Fisheries committee  Ms. Desbiens, I'm a bit confused about this. We were happy when our current Minister of Fisheries and Oceans was appointed. She's from our region and she knows the fishing industry well, having grown up there. I liked to say at the time—and Jean Lanteigne could corroborate this, as could Jason Spingle—that she was going to favour coastal communities in her announcements.

Fisheries committee  If we don't, we'll all be contributing to the decline of the fisheries sector in Canada. The general culture in this sector is the same as it was before Jacques Cartier, when the Basques came to Canada to fish as much as they could in order to fill their boats before returning with their cargo to Europe.

Fisheries committee  I can already tell you that, in order to rationalize Quebec's shrimp fleet, we would have to spend $26 million to buy back half the licences. Does the government really want to reduce the number of fishermen? We have to ask the question and get a clear answer too.

Fisheries committee  I don't think anyone can give you that figure today. What we're looking for right now is ways to overcome the current crisis. You know as well as I do that redfish will not help solve the problems of 2024.

Fisheries committee  Firstly, it's not so much about adding redfish quotas to independent fishermen as it is about the first part of the quota allocation that needs to be given to fishermen. We can't have a disastrous allocation key, like the one announced on January 26. This will be the first part of the solution, which will allow bankers to tell our shrimpers to be a little more patient before giving up.

Fisheries committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. For the purposes of this exercise, I will refer to the documentation available from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, or DFO. I'll start by reminding the committee that in 2019, amendments were made to the Fisheries Act to provide a framework for the conservation and protection of fish and fish habitats.