Fisheries (Alberta) Amendment Act

The public and fisheries stakeholders expect tougher penalties for fisheries violations such as the illegal stocking of fish.

We also need to ensure that Albertans continue to benefit from the effort and investments made in our fisheries resources by government, fisheries groups, industry and the public.

More sentencing options will better equip the courts to protect our fish resources by including penalties that could hold offenders responsible for returning a damaged fishery back to a healthy state.

Prior to these sentencing options, the courts were limited to assessing fines and short licence suspensions for fisheries violations. Among many options, the new sentencing orders can include:

• Assessing a fishery's restoration costs to convicted persons
• Issuing orders to stop new offences
• Suspending or cancelling licences
• Ordering fisheries restoration actions
• Assessing additional monetary payments to support fisheries management and habitat enhancement programs

Ongoing court proceedings involve numerous serious Fisheries (Alberta) Act violations resulting from a successful undercover operation in the Lac La Biche and Athabasca areas. There have been 10 accused persons convicted as a result of this investigation, who have been fined a total of $140,000.

Through creative sentencing, a portion of that amount could be assessed in the form of an order for payment to support fisheries management programs. In addition, orders could be issued to the convicted persons requiring that they report future fishing activities.

Fines from convictions, which are directed to the General Revenue Fund, are not adequate to cover the cost of restoring lost fisheries, and all of the cost is currently being borne by the government and fishery stakeholder groups.

Estimates to restore trout fisheries affected by the illegal stocking of perch have ranged from $100,000 to $500,000 depending on the size and complexity of the water body.

Creative sentencing could order an offender to pay the full cost to re-create the stocked fishery as it was prior to the illegal fish introduction.

Yes. For many years, the courts have been successfully using creative sentencing under the Wildlife Act and the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act to deal with serious offenders.

For example, through creative sentencing, offenders have been ordered to report their subsequent hunting activities or make payments to the Minister's programs for wildlife conservation.

The amendments to the Fisheries (Alberta) Act will follow existing creative sentencing models.