Fisheries committee  None, sir. I will say, as a point of clarification, that the crab fishery in particular has approximately 10 or 12 companies, and it runs from very small family businesses that have been ongoing for 30 years, up to Royal Greenland, which has very deep pockets. That's the complexion of these processing companies, and there are no penalties.

Fisheries committee  Not all companies rely on larger companies. Some of these smaller companies have long-established relationships in both Asia and the United States. Some of those relationships go back over 30 years. I acknowledge that some companies use OCI and Royal Greenland for marketing purposes.

Fisheries committee  First of all, for everybody's benefit, it's not everybody. There are a number of harvesters who would not participate in that for fairly obvious reasons. There could be repercussions from the company if they spoke out against the process. I think that would be perhaps the primary issue here.

Fisheries committee  Yes, I have an opinion. It is absolutely remarkable that we have a tie-up on the crab fishery. Just to put that in perspective, last year it was about an $850-million fishery. This year it stopped, and the other things that stopped with it were lobster.... By the way, lobster was settled through a formula, so there are no secrets or surprises.

Fisheries committee  I agree. Surveys are pretty ineffectual in dealing with a situation like this, but if you go back to the provincial licence issue, if you have a provincial licence, there have to be consequences. First of all, you have to have a plan. What are you going to do with that provincial licence?

Fisheries committee  Thank you. If I can respond, first of all, one needs a permit, a licence from the province, to act as poorly as one does. Without that provincial licence, you can't manipulate, you can't obfuscate and you can't control. The initial fix to this is making sure that you have a licensing policy that actually is conducive to an orderly fishery.

Fisheries committee  No. The quick answer is no. We need a declaration. I think we need to restate what the policies are here, and we need some direct intervention on these companies. Nobody has been charged, not that there would be charges, but there could be charges. There could be legal issues here that have been contravened and need to be addressed.

Fisheries committee  I hope I didn't lose my time for that.

Fisheries committee  I'll take an extra minute. Thank you, Mr. Chair. On behalf of the 13,000 members of our union, thanks for the opportunity to address the honourable members today. We, the FFAW, represent every single harvester in this province, encompassing about 3,000 owner-operator enterprises and their over 7,000 crew members.