No. It was a big cry.... It was basically the government of the day saying that it was the way we had to go because of the moratorium, the downfall of the Greenland halibut, the codfish, the moratorium.... We had to diversify, and this was the start of diversification.
I want to make myself clear. I don't know if these numbers are sinking in, but we had to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to gear up to do this shrimp fishery. We did it on a temporary licence, but we were told this was the start of a new fishery, a big fishery taking the place of the groundfish. So we did that and we moved ahead, and eventually we were given permanent licences.
Today I'm being told that this permanent licence.... I just reinvested this spring. I have the only twin trawler in Newfoundland, with brand new technology that came from overseas, and here I am today: I haven't got a pound of shrimp landed yet, and I'm cut. I'm chopped. I have a $2-million vessel tied onto the wharf. I have 25% of my income in that vessel. I have nine crew members. That's nine families.
Again, I am one of 1,200 people who have invested and rationalized, which DFO forced us to do. And they did force us. We had no choice. If we wanted to survive and keep paying our bills, we had to rationalize. They took every other tool away from us.
So again, yes, we did get into the shrimp as a temporary licence, but in being told this was taking the place of the groundfish, and we did get a permanent licence, which I hold today.