The member can say not true all he likes. I know full well it is true. He can have his chance when he stands in his place in debate. He can stand in his place and give his side of the story and we will see then what he supports for the people of Atlantic Canada.
There have been some concerns raised about Bill C-27, particularly about the procedures of boarding and what happens after our enforcement officers board a vessel. There are those who still think and are saying publicly that we must have approval of the flag state before we board a vessel.
I have been briefed by officials from foreign affairs and DFO and I comfortable and accept that this is not the case. Our enforcement officers can board those vessels if they see fit and when they desire. If they find a violation then quite naturally out of courtesy they have to notify the flag state, the state from which the vessel hails. That is only common courtesy. Then there is a three day period in which the flag state has to respond. The flag state can respond in a number of ways. It can try to contact another patrol vessel in the area, a NAFO patrol vessel, send it to the ship and then the Canadian people will move off and the NAFO vessel will take over. If the flag state does not respond in three days and that lack of response is concurrence with what has happened, then the Canadian authorities can take that vessel to port.
As a member of parliament and a person very concerned with this type of legislation because of all the implications for the people I represent, I feel the legislation is a move in the right direction. It will enable us to better enforce the high seas. It will enable us to better detect violations on the high seas and it will enable us to deal with those situations which for years have gone on undetected in a lot of cases but which when detected nothing has happened to the violators.
I would be remiss if I did not mention the Estai affair which got so much attention in this country just a few years ago. We used force on the high sees and fired a shot across the bow of the Estai and brought the vessel to St. John's, Newfoundland. We found juvenile turbot caught by a liner in a net of the Estai . It was an international incident.
What is ironic is that after all the kerfuffle and the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent in that arrest, using our military vessels and our coast guard vessels, putting the crew of the Estai up in the Hotel Newfoundland, an approximate cost of $100,000, the end result was that the Estai was given back to the Spanish, the fish were given back to the Spanish, including the juvenile turbot, and the half a million dollar court bond that was posted by the Estai was given back to the company.
It cost $100,000 of taxpayer money to wine and dine the Spaniards in the Hotel Newfoundland and the costs that were incurred in the enforcement and the actual arrest of the vessel. We all remember Captain Canada. That was the end result of the Estai affair.
The legislation in my view will certainly improve on those kinds of situations. By merely signing on to the agreement, the people and the countries involved in the agreement are going to concur and subject themselves to boarding and enforcement, even in NAFO regulatory areas where before they would come in and not be subjected to any kind of enforcement. Because they are a part of the agreement, when they fish in NAFO areas they will now be subject to NAFO regulations, a very important step forward.
I want to go back again to the situation we face in Newfoundland and Atlantic Canada today. I plead with the Government of Canada to move quickly in responding to the needs of those thousands of Atlantic Canadians. There is a big economic and social problem in Atlantic Canada and it has been caused by the downturn in our groundfish industry.
The fishery in Atlantic is by no ways dead. The export value of the fishery in Newfoundland and Labrador last year was $550 million, quite significant. What has happened is that people have diversified into other species. What we once called underutilized species are no longer underutilized. There are no fish inside our 200 mile limit today that are underutilized. They are all very valuable, resources we have to value add to and create more employment and more value for our people.
I plead with the Government of Canada to deal with the very serious crisis because it is a crisis, as I have said before, that has been caused by years and years of bad management decisions. Fish given to foreigners is totally a decision of the Government of Canada. The number of vessels that fish any one particular stock of fish is decided by the Government of Canada. The size of the vessels is decided by the Government of Canada. The harvesting technology, whether it is a gill net, a cod trap or a stern trawler, is approved and concurred in by the Government of Canada. The amount of fish that has been allowed to be harvested over all these years on an annual basis has been decided by the Government of Canada.
All of those decisions have been decisions of successive governments of Canada. They have contributed to and caused this very serious problem. This government has to accept its responsibility to Atlantic Canadians.
Fish stocks have not regenerated as quickly as we thought they would. Some of the southern stocks are showing signs of improvement, but northern cod definitely is not. It is the responsibility of the Government of Canada to look out for those people whose lives have been ruined. It is going to take another five or ten years for this situation to improve and for fish stocks to regenerate.
People's lives have been ruined because successive governments have decimated their fish stocks. Those governments were the custodian of the fish stocks. It is the responsibility of the Government of Canada to look after these people until the stocks regenerate and they have a future working in the industry. In most cases it is the only job these people ever had. I plead with the government to do that.