Fisheries committee  I have noted your questions. They are quite specific. We can provide that information for you. Subsequently, we can provide you with explanations about what the figures mean so that you will be well informed when we visit these sites.

Fisheries committee  We have the same situation in Quebec.

Fisheries committee  There's no problem getting the specific information you requested. If, later on, you want more details, information and explanations, we would have to look at the situation with you and with the departmental authorities to determine how we can respond to your request.

Fisheries committee  That is 40 per cent of the operations and maintenance budget.

Fisheries committee  On average, the figure is $1.5 million a year for dredging. In the operations and maintenance budget, which varies slightly, the figure is approximately $3.5 million.

Fisheries committee  I could begin, and then allow my colleagues to talk about the problems in their regions. In Quebec, the facilities have deteriorated quite substantially. As I said earlier, the average age of the facilities is between 25 and 35 years. The problem is that we are at a stage where

Fisheries committee  I think your question is very important. It's very important for the department to count on their work to do the job. That's why it's very important for us to delegate some of the maintenance work to the harbour authorities. It's very important because I think we can save a lot o

Fisheries committee  They are involved in the process and they can manage minor projects. For example, in the Quebec region we delegate a lot of work to the harbour authorities. It's clear to us that we saved a lot of money in doing that. They don't always have the knowledge to manage these types of

Fisheries committee  Another thing is, we have to meet a lot of standards. Very often they don't know exactly what the impacts are to do a job. But we have to explain and we have to teach them how we have to realize these types of projects.

Fisheries committee  To answer Mr. Asselin's specific questions, we take a very transparent approach with port authorities and users when it comes to sharing the information we have about the facilities, the priorities and the reasons why we sometimes make one decision rather than another. This can a

Fisheries committee  We are involved in a process to....

Fisheries committee  We don't know at this point. I think we have to work on that to find what criteria there are, maybe the good ones for the future of the program, and in which way we are going to allocate the funds in the future. But you know the challenges are very big. We have a lot of challeng

Fisheries committee  We will see at the end of the process.

Fisheries committee  Maybe I could add something to that. We have a very big problem in Quebec region with dredging because we spend between 30% and 40% approximately of our maintenance budget on dredging. That's had a very bad impact on maintenance projects. But we receive from the small craft harb

Fisheries committee  I can try to answer your question. In most cases, when a port has little or no activity, the department's mandate is really to provide services to support the commercial fishery. In some cases, there are social considerations involved in the closing down of a wharf. Most of the t