Fisheries committee  Yes, I can respond to that. Part of the premise of my presentation was that there's access within the bands that could provide a moderate livelihood. I don't see the need, because most of this access is being leased out and fished by people outside of the bands. Then there has to be a second competing fishery, but there are a lot of people in my community here who wanted to get access to the fishery and couldn't get access to it.

Fisheries committee  I agree. I think that there's a lot of information out there, but I still think the whole aspect of the partnership between the fishing industry and the federal government in conservation and protection is not being taken into account. Generally speaking, as Kevin says, it's up to the committee to decide when it has enough information.

Fisheries committee  I think the main concern of the fishing industry is the capacity of the fishing industry and the regulations that have been brought in to limit the amount of stock coming out. As has been proven, the fishing industry has the capacity to clean the ocean out. The reason there's a great stock of lobsters there now is that they're left in the water because of the regulations that are in place.

Fisheries committee  What I can say is that we're under a lot of pressure from the Marine Stewardship Council. We have certification and all the assessments of our fishery that have been done. The harvest control rules had to be adjusted in order to pass that certification. It's important that we have that certification.

Fisheries committee  Yes, it was.

Fisheries committee  Yes, for sure.

Fisheries committee  As I said, everybody thought they had a perfect solution to this issue in 1999. This is causing a lot of problems. There also seems to be some restructuring taking place there now.

Fisheries committee  I think up until now we've had a really acceptable relationship with DFO. We appreciate that there are various sectors and various interests in the fishery. Over the years I've always thought they did a relatively good job at managing. We had a good working relationship with the department.

Fisheries committee  I'm going to make it clear—and I'm not a constitutional expert—that I see some of the activity that has taken place, and the self-implementation of the fishery, as a challenge to the jurisdiction of the government. It's not agreed to. It's not agreed to by either the federal government, as far as I know, or industry.

Fisheries committee  Yes. As I said in my opening statement, that action and response was inappropriate. It was certainly premature. There was a lot of education—

Fisheries committee  There is a lack of information and there's a question over jurisdiction within this country that has to be settled. We're dealing with an issue here on which the federal government has supremacy. That's my opinion.

Fisheries committee  I don't really think they have such a small access to it. The figures show that there's at least a proportionate amount, and maybe double the proportionate amount, of access to the fishery. We do have a limited and a fully subscribed fishery.

Fisheries committee  Well, I think that in the statement I just made, I recognized the authority of the federal government to manage the fishery.

Fisheries committee  Yes, I understand that.

Fisheries committee  I pretty well answered that question. The negotiators went to the table in 1999 and came up with the best possible solution at that time. That's our opinion. I'm not a legal expert—