Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans seems to be missing the point when it comes to trawlers and quotas in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. He said yesterday about the quotas, “whether they catch it in a dory or in the Queen Mary, it does not make any difference”.
The current uproar in P.E.I. is not related to the quotas. Everybody knows the quotas have not been changed. The uproar is over the use of this specific type of fishing gear which has proven destructive to stocks in other areas.
The minister knows full well that this type of gear has never been used in the gulf for this very reason. Local fishermen are concerned about the safety of the herring and bycatch stocks and have questioned the research methods used by DFO to estimate the health of the stocks.
Until we can be assured that midwater trawlers will not decimate the herring industry, it is best to err on the side of caution, which is what DFO is supposed to do.
If the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans thinks that jigging from a dory is no different from dragging a net the size of five football fields through the ocean, he is obviously very dismissive of the valid concerns of people who make their livings from the sea.