Thanks, because I think that cuts to really the heart of the issue confronting coastal communities throughout Canada. I've had the opportunity to meet people from all provinces and I think with different details on the problems.
The basic issue, core issue, is much the same all over the country in coastal communities: you've got an excessive amount of debt, a high cost of acquiring licences, no proper financing mechanism to enable that to take place, the baby boom generation moving through the workplace. While, yes, there are some younger people interested in becoming involved, it's not nearly in the same numbers as the older people who are moving through.
The combination of those factors is really an opportunity there. We shouldn't inflict the next generation of licence holders with the same problems as the current ones, which are not enough resource to go around and excessive debt load, but that will only happen with a real commitment by the two levels of government. I think there's a shared responsibility.
A good place to start would be some of the fees, to say that we'll take on some of the fees. The Government of Newfoundland recently reduced the processing licensing fees that they administer quite dramatically. They had jacked them up a few years ago, and in light of the circumstances rolled them back to basically nominal fees. I would certainly challenge the federal government to do likewise.
The fees are a big part of the cost of running these operations. It's one thing, as Clarence indicated earlier, in good times when you live with that and I suppose you choke it down, but when you're really squeezing every last penny to survive, then they take on a bigger importance.
So there really is a need for a strategic plan for the intergenerational transfer. If not, what Ray described will be the case over and over again with these communities just shrivelling up and dying, and there's no need for it. They can be vibrant places, there can be a future, but it takes a coordinated federal and provincial response with both parties coming to the table not only with policy but with dollars, because tinkering with policy won't fix it. It will need a commitment of dollars. Industry will have to play their share in that as well, but there has to be a shared effort in that regard if we're going to have any kind of meaningful and vibrant future in those communities.