I think the B.C. spot prawn fishery is a prime example of that. The leasing prices for that fishery in the last couple of years have been between $40,000 and $60,000 to access that licence. At the same time, in 2022, the overall coastwide fleet catch of spot prawns was in half. For that lease price to stay high, while the catch rate is going down, doesn't make a lot of sense.
At this point in time, instead of going out and fishing myself, taking the risk of fishing and possibly not catching enough prawns, and also taking on all of the financial burden of getting out on the water—my boat, fuel, food with inflation, the cost of everything rising, packaging, paying my crew, etc.—if I could just sit at home, lease that licence and earn that much money, that would be incredible. It's incredibly tempting to owners to access that, especially some of the older folks who are getting on in their careers. Rather than taking that risk, they can sit at home. Having a system that actually incentivizes that doesn't make any sense.
I firmly believe that if fishers were leasing to fishers, the leasing price would be more respective of what they could potentially earn from the fishery.