Industry committee  I'd be happy if they'd just leave us alone--

Industry committee  --and not try to improve things for us.

Industry committee  I'll deal with the first one very briefly. You're looking at almost an extinct species, in the sense that Mr. Irving's company and our company are probably among the few vessel-owning companies that work both internationally and domestically with Canadian flag vessels.

Industry committee  You could write a book on this, so I won't bore you. There's a whole series of policies in place, but if you work in Canada, you have to have Canadian flag vessels, and you have to have Canadian crews. But I'll tell you this: the thing that separates us from our competitors are o

Industry committee  From an Atlantic Canadian perspective, the danger from a vessel ownership standpoint in a company such as ours, but also in the broader industry.... For example, we have a whole host of suppliers that have been developed here in Atlantic Canada that support our company. There is

Industry committee  No, there was no commitment.

Industry committee  I didn't ask it in that particular way. In a general sense, I said that before they negotiate, analysis should be done. If they get the analysis during the course of the negotiation, then I assume they would send that to us. But I can ask that question.

Industry committee  I can answer that simply. I have requested that in several letters and have received no analysis, and negotiations have commenced.

Industry committee  You have to appreciate that if you look at the North Sea there are two distinct sectors: there's the British sector and there's the Norwegian sector. We work happily in the British sector. It's open. It's under EEC rules in terms of procurement and so on, and that eliminates prot

Industry committee  Absolutely.

Industry committee  I had one sort of...I'll call it a response, not an answer. You know how you can send a paper back that is a response but that doesn't shed any light whatsoever? I had one of those to an e-mail I waited for from an official for about six weeks or so.

Industry committee  Sure, yes, I can send you copies of all the correspondence. To be fair, what we're asking for really is for the government to have...and it's difficult. When you go to meetings, one person speaks but about twenty people are in the room. I don't know what they do; they go back to

Industry committee  I'll try to tackle the first one, dealing with EFTA. Let me just give you a little bit of history so you have the context. About four years ago, the previous government came forward with a proposal to have a trade agreement with EFTA. Supported by the Conservative Party, the Bl

Industry committee  As a vessel-owning company, we're not as concerned about Korea. They don't build, or don't have the expertise in, the types of ships we build. They generally build larger vessels. Plus there's the geographic distance. Norway, being in the North Sea, is relatively close. It's ea

Industry committee  Yes, I did.