E.I. and New Brunswick?
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- Sep/27/22 2:36:47 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, since the hurricane, I have been speaking every day with fishermen and fishing organizations about the damage caused by the hurricane and the needs of the industry to recover. As I said, it is clear that we need some new programs to deal with this.
It has been four days since the hurricane, and the minister has yet to call a single fishing organization in Atlantic Canada. How do I know this? It is because I talk to them to every day and she does not.
How will the minister design new programs that respond quickly if she does not talk to the fishing organizations and the people most impacted?
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- Sep/26/22 9:35:16 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, my fellow Nova Scotian, is in a riding that is one of the hardest-hit places in our province. It is devastating. He represents some very important fishing communities around Cape Breton. Obviously, all Nova Scotians are concerned with what is going on in the northern part of our province and Cape Breton in particular.
I want to take this opportunity, because he is the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, to see if he would speak on behalf of the government and make the commitment here that the government will quickly speed up the repairs of wharf infrastructure without bureaucracy, without the application processes we normally have. Will the government get the work done quickly so that our fishermen and people who depend on the fishery can get to work when the seasons open?
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- Sep/26/22 9:20:13 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I know the member for Courtenay—Alberni is passionate about the fishery as well, having served for many years very effectively on the fisheries committee, and he has relatives in Atlantic Canada. That is a great thing about Atlantic Canadians; we are everywhere. We are in Alberta. We are everywhere. We have connections across the country where we have gone to find work.
In terms of the role of the military, we are lucky that we have the military we have to respond to these kinds of crises and to help out. However, the primary reason people join the military, and my nephew is in the navy, is to go on deployment and not just be here in terms of supporting disaster relief. They primarily want to go out and defend democracy and freedom around the world where dictatorships and other people are trampling on human rights, as we are seeing now with Russia in Ukraine, and they are proud of that.
What frustrates them is that we do not make the investments in the military to provide them the equipment. It is a bit of a “chicken and egg”. Why would someone join the air force in Canada to fly fighter jets when we cannot seem to make decisions to actually buy any, and the ones we are flying now were purchased by Pierre Trudeau when some members of this House were not even alive?
The focus on investment in the operational needs internationally is the primary role for which somebody joins the military. If we are operationally ready and we have the resources here to help out in disasters, then that is an added bonus. Right now most people would be attracted to go into the military if we were properly equipping it.
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- Sep/26/22 9:17:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think there are some strong methods already. I know that, on the point where I live on the ocean, half of the homeowners have used this technology and it has worked. The other half of the homeowners, on the other side, have not used it and the shoreline is eroding.
Regarding the harbours themselves, where the commercial operations take place, we need to have much more investment in those harbours. We already have probably in the neighbourhood of $3 billion to $4 billion required to bring the wharves up to standard across Canada. That does not include making the breakwalls and everything else that needs to be done in order to make them a little higher because the seas are a little higher, the storms are a little stronger and the boats are a little bigger. All of those things are contributing to the exposure of those fishing communities to the storms that we are receiving.
I would agree with anything we can do to figure out erosion, but Mother Nature is Mother Nature and it is pretty hard to win a battle against the ocean with artificial means. The ocean will take things away, unfortunately, so planning where one puts one's house and how one builds those breakwalls is very important.
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- Sep/26/22 2:46:02 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, good wishes are not enough. If this happened on the Trans-Canada Highway, reconstruction would be happening now. There are only a few weeks left until winter sets in. We cannot wait weeks for assessments, months for design and permitting, months for tendering and months for construction. DFO needs to use its enormous power now to begin rebuilding now.
When will DFO do its job, support commercial fishermen and get to work?
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