Minister, there seems to be a convergence here of a whole number of issues, a number of files.
In the WTO draft agreement on fisheries subsidies, it specifically states in article V on fisheries management that a country's domestic fisheries practices would be challengeable by WTO members. In fact, what it says is that each member state:
shall adopt and implement pertinent domestic legislation and administrative or judicial enforcement mechanisms. It is desirable that such fisheries management systems be based on limited access privileges.
It goes on to describe that under annex VIII, for every country, their own domestic management practices could be challengeable within the WTO as to whether they meet a conservation standard.
We also have sort of a convergence here with NAFO. The NAFO draft convention, the proposed changes to the convention, includes the possibility of NAFO control not only in the regulatory area outside the 200 miles, but as well, via consensus, inside the regulatory area, basically the entire convention area inside 200 miles. In other words, NAFO could be a stand-in for the WTO's adjudication of whether or not a WTO member country's domestic fisheries management practices are in the best interest of conservation. NAFO would then be the judge of a WTO challenge, as I see it.
You also have the new fisheries act, Bill C-32, which actually, in clause 43, allows you as minister the right to establish fisheries management agreements with other outside bodies, other than the Government of Canada.
There seems to be a very unique coincidence here, a whole number of domestic and foreign policy issues that seem to be converging on the ability for outside interests, other than Canadian domestic policy, to judge or decide on Canadian fisheries management practices. Is this just a coincidence?