Mr. Speaker, those are important questions. Let me start with specialty birds. I agree, there are birds that are much more valuable than that. What the hon. member said earlier about the genetics and the long line of some of these birds over a great deal of time is very worrisome.
In terms of my approach to it, and I have asked my officials to ensure that we look at these cases on a case by case basis, our overall goal is to move to depopulate that whole area. However, I want to start by depopulating those areas that are completely around the infected area where we believe there could be a spread of that disease.
The backyard flocks and some of these specialties I want to leave those until later on and work with these people to ensure we do not do something that is unnecessary. The belief by the best science that we know is that this is the approach we have to take. However, I want to ensure that maybe further on in the process if it is found that we have to take greater action with these specialty birds, that we do that, but I want to put them later on in the system. There is no question it is widely believed that this is the approach we need to take, but I understand that there is a problem.
We want to work with all groups. I noticed the hon. member mentioned earlier that he felt there was not enough consultation with some of these other groups. I think if he checks that, in fact there has been. I have asked my people to get out and talk to as many of these groups as quickly as possible so we have a better understanding of their situation.
However, he can well understand that it is just an enormous task and we have a lot of people. From across the country, we have brought in CFIA people and the provincial ministry has brought in people too. We are trying to get out and do as much of this consultation as possible. At the same time we are trying to hold open public consultations in case we miss people. We want to give them the chance to let us know their views and let us know more about their particular situation.
In terms of other compensation, it really is too early to get a good understanding of what impact this has. I think in terms of jobs, we will see as we begin to kill more birds, with the processing of those birds those jobs will be there. However, there are other areas and certainly the hon. member has brought them up.
In the areas we need to look at, our priority right now is to depopulate those areas. This is really where we are putting all of our efforts. These other issues will be talked about with the industry and provincial government, and those talks will continue to go on. However, with respect to our resources, they are now really in the area of trying to eradicate the disease.