CONSULTATIVE ARRANGEMENTS 223 



for coordinating communications with the more special- 

 ized advisory committees recommended below. 



The new council should be involved in other policy 

 changes, so I strongly urge the government to establish it 

 immediately. (Pending legislative changes, the members 

 should be appointed less formally.) Once the new council 

 is established, the Minister's Advisory Council should be 

 dissolved and the dormant Pacific Region Management 

 Advisory Council should not be rejuvenated. 



The new council should be consulted regarding the 

 structure of the other advisory groups I recommend 

 below. The existing temporary advisory committees 

 should be asked to complete their work as quickly as 

 possible, and no new ones should be struck without prior 

 consultation with the council. 



Specialized Advisory Committees 



In addition to the Pacific Fisheries Council, more spe- 

 cialized consultative bodies are needed to deal with the 

 narrower, but often complicated, problems associated 

 with particular fisheries, regions and interest groups. 

 Many such groups already exist, and require only some 

 modifications in structures and procedures to fit into the 

 consultative system I propose: others should be estab- 

 lished. The advisory committees fail into distinct categor- 

 ies. 



Fisheries advison committees These are committees 

 to address the problems of managing particular fisheries, 

 such as salmon, herring, abalone and the mariculture 

 industry. The number and variety of these specialized 

 groups will depend upon interests, needs, and develop- 

 ments in related policies; they need not be permanent 

 committees in all ca.ses. 



3. A special advison conmiittee should be appointed for 

 each of the significaiit fisheries that have special regu- 

 latory policies, including the sport and Indian fisher- 

 ies, the separately liceased commercial fisheries and 

 mariculture. 



i) These conmiittees' terms of reference should 

 direct their attention to the coastwide problems of 

 managing the specific fisheries. 



ii) Members should be appointed by the Minister 

 (or, at his discretion, by the Director General) for 

 definite terms, drawing upon (without being lim- 

 ited to) representatives of organized groups. They 

 should be reimbursed for expenses associated 

 with committee activities. 



iii) Each committee should choose its own chairman, 

 establish its own working procedures within gen- 

 eral policy guidelines, and determine its own 

 agendas taking account of matters referred to it 



by the Director General or the Pacific Fisheries 

 Council. 



iv) The Director General should appoint a Depart- 

 mental official with special competence in the rel- 

 evant fishery to sene as a participating but non- 

 voting member of each committee, and to pro\ide 

 information and technical assistance. 



v) Each committee should report in writing to the 

 Minister through the Pacific Fisheries Council at 

 least annually. 



The existing Sport Fish Advisory Board received 

 mixed appraisals at the Cxjmmission's hearings. Appar- 

 ently it is too large, and the representation of recreational 

 and commercial sportfishing interests unbalanced. These 

 concerns should be considered when the committee is 

 reconstituted. 



In Yukon, sportfishing interests are geographically sep- 

 arate and different in kind from coastal sportfishing inter- 

 ests, concentrating mainly on freshwater fishing. For 

 these reasons, they should be represented in a separate 

 Yukon sportfishing advisory committee as I propose in 

 Chapter 20. 



Some other fisheries call for regional representation as 

 well. I have discussed this need in connection with 

 salmon and hemng management in Chapter 4. The area- 

 based licensing arrangements proposed in Part III might 

 generate a need for regional consultative groups for other 

 commercial fisheries also. Such supplementarj' arrange- 

 ments should be decided in consultation with the relevant 

 fisheries advisory committees. 



Two related points should be made especially clear in 

 specifying the scope of these committees" functions. First, 

 they should not concern themselves with the fractious 

 question of catch allocations among competing groups. 

 The general policy on this issue should be established at a 

 higher level in consultation with the Pacific Fisheries 

 Council, and specific arrangements should be laid out in 

 pre-season fishing plans as proposed in Chapter 4. How- 

 ever, these committees should be involved in setting 

 objectives for resource management and appraising the 

 results achieved. Second, these committees should not 

 concern themselves with day-to-day in-season manage- 

 ment, but rather with policy, planning and results. 



The Pacific Fisheries Council should append the 

 reports of fisheries advisory committees to its own reports 

 to the Minister, and should be encouraged to comment 

 on the committees' conclusions, put them into a broader 

 context for the Minister, and add supplementary advice. 



Fislteries conservation committees In Chapter 5 I 

 noted the unsatisfactory structure of the Salmonid 

 Enhancement Task Group and suggested that it should 



