Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Ms. Desbiens, for educating us on this issue. We've talked about it briefly, and yesterday, I did some research in my hotel room when I had a bit of spare time. There are a couple of things in your letter I'd like to clarify.
In your letter, you said the capelin fishery usually opened on April 1 in your region, but according to what I found, the fishery has always started on May 1. You also expressed some concerns.
You told me that numerous discussions with Fisheries and Oceans Canada had taken place to have the opening date changed to April 1, but to my knowledge, no such regulation was the subject of a decision.
As you know, Ms. Desbiens, before a decision can be made as to whether the fishery can begin on April 1, a stock assessment has to be conducted. According to the information I was able to obtain, the stock assessment will be carried out around April 20, so even if the committee were to meet next week or this week, I don't think there's much we could do to have the fishery open on April 1. I'm not saying I don't think the committee should meet; I am simply saying that, even if we do hold the meeting, we probably won't be able to get the decision changed. I do, however, think it's worth looking into the matter.
I'm not sure whether you met with the fishers, but I should point out that, last year, one of them committed an illegal fishing violation by fishing before the season opened. That is something to be concerned about as well.
Were you aware of these things? Did you know the stock assessment was scheduled to be carried out around April 20? Perhaps we could meet with the minister and her officials after the break weeks since we are past April 1.