It's the perception that there's a linkage between what the Cultus exploitation rate might be in 2006 and the perception that the department was coercing or somehow forcing individuals to accept a higher exploitation rate for recognizing first nations fisheries. It's a false assertion; it is not correct.
As I've indicated, the fact is that the department would definitely like to see groups come together and agree on exploitation. We think it's a more desirable approach than the department simply trying to arbitrate. The department will analyze what the groups come up with relative to our objectives before providing advice to the minister. In no way was there any pressure, coercion, or direction provided to parties that we would agree to a certain level of exploitation rate only if they agreed to something in lieu of that.
In respect to the issue of attrition on the Fraser River, we have an attrition issue generally within the department and certainly in the Pacific region. Frankly, we're an aging public service and a number of people are retiring, fishery officers, scientists, and others.
Our challenge on the Fraser River is to meet the direction from our minister. The minister indicated that he would like to see our enforcement effort on the Fraser equivalent to what it was in 2005, which was augmented over 2004. At a time when we're still faced with the reality that in some cases we have an aging workforce, particularly scientists and fishery officers, some of those people are exiting, leaving, or retiring.
The challenge for us in 2006 is to maintain the same level of fishery officer effort on the Fraser River that we had in 2005, in the face of the demographics that we have. That is what we are planning to do and what we intend to do, but it will be a challenge.