We think that regular maintenance and dredging for six or seven years at Pointe-Verte would have been enough. When they came 18 years ago for the first time to dig, they had to dynamite most of the wharf. When 10,000 metres of rocks are left in the corner of the wharf from the outset, that's an indication that not everything was planned and that there was no follow-up. If a private business worked like that it would go bankrupt pretty quickly.
There has to be a little more consistency when a wharf project is undertaken and people become responsible for a wharf. We're asked to draw up business plans, but even though we send them off, there is never any follow-up to those plans. Or it takes so many years that we have to redo those business plans again and again. As we stated earlier, we're all volunteers and we're not directly involved in administration. I am a fisherman and I cannot spend all my time on the phone talking with someone in Ottawa or elsewhere. It's starting to take a lot of time. I almost need a secretary. When you think about it, we don't have the means to do this. Fortunately there are places where people do carry out those responsibilities. The amount of work is enormous.
I would like to add a point about major and smaller wharfs. What is true—and I don't mean this to be discrimination—is that major wharfs and smaller wharfs should have different budgets. And that has already been stated. I understand that situation of major wharfs. Many vessels come in. I've been to Shippagan and to Lamèque and I know that there are parts of the wharf where berthing is impossible because it's in such a state of disrepair. I understand. I also understand that all the money goes into one pot and everybody has to compete for it.
Elections were being talked about earlier but that is not what is important. It's the person who knows people who knows other people who know the right people who will get the money. That is the reality. That's the only way of getting money for a wharf. If a friend, or his son knows a member of Parliament who knows the minister in Ottawa, then he stands a very good chance of getting money for his project.
That is how things work in small outfits. We have ended up acting like dogs fighting over a bone.