Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for his remarks about the bill. I believe he and his colleagues are starting to learn that even though there may be certain things in the bill with which they do not agree or with which they have concerns, and I appreciate that because it has always been that way and that is why we developed the legislation, he has admitted that there is a lot of good in the bill.
In every fishing province, the ministers and the governments involved have said to get on with it, get this bill to committee so we can get into the nuts and bolts and make the changes.
I want to refer quickly to a couple of things the hon. member mentioned. He talked about his concerns about the tribunal and no recourse to tribunal decisions. There is recourse. If a decision is made that will negatively affect somebody, there is the Federal Court. The main reason the tribunal was put in place was to have an arm's length, independent group that would take the politics out of who gets the licence and who does not. I am sure the hon. member would agree with me that too often in the past we saw games played along those lines.
In relation to the word “transfer”, I fully appreciate his concern. However, there is no change at all from the old act, none whatsoever. Transfer is just a term of practice. We cancel a licence and reissue it to somebody else, because the person receiving the licence has to be somebody who qualifies. He has to be a core fisherman. We just cannot transfer a licence on a whim to somebody who is not connected. That is the problem in the fishery, where people are trying to get other people out of it so that those who remain can make a living. The wording in the new bill in clause 30(1) is the same as the fishing regulations in the old act. The word “practice”, to practice itself on change, but if there is wording that can give the member more security, absolutely. It is not crucial that it has to be written like that if it is not clear.
On the other issues he talked about in relation to trust agreements and so on, we are aware of that. We have had discussions with groups. Some I have sympathy with, some I do not. As the member knows, people took advantage of that over the years for personal gain. People involved in the fishery want to benefit from it. They do not want people who are not necessarily connected raking in profits when they should be going to those on the ground. There are things that can be done, but these are done in regulations. They have nothing to do with the act, so--