Good afternoon.

Since I wasn't sure what form this was going to take, I'll just add on to what Ms. Orjikh has said, since we were all in agreement, but I'd like to begin with a little background.

The Municipalité de Lac Simon has many waterways, including three major bodies of water: Lac Viceroy, Lac Simon and Lac Barrière. We are a small municipality in the Outaouais region. We have a municipal public wharf, and the neighbouring municipality has a public wharf that is privately managed. Access to one of our waterways is limited to a private community, which, for the moment, somewhat limits the damage caused by the types of watercraft that Ms. Orjikh mentioned. One of those waterways is accessible via our main body, Lac Barrière. So these waterways are generally accessible through one another. We also have five shallow bays where passing watercraft may disturb sensitive species and stir up sediments.

Those are the challenges associated with our main waterways, but there are others, which I will discuss once I've provided this background.

The problems that we experience aren't solely due to pollution. They are also caused by human behaviour and certain types of boats. We have pollution and garbage, mainly because some people throw their beverage containers into the water. Others go into those shallow bays and disembark from their boats in order to relieve themselves. It's difficult for a municipality to penalize such behaviour and legislate water-related issues because we have to act within our jurisdiction. Motorboats also stir up sediments in those bays, and that reduces water quality.

We also intended to tell you about the problems associated with wakeboarding and watercraft that cause erosion. We have managed to introduce a restriction, but it was a tedious process and took many years to implement. As Ms. Orjikh explained, it's a costly and painstaking process, but we nevertheless tried as hard as we could. We are enforcing the rule, but we can't go any further because our authority as a municipality is limited in that regard. Consequently, even though we limit motorboat speeds in the middle of the lake to 70 kilometres an hour, as Ms. Orjikh also mentioned, boats often stay within 300 metres of the shoreline and cause erosion because 70 kilometres an hour on water is still very fast.

So that's the situation. Our powers are limited by the fact that this is an area of federal jurisdiction, and that's the problem. The current federal boating regulations do not afford adequate protection for our waterways. In our humble opinion, they mainly protect user safety. They do not limit the number of boats. For example, there can be 500 boats at a single location. We can't limit that. It's very complicated. We also can't control the types of boats used. As you can see, wakeboarding is a new phenomenon, and we can't limit it in order to moderate the waves. We have no way of controlling it. I should also mention the red tape associated with the application procedure, which can regularly take between five and 10 years, from what I hear. It's very costly.

I should also mention the aircraft phenomenon. I've consulted other municipalities on this. It's also difficult to control what goes on in that area. You can control pollutants and invasive aquatic plants on boat hulls, but it's more complicated for people who have airplanes. There appears to be an administrative void in this regard where neither the provinces nor the municipalities may intervene.

Consequently, there is apparently a kind of gap in the responsibilities shared between federal and provincial governments regarding boating and the environment. I don't know if we can say there's an inconsistency, but it's difficult, in a municipal context, to make people respect both boating and the environment. When we manage to do so, it's as a result of long-standing efforts, after the damage has already been done to our lakes.

That's a fairly accurate summary of our situation.