Transport committee  It's an excellent question, Mr. Watson. The short answer would be spring. If all of this could be done with final proclamation by spring, that would be the best. I'll reflect back to what I said earlier. Trade is projected to double by 2020, and that is 11 years away. We simply

Transport committee  On the first question, Mr. Watson, as one of the smaller ports in size and revenue we are very pleased to see government's advance in two specific areas. One is the access, as you say, to federal funding. It's not on an unequal footing; it's just making the playing field more lev

Transport committee  My colleague said yesterday.

Transport committee  I know others will want to speak on that as well. First and foremost, going forward, if the bill passes as it is constructed currently, there will be two levels of ports, tier one and tier two, for the purposes of borrowing. A code, which is yet to be finalized, would require mo

Transport committee  We are bound, though, by fair market value as well. We wouldn't be able to undercut for the sake of getting the commercial endeavour to move on the other side of the fence.

Transport committee  Mr. Masse, we have seen no consensus about moving away from the current situation, that being that we have at each port an external audit. Many ports have taken on internal audits. Also, we currently have, under the Canada Marine Act, a special examination that must be undertaken

Transport committee  We feel that it's covered by the three things I just mentioned.

Transport committee  Thank you, Mr. Masse. Yes, go ahead, Gary.

Transport committee  Gordon or Gary, would you like to take that?

Transport committee  I can give you two answers. I think they're complementary, but I'll let you judge.

Transport committee  The first one, to be rather strict, is that this is a pure division-of-powers constitutional argument, and that was decided and set by the Supreme Court of Canada in June 2007. So that's the cold, calculated answer. The second part of it is that I can't speak from an association

Transport committee  Yes. I'll let Captain Houston give input there, sir, but I will say one thing that I forgot to say earlier, and that is, there's a schedule to the letter of patent that constitutes each port authority, which restricts the level and the types of activities that each port can under

Transport committee  Pardon me, sir?

Transport committee  Yes, and that was my second point. There is a seat on the board of directors to be nominated from the municipality in which the port resides. So yes, there is also a person there as well as a policy charge. Third, particularly in smaller ports such as St. John's, there is contin

Transport committee  Mr. Volpe, I know that Patrice Pelletier would like to say something. Would you like to answer specifically to that, or shall I?