FISH Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON FISHERIES AND OCEANS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES PÊCHES ET DES OCÉANS

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, December 4, 1997

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[English]

The Chairman (Mr. George Baker (Gander—Grand Falls, Lib.): Order.

Our order of reference, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), is a review of the role of sciences in fisheries management.

Our witnesses today are Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings, Professor of Fish Biology, Dalhousie University, and Dr. Carl J. Walters, Professor of Fisheries and Zoology, University of British Columbia. He's videoteleconferencing from Vancouver. We also have Dr. Dick Haedrich, Professor of Biology at Memorial University.

Committee members from all political parties are present here. We have the Reform Party, the Bloc Québécois, the PCs, the New Democratic Party of Canada, and also the Liberal Party of Canada.

We have received advance information concerning the subject we're going to be talking about today. Each committee member has read a rather interesting exchange between the three witnesses we have today and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

The way we'll run today's meeting is that for opening statements we'll have, first of all, Dr. Hutchings; then we'll go to Dr. Walters by videoconference; and then we'll go to Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings (Professor of Fish Biology, Dalhousie University): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

In recent years it has become evident for many species that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has failed to meet its primary objectives of fish conservation and sustainability of fishing activity. When a government department is unable to meet its legislated responsibilities, it is not only reasonable, it is necessary, that society evaluate the ability of the institution to fulfil its societal obligations.

The scientific paper written by Carl Walters, Dick Haedrich and me represented one such evaluation. To criticize such an evaluation, as senior-level bureaucrats in the department have done, is to criticize the right of citizens in a democracy to examine critically the performance of its governmental institutions. For university professors, beholden to the interests or constraints of no employer or institution, it is indeed incumbent upon us to address questions of concern to society that fall within our areas of expertise.

I wish to preface my remarks by underscoring the fact that I speak of an institution, not of individuals. I am critical of a system, not of individuals within that system. In part, this is because I am fully aware of the existence of many dedicated employees within the department. Indeed, many of its scientists are of national and international stature, and I greatly value my professional collaborations with them.

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The primary question I'd like to address this morning is the following: does the present institutional framework of having science fully integrated within government ensure, number one, the comprehensive treatment of scientific uncertainties, number two, public disclosure of legitimate differences in scientific opinion, and number three, full public airing of legitimate concerns of resource management decisions from a science perspective?

We might also ask a variety of other questions. Among them is, to what extent should ministers and government spokespersons be required to acknowledge and identify sources of uncertainty and potential biological and socio-economic risks associated with resource management decisions?

Uncertainty can be defined as the incompleteness of knowledge about the state or processes of nature. With respect to fisheries stock assessment, there's uncertainty with things such as the basic elements of fish biology, estimates of fish abundance, and the structure of models used to estimate fish mortality.

One element common to all resource management decisions is that they carry risks, where risk is defined as the probability of something undesirable happening.

Applying the concept of risk to the reopening of the cod fishery, for example, we can ask, what is the probability or risk that the stock will decline between this year and next, or what is the risk that the spawning part of the population will fall below a specific conservation target?

When science is fully integrated within government, clearly there's the potential for scientific information to be unduly influenced by non-science factors. There are many reasons for this, but I'd like to focus upon one. Whenever a minister of the crown renders a decision, employees within that minister's department cannot be seen to embarrass the minister. From fisheries scientists, such embarrassment might come in several forms. For example, there could be direct criticism of the decision from a scientific perspective, identifying the biological risks associated with the minister's decision, or specifying the scientific basis, or lack thereof, for the minister's decision.

If a minister makes a decision that is ill-advised from a scientific perspective, that's the minister's right to do so. But if the minister's decision is potentially fraught with significant biological risks, or if the decision is presented as having a scientific basis when in fact it doesn't, I suggest that it's in society's best interests for us to be fully informed of such scientific deficiencies. Yet for a government scientist to publicly disagree or publicly identify scientific risks or scientific deficiencies in the minister's decision is to publicly disagree with and potentially embarrass the minister, and it's simply not allowed.

Why should Canadians be concerned about the potential suppression of scientific uncertainty? Well, science is about understanding nature. Scientists try to make sense of the extraordinary variation in the world around us. Science is about the formulation and testing, and reformulation and retesting, of hypotheses to explain process, pattern, and variation in nature. Importantly, scientists gain knowledge and science is advanced in general by the ability of scientists to communicate with one another through informal discussions, conference presentations, and scientific publications.

To inhibit the communication of science is to inhibit science. To limit a discussion of scientific uncertainty or to downplay its existence is to misrepresent science. Any action, intentional or unintentional, directed or ancillary, that inhibits the means by which scientific information is analysed, publicly communicated, debated, and accepted by scientists will, by necessity, limit the effectiveness with which science can contribute to public policy and constrain the degree to which wise management of natural resources can be taken. When the ability of scientists to communicate science publicly is negatively influenced, that negative influence can justifiably be described as suppression.

How can the role of science and resource management decisions be weakened? I'd like to suggest a number of means by which that can occur through a form of suppression.

Number one, resource management decisions can be presented as having a scientific basis when none exists. One example would be the 1993-1996 arguments that harp seal harvests off Newfoundland will assist the recovery of northern cod.

Number two, resource management decisions can be presented as having scientific validity despite being subjected to none of the criteria that are part of normal scientific evaluation. One example is the two-year timeframe for the 1992 moratorium for northern cod.

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Number three, biological risks associated with resource management decisions may not be communicated or are improperly communicated to society. The reopening of the cod fisheries and the increased turbot quota in 1997 come to mind. Scientific uncertainty and the breadth of legitimate differences in the scientific interpretation of nature might not be identified explicitly or communicated publicly, and this is often the case in statements by government spokespersons.

To elaborate slightly on two final examples, the ability of scientists to communicate their research can be constrained because of the perceived political sensitivity of the results of that research.

Here's one example. In last spring of 1995, Alan Sinclair, Ransom Myers and I undertook research on the mortality of juvenile Atlantic cod. The main impetus of our work was to determine whether the mortality of young cod had changed through the 1980s and early 1990s in association with an increase in seal abundance.

We wished to present our work at an international conference sponsored by the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization and the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea. The symposium was entitled The Role of Marine Mammals in the Ecosystem.

Given the topics to be discussed at the symposium, it was an obvious venue to present the findings of our research and, most importantly, to receive critical feedback from scientific colleagues as to the appropriateness of our methodology and the degree to which our conclusions were justifiable based on the work at hand. However, because of the politically sensitive nature of the work and because our conclusions were at odds with recent statements by the minister and government spokespersons regarding the influence of seals in the collapse and recovery of northern cod, we were not permitted to distribute copies of our work to our fellow scientists.

The effects of this include the intimidation of departmental scientists and an expression of a lack of confidence in their scientific integrity. The department at this symposium was perceived by international scientists to have behaved unprofessionally, and it was indeed an embarrassment to Canadian scientists.

The message to scientists was that if you undertake research that's politically sensitive and if your research draws conclusions that could be interpreted as being contrary to the minister's position, be aware that the communication of the results of your research will depend upon potential political consequences rather than on their scientific merit.

I might also add that it's apparent Minister Tobin was not informed of the existence of our work. This was work that could have proved embarrassing to him.

The last example of how science and resource management decisions can be weakened is when scientific information necessary for informed management decisions is not made available to the bodies that recommend management actions to the minister.

The examples here include the 1992 and 1993 overview presentations on the status of groundfish to the Atlantic Groundfish Advisory Council, or AGAC. On July 2, 1992, the chair of CAFSAC's groundfish subcommittee was to make a presentation to this council. His presentation was an overview of trends in fishing mortality, stock biomass, and exploitation rates for Canada's Atlantic cod stocks. The presentation stressed a commonality in pattern among stocks.

The message that would have been conveyed by this presentation to those responsible for recommending catch quotas to the minister was that all of Canada's cod stocks were characterized by increasing fishing mortality and declining stock size. In other words, all of the cod stocks were potentially in very serious trouble.

However, senior departmental officials decided that the CAFSAC subcommittee chair would not be permitted to make his overview presentation to AGAC. This is indeed substantiated by a comparison of the presentations that were intended to be made and those actually made, as determined from the minutes of the AGAC meeting.

The reason given for the decision may be attributable to the inconsistency between the scientific information contained in the subcommittee chair's presentation and an announcement made June 30 by the deputy minister that the minister was going to be closing the northern cod fishery and that the decline of northern cod was exceptional and unique relative to that of other Canadian cod stocks.

The effects of this intervention are fairly obvious. The body responsible for recommending catch quotas to the minister was not made aware of scientific information clearly relevant to the status of groundfish stocks. Fishing was permitted to continue in all Canadian cod stocks except for northern cod.

I'd like to finish by offering recommendations under two broad headings. These are recommendations to strengthen the role of science in fisheries resource management.

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The first might be the creation of a national standing committee on fisheries resource management. The mandate of this committee would be to report the biological risks associated with fisheries resource management decisions. The committee could be comprised of fisheries scientists, ecologists, and population biologists from the DFO, Canadian universities, and international government laboratories.

Following a request from any interested party, the committee would provide scientific information on the potential risks, if any, posed to fisheries management decisions. Requests for scientific information from the committee, along with the committee's reports, would be communicated to the public by a body that has complete independence from the process by which management decisions are made. Such a body would be the Office of the Auditor General.

A standing committee on fisheries resource management would provide several benefits. The committee would provide a mechanism by which scientists within and without the DFO could communicate the scientific basis of and risks posed by fisheries management decisions. The benefit to society and to the DFO's clients would lie in the general benefits associated with being fully informed, and the minister would receive initial and ongoing political credit by negating the potential for politicization of fisheries science.

The second area in which we could strengthen the role of science is the strengthening of the science itself. Financial cuts to government- and university-based science are seriously compromising Canada's ability to understand the impacts of human activity on aquatic ecosystems. For example, we have little understanding of, and practically no power to predict, the ability of cod stocks to return to former levels of abundance. In DFO science, financial cuts to research and losses of scientific positions cannot help but undermine the quality and breadth of science upon which wise and informed management decisions are based.

Possible recommendations to alleviate this would include the following. First, new funding should be provided to reinstate DFO science subvention grants to fund university-based research that has direct application to fisheries management.

Second, additional funding should be provided to initiate a rejuvenation of DFO science branches by hiring recent university graduates. The Newfoundland region, for example, by my estimation, has lost about 40% of its research scientists in the past five years. None of these individuals have been replaced. The only formally recognized multidisciplinary group at the DFO in the Newfoundland region has been disbanded.

Third, funding should be provided to establish university fisheries institutes that would be comprised of fishers, university- and government-based biologists, economists, and sociologists and graduate students. Such a framework would allow for interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research into all matters pertaining to the fisheries.

Finally, consideration might be given to the suggestion that we decentralize or transfer decision-making, research funding, and personnel from Ottawa headquarters to regional research institutes so that funds could be more efficiently applied to local fishery issues and scientific concerns.

The status quo is defensible only if it can be demonstrated that the benefits to society generated by moneys spent on personnel and physical plant at DFO headquarters in Ottawa outweigh the costs to society associated with the losses of scientists and declines in research funding in the regions.

In closing, I offer these recommendations as points of discussion, and I offer them to the committee for its consideration. In any event, the spirit in which they are presented and the motivation for the paper I co-authored with Carl and Dick stem from the desire to strengthen the role of science in fisheries resource management in Canada.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings, Professor of Fish Biology at Dalhousie University. Dr. Hutchings, we will be going back to you for questions in a moment.

We'll now go by videoteleconferencing to Dr. Carl Walters, Professor of Fisheries and Zoology, University of British Columbia.

Dr. Walters.

Dr. Carl Walters (Professor of Fisheries and Zoology, University of British Columbia): Good morning.

I think I can offer you a perspective that is quite different from Jeff's. I have never worked in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, so I haven't personally felt the problems he has. I've watched my students scream in frustration over the years, students who might have worked in the department.

In the mid-1970s, I ran a series of courses for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which at that time was Environment Canada, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, for people directly involved in field management.

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I saw then a profound difference between the Canadian and American systems. I'd characterize the Americans as being bureaucratic climbers. Every discussion was concerned with how to further their reputations in the bureaucracy.

The Canadians were just the opposite. They were, first of all, responsible, ethical people. Their first concern was the resources and honesty.

I've seen how that system looked. I think there has been a profound change in that system over the years. I think the bureaucracy, as it has grown, has closed, become defensive, and created the kind of problems that Jeff has described so eloquently.

Why does this happen? How can things change so greatly? I think the basic problem arises from the reward systems in the public service. I think those systems no longer favour the honest or ethical person; they favour the team player and spin doctor. This is the guy who can move up through the system cleverly. That system is leaving behind the people who really can offer wise advice to the public. It's now perhaps even suppressing the opinions of those people.

You'll probably hear that things are better now. You'll hear that, number one, there will be better independent scrutiny of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and its policies through the conservation commissions existing on the east coast and those to be developed on the west coast.

I think you need to ask yourself whether those commissions really are going to provide the scrutiny that's needed when the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has had any hand whatsoever in deciding who is on the commissions and how they're staffed. I think you want to ask whether scientists speak freely about their work today, even though there may have been problems in the past.

My answer to that is no, they can't.

Number one, the media relations guidelines still supposedly limit them to factual information, not policy implications or criticism or interpretation of policy decisions. That places the scientist in an impossible position. Virtually anything we speak about has immediate policy implications, especially if it's critical of government policy.

More subtly, though, as to whether or not a scientist can speak out on paper to try to make his views known, there is an enormous potential career cost to the person who does that. He will be labelled as a maverick or radical, or any of a number of other things, by the spin doctors in the bureaucracy, and his career advancement will be affected. It's a curious situation today that Canada's best fisheries scientists are mainly sitting right at the bottom of the bureaucracies.

I think you need to look closely at an event that occurred this summer that to me involves issues far beyond fisheries. One of Canada's senior and best fisheries scientists, Ransom Myers, is under threat of a lawsuit by two senior DFO officials. To me, this is a completely unacceptable situation. It's not unacceptable because of fisheries or anything, but because of the idea that a member of the Canadian public can ever be threatened by a public servant. At the very least, the DFO officials who were involved in that suit should have been relieved of any responsibility for public policy immediately, pending resolution of the suit. As far as I can see, the government has done nothing.

Let me just end here with a couple of recommendations. I won't flog you about the need to fund university research.

I think one matter you'll need to debate is the question of whether or not there needs to be an independent science organization operating out of DFO. I'm not sure I agree with Jeff Hutchings's conclusions about that. I think I tend to agree with David Anderson about the need for the close integration of science and policy, which is for scientists and managers to work closely together within the same organization. I think that's especially important in view of the shocking technical incompetence that's been shown by a lot of policy and management people in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in recent years in interpreting and dealing with scientific information with uncertainty.

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I'd like to see DFO stay as it is, an organization that attempts to integrate science and management, but I think two things should be done that can be done relatively easily. The first one is to make sure that the independent review commissions the public uses to ensure the bureaucracy remains honest really are independent and that they're well supported financially, intellectually, emotionally, and politically in order to really make them capable of being nastily critical and capable of blowing the whistle on instances of suppression of facts and uncertainties and so on, as Jeff recommended.

Second, there is a broader thing. There's a real need to revise the public service communication guidelines to not only make it acceptable for scientists to speak out about the policy implications and their views about the policy implications of their research, but more, to make it their fundamental responsibility to inform the public, their employer, about their views. We're perfectly capable of sorting out the bad apples and the people flaunting themselves and so on. I think we really do need this, and I think they have a responsibility to tell us about what they think.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Carl Walters, Professor of Fisheries and Zoology, University of British Columbia. Dr. Walters, we'll get back to you in a moment with questions from committee members. You mentioned Dr. Ransom Myers. We have Dr. Myers appearing before this committee on Tuesday of next week.

We will now hear from our final witness for this morning, Dr. Dick Haedrich, Professor of Biology at Memorial University.

Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Dick Haedrich (Professor of Biology, Memorial University): Thank you. You've just all come back from the outports of Newfoundland, and there I think you've seen the human face of this environmental tragedy that has befallen us. I just want to make sure that people are clear about the fact that this was not a natural disaster you saw. It was caused by people and it was preventable. I hope we can all learn from what has happened in some sort of way.

I congratulate this committee, Mr. Chairman, on undertaking this study. I also thank you for inviting me here. I hadn't really intended to make a statement, but the invitation did get the wheels turning, so I've prepared some points for you.

In many ways the things that I will say reflect the points you've just heard from my two colleagues. I have to say to Jeff, for whom I have an enormous admiration, that as usual his was a very eloquent presentation and seemed to encapsulate many of these points very well.

I study fishes and their ecology. I spent the first half of my career as a research scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Since 1979 I've been a professor at Memorial University. In the last several years there, we've been engaged in a large project that has looked generally at sustainability but has particularly had in it an aspect of looking at science and policy.

A part of that work was to examine questions as to how scientific decisions were made. One of the questions that we pursued became the one that was the title of the paper Jeff and Carl and I published: “Is scientific inquiry incompatible with government information control?” Jeff has spoken to some of the ramifications of that.

You also know the history of what happened after that. The paper was published and there was an immediate attack, with personal attacks, and an attempt to discredit us—one that continues to go on in a back-room kind of way—and to interfere with the norms of scientific publication. The press, however, followed this and in fact learned a lot more than we ever had and made the story somewhat broader.

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I would invite the committee to have a look at the other paper that was published with ours and mentioned by David Cook in his excellent editorial. That is the one by Steve Kerr, a former employee of DFO, and Richard Ryder, one of Canada's outstanding limnologists. In many ways that paper was far more critical in a direct sort of way than ours.

The consequence of that has been my belief that it is worth looking in a much broader sense, in fact, at the issues Jeff has already talked about, and that is the role science plays in decision-making on any science-based area in Canadian affairs and government, not just DFO but perhaps in other areas, for example.

There is a bit of a perspective that I'm going to offer here, and that is this. We've heard a bit about universities, and one thing I would say is that this whole issue and its history has shown that Canadian universities are by no means ivory towers. They are capable and willing to take on difficult questions and follow them through to their conclusion, one of which is for us to be in this most unexpected position of appearing before a committee of Parliament.

The story that has emerged has gone.... As Carl said, it can't be just claimed by DFO that things are going to be better now, that things have changed, and so on. This damage to scientific credibility has gone so deeply that I think some sort of a fundamental change is required.

Again, I should reiterate what Jeff said. The problem here is not with the science. In DFO there are some very excellent scientists. There is fine science that continues to be done. But this action of calling on science and making political decisions supposedly based on that is very damaging within the scientific community at large. This is the reason that I say some dramatic action will likely have to be taken to restore the confidence in that organization.

I've also mentioned the way in which science in aid of resource questions has been organized in some other countries. I mentioned the Netherlands, Norway, Ireland, and the U.S., where it's quite common to have fishery centres or wildlife management laboratories from government based on university campuses. There's a complete intermingling of scientists from both places. All of them are subjected to constant badgering from students, who are wonderful iconoclasts, who keep you honest, and so forth. I've seen this at the University of Massachusetts, the University of Vermont, at the University of Maine, UCLA, many institutes in the Netherlands, and so on. I could go on and on and talk about these, but they do seem to work very well.

They have an added advantage, which I believe in very much and Jeff touched on, that is, a kind of movement from a very centralized management to those areas where the questions are most important. They have the added point, which hasn't been talked about, in that they very commonly include, from the original conception, the views of fishermen, local resource users, and so on.

I'll say a few other things about the future. Continuing in the role of speaking about this organization of science, one of the trends we have in this country is towards devolution, where things are being moved more and more on the provinces. I say in points here that this is something where again we have to turn to the universities that have the capability to do this sort of thing in local areas, and particularly in Atlantic Canada, I feel, where there's no other science establishment at all taking on the role of things that have been done by federal government labs. More and more, this is going to be turned over to universities, I believe.

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We've all talked about funding for science in different sorts of ways. Coming from university professors, I know this sounds very self-serving, but I truly believe that even though it sounds that way, it's not. In my case, for example, I'm nearing the age of retirement and so on, so it's not going to be a long-term thing for me.

I have worked with NSERC and I have also worked with the National Science Foundation. We have a very fine system of science funding here in Canada through NSERC, but this should not be allowed to languish. It needs support. I also think the science within DFO needs support, but I believe it should be through the regions. I also believe that universities are willy-nilly going to play a greater role in that.

There's just one other point. It's a very particular one, but it's one that is important to me and I think it is generally important. As the committee goes on to look more at policy and at science and so on, I would like you to particularly look at this question of the availability of data.

I think you've heard from fishermen in Bonavista who want the fishery opened right away and who say there are lots of cod out there. One of the reasons they say this is that they do not have full access to all the data that are available. Many of these data are gathered by DFO, and it's impossible for many other organizations to undertake such a collection—long time series, for example. We in the universities have a great deal of difficulty getting these data. Sometimes we can get them, sometimes we cannot. Who gets them seems to be whimsically applied somewhat selectively and so on.

I also would agree with Carl Walters about claims that you may hear things have been fixed, that things are better now. In my experience, this has not been the case, particularly with this issue of getting data out.

Jeff was more eloquent on this. He spoke about how the people have to know what they're dealing with in regard to the data, and I believe that's important too.

Why don't we stop there, Mr. Chairman, and you guys can start your questions.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Dick Haedrich—and by the way, Dr. Haedrich is a Professor of Biology at Memorial University.

We'll now go to questions from MPs. Since this is being televised, we have about 47 minutes of questions remaining. We'll try to keep it to eight minutes per person per political party, and we'll go first of all to the Reform Party. Mr. Lunn and Mr. Duncan will be dividing their time, so that's four minutes each. We then go to MP Yvan Bernier, who has eight minutes; and then to MP Charles Hubbard, from New Brunswick, who has eight minutes; and then to MP Peter Stoffer, from Nova Scotia, and he also has eight minutes. We'll then go to Mr. Paul Steckle, and then MP Bill Matthews, from Newfoundland.

So, first of all, MP Gary Lunn.

Mr. Gary Lunn (Saanich—Gulf Islands, Ref.): Thank you, gentlemen. You've made some very powerful statements, and I have one question for you. I'm going to put something to you for a couple of minutes and I want you to comment on it.

I just want to comment on Dr. Haedrich's comments: “...this was not a natural disaster...it was preventable.” That's a very powerful statement. We definitely heard a consensus here that there are huge problems within science. I also believe what Dr. Walters said, that you cannot totally separate policy and science. If it's the only thing I agree with Minister Anderson on, so be it.

I also agree that there has to be complete autonomy of science from the department. Do you think you could have a model whereby the science and policy, the DFO and the science branch, are completely integrated with each other within the department, but whereby the whole scientific arm all the way up the chain is not accountable to the minister, whether it would be the AG or some other body. I also believe that the government can't divest the responsibilities, but that we need to move it out closer to the resource and the people.

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This is my last point. We heard the minister constantly talk about conservation, conservation, and conservation, as well as a partnership between DFO and the community. I'm of the belief that this can happen neither under the present structure nor with the present people.

I noticed that Dr. Hutchings made the comment that one may be critical of the system, but there are very dedicated employees. I'm sure there are many good employees. As for what I've seen and witnessed, I'm absolutely convinced—I want your comments on this—that there needs to be a wholesale structure.... You have to redefine how this department thinks, but you can't do that with the current people at the very senior levels.

I'm not talking just about one or two, I'm talking about hundreds of people in the senior management positions. I know there are many people, but they seem to be entrenched in the way they do things. I don't think that with what we've seen, such as the disasters we've seen, these people are capable of making those changes.

Dr. Hutchings, I'd like you to comment first, because you worked with these people. I would also like your comment on whether it can be integrated completely to work together but by reporting to separate bodies.

The Chairman: Dr. Hutchings, before you start, I wonder if you could be fairly brief so we can get in as many questions and answers as possible. I think the second portion was asked of Dr. Walters, is that correct? Yes.

Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Can the science be part of government but independent of it? I think one means of strengthening the means by which policy and science interact is by having scientists made aware of potential policy actions beforehand so they can assess and quantify the potential risks associated with various policy actions.

That currently does not happen. I think that would be one means of strengthening the interaction between the two.

In terms of maintaining science within government but independent of any potential influence, that was largely why I made my suggestion of having some kind of a body that could identify or communicate the scientific basis and risk, if any, associated with the resource management decisions. That would, in essence, act as a check, I think, upon any potential for politicization or any other kind of influence in science.

The Chairman: Dr. Walters, and then Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Carl Walters: I would reiterate the last point I made. I think this integration of science and management has to start with a basic reversal. One has to say to scientists through the system, starting from the ground up, that they have a responsibility to the public and that they should speak out with their views. I think that immediately will start to make it really difficult for the spin doctors in the regional offices and in Ottawa, and throughout DFO, to keep playing their games and telling people to trust them because they're highly trained professionals.

That, along with outside and independent scrutiny to make sure the bureaucracy can't get away with bad or dangerous policy, is the only thing I can see that can allow this integration to proceed in an honest way.

The Chairman: Thank you. Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: One thing that's important to understand is that science itself is a structured form of debate. It's not just a series of arrived-at truths. Science is something that has to be debated openly, questioned, tried, and so on.

I would suggest this framework of more smaller laboratories, perhaps located where students can get at them. I think that's the structure that's going to work.

I also think it's extremely important that policy questions should be made clear to scientists at the outset rather than coming at the very end and asking for something like that. That's the restructuring.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Haedrich. Now to MP John Duncan.

Mr. John Duncan (Vancouver Island North, Ref.): Good morning. I could ask questions for two hours of each of you. I'm sorry we're so limited here.

I found your recommendations very interesting. On Tuesday, we had a chapter of the Auditor General's report tabled in Ottawa. It indicated that in British Columbia we have 600 salmon stocks at high risk. It also indicated that the mandate of DFO, which is sort of a “no net loss” mandate, really doesn't look after individual populations and is quite contrary, for example, to the new provincial legislature in British Columbia, which is looking at a mandate for every stream. So a comment on how that mandate is probably a great obstacle, or your views on whether that's a great obstacle, would be interesting to hear.

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Also, if leadership on this whole fisheries science issue is not forthcoming from the minister and if the minister continues to defend the status quo, how do you promote these changes without demoralizing the scientists? We agree that there are good scientists within DFO. Will they survive all of this? I guess that's my question.

The Chairman: We'll do the same round.

Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: With respect to your second point, if the minister publicly defends the status quo, what I can tell you is that there is a variety of things going on behind the scenes within at least some of the regions—and I guess I'm speaking for maritimes region here—such as attempts to include alternative viewpoints on stock assessment to try to open things up and improve the review of stock assessments. There is a variety of things going on that the public does not generally know about that I think are very positive and that are enhancing the morale of scientists within some of the departments.

I don't think I'm qualified to address the Auditor General's remark with respect to the Pacific coast. I would leave that to Carl.

The Chairman: Dr. Walters, from the University of British Columbia.

Dr. Carl Walters: I think the biggest thing that's demoralizing our DFO scientists today is just the thing we've been speaking about, the suppression, the implied threats, and so on. In B.C. this summer, a young man named Ken Wilson, one of our best coho salmon biologists, felt that he had to take an extended leave of absence from DFO so that he could speak out about what he viewed as a horrible threat to some of the coho salmon populations.

I don't think the province can do a whole lot about that. The threat is coming from changes in ocean survival rates of a very large number of stocks. It's also coming from DFO harvest management policies in mixed stock fisheries outside of those streams. There needs to be a DFO policy change, but it isn't to hand over authority to the province.

The Chairman: Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: All I can really add to this is to say that there are small moves afoot. I think we're only gaining things by small steps, but an important thing, getting at what you are talking about, is the involvement of local communities. Many of these things are done primarily through university programs now, although DFO is involved to an extent. There is work being done with communities at Memorial University and there is extremely important work being done at Simon Fraser University with coastal communities.

These things are succeeding in small ways locally and they're also getting the public more interested and making them more aware of these issues. Some of the DFO scientists I have met who are involved in that take some comfort from the fact that things do seem to be happening there, but I'm somewhat at a loss to answer you about how you deal with this question of demoralization, except, as I said, by the minister taking some dramatic action, which I don't see.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Haedrich. We'll now hear from Bloc MP Yvan Bernier.

You have eight minutes, Mr. Bernier.

Interpretation is available, gentlemen, but Mr. Bernier is also very proficient in English as well, as we saw on our tour in Atlantic Canada. He gave some very good speeches in English.

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[Translation]

Mr. Yvan Bernier (Bonaventure—Gaspé—Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Pabok, BQ): I found your presentation extremely interesting. I think it's one of the day's burning issues.

I would, however, like to add the following two questions to the discussion. First, what about publications? We're wondering about publications concerning scientific research done by Fisheries and Oceans for the general public in Canada. What about publications done by researchers working for NAFO? I think some other countries are taking part in that research, notably Russia for the large salmon stocks. What about publication of these data in the various countries? How are your colleagues in other countries coping with this problem? If I refer to the data provided by NAFO, which is an international organization, I don't see how the domestic policy of a country like Canada could have any effect.

Second, I'd like to ask Dr. Haedrich to help me find an answer for the fishers in Bonavista, who tell us the water running past where they live is filled with fish and they'd like to go fishing.

I've always thought fishers had their own scientific, empirical model, that is, that they followed migration. But they've got a certain rigour. Should I compare your scientific rigour, you who learned your job in the schoolroom, to the fishers' rigour? In French, they talk about «following a course at school,» while our fishers tell us «they follow a course of water.»

I don't know how this expression is going to be translated, but it's as if I compared the street biologist to the classroom biologist.

[English]

The Chairman: Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: With respect to the use of fishermen, a very interesting question, which I have given some attention to, is that we speak of this as a question of scale. I have no doubt whatsoever that within the local area where these fishermen are dealing there are lots of codfish. I also feel they have—and this is from my personal experience in Newfoundland—an understanding of this ecosystem that tends to be much broader than that of government scientists.

On the other hand, the government scientists have a much broader geographic coverage, although the subject of their investigation is considerably narrower. So there is a big mismatch between the scales at which these observations are taking place. I believe both of them have to move a little bit.

Certain expectations would be that the first place you would start to see a recovery of that fish stock is near the coasts. It is not going to regain the total productivity that it had even 30 years ago, unless that is manifested across the continental shelf. All the evidence that comes from the government surveys is that the number of fish there are very, very low.

The individual trawl data have not been made available in general. The information that is supplied to NAFO and so forth, which was a part of what you said at first, is much more general, more aggregated, and so on. So it's not susceptible to a re-analysis.

The Chairman: Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: I'll address your first point, Mr. Bernier. We're not suggesting that DFO actually alters the data. It certainly does not. With respect to publications, stock status reports that are produced as a result of the fishery assessment reviews, for example, must ultimately be approved by DFO in Ottawa. There have been examples. We've documented a couple of them, and there are others in which particular information resulting from the stock assessment reviews are excluded from these stock status reports.

• 1030

The third thing I would note, with respect to NAFO, NAFO deals only with those stocks that straddle the 200-mile limit; secondly, they deal with issues concerning fishing mortality and stock abundance. There's a variety of other issues in fisheries research that we would be interested in, but NAFO generally doesn't deal with those.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Dr. Walters, did you want to add anything to that?

Dr. Carl Walters: I have a real quick comment on this business of co-operation. I've published a whole series of papers lately saying not only do we need links between fishermen and scientists, but that we can't do the job any other way. We must develop much better co-operative information-gathering systems.

The Chairman: Good.

We go now to the province of New Brunswick and MP Charles Hubbard, who is sharing with Mr. Easter. First of all, Mr. Hubbard from New Brunswick, and then we'll go to P.E.I.

Mr. Charles Hubbard (Miramichi, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, I'm very much concerned with some of the tones and the words that are used in describing what many of us see as the problem. I think we heard of words like “honesty”, “ethics”, and “intimidation”. It appears, Mr. Chairman, that if I were living in certain countries a few years ago...it would almost be like the KGB, who are monitoring and trying overall to co-ordinate, to communicate, and to send a message, and we have to question that.

In Canada we have an access to information system. I would think if certain members of the scientific community are questioning DFO scientists, there is that way of attempting to get their work, which is part of the public record, and to determine in reality if this actually is happening.

So I am concerned with that, but I would also like to pursue the concept I brought up with Dr. Doubleday, which wasn't received very well by him when he answered to our committee. That was the fact that in some countries, I asserted, there were contracts or relationships between universities and private agencies and the public in terms of the government and the fisheries, and that in certain relationships money was given to agencies and universities to co-ordinate their research. Dr. Doubleday seemed to indicate that this was not the trend, that this was not the way to do it.

I would certainly like to hear from the witnesses if they feel there should be more money diverted to the universities on the coast to enable them to establish and conduct programs in which they may provide good research. Universities have a tremendous number of students available in the summer and through graduate programs. It's my own belief that these groups could be used very effectively to put on the public record good scientific information. Could you please elaborate on that concept?

The Chairman: Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: I couldn't agree with you more. That was one of the reasons for making the recommendation that this particular DFO subvention program be reinstated. This was a program that provided in the past in the order of $750,000 annually for grants to university-based researchers to permit graduate students to conduct research that would be of benefit to the department. The department actually outlined three or four broad general areas in which they would consider proposals.

What that permits is, one, increased collaboration between the university-based researchers and government scientists, which is good; two, the ability to conduct research on basic biological issues that, given the cuts in DFO now, scientists there don't have the time or the funding to do; and three, it provides the benefit of this rejuvenation I was referring to, of having graduate students in universities being educated in these matters and being able to contribute when they graduate.

The Chairman: Dr. Walters.

Dr. Carl Walters: I personally am completely buried in co-operative work with DFO scientists' stock assessment work on the west coast here. I could use 10 of me.

The problems we're talking about are not problems between scientists within and outside of government. We get along just fine, beyond the usual yelling and screaming. The problems have more to do with the way our work is used and abused.

The Chairman: Dr. Haedrich.

• 1035

Dr. Dick Haedrich: I have two points, one with respect to the access to information and data and so on. In the DFO Newfoundland policy for data access, it's expressly stated that requests for information through access to information can be denied if the director of the science branch there says a staff member is working on it. That's the policy. Whether that has any effect, I don't know, but that is a part of their policy.

Secondly, I couldn't agree with you more about the ability of universities, not just with summer students but with students doing master's theses. The students we have want to work on these problems. They often need the kind of data that I've just spoken of. We just had a student who wanted to work on the distributions and abundances of larval cod in the past and larval cod in the present. She was told by DFO expressly—by management there in Newfoundland—that if she did this, she could not publish any of this sort of stuff, which is completely outside the scientific norms. So she's not doing that project. This is why I say that things like that are going on.

But universities have the capability, they have students who can do this, and they are quite cost effective, too, in addressing these questions.

Finally, not to be too long-winded, I have also learned in our project at Memorial University that you can begin from the outset to make it clear what the policy questions are that the science will be applied to. Here again, there's so often a mismatch, but if you start from that premise, you get to where you want to go.

The Chairman: MP Wayne Easter, Prince Edward Island, you have three minutes.

Mr. Wayne Easter (Malpeque, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have one fairly specific question for Dr. Hutchings and more general questions for the other two witnesses.

When Dr. Doubleday was before the committee he said, and I quote, “The quotations in Hutchings' paper were very selective, sometimes parts of a sentence”. He basically went on to portray it as though you picked out some sentences, parts of them, over the 10-year period in DFO, and made your assessment based on that point of view. Do you feel your article was based on true scientific facts or was it politicized to suit your own agenda? That's a question for you.

In order to save time, Mr. Chairman, I'll ask the other one as well. I was intrigued by Dr. Walters' point in which he said that earlier in his life he detected the difference between public service in Canada and in the United States. I think if you ask any of the politicians around here...I go back 20 years in terms of dealing with Ottawa, and in many of my public remarks these days.... I'm concerned about whether we really live in a representative democracy or a bureaucratic dictatorship. I say that in all seriousness, because there's no question in my mind that the bureaucracy.... At one time the public service was there to serve the public. I question whether that is now the case.

Voices: Hear, hear!

Mr. Wayne Easter: Yes, I'm parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Fisheries, but I find it just as difficult as any other politician to get information out of that particular bureaucracy. Try the agriculture department—it's just as bad or worse.

So I would like a little more information on that.

Lastly, to Dr. Haedrich, with respect to universities, I'm also concerned about the independence of their research.

In the last Parliament I had to deal extensively with the pharmaceutical companies in challenging them on the use of a hormone called rBST, which is used to increase milk production in dairy cattle. I believe that as universities depend more and more on funding not from the public sector but from the corporate sector, the confidence in university research, scientific and otherwise, will in fact be undermined. I dealt with the University of Guelph on that one. I'd like your comments on that,

Really, for all three of you, in our hearings across Atlantic Canada, we're hearing people say, look, let's go after those underutilized species, such as capelin, shrimp, etc., which are there in abundance. But do we really have the science in place at the moment to make those kinds of decisions in terms of the impact on the fish food chain as a whole?

• 1040

The Chairman: Gentlemen, I know it's going to be very difficult for you to do, but I wonder if you could keep it fairly short. We have to go to the NDP, back to the Liberals, and back to the PCs.

Dr. Hutchings.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: To address the first question, Mr. Easter, with respect to my own agenda, it's not clear what that would be. I certainly have no qualms with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. While I was a research fellow there, I did receive a publication award from the DFO. Every time I've requested funding for research from the DFO, I've received it. I have had many good and extensive collaborations within the department.

Personally, then, I have virtually nothing to gain by raising these issues in a scientific publication.

Dr. Doubleday has charged that quotes are selectively interpreted. We addressed those issues in our reply to his comment.

The only comment I would make here is that we indeed felt that perhaps he and his co-authors were missing, frankly, some of the points we were attempting to make. Ultimately we raised an issue. We raised a variety of issues. He is free, of course, to object to the means by which we did raise those concerns.

Frankly, it's up the scientific community and the public to assess for themselves the legitimacy of our concerns.

The Chairman: Dr. Walters.

Dr. Carl Walters: I don't think the DFO really tries to hide information. The trick to getting information out of them—because there's a huge amount of it, and very complex—is to get hold of somebody who's technically skilled and who knows how to ask them, which you have every authority to do.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: On the question of independent research at the universities, to be sure, this has threats of exactly the type you wanted. However, there is a tradition in universities of open debate of subjects. I know there are some universities—I can't immediately think of which ones—that have as an expressed policy of not taking on research that cannot be published. This cuts them off from some types of funding, but that's the status I support in universities, and argue for at Memorial, as a matter of fact.

The Chairman: We now turn to MP Peter Stoffer, from the New Democratic Party.

You have four minutes, sir.

Mr. Peter Stoffer (Sackville—Eastern Shore, NDP): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I guess to start off, now you know why I'm asking for an inquiry. I mean, this is a dog's breakfast. I could go on here, but I'll carry on. I don't want to waste my four minutes.

Absolutely unbelievable. But I'll be nice.

Mr. Anderson was here a few weeks back. He gave us a glowing report on how great things were at DFO. I submit to everyone here that this was probably written by the same people who write the Hallmark greeting cards.

I asked him how he could possibly expect to do all these neat and wonderful things when more cuts were happening at DFO this year and further cuts the following year. I submit to everyone here that they just cannot be done.

Dr. Hutchings, you said the department, to your knowledge, doesn't alter documents. I submit to you, sir, that if the department does not give the minister the information he requires to make qualified decisions, that's omitting documents, which is the same as altering documents. If they don't give him the information he requires, then that's the same as altering a document.

You were bang on when you said that the minister's information and the responses he gets are more or less on politically based needs and not necessarily on scientific needs. I've heard that wherever I go.

I've received many brown envelopes under my door conforming to what has just been said by you three gentlemen as well as by Dr. Paul Brodie from the east coast.

I have a couple of concerns I would like to mention to you. We were in Newfoundland. A lot of fishers had concerns with science in that they said they weren't being consulted.

I'm sure going to ask the chair of this committee to explain one certain aspect—a test they had done to try to find cod in areas in which fishers knew cod weren't there. If Mr. Baker can elaborate on that later in this meeting, I would greatly appreciate it.

As well, the fishers aren't asking for a fishery of the total cod. They don't want to get back to it. They just want a serious test fishery, both scientifically and DFO managed, of the cod they say are out there. I think we owe it to them, under strict surveillance and with proper guidance, to be able to open a certain test fishery for cod in areas where we have reports that the cod traps are showing increases in cod over the last three years. I would put it to the three of you that if it was possible, again under strict guidance, there should be allowed a very small opening of the cod fishery to see if these fishers are indeed correct. Time and time again, on the northeast coast and on the southern coast of Newfoundland, we've heard reports of tremendous findings of cod. I would just put that to you as well.

• 1045

I also find it very offensive that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans can go to the media to tell this standing committee to pipe down, to tone down its rhetoric on its complaints about science. I'm referring to a couple of statements made by Mr. Lunn, my colleague from Reform. I'm right on with him. I think it's great. If we can upset the minister in any way, that means we're probably hitting a very serious nerve.

I know I could go a long way on this, but I find it very pleasing when a member of the government says we live in a bureaucratic mess—and Mr. Easter, you're right on, and you have my top kudos on that.

If you three gentlemen wouldn't mind, in terms of the fisheries and in terms of the fisherpeople of the east coast and their lack of confidence in the science that's out there, please elaborate just a little bit on that for me.

I wish to share my time with Mr. O'Brien. He wishes to ask questions with regard to seals.

I do thank you three gentlemen for appearing today.

The Chairman: We can go fairly quickly to Dr. Hutchings, and then to Dr. Walters and Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Thank you very much.

Mr. Stoffer, I think what you have identified with respect to inshore fishers in Newfoundland and their relationship or lack thereof with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans really comes down to a matter of communication.

As a scientist, one of the things that does concern me is trying to interpret some of the trends we're seeing in the inshore cod trap catch rates. Perhaps it's indicative of good science, but perhaps it's not. There are means of sussing this out. What I would very much like to see at this point in time—and I think it's a great challenge to the department, given that TAGS is going to end fairly soon—is the department finding someone who could communicate the potential risks associated with making decisions based on fairly limited data. I think that's critical. So I would like to see increased communication in that respect.

In terms of small reopenings, perhaps it's the case that a small sentinel fishery or a strategic sentinel fishery using cod traps or whatever the fixed gear is could be strategically set to try to delineate the spatial extent of the present cod distribution. That might be advisable, but one would again have to look at the data carefully. I would like to see better communication between the department and the fishers with respect to potential risks associated with interpreting data just at their face value.

The Chairman: Dr. Walters.

Dr. Carl Walters: This complete difference in perceptions between science and fishers is very common, and it has become much more common today to recommend experimental management approaches—basically, let's get out there and conduct a fishery as a co-operative experiment between scientists and fishers in order to resolve the matter once and for all. This is a global trend for dealing with that problem and a very productive one for all of us.

The Chairman: Dr. Haedrich.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: This lack of confidence that you speak of is indeed one of the saddest fallouts of this whole issue, and it's most unfortunate.

I do think that if one were to go back to consider an opening, one ought to adapt the principles of adaptive management—that is, to design experiments explicitly including fishermen from the outset in any reopening, to make predictions as to what those would be, and to test them through that. That has been done in the fresh waters in Newfoundland with the Indian Bay Ecosystem Committee, which is managing its trout resources in that way. Fishermen and resource users were included at the outset in the formulation of questions.

The Chairman: We now go to Labrador MP Lawrence O'Brien.

Mr. Lawrence O'Brien (Labrador, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Mr. Stoffer, my good buddy. You paid me back for that hat I gave you in Labrador, I guess.

I'm no different from most people, particularly fishers. I grew up on a fishing boat along the coast of Labrador. I'm very skeptical. I think science has a role to play, but I'm skeptical.

• 1050

When I refer back to our Fisheries and Oceans scientists who were there previously, I sometimes wonder when we're talking about Dr. Doubleday if I hear double talk. That's a big problem I'm facing.

From a science point of view, I don't think there's any way in the world that scientists can go out into the great big North Atlantic and determine a biomass of anything. I don't think it's possible. I think we missed the boat on cod over the years. I think we're now missing the boat on shrimp. And, by golly, if I may use this, I think we really missed the boat on how we're dealing with the seal issue.

I said it to the Auditor General, I say it to you, and I say it to anybody: why do scientists, auditors general, and politicians, why do people generally shy away from dealing with the sealing industry? Is it because of Brian Davies and IFAW and the new group that's on the go on page 3 in the Hill Times and the Globe and Mail and so on? Is it that or not? Believe me, come to grips with it; whether it's independent science or DFO science or whatever, the issue of seals is that they eat fish. There's no question. They don't get a fat content built up inside their skin that thick all the way around without eating something.

I will tell you that my friends who fish, and good fishermen, tell me that the seals go up and under a big codfish, poke a little hole in the centre, and pull the liver out, and that helps create the nice fat content. That fish falls down to the bottom and is used on the floor for crab or whatever. The list goes on and on.

I feel the seals are multiplying to the greatest numbers I've ever seen in my life. When I grew up on the coast of Labrador the seals would come through the Strait of Belle Isle going into the Magdalen Islands area in the month of late December and early January. Now they come in late September and early October. They used to leave us in the Strait of Belle Isle in late May and early June. Now they're leaving in mid-July.

The other thing I want to say about cod—cod I'll use—and seals is that it has been a known fact by fishers—and I don't know if science will substantiate this or not—that when the seals roll in, the cod move out and vice versa.

So we have a lot of things out there relative to the question of seals that don't seem to be lending themselves to...both from the independent scientific world or the DFO scientific world. I think it's causing chaos in the North Atlantic, and I think it has upset the balance of the ecosystem to the point where we may see a massive disaster.

How do you respond to that?

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: I agree with you that things in the North Atlantic have changed dramatically with respect to predator-prey relationships. There's no question about it. We have reduced our cod stocks to exceedingly low levels, and certainly the harp seal numbers are at very large levels.

The only thing I would say is we know something about what seals eat. Inshore they eat mainly Arctic cod; offshore they eat mainly capelin. But the data are somewhat scanty to be sure.

The critical question from the seal hunt perspective is, are seals significantly retarding the rate of recovery of northern cod? That's something for which science can basically say we don't know. It might be, but we just don't know at this point. I think from a government perspective—and you refer to the great antagonism between seal protection organizations and the government—is if the department had, a few years ago, simply not used the recovery of northern cod as a reason for imposing the seal hunt, it might have made a difference, because it was simply a stance they could not defend. They should have simply said, from day one, it's a harvest to provide supplemental income to unemployed fishers and their families and it's a hunt that if properly regulated and organized is sustainable, and left it at that.

The Chairman: Thank you, Dr. Hutchings.

We now turn to Newfoundland, the PC Party critic, Bill Matthews, MP.

Mr. Bill Matthews (Burin—St. George's, PC): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I don't know why we're surprised we're in the mess we're in scientifically. We're at the point in history where we should be bolstering our scientific and research efforts and we've cut the intestines out of it. So why are we surprised we're in the mess we're in?

I wanted to ask Dr. Hutchings a couple of very quick questions.

You mentioned that, in your estimation, we've lost approximately 40% of research scientists in the Newfoundland area. Why would that be? What impact has it had on the scientific branch?

The Chairman: Did you want to ask other questions so that he can also deal with those? That's one question.

Mr. Bill Matthews: I have more.

The Chairman: Yes, could you ask them now.

Mr. Bill Matthews: It will only take two seconds to answer that.

The Chairman: Okay, fine, Dr. Hutchings.

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Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Those individuals have been lost either through death or early retirement packages, or they've left for university positions. I think it undoubtedly has had an effect.

Mr. Bill Matthews: You mentioned not being permitted to distribute documents, particularly on the study of juvenile cod mortality. Who had the authority to prevent that distribution? Who stopped it?

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Since I was not an employee with the department at the time I can't say with certainty, but I can tell you there were regional officials and officials in Ottawa involved in preventing us distributing hard copies of the document.

Mr. Bill Matthews: I believe part of the problem, as Peter mentioned, is the acoustic surveys, which you'll probably allude to. I think one of the reasons the Sentinel fishery has been successful is because of the involvement of fishermen who know the traditional fishing grounds. DFO scientists do not. I would suggest offshore surveys for years were done much along the same lines.

Trawler captains have told me the way DFO has done its research offshore just blows their minds, because they have fished for years and years and kept logs. So I have a feeling that on the scientific data that's come from both the acoustic surveys and the offshore research vessels, the bad results are because of the way it was done.

I don't know if Dr. Hutchings has any reaction to that, but I think there are far more fish there. I'm not saying we're out of trouble and we shouldn't practise conservation, but I believe a lot of the bad results that have been given to DFO and in some cases publicized are because of the way it's been done. It's been inadequate in my view.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Yes. I think it's highly unfortunate that in the past there was so little co-operation or interaction with fishermen. Basically the inshore fishery and inshore sectors have been virtually ignored with respect to cod. But with respect to herring in Newfoundland, there's been an excellent relationship between department scientists and herring fishermen along the south coast of Newfoundland. For about fifteen or twenty years they have worked with herring fishermen who have set their gear in the same places where they know herring are year after year, and that's worked exceedingly well.

Mr. Bill Matthews: I believe as long as science and management are integrated in any way one of two things will happen. Peter again has alluded to that.

If you omit something from a document, it's manipulation or twisting if that information doesn't go to the top officials in DFO or to the minister. Whenever science and management are integrated we will have that problem, because in the real world of politics that's how it works. Science should be totally independent from DFO. There should be no interference or integration whatsoever and the findings in some way should be binding.

The Chairman: Dr. Hutchings and Dr. Haedrich, I will explain to you after this committee meeting, because we don't have time now, how the committee took testimony and evidence from many fishermen who disputed the method of counting fish. We're convinced the fishermen are right about the types of surveys that were done. So I'll explain it to you after the meeting to get your opinion on it.

We'll go to one final question. We're out of time here. Mr. Lunn, you wanted a short snapper.

Mr. Gary Lunn: Back to my first question that was not answered. We are spending billions of dollars to destroy the resource on both coasts, and I say it's incompetence on the part of the department.

To Dr. Hutchings—and the other two may comment on it—how far do we have to go in changing the administration in order to get change so this department can redefine the way it thinks? How much change has to happen? Are the people there now capable of making the change that is necessary or are they too entrenched?

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: The individuals who are presently there have been there for a very long time. As with all such organizations, rejuvenation is important. I'm not entirely convinced we will see significant change at present.

The Chairman: One final questioner. I forgot MP Paul Steckle, Ontario.

Mr. Paul Steckle (Huron—Bruce, Lib.): Thank you very much.

Very quickly, I think it's the duty of this committee, and of course the reason for this committee meeting and asking witnesses the kinds of questions we're asking, to get evidence so we can respond.

• 1100

I'm going to ask you people to respond to a question, and that is this. Given the history we have with fish management, not a very good record, I want to have you tell us where the problem has been. We've gone around this issue, we touched on it this morning, but we really haven't said.... Are you prepared to tell this committee the signs you have gathered? Is it comparable, or does it make sense in regard to the traditional knowledge we had from fishers, who are giving us some sense of where the fish populations are and where they have been and how they should be sustained? Does it compare with your science?

Secondly, is there a correlation between the information you have given to the bureaucrats...not going to the politicians? Where is the breakdown? Are the bureaucrats breaking down what they want? Are they giving the kind of information they want? Are they setting the direction? Where is the problem? We need to know. I think we need to know in making the determinations of this committee.

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: As I've been saying, there are clearly uncertainties in science, and I don't think anyone would suggest there aren't. There can be very large errors in any estimation of fish stocks and fish abundance. Scientists know this and understand this. I think the big problem is that the uncertainties in stock assessment have never been clearly communicated to the public, to the fishermen, or to industry, for that matter, in any sense.

So first, uncertainties and errors are associated with science. Secondly, they are not effectively communicated to those whose livelihoods depend on them.

Your second point was on the transfer of information. In general terms, it's difficult for me to say. All I can do is draw attention to the couple of examples I mentioned here, among others, perhaps, one this AGAC meeting, the second information on potential effects of seals on cod mortality, which was apparently not transferred to Minister Tobin at the time.

Mr. Paul Steckle: You knowing the science, knowing the kind of information you have given, is that reflective in government policy?

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: It certainly is reflected to a certain extent, but I don't really feel competent to comment on it.

Mr. Paul Steckle: If you can't, who can?

Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings: Perhaps those who conduct some of the stock assessments could.

Actually, I could make one comment. Earlier this year the cod fishery on the south coast of Newfoundland was reopened. Two days before the minister's decision a fisheries scientist within the Department of Fisheries and Oceans leaked the announcement to the media. If this were an open department and this individual had no fear of recriminations, why would he leak this information to the media? To him, clearly it was the only means by which he felt he could communicate his concerns from a conservation perspective and scientific perspective associated with the reopening of this stock.

Dr. Dick Haedrich: An awfully important point here is that all these perspectives you're hearing from fishermen and individual scientists are small windows into a great big sea of confusion. What is needed to resolve that is not to go to any individual person but to have an open, free, debate according to established rules of science.

My view is that right now this is too monolithic. It's centred in bureaucracies, maybe in a few individuals. To address what Mr. Lunn has said, I think dramatic restructuring is needed to make it open, more regional, and so on—and remember, different perspectives. That's a restatement of what Jeff said about risk.

The Chairman: Gentlemen, to you all, Dr. Hutchings, Professor of Fish Biology, Dalhousie University, Dr. Haedrich, Professor of Biology, Memorial University, and Dr. Carl J. Walters, Professor of Fisheries and Zoology, University of British Columbia, thank you for your attendance today and your testimony before this committee.

Gentlemen and ladies, before we leave, you will recall the committee met informally and discussed the problems Canada had because we had not ratified the Law of the Sea and the transborder stocks and highly migratory species. We've been discussing this as a committee. The parliamentary secretary has an announcement to make concerning some agreement.

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Mr. Wayne Easter: As a point of information, Mr. Chair, the minister tabled in the House this morning the United Nations fisheries agreement, which is to implement the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea conference and agreements thereto. It was tabled this morning. It won't be debated until into the new year.

So I want to make you aware of that and ask you when you would want briefings on that particular legislation, before the Christmas adjournment or after. If you have views on that, let me know and we'll have it arranged.

The Chairman: We will certainly let you know as soon as possible, Parliamentary Secretary.

Since that was a major subject, one of our major recommendations that would have gone to the House of Commons, we're very happy that the parliamentary secretary and the minister were so active as to be able to table this legislation today.

Ladies and gentlemen, you've done a tremendous job on this committee. I want to thank you for the marvellous work you've done over the past eight days throughout this country. And thank you to the witnesses.

This meeting is adjourned until Tuesday, at which time we'll hear from, as Dr. Walters said, one of the best fish scientists in the country, Dr. Ransom Myers.

That's on Tuesday morning. We want to get this timing correct. You'll get a notification in the mail.

This meeting is adjourned.