Fisheries committee  We received many, many comments. We made changes where there was a consensus. As you see from the changes from Bill C-45 to Bill C-32, there weren't a great number, but those were the areas where there had been consensus from the interested parties, stakeholders, etc. The rest of the comments could be diametrically opposed.

Fisheries committee  Clearly a number of fisheries in the Pacific have already gone to ITQ. In that situation the individual transferable quotas did result in adjusting the effort in accordance with the available quota and having more efficient use of the capital and labour in those fisheries. It did, however, have impacts on coastal communities in the west.

Fisheries committee  Tuna is an iconic fish and it is obviously in trouble. Canada has worked with some of the other countries in ICAAT to try to prevent setting quotas too high. We have not been successful. It's been fished to a level much higher than scientists advise and it's also been overfished.

Fisheries committee  I think it's clear that the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation is subject to the same kinds of pressures that the fishing industry is more generally. The increased Canadian dollar, competition from China, etc., have put a lot of downward pressure on prices paid to fishermen, and that always causes some concerns.

Fisheries committee  Moving the 0A-0B line would be a significant bit of work. We share stocks with Greenland in that area. We are subject to receiving advice from the NAFO Scientific Council with respect to some of the species in that area. The whole convention there for NAFO would have to be reconsidered in terms of where they want to draw those lines, and that would be a fairly lengthy process.

Fisheries committee  Clearly the 2004 brood year was not a good year. We also are looking at significant changes in ocean survival in the Pacific. We've had different oceanographic conditions that the fish have been dealing with. The current estimated return would not provide a lot of economic opportunities for commercial fishermen.

Fisheries committee  The discussions have enabled us to increase total catches and to have a sustainable fishery. Obviously, quotas and sharing total catches still pose problems. So the discussions must continue. We can't solve all the problems and have peace on the water. The discussions have to continue every year in order to solve the problems that arise from time to time and to improve fisheries management.

Fisheries committee  Yes, that's what I'm saying.

Fisheries committee  On the Flemish Cap there was no great interest in catching the redfish, given the size, the cost, and so on.

Fisheries committee  Obviously, just like Canadian companies, Canada wants to make the best use of the available quotas that are provided under the NAFO process. In some cases, that means that where we have fish that we can't fish effectively or economically we'll trade that fish and get an exchange, for example in this case, redfish for shrimp.

Fisheries committee  If I may add, though, the minister may enter into agreements with groups of fishermen, for example, legally constituted bodies that would represent a majority of the fishermen. If there's somebody who doesn't want to pay and 90% of the people do, then there would be the capacity under the new act in order to extract the cash from the fishermen, with their concurrence generally, but those who were not willing to pay would still have to pay.

Fisheries committee  We are changing the way the hunt is managed to slow it down, to provide people more time to conduct it in a more humane way. It is humane, but we want to make it even more so. There are changes to the marine mammal regulations that are now being consulted on, where we are looking at additional steps that should be taken.

Fisheries committee  I don't have, off the top of my head, all the details around the northern shrimp fishery. As you are aware, it's an extraordinarily complex allocation key, and I can't say how we made those adjustments, off the top of my head—whether it went back to the offshore interests, where most of it came from, and that they are now able to fish that without the strings attached.

Fisheries committee  There are well over 100 of these arrangements. There could be as many as 165, or perhaps close to 200. We'll get you the full list. The one you're using as an example, involving the Northern Coalition, was for an allocation that was used to fund science in the north, in shrimp fishing areas 1 and 2.

Fisheries committee  It will be more complex to manage in this way because we have spatial and temporal closures required. We have that type of activity. We need to realign our science and management programs. I don't think we can ever know everything, but we need to know enough and have a broad enough picture that we can make informed decisions, and we need to work with the industry to deal with these things.