Thank you very much.
I appreciate the testimony.
Mr. Gibb, you're certainly welcome to come to my farm. I have nine beaver houses on my farm; they certainly need to be controlled.
This was a very important study to do, but I want to make it perfectly clear that Mr. Howie and the Association for the Protection of Fur-Bearing Animals was not a witness suggested by the Conservatives. I think it's very important to get that on the record.
I will make the point, as well, Mr. Howie, that your testimony was interesting, but I am looking at a February 5 article where you say: “Our goal is to bring an end to the commercial fur trade and to find non-lethal solutions to wildlife conflicts, which would in turn largely eliminate the need for trapping.” To be perfectly clear, your organization wants to see an end to fur trapping in Canada.
On your other point, where you talked about the “bias” of biologists who are funded by perhaps hunting and trapping organizations, most of those organizations have very small amounts of money. I think it's very important to point out that The Humane Society of the United States has a budget of $60 million a year. So when we talk about bias we need to be very clear about what the real story is.
Mr. Cahill, could you please tell the committee how important this study is?