Fisheries committee  I'd like to add to what George said, and this is one example. If we want to look at it from a Transport Canada perspective--and we're here on account of both DFO and Transport Canada. I've said it in Ottawa, and George said it, regardless of what size you can have, what size you're allowed to have, or what size you should have, if we get to the point that the proposed regulations come in from a Transport Canada perspective and restrict someone in getting a new vessel because of stability, because of fire extinguishers, because of carriage requirement, or whatever, actually--and this is to help what George said--you are going to get a person staying in his existing vessel a lot longer time, to conduct fisheries in a dilapidated boat over time, because he can't afford the brand new one.

Fisheries committee  Yes, sir, I am very aware of it. Two points. One, the RIAS is mandatory in this particular situation. But first let's go back to what we were referring to earlier, that a lot of the talks are around Transport Canada's new proposed fishing vessel regulations. That's just one segment of the reform of the Canada Shipping Act, 2001; for you parliamentary people, it's called Bill C-14.

Fisheries committee  I'd like to address some of that. Gary might want to add to it. Let's look at southwest Nova Scotia and let's look at the trap fishery, not the one you see on the Discovery Channel off the coast of Alaska but the one off Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I., and, for that matter, Newfoundland.

Fisheries committee  I'll agree primarily with that statement, but we don't even necessarily have to go to the stability. If we want to look after the cod moratorium in 1993, a lot of Newfoundland fishermen were uncertain about their futures as fishermen. Some of them reintroduced some of their inactive licences, and one of them was for crab.

Fisheries committee  George, yes. George died in that particular accident. With that vessel, it was an accident where the power block snatch locked, and the catch they had went to the bottom and pulled it over. Yet that vessel had full stability booklet. You'll find that many vessels that have gone down have had full stability booklets.

Fisheries committee  There's never been an issue of whether the traditional Cape Island-style lobster fishing boat or the Northumberland-style lobster fishing crab boat that we see.... I'm not going to talk about some that have been modified to such heights, and galleys and everything else, but the traditional ones.

Fisheries committee  In answer to that, on May 2, 2006, in Ottawa at the CMAC, in its Standing Committee on Fishing Vessel Safety, there was a presentation made, and I know Melanie, Lisa, and George will remember this. I can't remember the name of the individual who did it, but it's on the record, and we've since corresponded through the NSBA on this particular issue.

Fisheries committee  I may still try. But it's the hardest one to manipulate.

Fisheries committee  That's my stand. As a representative of my own company, Wedgeport Boats Limited, as president of that, and wearing that hat, I still believe in what I say from that perspective, and representing the interests of the NSBA and the feedback from them, the length for the fishing restrictions should be left to the fishermen within the guidelines of the mandate of DFO.

Fisheries committee  Yes. I want to touch base first on the stability issue, and I'll highlight a couple of other things to emphasize what Lisa said earlier. Then I'll make some comments on the length restriction or the restriction of vessels. In Lisa's report she mentioned statistics basically for the maritime region from 2002-03.