FOPO Committee Meeting
Notices of Meeting include information about the subject matter to be examined by the committee and date, time and place of the meeting, as well as a list of any witnesses scheduled to appear. The Evidence is the edited and revised transcript of what is said before a committee. The Minutes of Proceedings are the official record of the business conducted by the committee at a sitting.
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37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION
Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans
EVIDENCE
CONTENTS
Wednesday, October 1, 2003
| ¹ | 1535 |
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The Clerk of the Committee |
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Mr. Peter Stoffer (Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore) |
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The Clerk |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. R. John Efford (Bonavista—Trinity—Conception, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. Andy Burton (Skeena, Canadian Alliance) |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. Bill Matthews (Burin—St. George's, Lib.) |
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The Clerk |
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Mr. John Cummins (Delta—South Richmond, Canadian Alliance) |
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The Chair (Mr. Tom Wappel (Scarborough Southwest, Lib.)) |
| ¹ | 1540 |
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Mr. John Cummins |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Alan Nixon (Committee Researcher) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance) |
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The Chair |
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Mr. John Cummins |
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The Chair |
CANADA
Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans |
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EVIDENCE
Wednesday, October 1, 2003
[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
¹ 
(1535)
[English]
The Clerk of the Committee: Honourable members of the committee, I see a quorum.
Pursuant to Standing Order 106, we can now proceed to the election of the chair.
[Translation]
Are there any nominations?
[English]
Mr. Stoffer.
Mr. Peter Stoffer (Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore): I'd like to nominate Mr. Tom Wappel, please, from Scarborough.
The Clerk: Are there any other nominations? Seeing none, nominations are now closed.
The question, then, is that Tom Wappel be elected chair of the committee. Is it your pleasure to adopt the motion?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
(Motion agreed to)
The Clerk: I declare Mr. Wappel elected as chair of the committee.
We'll now proceed to the election of the vice-chairs. I'll start with the vice-chair for the government side and I will receive nominations.
Mr. R. John Efford (Bonavista—Trinity—Conception, Lib.): I will nominate Mr. Matthews.
The Clerk: Mr. Efford has nominated Mr. Matthews.
Are there any other nominations?
[Translation]
Are there any other nominations? If not, I declare the nominations closed. We have a motion on the table to elect Mr. Matthews as government vice-chair.
(Motion agreed to)
[English]
The Clerk: I declare the motion carried and Mr. Matthews elected as government vice-chair.
I will now take nominations for the opposition vice-chair.
Mr. Burton.
Mr. Andy Burton (Skeena, Canadian Alliance): I will nominate Mr. Cummins.
The Clerk: Mr. Burton nominates Mr. Cummins.
Are there any other nominations? Mr. Matthews.
Mr. Bill Matthews (Burin—St. George's, Lib.): I nominate Mr. Stoffer.
The Clerk: Mr. Matthews nominates Mr. Stoffer.
Are there any other nominations? Seeing none, I declare the nominations closed.
Before proceeding, I will briefly explain the process. Nominations being closed, my colleague, Mr. Farrell, who I believe many of you know, will distribute ballots to the members. After members have written their choice on the ballot and deposited it in the box, which we will circulate, we will count the ballots and announce the successful candidate. If no member receives a majority of valid votes cast, we'll conduct another ballot.
¹ (1534)
¹ (1539)
The Clerk: I declare Mr. Cummins elected as the opposition vice-chair.
I now invite Mr. Wappel to take the chair.
Mr. John Cummins (Delta—South Richmond, Canadian Alliance): Before we get going, I want to congratulate you, Mr. Chairman. [Technical difficulties--Editor]...job, and you've provided some very competent leadership to the committee. From the opposition side, we want to commend you on that. You can be assured of our continued cooperation to make sure that the committee is as effective as it has been.
The Chair (Mr. Tom Wappel (Scarborough Southwest, Lib.)): Mr. LeBlanc, is that on the record? Thank you. You'll get me a transcript of that.
(Technical difficulties--Editor)...I want to congratulate the vice-chairs on their election and I want to congratulate Peter for bringing his name forward. I know he's very passionate about the issues. I'm glad you put your name forward, or had your name put forward, and I know that we'll continue to work together in the interests of the fishery.
Thanks very much for your support and your confidence. I certainly do appreciate it.
This will last about six weeks this fall, and then we'll see what the future brings.
¹ (1540)
Mr. John Cummins: I want to thank the members too for their support as well, Mr. Chair.
The Chair: We have a choice to make, colleagues. We have had distributed to us a summary of issues and recommendations from the visit of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans to eastern Canada May 5 to 9, 2003.
We weren't really scheduled for this meeting, except that the clerk was able to do it so that we could get the elections out of the way, but we're all here. We could have a meeting tomorrow, which was what we were originally going to do, and meet from eleven till one to discuss this. The purpose of discussing this is to give some concrete drafting instructions to Alan.
By the way, some may or may not know that the reason François isn't sitting here is that he has taken paternity leave for presumably the liberal 52 weeks, I think it is.
Mr. Alan Nixon (Committee Researcher): It won't be that long, Mr. Chair.
The Chair: It won't be that long, but it will be some time. Alan is by himself, and he needs as much time as possible to work on these issues.
If we want, we could go through this now--and I'm totally in your hands--or we can convene at eleven o'clock tomorrow morning and we can go through it at that time. I've gone through it, and there are obviously some issues where events have overtaken us. There are some issues we've already dealt with. For example, there's aquaculture mentioned in here. There are a couple of issues where your chair, on your direction, has already written to the minister on the issue, for instance, on the core fishermen in Newfoundland. So those are issues we really don't even have to deal with.
Does anybody have any views on whether we'd like to get started on this now or whether you would prefer to go to the meeting of tomorrow? Those are the only two choices. We can work today and maybe make enough progress that we don't need a meeting tomorrow, or we can forget it today and go to the meeting tomorrow. But we're not going to forget it today and forget it tomorrow. Does anybody have any views?
Mr. Elley.
Mr. Reed Elley (Nanaimo—Cowichan, Canadian Alliance): Mr. Chair, I have not received the report and I have not seen the report, so I would feel totally incompetent to comment on the report.
The Chair: Fair enough.
Is anybody else in that position?
Mr. John Cummins: I haven't got one with me.
The Chair: We have copies.
This was sent by e-mail--admittedly, this week, because of the translation situation.
I'm presuming that many of the Atlantic members would be aware of many of the issues anyway and could certainly make their input.
With your indulgence, and since we're all here, if you wouldn't mind starting it, at least take a look at the issues and see if we can give some direction, if that's okay.
The clerk is whispering in my ear that perhaps we should do this in camera.
[Proceedings continue in camera]