Transport committee  Yes, actually you know you have different levels of HNS and the liability regime is really the tail of the dog. Marine safety comes first. You want to avoid accidents and incidents, all of that. Number two is preparedness and response. There is a lot of work that is being done, currently, about developing a preparedness and response regime for HNS, so that's another pillar of a regime.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  From our perspective everything is here. Maybe in a couple of years Canada will want to move further, but for the time being, everything is here.

Transport committee  What we have a direct interest in is strictly part 4, the one on the implementation of the HNS convention. For the other parts we have only an indirect interest; we are not experts on that. Basically our submission is that part 4 move forward and that it become part of Canadian law, and we are fine with that at this stage.

Transport committee  I would say that, from our standpoint, Canada is overdue to be able to ratify the HNS convention and implement it because it's the first building block of the system. I might be afraid that this would be pushed back. Waiting to have a whole regime after the tanker panel finishes and it goes into all kinds of consultations again and so on and so forth, it might be years from now before we have these next amendments.

Transport committee  Under the conventions, yes, a shipowner's liability is capped. Then you have this international fund that is capped as well, so, if you don't have enough money, what do you do? Well, it's not in the convention; it is for each country to decide what they will do. One solution is, if you don't have enough money in the pot to pay for all the claimants, each claimant gets paid on a pro rata basis.

Transport committee  Yes, and also, remember that if over time, say 10 years from now, the international community, including all the signatory states, believe that this limit should be upgraded, there are provisions in the conventions to do that quickly.

Transport committee  No, I don't have any knowledge of such a big spill that would have happened. So what we know is that this limit hasn't been reached and is far from having been reached yet.

Transport committee  From an international shipowner's perspective, I guess it would have an indirect effect in terms of response in case of a spill at the terminal. But for us it's something that is indirect, and we didn't comment on that in our letter because it's not our direct liability or responsibility.

Transport committee  I would have to go back to it because you have a gradation depending on the size, so it's kind of complicated, but I can send you a table after this hearing. It's lower than the HNS convention.

Transport committee  Actually this general liability convention is being upgraded and amendments to the limits will come into force in 2015. It's been amended by a tacit amendment recently, and the upgrade will come into force in 2015, so I can send you upgraded limits in this note as well.

Transport committee  That question is for me?

Transport committee  Yes, that's the case.

Transport committee  It will be on a ship-by-ship basis. Each ship will have its own insurance and it will cover up to the limits of liability of the convention on civil liability for ships, which is currently incorporated via part 3 of the Marine Liability Act, because in shipping matters the liability of a ship is always capped at some point.