The House met at 2:00 p.m.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Humber East.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. MERCER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

On Sunday past, it was my privilege to attend a Commissioning Service for sixteen men and women who will be going to Guatemala to undertake humanitarian work on behalf of the Corner Brook Pentecostal Tabernacle.

While in Guatemala these men and women will participate in the construction of a 50,000 square foot Vocational Training School to enable Guatemalan youth to learn meaningful trade skills, thereby allowing them to obtain employment and to participate in the continued development of their country.

This project, which will cost about $1,250,000 Canadian dollars, is spearheaded by the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada and is in addition to the basic literary schools which that Church already operates in Guatemala.

While in Guatemala these volunteers will also distribute baby blankets, clothing, medical packs and dental supplies to local hospitals. In a country where it is not uncommon for newborn babies to be sent home wrapped in newspaper, these supplies are badly needed.

Having voluntarily accepted an invitation to participate in this project, the Corner Brook Pentecostal Tabernacle took it upon itself to recruit volunteers, and to raise the considerable sums of money needed to finance travel to and from Guatemala and to contribute approximately $10,000 U.S. towards the construction of the school.

I ask this hon. House to join with me in congratulating the Corner Brook Pentecostal Tabernacle and volunteers Alfreda Cassell, Rhonda Andrews, Deanne Rice, Teara Gordon, Debbie, Michelle and Oral Small, Gloria Stacey, Sherri Ellsworth, Jason and Bob McGinn, Ross Coles, Herb Canning, Wade Smith, Dan Ellsworth and Ross Grimes for volunteering to partake in this truly humanitarian mission to Guatemala.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's East.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. OTTENHEIMER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Last Friday, April 12, I had the privilege of attending the Gonzaga High School graduation and senior prom. It was held at the Fairmont Newfoundland in the mist of the hustle and bustle of the Juno excitement.

Approximately 550 people attended including 236 graduates, their guests and their teachers. I am convinced that the future of this Province, Mr. Speaker, is boded well when we consider the personalities and capabilities of our bright young people.

Students graduating today are entering a world with opportunities that their grandparents and even their parents never dreamed of. Science, technology, medicine and so many other fields have broken through borders that we once thought were unbreakable.

In these careers and in many other disciplines - music, the arts, sports, business - we are proving ourselves capable in this Province of producing graduates who could rise to meet the challenges and excel in their chosen field.

It is incumbent on us to build on the successes so graduates like those from Gonzaga can turn their remarkable talents into opportunities for unprecedented growth here at home.

I sincerely hope that the vast majority of these 236 graduates will chose their native Newfoundland and Labrador as a place to live and prosper.

I wish to congratulate their Principal, Mr. Len White, and their graduation co-ordinating teacher, Mr. Kenneth Coffey, on the preparation of an excellent evening.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Port de Grave.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise in this hon. House today to congratulate the journalists of the Newfoundland and Labrador media who have been nominated for the Atlantic Journalism Awards, which will be presented on May 4 in Halifax. These awards recognize journalistic excellence in print and electronic news in the Atlantic Provinces, and while politicians and the media can sometimes have less than favorable relationships, Mr. Speaker, these local journalists are topnotch in their field and should be congratulated for their efforts.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: The nominees are as follows: VOCM News is nominated for two awards in Spot News Radio reporting;

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: From NTV News, photojournalist Bart Fraize has two nominations. From CBC Television in Newfoundland and Labrador, reporter Kevin Harvey has two nominations, along with Jane Adey and Doug Greer.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: From CBC Radio Newfoundland and Labrador, David Cochrane, as well as Scott Strong.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: And from The Telegram, Barb Sweet, Ryan Cleary and Rob Antle.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: The latter of which, Mr. Speaker, was nominated for a story published in the Atlantic Progress magazine.

All these nominees, Mr. Speaker, show the importance of our local media to our daily lives, and while we may not agree with everything they report, we should recognize their efforts.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The previous member forget to mention the Northeast Times.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to stand to recognize and congratulate St. Francis of Assisi School in Outer Cove on being awarded $10,000 worth of musical instruments.

Last Thursday, April 11, 2002, I attended a function at St. Francis of Assisi where the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Science presented Ms Donna Marie Kelly and the school band with sixteen new musical instruments, which include a Tenor Sax, French Horn, and various others. One of the requirements to win this award is that the school had to demonstrate something innovative. Ms Kelly, the music teacher, and the St. Francis of Assisi School Band travelled to different schools within the Province, which do not have school bands, every second year. They do this to put off workshops and to promote the need and benefits of school bands and they are to be congratulated for this, Mr. Speaker.

I would also like to thank the Ennis Sisters for attending and presenting the award on behalf of the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Science. So the Premier was not the only one with the Ennis Sisters this past week or so, Mr. Speaker. The Ennis Sisters also sang a few songs which were greatly enjoyed and appreciated by all in attendance.

This "Band Aid" Program of the CARAS is a wonderful program and benefits many students across this great country of Canada.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Carbonear-Harbour Grace.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SWEENEY: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I rise in this hon. House to congratulate Riverhead, Harbour Grace native Danny Cleary, who was added yesterday to Team Canada for the upcoming World Hockey Championships.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SWEENEY: While I am sure he is a little disappointed that his Edmonton Oilers did not make the playoffs this season, I am sure all Newfoundland and Labrador hockey fans will be watching his progress at the tournament in Sweden.

Cleary is a two-time Ontario Hockey League All Star and made the American Hockey League's Second All Star Team in 2000. He was Chicago's first pick, thirteenth overall in 1997, and was traded to Edmonton on March 20, 1999. In sixty-five games with Edmonton this season, he was the Oilers eighth leading scorer with ten goals and nineteen assists for twenty-nine points.

Mr. Speaker, I want to send my best of luck to Danny on behalf of all members of this House, and hope that Canada will continue to make its mark in international hockey circles with a World Hockey Championship to add to the Olympic Gold Medals already obtained this year.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Post-Secondary Education.

Mr. Speaker, in the Speech from the Throne that was delivered last month, the Province announced plans to develop a new institute for biodiversity and ecosystem science in partnership with Memorial University. To date there has been no announcement of the location of that facility. Mr. Speaker, Corner Brook has ideally positioned itself and worked extremely hard to build a strong reputation in the environmental sciences and staked out an niche where it hopes to diversify its economy.

Mr. Speaker, I would ask the minister, would she agree that Corner Brook is not only the right location but the only suitable location for this new institute which is a natural match between the existing Memorial campus and the huge base of environmental expertise that already exists in the area.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Youth Services and Post-Secondary Education.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS KELLY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I agree with the hon. member, that there is a good amount of expertise in this particular area and a decision has not been made contrary what many people both in Western Newfoundland and throughout the Province believe. This is under consideration. The allocation of funds has been put in place but no decision has been made as to how this money will be spent, how it will all be implemented. That is under review and meetings are being held now both with the university and within government because terms of reference, function, all of that has to be done before any final decisions are made.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am aware that no decision has been made. I think there was some confusion that arose over the last month as to whether a decision had been made or not. In light of that, since the institute is a new public sector science program in resource management and sustainable development jointly operated by the government and the university, it is an idea match for government's stated objective of locating public facilities and jobs to appropriate locations around the Province. It would be totally consistent with the statement of previous Premiers Tobin and Tulk.

Mr. Speaker, I would ask the minister: Will she write Memorial University, as I have, and tell them that this new facility should go to Corner Brook because it makes sense and it is a perfect match for government's existing policy?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Youth Services and Post-Secondary Education.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS KELLY: Mr. Speaker, at this time there is no need to write a letter to the university because we are meeting with the university - various government departments. As you know, there would be implications for the Tourism, Culture and Recreation Department, where the funds are coming from, from my own department, from the Department of Environment, and the university, and the other interested parties in this matter.

We anticipate that a decision will be made within the next few weeks. Mainly what has to be done now is a terms of reference and that sort of thing before you can make a decision. If we are to spend this money properly, we have to make sure that all the terms and conditions and everything are put in place, the policy behind the decision.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

What I would like to ascertain is, what is the position of this minister and her government. The President of the Humber Economic Development Council, Peter McBreairty, said that the new institute would, in fact, create a cluster of scientific and environmental institutes that will actually attract economic growth in the region.

Mr. Speaker, I would ask the minister that, in the light of the fact that Corner Brook has been largely ignored by this government and in fact does not have any Cabinet ministers in that area - I bring that to the attention of the hon. Member for Bay of Islands -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. WILLIAMS: - and the hon. Member for Humber East, that there is no Cabinet representation. In light of that fact, will government now make a commitment to the people of Corner Brook that it will do something about its future economic growth?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, it is nice to know that the Leader of the Opposition is in his standard form today of being totally inconsistent on behalf of the Opposition Party.

Mr. Speaker, The Telegram quoted, back in October, 2001, when the first phase of this particular opportunity to move wildlife services to Corner Brook was done by the government, that he was opposed to it. I assume he was speaking for the Opposition at the time. Now, because it seems to be convenient for the Member for Humber West, he is for it all of a sudden.

The Leader of the Opposition could probably be reminded of this: the institute at Memorial University is one part of a three-part plan announced by the government in the Budget. The institute is $150,000 that the government is providing to Memorial University because of the fact that, in fact, they have a whole science division and a research division of their own already established. And, Mr. Speaker, we respect the fact that they are an autonomous institution run by a Board of Regents that make the decisions. We do not order. As a matter of fact, if he checked the legislation he will find out that the government cannot order the university to do anything. We can provide the money and, as the minister pointed out, we are meeting with them because our belief is that if it makes sense, and if it fits in with the rest of the government's plan to have the wildlife division located in Corner Brook, which the Opposition objected to when it was done last fall, were totally against it.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: They said, Mr. Speaker, that the $2 million for the lab was a waste of money. They said, and I quote here, the member speaking for the Opposition said: It is not time for the government to be doing things that don't need to be done.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: That was their position in October and now -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Ferryland.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions today are to the Minister of Finance. Government is in the process of changing the Public Service Pension Plan from one that is being controlled by government to a giant trusteeship. There are currently over 10,000 pensioners receiving pension under this plan.

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the minister: Will those retired pensioners have a say in the planning of that trusteeship, and will they have representation on the Board of Trustees when it is up and running in less than a years' time?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Our government was perhaps one of the most progressive in the country when we agreed to negotiate a joint trustee management arrangement for our Public Service Pension Plan. Right now, we are in the process - right now government is the sole trustee of the pension plan. We have a number of beneficiaries, including those retired and currently in the system that will be future beneficiaries. We are aware of all the parties and we are working with all the parties. What we have said to the Pensioners' Association, which I am sure the Leader of the Opposition may have had an opportunity to speak with their representative today, is that we are working on an approach which we believe we have made a proposal to the unions, which we believe will recognize all the party's needs and interests. We are currently awaiting a response from the unions, and as a courtesy to the process we would prefer to wait for that.

As we told the Pensioners' Association this week, before we get into the public details of that we recognize our responsibilities as a trustee of a very important, now 50 per cent funded pension plan, and we will do everything to ensure that all of the parties are represented at the table as they have been previously when we were the sole trustee of the plan.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for Ferryland.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SULLIVAN: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

They are waiting for an answer. They requested the Premier in their presence today and the Leader of the NDP but nobody had the courtesy to come out and even speak to them and discuss it with them. I want to say, Mr. Speaker, the Public Service Pension Plan has assets of $1.5 billion and a significant portion of that was paid by these retired pensioners.

Now, about 30 per cent of these people today were never represented by any bargaining unit and there is a similar number of people in the public service today who are not represented by any bargaining unit.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member is on a supplementary, I ask him to get to his question.

MR. SULLIVAN: I want to ask the minister, who will speak for these people? Should these people have a direct input, a direct voice, and a vote, I might say, in how their future income is managed?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Finance and President of Treasury Board.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, I think it is very important for the people of the Province to understand that the Pensioners' Association were informed prior to today of our plans and what has happening. The member opposite would like to leave the impression that we have ignored these people or we would not speak to them. In fact, Mr. Speaker, they were made aware of the issue that I just previously raised.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS J.M. AYLWARD: No, Mr. Speaker. The member is mumbling, I cannot quite hear what he is saying but I am sure he will have another opportunity to speak to it.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Maybe he will stand up and say it again, that is quite true.

Mr. Speaker, it is important to know that the representative of the Public Service Pensioners' Association was contacted by an official and was told exactly where we are going with this process. It is a very important process. We have not made any decision -

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MS J.M. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, the member opposite is still mumbling, I cannot quite hear what he is saying.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MS J.M. AYLWARD: What I am trying to say, because I think it is a very important issue for the people of the Province and for the pensioners and that is, Mr. Speaker, that they are aware of the process and that it is a very important component that we are trying to resolve with all of the parties. The pensioners are aware of it, the unions are aware of it and, Mr. Speaker, maybe the member opposite has some difficulty with that.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister now to conclude her answer.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: We are trying to work this through in a cooperative way, which is perhaps a foreign concept, but we would like to work with all of the parties because this Public Service Pension Plan is one that we are very proud of -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. minister now to conclude her answer quickly.

MS J.M. AYLWARD: - in moving towards a join trusteeship.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Trinity North.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Mr. Speaker, on March 27, the Minister of Health and Community Services released the final report of the Hay Group who did an operational review at the Health Care Corporation of St. John's.

Mr. Speaker, can the minister tell this House if he agrees with the report's comments, particularly those around the Janeway Emergency Department?

I quote: There are concerns regarding the training of the Janeway Emergency Department physicians in emergency medicine and their capabilities in emergency medicine techniques and care processes.

Does the minister agree with that statement?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SMITH: No, Mr. Speaker, the minister does not agree with the statement as is quoted by the hon. member.

As the hon. member would know, this is one piece that was contained in a comprehensive report. As a matter of fact, when the first draft was received some concerns were raised by the Health Care Corporation with regard to this particular reference, and officials from my department did follow up with the consultants. The consultants have indicated since that they have followed up with some clarification which has been provided to the Health Care Corporation.

Certainly, this minister, this department and this government have complete confidence in the professionals who are employed by the Health Care Corporation, especially the officials at the Janeway, and we assure the people of the Province that they can be confident that they will be receiving a first-rate service when they present themselves at that institution.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for Trinity North.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: Mr. Speaker, I suggest that the minister relay those comments and apologize to the physicians working in that department. He should do that fairly quickly, because they are becoming very disgruntled. I don't know if the minister realizes, but all the health providers in this Province are outraged by that statement.

Does the minister know, does the minister realize, that as a result of that report and the comments in that report that just a couple of days ago a physician, a nuclear medicine specialist, who was recruited by the Health Care Corporation withdrew his acceptance of a position because of the content of that report? Is the minister aware of that?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

MR. SMITH: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In fact, the concerns that the hon. member has raised are legitimate. Certainly, as I have indicated to him, we are certainly concerned when statements are made with regard to our professionals who are employed within this Province who do provide a first-class service to our citizens. However, I would say to him, in my opinion, to stand here and try to claim the moral high ground on this or any other issue is the last thing I would expect to see that hon. member doing, who sat around our caucus table -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SMITH: - and took part in our discussions, knowing full well that he was ready to move to the other side.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: Order,. please!

A final supplementary, the hon. the Member for Trinity North.

MR. ROSS WISEMAN: As I was saying, Mr. Speaker, it was a pretty simple question. I asked the minister if he was aware.

Let me ask him another question: Is the minister also aware, or is he not aware, that just a couple of days ago as well, an internist who was recruited by the Health Care Corporation to work at St. Clare's has now said that he is not going to accept their offer because he is not certain about the future of St. Clare's Hospital? Is the minister aware of that issue?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, on any given day there are any number of issues with regard to the delivery of health care in this Province that are circulating in the media and are being brought forward to this House by hon. members. We are talking about a service that is being provided to a large number of people right across this Province. We are talking about a service that is being delivered by many hundreds of professionals.

Mr. Speaker, the issue that the hon. member raises - if a physician makes a decision, the minister or the health care officials cannot be directly involved in every decision that is made by every individual, when a person is offered the opportunity to be employed, or is employed and decides to leave. The reasons they use to make their decisions are entirely up to them.

The fact that you are referencing a report here, a comprehensive report - I might point out as well and remind hon. members, I have sat in this House for months and listened to the Opposition talk about the savings that could be realized in the delivery of health care services in this Province. The hon. members opposite have stood repeatedly and made accusations that there are savings to be made.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. SMITH: This report that has been produced was commissioned to do exactly that, to review the system, to see if there were savings that could be realized. This is what the report has done.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. member now to conclude his answer.

MR. SMITH: The officials now have the report. They are examining it and trying to determine whether, in fact, there are suggestions here or recommendations that can be implemented.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My question is for the Premier and it regards his government involvement in the building of an eighteen-hole golf course in the Windmill Bight Provincial Park. Mr. Speaker, the documents filed with the Minister of the Environment show that this project can only be viable if a world-class golf course at a cost of $7 million is built along with a resort hotel at a cost of $6 million, dependent on between 50 per cent and 75 per cent of its clients being from outside of the Province.

Mr. Speaker, why is this government involved in a project of this nature without proven financial viability that is opposed by its own parks division, that is illegal under the parks act, and by its own estimate requires at least $7 million of provincial contribution, of government contribution, to make the project work at all?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Environment.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. K. AYLWARD: Mr. Speaker, the project that the member refers to is under environmental assessment. It is in the process, and we will evaluate all of the implications through the process and render a decision about the project being able to proceed. If the project is able to achieve contributions to it, then so be it, and that is for the project sponsors. The bottom line from the environmental situation is that the Environmental Assessment Act is being followed and this project is under assessment by our officials at this point, and a decision will be rendered in due course.

MR. SPEAKER: A supplementary, the hon. the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, my question does not concern the environmental assessment but the fact that this government, even prior to an environmental assessment, prior to the fact that proponents have not shown economic viability, knowing that the project was illegal under the parks act, has committed $2.6 million of government money under the Municipal Financing Corporation, Mr. Speaker, which is not designed for economic development projects. This has already happened.

Mr. Speaker, why is this government going forward with a project that could start the slippery slope of more and more government money into a project that does not demonstrate financial viability and cannot apparently, on the face of the documents filed with the government to date, cannot show sustainability, cannot show economic viability, and has not done any independent market studies that can demonstrate that? Why are they doing it?

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I don't know who the Leader of the NDP represents or speaks for on this issue, but I can tell you this: the government responded to a request from the residents of the area through two different councils who came to us with a proposal supported by the Leader of the Opposition, I understand, because he believes in golf course development, as I do.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) his own money.

PREMIER GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, not all of his own money.

AN HON. MEMBER: Oh, oh!

PREMIER GRIMES: Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition, for those that did not catch it, wanted to make sure that everyone knows that he built his golf courses out of his own money. I am delighted to hear that the did spend a good chunk of his own money with respect to that.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

PREMIER GRIMES: Money that was made, Mr. Speaker, in profits in businesses from Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, and I congratulate him in being a success in that. I cannot wish him the same success in his current career.

Mr. Speaker, the issue with respect to the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi; the government responded to a request from the municipal leaders, from the residents of the area, who believed the right thing for development in that area of Newfoundland and Labrador is a golf course along with the current provincial park. As a matter of fact, they would like to see it in the current provincial park because they think that is the best fit. It was not our proposal, it was their proposal. We acceded to their request and they have understood, from the beginning, as they do today, that we are willing to commit the money - I believe it is $2.6 million -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: - if the project, Mr. Speaker, passes environmental approval through an assessment process. So, the government is spending no money unless all the rules and laws and regulations that apply are successfully and properly complied with, and we will try to work with the people in the area -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: - who believe that this is a great opportunity for their part of Newfoundland and Labrador.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My question today is for the Premier of the Province. I understand that there was a major fundraiser held last night at the Sheridan Centre in Toronto for the Liberal Party, organized by Brian Tobin -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. J. BYRNE: Relax. Thank you.

- organized by Brian Tobin, Gary Anstey, Steve Whitmore and Craig Dobbin. I hope you do well, Premier. Many major contributors were in attendance and, of course, Mr. Speaker, fundraising is not the issue here. This is an issue of conflict of interest, whether real or perceived. Wouldn't the Premier agree that this Province would be in a far stronger negotiating position if he gracefully declined donations from companies that the Province is in very serious negotiations with on major deals that will forever affect the lives of the people of this Province?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is unfortunate that the hon. member could not be in Toronto last night to see a celebration of Newfoundland and Labrador in Toronto.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: Attended, Mr. Speaker, by a broad cross-section of the business community in southern Ontario and throughout Canada. Mr. Speaker, the likes of Kim Stockwood and Damhnait Doyle who performed, Gordon Pinsent -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: - who chaired the event and had people with tears in their eyes at the end of the evening because they were so proud of what he was saying, not necessarily me, but what he was saying about Newfoundland and Labrador and the possibilities and the opportunities and the future and the potential that is here in this place, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: It was an absolute delight and a treasure to be there and I am delighted, as well, that the people actually donated some money. My way was paid by the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador. I announced that to The Telegram yesterday before I left; and, Mr. Speaker, I am assuming we will make a profit on it for the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador. I know that Newfoundland and Labrador is seen in a better light today as a result of the representations of those kinds of proud Newfoundlanders and Labradorians -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: - than it was the day before, and I would gladly do it three or four times a month if I could get the opportunity -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to take his seat.

PREMIER GRIMES: - and I would invite any members opposite to do the same thing if they can get anyone to show up.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cape St. Francis.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. J. BYRNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the Premier did not answer the question. Mr. Speaker, the Premier can spin and rationalize all he wants. This is not the first time that the Premier heard of this issue. The former Member for Humber West, who took him on for the leadership of the Liberal Party, would not take donations from corporations, as the Premier is doing, I say to the Premier. Mr. Speaker, why doesn't the Premier of the Province understand that taking donations from companies for political purposes -

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Oh, oh!

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

MR. J. BYRNE: Mr. Speaker, why doesn't the Premier of the Province understand that taking donations from companies for political purposes - that he is negotiating with - is indeed a very serious conflict of interest? Why don't you understand that?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Premier.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

PREMIER GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out again that there is no conflict of interest with respect to this matter. Every political contribution and donation that is made to the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador is reported to the Electoral Office. It is reported to our Conflict of Interest Commissioner, who is an officer of this House, and every single person and every single group that showed up in Montreal a month ago when the Leader of the Opposition asked the same question in this Legislature; so I guess he does not think it is that good a question because he sloughed it off to one of his other members to ask this time around.

Mr. Speaker, we had the issue in Montreal where I was delighted to speak to a broad base of the business community and talk about the opportunities here, and it is always an officer of this House, who has all the information disclosed to them, who decides if there is any conflict of interest, and there is none. We believe in full disclosure. I tell everybody exactly that: that anyone who contributed to the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador last night in Toronto or in Montreal a month ago, their names will show up in the disclosure statement tabled in this Legislature.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. Premier now to conclude his answer.

PREMIER GRIMES: Everybody can see exactly what happened. I am just delighted that we do have hundreds of people willing to come out -

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

I ask the hon. the Premier now to take his seat.

PREMIER GRIMES: - and hear about Newfoundland and Labrador on a regular basis so we can (inaudible).

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's West.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MS S. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

My questions are for the Minister of Health and Community Services and they have to do with cancelled surgeries at the Health Sciences Centre due to the unavailability of beds in the Intensive Care Unit, and I will give an example.

There is a woman who has been fasting since Thursday and she still has not been able to get for her surgery. The reason for that is, there is no bed available in the Intensive Care Unit. Surely, Minister, you can do something about this.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Health and Community Services.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SMITH: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the hon. member realizes that it is certainly not the job or the wish of this minister to micro-manage our health care system. We have entrusted that responsibility to some very capable professionals who are well paid for the job that they do, and do an excellent job on the part of the people of this Province.

At any given time the hon. member, any hon. member or anyone, can find isolated incidents that they can refer to where situations of this nature arise. I would say to the hon. member, as I have always said in this House, if there is a situation, if there is a feeling of the hon. member that there is any way that I, or anyone on the government side, can assist, then we are certainly prepared to listen, talk and discuss that. Obviously, to discuss individual cases in this forum certainly would not be appropriate.

I would say to the hon. member that if she knows an individual, if she knows a situation of this nature, I would certainly invite her to come forward and meet with me, as other members opposite have done, and I will gladly sit with anyone to try to deal with individual situations.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

Question Period has ended.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for St. John's South.

MR. T. OSBORNE: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have a petition today from the Grenfell College Student Union, who have asked that the petition be presented to the House of Assembly. It was circulated through the students at the college and the enclosed petition includes a large percentage of the Grenfell students who agree with the concerns listed on the petition.

The Grenfell College Student Union hereby request that the enclosed petition be presented in this House of Assembly. The prayer of the petition reads as follows:

We the undersigned residents of Newfoundland and Labrador draw the attention of the House of Assembly to the following:

WHEREAS Sir Wilfred Grenfell College is a division of Memorial University of Newfoundland, and Memorial University of Newfoundland is a public institution; and

WHEREAS Sir Wilfred Grenfell College is an institution that teaches environmental responsibility; and

WHEREAS the landfills in Western Newfoundland are quickly filling; and

WHEREAS Sir Wilfred Grenfell College is producing a very large amount of white paper waste; and

WHEREAS many other institutions and businesses, both private and public, are producing large amounts of white paper waste;

THEREFORE your petitioners call upon the House of Assembly of Newfoundland and Labrador to provide the necessary infrastructure to make white paper recycling feasible in Newfoundland and Labrador, and to provide legislation stating that these infrastructures will remain in place permanently.

I have noticed, Mr. Speaker, there is a large number of signatures on this petition, and I have noticed that they have used recycled paper. It was paper that was previously used, printed on the other side, so their hearts are truly where this petition is.

They raise a very valuable point. I know that one of the pulp companies in this Province is currently using recycled paper and they cannot get the amount of paper that they require for recycling purposes from this Province because there is no recycling program in this Province. They actually import paper from other areas, from the Eastern Seaboard of the United States. They have a very valid concern here; it is a very real concern. A large amount of the waste that goes to the landfills in this Province, Mr. Speaker, is paper products.

The students at Sir Wilfred Grenfell College have raised a very valid point. It is a point that the people of this Province have spoken on. It is a point that the people in this Legislature, the representatives of the people of this Province, should pay heed to. Recycling creates jobs. Recycling reduces waste going to our landfills. Recycling in this particular situation can provide a much valued resource to one of the paper companies in this Province which uses recycled paper.

I support this petition. I support the people who signed this petition, and I am more than happy to represent them and to present this petition in the House of Assembly today.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. TAYLOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TAYLOR: Pardon?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TAYLOR: A private member's resolution, yes.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to move, at this time, the private member's resolution that I -

MR. SPEAKER: We are on petitions. I thought the hon. member had a petition to present.

MR. TAYLOR: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for The Straits & White Bay North.

MR. TAYLOR: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. I thought that was what you said. With the noise, I didn't hear you very well.

At this time I would like to move the following private member's resolution which I tabled here yesterday. I will read it now into the record:

WHEREAS the Federal Fisheries Independent Panel on Access Criteria is proposing that Aboriginal rights and regional equity replace adjacency as the primary consideration in allocating fishing quotas; and

WHEREAS acceptance of these recommendations would further reduce Newfoundlanders' and Labradorians' access to the marine resources that they brought into Confederation;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this Honourable House inform the Government of Canada that it is unalterably opposed to any limitation of the principle of adjacency in allocating fish quotas; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that we will resist by all appropriate means any decision of the federal government to allocate quotas to fishing interests that would not qualify for allocations under the principle of adjacency.

Mr. Speaker, the report that we are speaking about is the report of the Independent Panel on Access Criteria, a report that came out just about two weeks ago; two weeks ago Friday coming, actually. It is a report that came primarily out of a bit of a controversy a couple of years ago - a bit of a controversy, I guess, is a little bit of an understatement in this Province - when the federal minister of the day decided to allocate 1,500 tons of Northern shrimp off the Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, off this Province, to interests in Prince Edward Island.

Mr. Speaker, this was, at the time, one more example of a long list of allocation decisions that were made by the federal minister, by the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, the federal government, to allocate resources to interests in Atlantic Canada and Quebec, in the Maritimes and Quebec, to allocate quota to these interests from the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, areas that were not adjacent to those provinces' shores, but rather areas that are adjacent to our shores.

Government after government in this Province, person after person in this Province, organizations, councils, unions, fishing industry organizations, have all advocated time and time again, over the past twenty, thirty or forty years, that allocations should always be governed by adjacency. If that were the case, then the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and the Coast of Labrador, the resources off those areas, off those coasts, would be allocated to the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, to interests in the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, whether that is to fleets less than sixty-five feet; sixty-five to one hundred; Aboriginal groups; community groups; processors; what have you. The fact is that it would remain in this Province irregardless of the individual or the organization that would own it.

Mr. Speaker, what we see in this report of the Independent Panel on Access Criteria, and I think that some people in this Province had some hope that if an independent panel reviewed the way allocations were made by the federal government, that there would be a fair and equitable set of guidelines come out of it. Something that would give a federal minister, irregardless of who he or she was, irregardless of the political stripe, that they would have a set of guidelines to go by that would be fair and applied in a consistent manner.

Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, what we see coming out of this report is really a singling out of the waters off the Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland, and off the Coast of Labrador; a singling out of these waters and a decision or a recommendation that in this area - in all of Atlantic Canada and the Eastern Arctic and Quebec waters - that in this area alone adjacency would not be the overriding, determining, guiding, what have you, principle for access and allocation. Mr. Speaker, that is very dangerous. It is very dangerous because - the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador did promote, as does everybody in this Province, the principle of adjacency and access and allocation in this area. Unfortunately, every other province and territory, because Nunavut was included - I should say with the exception of Nunavut. Every other province who made representation to this panel disagreed with this Province and the government, the minister opposite, recommendations that adjacency be the guiding principle.

Mr. Speaker, it should come as no surprise to us that the other provinces disagreed and the other groups disagreed. I will just give some examples of the positions that the other provinces took. "...PEI advocated a more considered approach than choosing any single criteria such as adjacency or history. That fairness and equity should apply to the extent that no jurisdiction can be denied meaningful benefit." Well, why wouldn't P.E.I. say that? They are adjacent to nothing, they have had access to nothing, and they have no historical dependence on anything. They have nothing. They can make no claim to anything off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador because they are not adjacent to it and they have never historically fished it. So, they could not support history or adjacency.

Quebec, on the other hand, supported historical dependence. They supported historical dependence because over the years Quebec has had some access to this area and they are not adjacent to the area. So historic dependence works for them, adjacency does not work for them.

We look to Nova Scotia or New Brunswick. "New Brunswick felt that the principle of adjacency has consistently worked against its interests in the past." Of course it would work against it because it is not adjacent to anything. Once again, similar to P.E.I. It is up on the St. Lawrence River practically. There is no more to give allocations to New Brunswick than it is to give allocations to Ontario off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. They want something other than adjacency or historical dependence to be the guiding principle. Certainly, something besides adjacency.

Nova Scotia was the most blatant of all, I guess. "...expressed concerns that the selective use of criteria to achieve desired results and the lack of a transparent process." Now, they expressed concerns about that but then they go on to ask for just such a criteria, something that can be used selectively. They argued: "Nova Scotia officials argue that adjacency was an important but not a paramount criterion, since its strength diminished in relation to historic shares in the case of fisheries farther offshore." Why would Nova Scotia say that? Well, I think, Mr. Speaker, we have to go back and look at a little bit of history.

I took the liberty today to go onto DFO's Web site and look at historic figures, look at quota reports, and the furthest back I could get today, on short notice, was 1989, the quota report for 2J+3KL. This is very interesting, very telling because a lot of people in this Province sometimes say that politicians make much ado about nothing when it comes to the 1,500 tons of northern shrimp, but they are completely wrong. Fifteen hundred tons of northern shrimp was just one small example of the things that we have had to live with over the years in this Province. I will give you an example: 1989, the 2J+3KL cod quota report, vessels greater than sixty-five feet in length, two different fleet sectors, sixty-five to 100, and vessels greater than 100. When you combine the various allocations in this, Nova Scotia had 46,446 tons of a 96,000 ton quota. I am sorry, I added it up wrong, of a 130,000 ton quota. Newfoundland had the remainder of 84,556 tons.

Now, Mr. Speaker, this is the offshore quota, the greater than sixty-five foot quota. This is what we have seen over the past. Some people might say after yesterday, when they heard my comments, that I am sensationalizing it and blowing it out of proportion, the impact that this report could have on allocation decisions off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. Well, Mr. Speaker, this just goes to prove how far this can go, from 1,500 tons of P.E.I. shrimp, as I said yesterday, to possibly 50 million pounds of northern shrimp that could be allocated to other interests.

Mr. Speaker, when you take issues like Aboriginal rights - and we have no problem with Aboriginal rights. As I said in my interview yesterday on the Fisheries Broadcast, there are legitimate cases for access, and these cases can be accommodated within the adjacency principle. The Labrador Inuit Association has long held an allocation, has long had access to the northern shrimp fishery off the Coast of Labrador, and off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and up in the Davis Strait. The Labrador Innu Nation recently had an allocation. So there are examples of this. There are Aboriginal groups in Nunavut who have access to these areas, to shrimp fishing in these areas, and so they should, Mr. Speaker, but where do we draw the line? When we say that Aboriginal rights supercede adjacency, we are on very dangerous ground. We all know the controversy that is brewing - or not brewing, that is boiling over in the Maritimes when it comes to the Burnt Church's of the world, the Burnt Church's of the Maritimes.

If the opening is given to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to allow him to solve the problems that he has, that his department has, and the people in the Maritimes have in trying to provide access to Aboriginal groups, to the fishing industry, which they should have, in their own area. The people of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and P.E.I. who are in the fishing industry there, should solve the problems that they have with the Aboriginal communities in that area, just as we, in this Province, have to resolve it here. We should not have to pay with Northern shrimp for the injustices of the past, in the Maritime Provinces. That is the bottom line. That is the reason for this private member's resolution today. That is the reason for it; we cannot tolerate it.

Why should we bring this up here today? As the minister said yesterday, he doesn't think the federal minister is going to accept it. That could be, and I hope he is right on that. I am not going to question the minister's judgement on that, but I will say one thing. In about two weeks to a month, we will probably see the Northern shrimp management plan brought down; the 2002 Northern Shrimp Management Plan. Mr. Speaker, we have to be a little bit cynical all the time when it comes to politicians. Even we politicians have to be cynical about politicians. Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you.

Madam Speaker, we all must recognize that there are two very important federal by-elections going on in this Province now and I, for one, do not believe that the minister is going to accept anything in this report right now that is going to jeopardize those by-elections in this Province, and I do not think right now we will see allocations to interests outside this Province for this year for Northern shrimp. I do not believe we will, because the decisions on Northern shrimp will, in all likelihood, be made before the date of the by-elections. The federal minister, I am sure, is cognizant of that.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TAYLOR: As the Member for Bay of Islands points out, and rightly so, after is where we are on dangerous ground. Madam Speaker, that is why it is incumbent on us to fight this in the strongest possible way today, tomorrow, right up until we get a decision that this report is canned, garbage, shredded, gone, and adjacency is the guiding principle for allocations and access off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, off Nunavut, off Nova Scotia, off P.E.I., off New Brunswick and Quebec.

We are not asking to be treated as a special case. As I said yesterday, we just want the waters and the fish, access to it and allocations of it, that we brought into this country. That is what we are asking for. The report here, of the Independent Panel on Access Criteria, says that Nunavut should be treated as a special case because, "Officials pointed out that Nunavut's share of adjacent resources, most notably turbot and shrimp, was unfairly small compared to the Atlantic provinces' share."

That is absolutely correct. It is unfairly small compared to the allocations we have in waters adjacent to their shores. We cannot disagree with that. We cannot disagree with that because, to disagree with that would be to support the Atlantic Provinces in their bid for allocations off our coast. But, Madam Speaker, treating Nunavut as a special case is not the answer. Treating Nunavut in a way that we want to be treated is the answer. Allocate, give priority access to Nunavut for the fish resources that are off their coast, and give priority access to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians for the fishery resources that are off their coast, that are adjacent in their waters. The Province's position going into this, as I read it from the report anyway, the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador's position was: When a border of a NAFO area is defined by a land area, that land area is adjacent to the NAFO area.

If that principle was applied to Northern shrimp, Northern cod, Greenland halibut, and whatever else, then we would not have a problem. If that is what that report came out and recommended, then I would not be standing up here and speaking on this today. We might be standing up and speaking on it, but we would be standing up and asking the minister to hurry up and accept this report. The fact of the matter is that the report is completely at odds with what we want to see, completely at odds with everything we stand for and have asked for in this Province. As a matter of fact, it is completely at odds with everything we have said to the international community since the day that we realize that the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks were outside of the 200-mile limit and were open to abuse by foreign nations. Ever since we realized that, we have been arguing to the international community that we should have jurisdiction over this area, whether it is custodial management or complete jurisdiction, complete control, whatever way we have made different arguments from time to time. The fact of the matter is, we have argued that we should have control over that area because it is adjacent to our country, even though it is outside our 200-mile limit.

This report says that the further offshore you go, the further away from land you go, the less adjacency should be the guiding principle. If the minister accepts this, then he has to stop and we have to stop all these arguments that we have made about the foreign overfishing problem that we have on the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Pass and the Flemish Cap. Madam Speaker, that is just one more reason why this report must be canned. This report can never see the light of day, can never be used as the guiding principle for access and allocation of the fishery resources.

If the people, the governments of the Maritimes and Quebec, and the federal government, accept this, they once again want to use fishery resources off the Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador in particular, to solve the problems they have in Atlantic Canada. We have seen it before. There are numerous examples of it. The P.E.I. shrimp deal, as I have said earlier, was just one small example, a very small, insignificant example, as a matter of fact, compared to, as I pointed out earlier, the 46,000 tons of Northern cod that Nova Scotia - Nova Scotia, and I am not sure if people realize this, in 1989 when the fishery was collapsing on the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia had 46,000 tons of cod allocated to it in this area. How did they get there? It is worthwhile to point out how Nova Scotia got there. They had some historic dependence, of course. Nova Scotia fishermen historically fished the Grand Banks, but very, very rarely did they fish the Hamilton Banks. So they did have some historic dependence, but they got there when red fish collapsed in the Gulf. That is what happened. They got there when the red fish stocks collapsed in the Gulf, what we know now as unit one. Red fish collapsed in the late 1970s. The offshore fleet was reinforced for ice and sent North into Northern cod, that vast untouched Northern cod stock that everybody talked about, and it was destroyed as a result of it.

When the large boat seal hunt was shut down in the mid-1980s, Nova Scotia interests were given Northen shrimp. When the whale fishery was closed down - Northern shrimp allocations. These types of allocations have always been used on the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador to solve the problems that we have in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It is time for it to stop.

If we do not fight this report that we have before us today, that we have had in front of us for a couple of weeks, the minister, any future minister, any government, irregardless of who they are, irregardless of where they are from, will have every opportunity, every justification, that every minister in the past did not have for making its allocations to people outside this Province for resources that are adjacent to this Province.

Madam Speaker, the report talks about equity. It says that no allocation decisions should be made that contribute to interpersonal or inter-regional disparities. The case could be made that, given the amount of shrimp that we have allocated to our fleets on the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, and the lack of shrimp that is allocated to fleets in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I., Quebec, on the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, area 6 and area 5, the argument could - if you use this report, I am not saying it is right, but rightly so according to this report - be made that the allocation decisions made by the minister in recent years have contributed to inter-regional disparities. That, tied with the Aboriginal rights and a lack of an adjacency principle, would clearly throw the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador wide open for all kinds of access by other provinces here. We would have no more right to these waters, we would have no more right of access to these waters, as a person living in Englee - and this is the irony of it. In Englee, where the plant has been practically closed down, a very low level of activity for years now, ever since the cod motorium, and Conche and Croque, places that are looking for access, places that have lobbied consistently over the past five years for access to this resource, for an allocation of this resource, the people of this area would have no more right - as a matter of fact, once you use the Aboriginal rights argument and the equity argument, they would have less right to the fish that is off their shore, that are fifty miles from the harbour in Englee, seventy miles from the harbour in Englee, 150 miles from the harbour in Englee, anywhere in that area you could fish shrimp, and the people who live there would have no more right of access to that than somebody who is living in Miramichi Bay in New Brunswick.

That is what is of most concern. That is why we must fight this. There is no way that anybody should be able to tell us, there is no way that a report, that a minister, that a panel, should be looking at the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador any differently than it should -

MADAM SPEAKER (Ms Hodder): Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that his time is up.

MR. TAYLOR: By leave, to clue up?

MADAM SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave.

MADAM SPEAKER: Leave granted.

MR. TAYLOR: I just want to clue up. About thirty seconds, Madam Speaker.

There is no way that these allocations should be susceptible to that kind of abuse, in my view. It is an abuse of resources off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. We have seen it so much. I will say this in conclusion, Madam Speaker - I know I have a few minutes to conclude debate later in the day - but I will say this: The only time that we hear about great Canadian resources, when we hear about the great Canadian northern cod resource, when we hear about the great Canadian northern shrimp resource, whenever we hear that term, we can be sure that they are talking about the people in Atlantic Canada and Upper Canada, they are talking about the fish that is off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. That is the only Canadian resource that is in this country. Whenever we get outside of Newfoundland and Labrador, it is a Nova Scotia resource or an Alberta resource or an Ontario resource or a British Columbia resource.

So, Madam Speaker, in conclusion, we must look for adjacency to be the guiding principle. We must demand that the minister can this report, and we must, all parties, all individuals and all groups involved with the fishery, and outside of the fishery in this Province, stand up and oppose this to the strongest degree possible, and let the minister know that we will never support anything other than adjacency in allocating fish around our Province.

On that note, Madam Speaker, I will conclude and let somebody else have the floor.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MADAM SPEAKER: The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. REID: Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I would like to speak for a few minutes today to the resolution put forward by the Member for The Straits & White Bay North. I thank him for putting it forward, because, as he said, it is a very important issue, probably one of the most critical issues facing the fishing industry in our Province today.

Madam Speaker, if you will permit me, I would like to give a brief history of how we got this Independent Panel on Access Criteria and the report that we are talking about here in the House today.

If you all remember, two years ago, in 2000, the federal Minister of Fisheries of the day, Mr. Dhaliwal, gave a 1,500 ton allocation of shrimp off our coast to Prince Edward Island. Madam Speaker, to this day we don't know what criteria he used to determine that P.E.I. should be entitled to shrimp off our shores, because it has always been our position that the adjacency principle is the one of utmost concern to us, and that is how you should determine who gets access. The first one would be adjacency, the second one would be historical attachment, and the third would be economic viability.

Having said that, Madam Speaker, you know what happened in the Province once Mr. Dhaliwal allocated the shrimp to P.E.I.

MR. E. BYRNE: It is fine.

MR. REID: Pardon me?

MR. LUSH: He says it is fine.

MR. REID: That is good.

We are just having a talk here, Madam Speaker, about amending the resolution, and I understand from the Opposition that it is okay, the amendments that I would like to propose.

Anyway, after Mr. Dhaliwal gave the allocation of shrimp to P.E.I., obviously it was not acceptable to the people of this Province, and there was quite a big debate, quite a lengthy debate that took place here and with the federal Department of Fisheries concerning this. It was agreed by my predecessor at the time, along with the federal minister, that the only way to really get to the bottom of all of this is if we were to appoint an independent panel to determine who would get access to our fish stocks off our coast so that it would be an open and transparent process so that we would all know, once and for all, who owned the fish off our shores. Once we knew that, then we could always determine if there was going to an increase in the quotas, who would get that.

So, Madam Speaker, that is where the Independent Panel on Access Criteria was established, and, I guess, it was in process when I came into the department back last February. From that time on we took this panel very seriously, along with the union, the FFAW, FANL, the Fisheries Association of Newfoundland and Labrador, and I might also add, that the Federation of Municipalities also took this issue very seriously, along with this government. We set out, at the time, to make sure that we, in the Province, and I mean all of us in the Province, put forward a united voice to this panel on what we considered to be the three criteria that should determine access to fish off our coast. The first one, obviously, was the adjacency principle, that fish adjacent to the shores of our Province should go for the benefit of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

The second one would be historical attachment. Those attached to the fishery in our Province should get the first crack at any increases in allocation and so on, Madam Speaker, but we also have to remember that there are others outside of our Province who also have a historical attachment to some of our fish stocks. I am not talking our northern shrimp, but I am talking about cod on the southern Grand Banks that was also harvested for many years by schooners from Nova Scotia and so on.

The last criterion that we put forward, Madam Speaker, was economic viability, and that means who could harvest that fish and process it the most economically. Obviously, again, it was the harvesters in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The panel was put together and there was some debate, first of all, on who were going to be members on that panel. The federal minister put forward some proposals. He proposed some names obviously that we did not agree to. For example, we did not want to have someone from Nova Scotia sitting on that panel if we did not have someone from our Province, and likewise, from Quebec, P.E.I. and New Brunswick. So it was agreed that the members of the panel would come from outside of the region. That was agreed to and that panel then went to each of the individual provinces and to Nunavut, and they heard presentations from the governments and from individuals.

I might add, Madam Speaker, that we put forward more presentations to that panel than any other province. The provincial Department of Fisheries did two presentations, and I did one as well. We, the Department of Fisheries and the government, also helped the Federation of Municipalities who prepared a fabulous brief, and the union and FANL worked in conjunction with us. So there were at least four presentations to this panel from the Province, from residents of Newfoundland and Labrador. The thing about it is we all said the same thing, that the only criteria that should be used for access to fish off our shores was the first one. The primary one would be the adjacency principle; the second, historic attachment; and the third, criterion of economic viability. We all said that, Madam Speaker, and we said it loud and clear in written briefs and in oral presentations that we also made. I gave one last fall to the panel when they were here.

Just recently the panel submitted its report to the federal minister. When I was in P.E.I. two weeks ago, the Chair of that committee, a Mr. Kroeger from the mainland, gave a brief overview of what was in the report. Like the Opposition, like everybody in this Province, once we actually saw what was in the report, obviously, we cannot stand for what they are saying. Here is basically what they are saying in the report. The overall principle - and there is a difference between the overall principles and the access criteria - talks about conservation, Aboriginal rights, and equity. I asked Mr. Kroeger, by the way, in that meeting, what his definition of equity was. Strangely enough, he hemmed and hawed and said: well, I guess equity is in the eyes of the beholder. I said: yes, I guess you are right because we do not consider it to be equitable when you are giving fish from Newfoundland and Labrador, that we so much rely on for survival in this Province, to other players in other provinces. So, that is not my idea of equity, for sure.

The actual access criteria, Madam Speaker, that they put forward was - they followed our suggestions in that the three criteria should be - in this order too, by the way. The three we put forward were: adjacency, historical attachment, and economic dependence or economic viability. We put those three criteria to the federal government in that order. They accepted these three criteria which would determine access to fish stocks in Atlantic Canada. The unfortunate thing about it is, the adjacency principle that we put forward, they somehow took that out of context. Their definition of adjacency is certainly not our definition of adjacency.

Let me explain to you, Madam Speaker, what their definition of adjacency is. For example, when New Brunswick did their presentation to this panel they said adjacency was not important. They said that the principle of adjacency was not important. Obviously, it was not important to New Brunswick, Madam Speaker, because if you look at the fish stocks that are adjacent to New Brunswick, they cannot compare to the fish stocks that are adjacent to Newfoundland and Labrador. Obviously adjacency would not work in their favour. So they said: adjacency is not the most important criteria.

So, they go to Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia says: yes, adjacency is very important criterion for establishing access. Where they differ from us is they say that adjacency should be most important in their inshore and their mid-shore, but not as you move further from land. That, Madam Speaker, is where we have a major concern, their definition of adjacency compared to our definition of adjacency. Our definition of adjacency is that any fish stock or any water body that touches our coast, that is adjacent to our coast and should go to the 200-mile limit, obviously. What Nova Scotia is suggesting, and what Mr. Kroeger appears to be suggesting in his report - because we do not really have clarification yet from the minister or from Mr. Kroeger exactly his definition of adjacency. What he is saying is that adjacency is important in the inshore and the mid-shore but the further you go from land the less importance adjacency has. Now, from Nova Scotia's perspective that is perfect. You take their lobsters and their bit of groundfish on the Scotian shelf, perfect. So, what they are saying is: alright, the fish in the inshore and the mid-shore should be ours, the adjacency principle should apply, but if you get off land 100 miles or 150 miles - like we do, we fish that stock. The Member for The Straits knows, he has been out there. You fished off out there, 200 miles.

What they are saying is you get out maybe 100 miles, or fifty miles beyond shore, the adjacency principle should diminish. The only reason they are suggesting that, Madam Speaker, is so that they can get access to the fish stocks off our shore, off our inshore and off our mid-shore (inaudible) but also go after the shrimp and other stocks that are further from shore off the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. We cannot, and will not, accept that principle, Madam Speaker, with the way that it is being proposed; but again, we need clarification from the federal minister and we need clarification from Mr. Kroeger who wrote the report, and the panel as well.

I, like the member opposite from The Straits & White Bay, cannot tolerate what is being proposed by that panel with regard to adjacency, that it is only important in the inshore and the mid-shore because we have too much at stake, Madam Speaker. That means, basically, if you take fifty miles, you go out fifty miles - for example, you pick an arbitrary number and you say: alright, adjacency is important up to fifty miles. That looks after the stocks in New Brunswick, P.E.I., Quebec and Nova Scotia but if the adjacency principle does not apply as you get out beyond fifty miles - and the fifty miles, Madam Speaker, is just an arbitrary number that I am using as an example. If you get out there, then it is a free for all. What they are saying is we will look after our own stocks but we also want a cut of yours. That is, basically, how P.E.I. ended up with 1,500 tons of what I consider to be our shrimp to begin with.

I told Mr. Kroeger, the Chair of the panel, that was not acceptable to us. I also told Mr. Thibault, the new Minister of Fisheries and Oceans for Canada, in that meeting that it was not acceptable to us. On coming back to the Province we talked to FANL and to the union about this. I have spoken to Mr. Thibault again, on the telephone, and told him that this adjacency principle, their definition of the adjacency principle, was not going to wash here in this Province. I have also written the federal minister and outlined that to him in a letter.

Contrary to what was said yesterday in the House of Assembly about us not really doing enough on this issue, Madam Speaker, that is clearly untrue. The work that the officials in the department and myself, FANL, the union, and the Federation of Municipalities, we have put a lot of work in on that in the past year, and we are going to continue. Where it is right now is that all the provincial governments in Atlantic Canada and Quebec have been given the report. We are analyzing that report. The officials are going to have a meeting to discuss the report. As I said, I have already written him and told him what our concerns are. The officials are going to analyze the report. Then, at the end of May, we are going to have another Atlantic minister's conference to discuss the IPAC report. Like the member opposite, he says we should shelve that report. I agree, but if we could get them to change their definition of the adjacency principle maybe we would not need to do it. If our adjacency principle was accepted, I do not think we would have too much to worry about, Madam Speaker.

We cannot allow fish that is adjacent to our shores to be given to the other Atlantic Provinces; not that I mind sharing with our cousins in the rest of Canada, but that fish is too important to us. We are not asking for a share of their fish. As Earle McCurdy, the head of the FFAW, said some time ago: In the worst days of the groundfish moratoria, the Newfoundland and Labrador industry did not request access to fish resources adjacent to the other Atlantic Provinces.

We have never asked for that, and I think Mr. McCurdy summed it up quite well. He said: Even in the worst days of the moratorium, when there were towns closed, fish plants closed, people leaving the Province, never once did we say to the federal minister: Give us some lobsters off P.E.I. Let us go down on the Georges Bank off Nova Scotia and take some of their fish.

No, Madam Speaker, we did not do that because we respect the adjacency principle in this Province. Neither should they, simply because they want extra fish to make some extra money for larger companies in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I. and Quebec, ask for fish off our shores.

Before I close, I would like to make some amendments to the resolution of the Member for The Straits & White Bay North. They are not going to change the spirit and intent of the resolution. I understand that, members opposite. It is just that this board, for example, was tasked simply to look at access criteria and not allocation, so all we are doing is changing words like ‘allocation' to ‘access'.

When you talk about the marine resource, you have to remember that there are many marine resources, such as the oil that is beneath the ocean floor out there. We have talked about access to fish stocks, and we are just going to change some of those wordings. I am not sure if I have to read the new resolution. Tom, do I have to read that in, or do I just table a copy of it?

MADAM SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. LUSH: I think members opposite have agreed with the resolution. Actually, the resolution does something to all of the statements made by the hon. member, just to fine-tune it. I think they have agreed. What we will do is just carry on, and before the hon. member speaks we will just indicate what we have done for the record; but I think we will just say that we have amended all of the parts of the resolution. I think the hon. member's resolution is made up of two WHEREAS and the two RESOLVE. There is no intention on this side to affect the spirit of the resolution. It is just to fine-tune it. We will circulate it to everybody concerned and, at the end of the day, we will say what we have done to it.

Thank you, Madam Speaker.

MR. HARRIS: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.

MADAM SPEAKER: On a point of order, the hon. the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Madam Speaker, if there is going to be an amendment, surely anyone speaking after the minister would like to be able to speak to the amendment. I wonder if we could have that distributed very quickly so that subsequent speakers can do that.

MADAM SPEAKER: It will be distributed.

The hon. the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture.

MR. REID: Madam Speaker, just before I sit down and finish up my few words I will pass along the amendments so that the hon. members across the floor can have a look at it.

MADAM SPEAKER: I do remind the hon. member that his time is up.

MR. REID: Just one minute, by leave, Madam Speaker?

MADAM SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MADAM SPEAKER: Leave granted.

MR. REID: All I would like to do is to encourage every Member of the House of Assembly to actively get involved in this because, let's face it, it concerns every single soul in Newfoundland and Labrador. We should all be singing from the same hymn book, as they say, on this issue, because we have to protect the interests of those who depend so much for a living on those fish resources that are being talked about in today's resolution. I ask that the members opposite, along with myself and the government here on this side, the union, FANL, and the Federation of Municipalities, keep a united front on this and that we proceed together to impress upon the federal government the need to not adopt the adjacency definition that Mr. Kroeger and the Independent Panel on Access Criteria is proposing.

Again, I say, it is far better for us to act with one unified voice here in the Province than it is for us to be attacking each other here in the House of Assembly, because the longer we continue to do that, Madam Speaker, the less influence we have in Ottawa. Rather than pay attention to us, they will use the old tactic of dividing and conquering and they will get their own way.

Again, I would like to thank the Member from The Straits & White Bay North for putting forward the resolution today, and with the few amendments that we are proposing we will certainly vote in favor of it.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MADAM SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Bonavista South.

MR. FITZGERALD: Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I stand today to make a few comments on the private member's resolution as put forward by the Member for The Straits & White Bay North and issue our concerns with the report that has been put forward by the Federal Fisheries Independent Panel on Access Criteria.

It is a report that concerns us all. When we hear or when we see a report such as this submitted to the House of Commons and to the federal Minister of Fisheries, who has the ultimate control over quotas and where and when fish is allowed to be harvested, it causes great concern. It causes great concern because our minds go back to just a few short years ago when we saw 1,500 tons of Northern shrimp taken from fishermen and fish plant workers in this Province and given to a neighboring province, Prince Edward Island. While we have been very quick to step up to the plate and share resources, and God knows we have shared enough in the past at the expense of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, I think the time has come when we have to stand up and be counted for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

Madam Speaker, I think the time has come, when we go around this Province and see our own boats tied up to the wharves, when we see our fish plant workers walking around with nothing to do, laid off, and we hear that 1,500 tons of shrimp that could be harvested by Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, by our own fishermen, processed in one of our own eleven plants to process shrimp here in this Province, when we see that being taken from us and given to another Atlantic Province where it created not one job.... There wasn't one job created in Prince Edward Island, of the 1,500 metric tons of shrimp that Mr. Dhaliwal, in his wisdom, removed from this Province and gave to Prince Edward Island, not one job.

The other situation, Madam Speaker, you might say: Well, why are we so concerned. It is only a report. We hear that. We heard it from the Minister of Health today when he stood up in his place and said it is a report, it is a report that we are going to look at, when the Member for Trinity North referred to a report that the Department of Health had done with health care here in the Province.

Well, this is a report as well, and it is not going to the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador. This particular report is going to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans in Ottawa. If we think back, and we do not have to think back a long way, we do not have to think long to see some of the decisions that have been made in Ottawa regarding the fishery in this Province, how they have worked negatively and our voice has not been listened to. Far too often, far too often, decisions are made in isolation of what the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador and what the people in Newfoundland and Labrador think.

When you look back, I suppose, it all goes back to politics. It all goes back to politics when you look at us, this Province, being represented in Ottawa by seven members, when you look at this Province being represented in Ottawa by seven Senators, for a total of fourteen. When you look at the mindset of mainland Canada, and I refer to Ontario specifically, where they have - well, it was 101 seats and I think now it is probably 104 or 105, maybe as many as 107 seats in the House of Commons- it is not hard to realize who calls the tunes in Ottawa.

I will go back, Madam Speaker, to when I was part of a delegation that went to Ottawa to look for benefits for fish plant works and fishermen, and the Member for Baie Verte, and the present Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture, I will never forget going and meeting with the Liberal caucus up in Ottawa. There were about three people who showed up. Out of a total of 185 or 190 people, there were three people who showed up for a delegation from this Province to talk about the fishing industry in this Province. There were three people from the government party who showed up. I will never forget it. I can never get it out of my mind.

When I talk about looking to Ottawa for benefits and I talk about the clout that we have in Ottawa, I have to think of the MP for some Toronto riding - I think it might have been Dundas or something - Dennis Mills. Dennis Mills was the Member of Parliament. I will never forget it.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FITZGERALD: The Member for Baie Verte-White Bay shouts and says he remembers it quite well. I will never forget him standing up, in the few people who were there, and his comment was directed to me when I put forward the case, as best I could, and his comment to me was: Mr. Fitzgerald, if you have so many people unemployed or if you have so many people looking for a job in Newfoundland and Labrador, I suggest you tell them to come to Toronto. We have 10,000 jobs up here that we can provide them with. That was his attitude, Madam Speaker. In other words, bar up you house, tie up the gate, take the children, get the U-Haul and come on up to Toronto and we will put you to work making whatever the minimum wage is. Madam Speaker, it is not as easy as that. It is not as easy as that, but that is the mind set that exists. That is the mind set.

When we seen the 1,500 tons of shrimp that was provided to Prince Edward Island, we did not even get representation from some of our own MPs that were up in Ottawa at the time. That is the kind of representation we have. That is what concerns this member, and that is what concerns the members of this Opposition. I am certain if the members on the other side would speak the truth, they would say that they have some great concerns as well. They have some great concerns about our representation, they have some great concerns about the clout that our seven members have, and they have even greater concerns about other people looking to be able to access a resource that we do not have enough of already in order to maintain a livelihood in this Province.

Madam Speaker, we are not looking for anything by looking for the simple adjacency principle to be recognized and to be adhered to here in this Province. What we are looking for is something that is rightfully ours. We are looking for something that we fished before; we are looking for something that is adjacent to our shores; we are looking for something that provides economic viability to rural Newfoundland and Labrador. Madam Speaker, before we go looking to be able to catch and harvest other species and other quotas, I think it is imperative that we look after what we already have, I say to the minister. I think it is imperative that we look after and look out to what is happening on the Nose and the Tail of the Grand Banks. What we see in this Province today and what we are witnessing with overfishing by the Russians, the Icelanders and the Faroese, Madam Speaker, and the other countries in the European Union, the Estonians, is nothing short of criminal. If anybody read the story in today's Telegram - and it was raised yesterday by a member, by Mr. Loyola Hearn, the MP for St. John's West in Ottawa - it is nothing short of criminal. Here we are paying lip service to it.

Yesterday, the Member for The Straits & White Bay North asked a question to the minister about what we are talking about here today, about this independent panel access criteria. His comment was: Join with us, to come out and protest what is happening. There is nothing wrong with that. There is nothing wrong with that, I say to you, Madam Speaker, but in order for people to join together towards a common cause it has to start by putting together a committee of this House, not an adhoc committee that will meet every time there is a problem and disband it after.

Maybe it is time, I say to the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture, that we set up a standing fisheries committee in this House. Maybe it is time that we strike a committee of this House that would go out and make representation to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. Maybe it is time for a committee of this House to go and be the guides, if you would, be the front-runners in taking forward this most important topic, and protecting this important industry in our Province. Madam Speaker, I do not know of anything else so important as the fisheries is to rural Newfoundland and Labrador. When I talk about rural Newfoundland and Labrador I say the whole Province, because St. John's depends on the fishery just as much as Bonavista, Port Union, Catalina, or anywhere else.

I say to you, Mr. Minister, maybe it is time that we struck a standing fisheries committee of this House so that we can take our concerns forward and it would not be a situation where somebody would have to stand and say: maybe we should appoint a committee. Maybe we should appoint a committee to see if Fishery Products International are playing by the rules; why there were created in the first place. Then all of a sudden there is another issue and we say: maybe we should form a committee to go and see if this is the way it should be or to make representation on somebody's behalf. Maybe it is time that we struck a committee of this House. It does not have to be headed by the minister. In fact, it should not be, but we should have a committee of this House, a standing committee on fisheries, that should go forward and take this department and make representation and make suggestions and hopefully, Madam Speaker, convince the decision-makers in Ottawa of how important this particular industry is to Newfoundland and Labrador, and not play lip service to it or slough it off because somebody else is looking for something. Madam Speaker, it is far more important than to allow that to happen.

I do not think you are going to see any decisions made on what this independent access panel put forward. You are not going to see any decisions made within the next couple of weeks because there are a couple of by-elections on the go. There is a by-election on the go in Bonavista-Trinity-Conception, there is a by-election on the go in Gander and Grand Falls. Naturally, the Liberal member's cousins are not going to do anything that would embarrass their members and cause them votes.

Madam Speaker, if there was ever a time to send a message to Ottawa, if there was ever a time to show Ottawa our displeasure with how they have handled the fishing industry in this Province, if there was ever a time to show Ottawa what we think, if transfer payments - they are cutting transfer payments to this Province. If there was ever a time to send a message to Ottawa to show them what we think of the changes they made to the EI system in this Province, Madam Speaker, now is the chance. Now is the chance for people to speak out and show Mr. Chrétien that we do not agree with the decisions that are being made by the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. We do not agree with the decisions that were made by the hon. Jane Stewart. We do not agree with the decisions that were made by Mr. Dhaliwal or Mr. Anderson. Now is the chance to send a message, Madam Speaker.

When I was reading The Telegram - I have to go back to talking about what is happening here with foreign overfishing. I have to refer to the Russian boat and the story that was in the paper just today, Madam Speaker, where our own Department of Fisheries and Oceans went abroad a Russian trawler that landed here in one of our Newfoundland ports, off-loaded fish - you know, it is unbelievable what is happening. I mean, here we are standing in this House every day, talking about foreign overfishing, talking about the lack of work for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, talking about our fish plants and our fishing communities, idle, shut down, working fourteen weeks of the year, having to go back to government to beg for job creation programs so that they can qualify for EI, Madam Speaker, and then we hear another group of people where we talk about taking a simple step in closing our ports. I believe in that step, by the way, I believe that that is the first step, closing our ports to countries that are flying flags of convenience out there with no adherence to rules or regulations at all. All of the sudden we hear some of our own people saying that: Ah, we shouldn't do this, we shouldn't close our ports, we should allow this to happen, there have to be other ways of dealing with it. But we have to all pull together.

I know it is financially hard for businesses. They have built a business, and it is not something they want to see happening. That is human nature. When you see Russian ships, and I refer to Russian ships because the last two that came here that we were made aware of, by the watchful eye of Mr. Gus Etchegary, and I have to give him credit for it, but when you see what was on that particular boat - some of the things that were brought out was one ton of frozen cod liver. This was in the manifest that was on the Russian trawler: one ton of frozen cod liver; thirty-four tons of fish meal. Madam Speaker, you might say: So! There was a ton of cod liver, there were thirty-four tons of fish meal. So what! When you look at the amount of codfish that was reported being caught, it was only seven point six tons; seven point six tons of codfish caught.

Madam Speaker, lets get realistic here now; seven tons of cod fish caught. The information that was provided by scientists and by people who know something about the fishery indicated that in order to have one ton of frozen cod liver and thirty-four tons of fish meal aboard the boat, then they had to have caught 250 to 300 tons of cod. So, 250 to 300 tons of cod in order to have -

MADAM SPEAKER: Order, please!

I remind the hon. member that his time is up.

MR. FITZGERALD: Just by leave for a few minutes, if you would. Just by leave, Madam Speaker.

MADAM SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave.

MR. FITZGERALD: Madam Speaker, when you realize that, when you realize that this boat was allowed to come to our waters, in our ports, unload fish that shouldn't have been caught, unload fish that our own fishermen and fish plant workers would probably be working at, providing employment, looking after their families - where is the boat now? Gone back to Russia.

What did we do? Absolutely nothing, other than stand here today and complain about it. That is shameful!

Madam Speaker, I am going to, just for one minute - and I won't take advantage of leave - go through just a couple of towns in my district that were highlighted in the 7 per cent census report a couple of days ago.

In Bonavista, a fishing community, in 1991: 4,597 people; in 2001: 4,021. In Elliston - just listen to this one, Madam Speaker - 533 people in 1991; in 2001: 360, and there are less people there today. Catalina, 1,205 today; last year, 995; Plate Cove East, 145; last year, 120; Plate Cove West - listen to this one - 322; last year,183; Port Union, 638; last year, 486, and a lot less people working there today, I say to you, Madam Speaker. Those were proud communities, proud people who worked twelve months of the year in the fishing industry, made good money, came home to dinner every day, went out and bought their bread and bought their groceries in local markets that are now closed; communities devastated.

While adjacency is important, I think what is more important is that we look after what we already have and what is already under our jurisdiction to be able to look after, and to make sure that we bring foreigners and anything else that is happening within the 200-mile limit, on the edges of the parameter of 200 miles, to bring them to justice. If they come to use our ports, let's not bend over for a few paltry dollars, as important as they are, and allow that to happen.

Madam Speaker, with that I will conclude. I congratulate the Member for White Bay North for bringing forward this resolution. It is a topic that he knows very well. I congratulate him, but I say to people opposite, and I say to the Liberal government, it is time to break the ties with your cousins in Ottawa and it is time to start speaking out on this particular issue. It is time to look after Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and cut the ties with your federal cousins and look after the people we were put here to represent.

Thank you.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MADAM SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Cartwright-L'Anse au Clair.

MS JONES: Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I want to rise today and speak to the motion that has been put forward by the Member for The Straits & White Bay North and also amended by the Member for Twillingate & Fogo.

No doubt, adjacency is one of the guiding principles of fisheries development in Newfoundland and Labrador. Historically, we have always lobbied for principles of adjacency in the management of our fish resources, and how we have tried to build our economy within this Province is around those particular principles. Certainly any panel, any recommendation or any recognition that it could be comprised obviously has very devastating effects on people in communities across the Province, as has certainly been indicated by other members who have spoken here today.

Madam Speaker, we have certainly been very active in lobbying the federal government on various issues around the fishery, especially as it relates to foreign overfishing, as it relates to fishing on the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks, and also as it relates to quotas in jurisdictions within our own Province. We have continued to be active, we have continued to lobby, and we have continued to make representation to the federal government, educating them, impressing upon them the need to have good management practices within this Province to certainly supplement the benefit of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

When the panel heard from the provinces and territorial governments, I am sure there were some common messages that underlined the presentations that were presented, both by the four Atlantic Provinces, including our own, and also by Quebec and the Territory of Nunavut. Madam Speaker, I am sure that each Province has its own principles and has its own ideas of how the management should take place within this particular industry, but I can certainly tell you that there are none that are any more important or any more necessary than those principles that are certainly being used in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Our government made a formal presentation to this panel when they met in the Province, and we were quite explicit in our view at that time, that the current application for access criteria lacked transparency, predictability, stability and, most importantly, consistency. It was this position that we took, and took very diligently with the panel, impressing upon them, and one of the things that we specifically outlined was that of adjacency. What we said at that particular time was that adjacency should be the only criteria for access to new and emerging fisheries, because we really feel strongly about that. If we are to open up new fisheries, develop new fisheries within our Province, then we feel that adjacency should be the only criteria and that we should have first access to that.

Any new access to existing fisheries should be based solely on adjacency; however, historical participation will be respected because we, too, believe in historical participation and historical right. As a result, the communities that are dependent upon these resources will certainly be recognized in their efforts and given the respect that they need in terms of allocations. That was basically the position that we put forward at the time. We also felt that those recommendations and the recommendations around adjacency should be entrenched in legislation within the Government of Canada, recognizing Newfoundland and Labrador, and that being the guiding principle.

Madam Speaker, one thing that we did not recommend in the report was definitely not to have an Atlantic-wide access board. That would certainly not serve the needs of the fishing industry in Newfoundland and Labrador. It will not serve the needs of the people of our Province, and we felt that recommending a Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador fisheries management and development board would be the preferred option for us because it would give us more input, more direct say in what happens, and certainly a greater opportunity to participate in any new and emerging fisheries and in any future quota allocations that could take place.

The panel discusses the Aboriginal participation within the fishing industry. Madam Speaker, this is obviously a very important component. I have been a long-time supporter of Aboriginal rights and treaty rights and land claim rights within our own Province, within Labrador, but I really feel there has to be a balance, and that adjacency also applies to Aboriginal groups and it applies to their rights to be able to participate in a fishery. I think that the Government of Canada has set a number of precedents already in which they have used the principle of adjacency as the ultimate principle in making any decision or allocation, but they also have considered the rights of Aboriginal peoples.

In Labrador, for example, in Northern Labrador, where we have the Labrador Inuit Association, there has been longtime standing agreements with the Inuit people in which they were given allocations to be able to fish offshore quotas of shrimp and are able to harvest that particular product, and they are adjacent to the resource. They are probably closer to the resource than anyone else in the Province. Also with regard to the Innu Nation, again the guiding principle being adjacency, but also recognizing the right of Aboriginal people to be able to access the resource. Two or three years ago the federal government set that precedent by allocating an adjacent resource, an adjacent quota, to the Innu Nation in Labrador whereby they could fish that resource and harvest it and provide benefits to their own Aboriginal organization as a result of it.

The Labrador Métis Nation have been diligently impressing upon the federal government now for some time that they too should have an allocation of shrimp as an Aboriginal organization. I fully support their efforts. Their arguments are very legitimate. Again, they are a group who are directly adjacent to the fishery resource, and if the federal government was using the same principles in which they had made allocations to both the Inuit and the Innu of Labrador, they would also make an allocation to the Métis of Labrador.

So I think there is a very good example of a balance that has been created in terms of allocating a species and quotas, a balance that has been created between the principles of adjacency and recognizing the inherent right of our First Peoples of this country, our Aboriginal peoples. So I think that precedent is there. I think that we need to continue to work from that particular angle, giving our Aboriginal peoples our full consideration from that particular angle. In doing so, hopefully the federal government - and the message that I would send to the federal government today is that the Labrador Métis Nation should be included as well, and they too should have an allocation that needs to be looked at.

Madam Speaker, adjacency has long been the topic of conversation on the Coast of Labrador. I can tell you, that growing up all I have heard in relation to the fishery has been the principles of adjacency, and that is ensuring that people and communities benefit from the resource. I can tell you, oftentimes in our history, as it is today, it has always been frustrating for the communities and the people on the Coast of Labrador. I go back a number of years and remember the people of Black Tickle who always talked about when they would go to their stages and it would be empty. They would have no quotas of fish, but they would look out off the shore in the nighttime and they would see the vessels lit up outside the islands. It was like a small city on the water.

This is the frustration that those people experience, living adjacent to a resource that they had absolutely no access to. I do not think that it is right. We live in a country where we should honour and protect the rights of adjacency. It should be a guiding principle in terms of developing the communities around our country. I do not think that any community, in this day and age, should have a government manage a resource for them in which they manage it outside of the benefits that could accrue to their immediate communities or their particular area. It has been very frustrating for people, I am sure all throughout Newfoundland and Labrador and Atlantic Canada. But, I can tell you, growing up on the Coast of Labrador, it was always an issue. I remember from a very young age going out to meetings, fishermen's meetings, and they would always talk about adjacency; whether it was in relation to cod or crab or scallop or shrimp. It did not really matter the species - turbot. It was always the discussion and it was always the topic. Madam Speaker, people always looked for that security. They see it as a sense of security in terms of protecting their resource, and it is indeed.

When I look at this map which outlines the shrimp fishing areas throughout our Province, and I look in Area 6 where I think today out of 50,000 tons of shrimp that is being landed in our Province by the mid-shore and inshore fleet, 41,000 tons of that shrimp is coming from this immediate area right off the Coast of Labrador. I can tell you that without that kind of resource at our fingertips and having access to that kind of quota, we would certainly see a lot of people in this Province without employment and a lot of communities without people. I look at the shrimp areas and I often say it is almost unbelievable to know that there was something like 100,000 tons of shrimp being taken in the waters off our Province and most of it adjacent to the shores of Labrador, and we only got our first shrimp plant a year ago. So, I tell you that adjacent to the resource does not always constitute economic wealth. You have the advantage to make something work for you. That is what we were able to do with building the shrimp plant in Charlottetown last year and being able to land some of that product there and then create some jobs.

Madam Speaker, back about twenty years ago, I guess, the fisherpeople in Labrador, when they set up the Labrador Fisherman's Union Shrimp Company, their only means of survival at that particular time - and it has certainly brought them to the level that they are today - had been the principle of adjacency and their ability to be able to access large quotas of shrimp in the northern areas, the northern shrimp fishing areas of Labrador. Without that access to that northern shrimp, Madam Speaker, they would not have been able to build the company that they have built today. They certainly would not have been able to create the employment and be able to supplement the fishing enterprises in the way in which they have.

Madam Speaker, the Labrador Fisherman's Union Shrimp Company is a perfect example of how adjacency to a resource, being able to access that resource, and making the appropriate investments for the communities in which you live. It is a perfect example of how a fisheries management, in that particular way, has benefitted a large number of people and communities. I am sure that there are many other ways. There are other ways where you can provide even more benefit. But, I know in this particular case, when the shrimp company first became established - and although those quotas were offshore quotas with offshore licenses as opposed to inshore - they were able to hire Labrador fishers to fish offshore on those boats. They were able to sell the shrimp into the marketplace and reinvest the income from the product back into communities. That was certainly what built the crab plant up in Cartwright which employs about 150 people today. It built the crab plant in Mary's Harbour which employs about 160 people today, and it built the plant in L'Anse au Loup, a groundfish plant, which employs over 200 people today.

Madam Speaker, these are the kinds of investments that this company has been able to make into one small area of the Province to create employment. Obviously, there are many more other things that they were able to do with this capital and this investment. It just shows the benefits that adjacency can bring to communities. The same is the case in Northern Labrador where the Labrador Inuit Association, an Aboriginal organization, who access quota because of adjacency and because of their inherent right to be able to do so, and how their investments are being put back into the communities to build employment and to build the local economy to sustain people.

I think it is very unfortunate that we have to subject ourselves even to this kind of a debate or argumentation or presentation to the federal government. I think it is absolutely unfortunate that they do not understand the industry from the perspective that we do in Newfoundland and Labrador and realize the necessity of being able to have access to the stock in order to sustain the economy of our entire Province, Madam Speaker, not just one area like the area that I represent, or the area the Member for Bonavista represents, or the Member for Twillingate & Fogo, or The Straits & White Bay North; but the Province as a whole, Madam Speaker, depends upon how these quotas are allocated, how they distributed, and how the investments are reinvested for the benefit of the people in our Province. It is unfortunate that we have to go knocking on doors pleading the panels, pleading to them with report after report, submission after submission, debate after debate, resolution after resolution, in this House to educate them to help them understand the management of this industry and how important it is to our people, but it seems to be the trend. It seems to be the practice that we have to take upon ourselves each and every day and even just this past few months in the House of Assembly, I think, we have had something like three resolutions regarding the fishery calling upon the federal government to do one thing or another thing. Whether it is to pay more attention to the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks, whether it is to deal with the foreign overfishing, whether it is to deal with vessel size regulations, whether it is to deal with adjacency, whether it is to appoint a panel to review the criteria for allocations within our Province. It seems that all the time we have to be bringing resolutions to this House to go to Ottawa to address these issues and to put these issues forward. That is really unfortunate.

When you consider the history that we have as a Province within this industry, our history probably stems back further into the fishery - and of course it does - than anywhere else in the country, anywhere else in Atlantic Canada.

MR. SPEAKER (Snow): Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MS JONES: Mr. Speaker, may I have leave to clue up my comments?

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MS JONES: Thank you.

Obviously, it just goes to show that we don't always have the people in Ottawa acting in our best interests, and on what we say. It is unfortunate that we have to keep pushing the issue, but we do have to keep pushing the issue, Mr. Speaker, because our communities depend upon it, our livelihoods depend upon it, and our mere existence as a Province depends upon it. We can look at all the new industry that we want, but we cannot let the fishery of this Province fall by the wayside, be governed and dictated to by people with little or no understanding of how it should be managed and how it should be distributed.

I want to applaud the Member for The Straits & White Bay North. This is a good resolution that he has brought forward. I think it is important. Although we have to do it over and over again, it is important to keep doing it. I am glad that he has brought this forward today, because I can tell you, without the guiding principles of adjacency being addressed and looked at first and foremost, within the distribution of quota by the federal government of our country, our Province is definitely at a disadvantage, Mr. Speaker. We, the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, will be the people who will suffer at the end of the day, not the people in Ottawa. I think we have seen that time and time again, as we have dealt with issues around the fishery.

So, it doesn't matter if it is an issue as big as foreign overfishing, or an issue directly related to a fisherman, as vessel size regulations, it just seems our message is not getting through, and we are not being heard. I think, collectively, we have to stay together, work together, speak together, as one voice in Newfoundland and Labrador to try and change that. Mr. Speaker, I, for one, will certainly do my part to see that that happens, not only because my district depends upon this, but because all of us in this Province depend upon it.

Mr. Speaker, with those comments, I want to say that I support the motion as put forward by the hon. Member for The Straits & White Bay North, and the amendments that have been proposed by the Member for Twillingate & Fogo. I think it is a good resolution, and I certainly encourage all the people in this House to support this motion.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Baie Verte.

MR. SHELLEY: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I understand the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi wants to get up, and he will have some time in a little while, Mr. Speaker.

I certainly want to rise today, Mr. Speaker, to speak to this particular motion put forward by the Member for The Straits & White Bay North, and compliment him for bringing this forward today, and really, I guess, putting forward what we believe, as a party on this side of the House, where this should go. I think it was said by the Member for The Straits & White Bay North, in the can. That is how he pronounced it.

Mr. Speaker, simply put, this particular motion has hit a nerve with a lot of people over the years throughout this Province. I guess what sort of highlighted it all, or got it back to people thinking this way again, was just a year-and-a-half or two years ago, when the situation in this Province again where people saw a 1,500 ton shrimp allocation to Prince Edward Island.

Mr. Speaker, the history of the fishery in this Province has been highlighted by the way that this Province has been treated by the federal government throughout our history. Throughout the fifty-two years of joining this country, many people in this Province, especially people involved in the fishery, have always had a problem with how we have been treated at the end of the day, or managed, I should say, by our federal national government. That is what it all comes down to.

As you read the resolution put forward here today, it simply says this panel, this independent panel: is proposing that Aboriginal rights and regional equity replace adjacency as the primary consideration in allocating fishing quotas.

Mr. Speaker, that is simply not going to work. We all know that, as the minister pointed out, and rightly so, earlier today, places like P.E.I., New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, they are not worried when you go fifty or 100 miles from their shore when they are okay with the lobster catches, crab catches, whatever the species, because they know adjacency does not mean a lot to them because outside of that it is not important. But, it is important to this Province. Year after year we seem to be battling the same thing over and over again. This is not a time, as the member mentioned earlier, about knocking on doors with committees and pleading. The word is not pleading this time. This time it has to be a demand. It has to be at a point when this Province of Newfoundland and Labrador says: That is it. The jig is up. This has to stop here.

What the Member from The Straits & White Bay North is talking about is closing the door shut, not leaving any possibility. Actually, the minister referred to it earlier when he talked about the criteria that was listed. He said they listed, and I think FANL was involved, the unions and the Federation of Municipalities, that they listed the criteria of adjacency, historical attachment, and economical viability, in that order. They listed in that order on behalf of this Province, but it seemed that what they thought might have been a small change is that adjacency did not end up as a priority. Adjacency was not at the top of the list. Well, Mr. Speaker, it has to be. That is what we are demanding in this motion, that this particular report notice the word adjacency as the number one. If we do not do that, we are going to have a lot of problems down the road.

As the Member from Bonavista South pointed out, a couple of times in the last five or six years I have gone to Ottawa with the Member for Bonavista South, and the Minister of Fisheries, and the former Minister of Fisheries, and talked on fisheries issues in this Province. Just to go there on any panel, and I am sure a number of members have gone on a number of panels to Ottawa to represent views on fisheries for this Province, it seems like it is always the same thing over and over. The Member for Bonavista South pointed out earlier, when the MP - Don Mills, I think was the name he used earlier; I could not remember the gentleman's name - his attitude toward Newfoundland, and that we had a problem in the fishery. We had to point out to him very quickly that the reason Newfoundland and Labrador exists, and where it started, and the history of Newfoundland and Labrador, was some 500 years ago when the fish brought us here. That was our history. That was our backbone. It still is. I believe this date is right, July 2, 1992, the Member for The Straits & White Bay North talked about where he was at that time. You know how you sometimes remember certain dates, what things happen, where you were. Well, I guess with his close relationship to the fishery over the years, he remembers exactly where he was, driving up the Northern Peninsula, when he heard the news from John Crosbie. I think a lot of people in this House and a lot of people throughout this Province remember that day. They remember the cameras and how people were banging on the doors at the Delta Hotel, and what that meant to this Province, what the fishery means to this Province.

To move forward from that, we talk about the mismanagement of the fishery by the federal government, and now for them to even consider this report without getting a priority to adjacency, after the smack that this Province took in 1992 with the closing of the fishery.

Mr. Speaker, in my view, the federal government of the day should be looking at this as a priority for this Province first and foremost because we took the hardest hit. We were the ones who saw 60,000 people leave this Province since 1992. We were the people who lived in rural parts of Newfoundland and Labrador and now see houses close down, U-Hauls leaving. That is all in that effect. It was all a part of that. This is not just a one-piece story. This has been going on for years. What made Newfoundland and Labrador thrive was the fishing industry. I have known isolated incidents, and I have heard members in this House talk about it, where people in my district pack up in the spring of the year to go to Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island to work in a crab plant or to work in a lobster plant. Some people think we are embellishing by telling those stories. Go sit down and talk to those people. I have sat and talked with them.

Just a couple of summers ago, I was on the ferry crossing from Port aux Basques to Sydney when three ladies come over to talk to me. They recognized me as the Member for Baie Verte and came over to talk to me about where they were going. I can't give away their ages, of course, and I am not giving their names either, but they did seem to be in the range of about forty-five to fifty-five years old. They were on their way to Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia to work in crab plants and lobster plants; people from this Province who worked in the plants for twenty and thirty years. As a matter of fact, I think the ladies were from the Northern Peninsula. They were not from my district. They were from another part of the Province, but I am pretty sure it was the Northern Peninsula. That said a lot to me, that we see people who worked in fish plants in this Province for twenty or twenty-five years, at the age of forty-five, fifty years old, going away to work in a fish plant or a crab plant or a lobster plant in P.E.I. and Nova Scotia or New Brunswick, wherever it may be.

Mr. Speaker, this is at the bare root of the problem that hit us the hardest on July 2, 1992. That is what the federal government had to be reminded of, that we were the ones that took the hardest hit in 1992 because of mismanagement by a federal government, whatever party that may be. We have gone beyond that. I agree with the minister when we say - and we have done it before in the sealing industry and so on - if there is ever an issue that we have come together on, not just this House of Assembly as elected people but this entire Province, where we are not going to go up, as the member said earlier, and plea, knock on a door, lobby and set up another committee - this has to be no less than a demand this time. This is where it stops; no loopholes, an ironclad guarantee that this Province will not put up, any more, with the giving away of our resources.

Mr. Speaker, it is not just in this House of Assembly that people are saying that, because I know any member here would stand today and say the same thing. Throughout this entire Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, you go anywhere in this Province, and if you got into a conversation with people they would say the same thing. We see it time after time with many different resources, with forestry, mining and so on, but the one that drives home the most is the one that brought us here, which is the fishery resource off our coast.

When we see that many people leave this Province, Mr. Speaker, when we look at that many people leave this province - some 65,000 people since the moratorium, since1992. Imagine! That is like wiping out the City of Mount Pearl and Corner Brook combined, overnight. Most of that out-migration, Mr. Speaker, I would assume, had to do directly with the fishery industry and the collapse of the fishing industry in this Province. That is why we saw the out-migration. I do not think we have any particular numbers on that, but I would be surprised if 70 per cent to 80 per cent, at least, of the out-migration of people who left this Province in the last decade, wasn't directly related to the collapse of the fishing industry in the Province.

So we have a case, Mr. Speaker, a good strong case, that has to be brought forward by every single party in this House, and anybody in this Province who would join us in bringing forward that case. But this time it is not to go up to make a strong recommendation, it is not to go and plea, it is to demand that it stops here this time.

This today, Mr. Speaker, as the minister referred to earlier as an important issue, I would say is a critical issue. I do not know if people stop to think about it much yet, but as they start to realize it more and more in this Province - I know in my district, where a lot of people depend on the fishery, last year when we talked about foreign over-fishing, when we were in protesting on a road in La Scie because there was no work in the plant last year, what do you think was going on out on the Grand Banks when we were standing on a road in La Scie protesting about no work for the plant there? Foreign overfishing, Mr. Speaker, as the Member for Bonavista South referred to earlier. That is what is happening. While the people here cannot get forty hours of work a week, twenty hours of work a week, we have draggers out on the Nose and Tail of the Grand Banks depleting our stocks, and it has been going on for too long.

I cannot help but mention today about the Estai and the whole fiasco that happened there. It certainly brought attention to it. There is no doubt about that, Mr. Speaker. It certainly brought attention to the issue, which was the positive part of it. You have to give due where it should go. But at the end of the day, what was the real result? What is the result today, when we have an example like the Member for Bonavista South mentioned earlier, about the Russian trawler? That is where we have to get some final results.

So the overfishing in the international waters, the adjacency issue as it refers to Atlantic Canada, is all a combination, Mr. Speaker, of the problems within the fishery. Then right on down to, as I spoke about a few minutes ago, my own district - Little Bay Islands, which has a plant there, the La Scie plant, which has a history as a thriving fishing community, last year was on its knees, with less than thirty people; a place that used to employ 600 people at peak times. These are not communities that have not contributed to this Province. They were knocked down, Mr. Speaker, flattened, because of things that happened in the past with the fishing resources off our coast. That is why it happened. Who was the manager? Who was managing that resource? The federal government.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, whoever goes to Ottawa, or wherever we go, or if we do it here, and whoever does it, the message has to be straightforward and to the point, that this time it is not going to happen. Whatever means - and, Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of definitions, and I have heard other people talk about it - whatever means that are necessary to send the message this time, that it will not happen again. It is time to stop it. We have been brought to our knees before in 1992, it cannot happen now.

Shrimp plants and crab plants around this Province - and, Mr. Speaker, as I say, the La Scie or Englee, I understand, last year had a very rough year. Also plants within our own Province closed down, and people have worked in them for twenty or thirty years. And we are considering taking a resource off our coast so that plants in other parts of Atlantic Canada can thrive! Mr. Speaker, I do not think it would happen in reverse; let's put it that way. I do not think, if it was off Quebec's coast, within a 100-mile limit, and they asked for the same thing, the same thing would be happening. I do not think the same consideration would be given that this panel gave. No, Mr. Speaker; it would stop. That is why, whether it is seven MPs in Ottawa or whatever it is, the government of this Province, the Opposition, the other party in this House, anybody can join to say that this is the end of this, it has to stop there.

Mr. Speaker, in one of the WHEREAS, it says, "WHEREAS acceptance of these recommendations would further reduce Newfoundlanders' and Labradorians' access to the marine resources that they brought into Confederation". Mr. Speaker, I think it is timely, I think it is critical, and I believe that the Member for The Straits & White Bay North has taken the right approach to this with this particular resolution. I believe that the minister made some changes that we have all accepted, that we all agreed to. It is a step in the right direction. But once we link arms to do it, Mr. Speaker, we cannot back up. There is nowhere to back up, Mr. Speaker. This resolution is a starting point, it is a critical time to do it, and I think that with all of us in collaboration and understanding the issue, that we have a case that we can put forward that is going to be strong enough to say to this panel: Scrap it, put it away, at least as it refers to the adjacency rule. Until that is clear and ironclad, and we can be sure that we are going to protect the resources off our Province for the people in the fishery of this Province, Mr. Speaker, then we will not accept it.

I agree with the Member from The Straits & White Bay North. I want to commend him for bringing forward this resolution and we will see where we go from here.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Government House Leader.

MR. LUSH: Mr. Speaker, I will not be speaking long. The hon. member wants an opportunity, and I will only take up a couple minutes.

Basically, I just want to tell the House what we are doing with the resolution so that everybody understands, even though we have all agreed. We will circulate what the resolution will be. It says: the resolution is amended (a) by striking out the two recital clauses and substituting the following. I will not read them. We will circulate them to hon. members. And (b) by striking out the two resolution clauses and by substituting the following resolve clauses. So it does not change anything other than the words. It does not change the spirit of the resolution. We thank hon. members for agreeing to that and we just place it on the Table and ask that it be circulated.

I just want to say. Mr. Speaker, that since we have been a government, since have been given responsible government, that a lot of speeches have been made in this institution, in the institution of Parliament in this Province, about fisheries. I would suggest, though a lot of discussion, a lot of debate, has gone on during that time, there is not any resolution, I would suggest, ever before this House any more important than what we have today.

We can say this: Who would have thought, Mr. Speaker, that we would be here today debating the fisheries in the manner in which we are? Debating whether we have access to fisheries on our shores. Debating whether we can use the resource. Debating whether we can pursue the resource that caused our existence.

Fish is what brought us here, fish is what keeps us here, and we must do everything we can to ensure that the fishery remains a vital resource and remains a vital part of the economy of the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. If we cannot establish that the right to access is governed primarily by adjacency, we would have lost a tremendous battle. We would have lost a tremendous birthright, Mr. Speaker, because fish is what brought us here and fish is what keeps us here.

Mr. Speaker, I am so delighted to know today that all members are showing their concern, showing their commitment, showing their passion for this Province by unanimously supporting this resolution today and sending a message to Ottawa, to the federal government, to demonstrate that in this Province we will settle for nothing less than the complete adherence to the adjacency principle in terms of access to our fishery. That is what this resolution is about, Mr. Speaker, and this is where we stand.

All of the members of this House, on this very important resource, on this very important issue, we stand united, and I think that is a tremendous message to be sending to the federal government. I congratulate hon. members for taking that stand today. Mr. Speaker, as a government, we will continue unrelentingly. We will continue to ensure that the fishery of this Province remains an important industry to the whole Province, the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador, and that we establish and assert as much control and authority in developing that important resource as we can.

Mr. Speaker, I realize that the hon. gentleman wants to speak and I will not take up any more time.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.

MR. HARRIS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the previous speaker for ensuring that there was sufficient time for me to have an opportunity to make a few remarks on this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, it would be hard to exaggerate the importance of the resolution before the House today, the resolution about the fisheries which is at the very, very heart of the way in which, under the Government of Canada, under our Constitution, fisheries resources are going to be allocated in the future, and the principles on which it is supposed to be based.

Mr. Speaker, the previous speaker mentioned, going back to Confederation, who would have thought that we would be here today debating and arguing with the Government of Canada about the principles under which the fish off our shores is to be allocated and to whom it is going to be allocated within Canada. Mr. Speaker, that would be unthinkable. Unthinkable, Mr. Speaker! If the Premier of Newfoundland in 1949, Premier Joey Smallwood, had thought for a moment that we would be debating this here fifty years down the road, I doubt very much if he would have been a Confederate. I think that members opposite might agree with that, that if it was thought by Joey Smallwood in 1949 that we would be debating this issue fifty years down the road, I doubt very much whether he would be a Confederate as he was, Mr. Speaker.

We are now looking at: Yes, it is only a recommendation, but it is a recommendation, Mr. Speaker, that seems to go along with the attitude amongst other provinces, whether they be Maritime Provinces or whether they be in Ottawa. We heard Mr. Dhaliwal say two years ago that this was a Canadian resource, not a Newfoundland resource, that he was giving to Prince Edward Island. He wasn't really giving it to Prince Edward Island, Mr. Speaker. It was three or four businessmen in Prince Edward Island who weren't even catching the fish, who never even saw the fish. They had a quota which they then sold to somebody, while it was in the water, that was caught by somebody else, processed by somebody else, shipped somewhere else, never saw the shores in Prince Edward Island, never saw the shores there. This was done, and we heard Members of Parliament from Prince Edward Island say, this was the basis of regional equity, that this shrimp was being allocated to three or four business people in Prince Edward Island on the basis of regional equality or regional equity, that they deserved to have a share of this resource off our shores.

Now, there has been a lot of talk of shrimp today, Mr. Speaker. I want to congratulate, first of all, all the previous speakers for their contribution to the debate. Each and every one of them has had something important to say about how the principle of adjacency ought to be, and has been, historically, and is internationally, the guiding principle regarding access to fisheries. That it ought to be, continued to be, the guiding principle and the primary principle that affects allocation of fishery resources, subject, of course, to reasonable and aggressive conservation measures to ensure that the stock remains. But, we are not only talking about shrimp.

The argument has been very eloquently made by the Member for Cartwright-L'Anse au Clair about the role that shrimp has played in the development of this other Labrador Coast and supported the Inuit communities in the north and the very important role that they play. The Labrador Fishermen's Union Shrimp Company has been the vehicle through which the adjacency of the shrimp has had benefit to the people of the Southern Labrador Coast and the communities, and they have used that money, they have used that access, they have used that involvement with the resource to provide employment and to build their communities. That is only one example of many around the Province where access to the shrimp resource has made a significant difference to our communities.

This also applies - and whatever principles we are talking about here, that may be adopted by the Government of Canada, will not just apply to shrimp, they will apply to the northern cod, they will apply to the cod fish around our waters as they come back, and as we hope they will. The other day there was a scientific report indicating that there was a very strong hope that the 1998 year class of cod will produce a very significant level of reproduction and potentially play a strong role in the rebuilding of the cod stock. That is, indeed, very good news after a lot of bad news for the last ten years since the motorium began in the groundfish industry; a devastating tragedy, Mr. Speaker. As it was said by one report, a tragedy of biblical proportions where the northern cod stock, once the largest single biomass of food fish in the world, was reduced to the point of near commercial extinction and a moratorium had to be imposed. That is the kind of issue that we are talking about here, Mr. Speaker, one of enormous importance to this Province but also to the food and protein that can be provided from this resource to this country and to the rest of the world.

That resource as it comes back, as it returns - as everyone here in this House and in this Province of Newfoundland and Labrador hopes it will. That resource, and the quotas for that resource, will also be allocated by whatever principles are adopted by the Government of Canada as a result of its response to the Independent Panel on Access Criteria. They have three so-called principles, which I submit is more of an unprincipled dealing with a resource that was brought into this country by the people of Newfoundland and Labrador in 1949. It is more about, in my view, Mr. Speaker, taking this resource and divvying it up to resolve other Canadian issues that are not related to the resource that was brought with us in 1949.

The access to this resource, to suggest that certainly conservation, no one would disagree, that it not a principle related to access. It is a principle related to management. It ought not to have anything really seriously to do with access and whether the allocation goes one place or another. The conservation measures and reasonable and aggressive conservation measures would apply regardless of where the allocations were going. To suggest that Aboriginal treaty rights and interregional equity be principles for access to fish resources in Atlantic Canada ignores the requirement that Newfoundland and Labrador be recognized as the Province with the immediate, historical and prior right to a livelihood and benefit of this resource that was brought into the country from our shores.

The adjacency principle is the guiding principle of international law as it affects a country's right to have access to the fisheries off its shores embodied in the 200 mile limit, embodied in the activities of countries such as Iceland twenty-five years ago and thirty years ago when they fought off the British Navy with their little trawlers, Mr. Speaker, and their special equipment. When they cut the trawls of British trawlers, when they told the British Navy that they were prepared to engage in battle, a battle that they would likely have lost in terms of firepower, in terms of the ability to literally defend its fishery and its shore, but a battle that Iceland won in the international court of public opinion and justice. The rightness of their cause forced the British Government to pull back the gunboats, to pull back the British Navy and to, in fact, pull back their fleet and recognize that Iceland, as a country with its adjacency principle, a fishery that it depended on for its livelihood, a country whose economy, whose communities, whose employment, whose industry depended on the fishery was not going to be faced down and stared down by the gunboats of the British Navy. It worked, Mr Speaker. It worked.

Here in Newfoundland and Labrador the principle of adjacency is just as important, I say, to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador as the principle of adjacency was to the people of Iceland. That was in the face of all the historical fishery by the British and by others around the shores of Iceland. Yet, Iceland was able to say, internationally, that we will not put up with an interference with our prior right as the adjacent country to this fishery around our shores, and they succeeded.

Mr. Speaker, we, too, have to have the same resolve in this Province to make sure that we do not see, by virtue of this resolution and by the potential acceptance of this resolution, that our fishery is going to be available equally. When we talk about regional equity, we are talking about four provinces and Quebec, five provinces in the Atlantic region, who have some type of fishery. If we are suggesting this is going to complete - or do it another way, Mr. Speaker, what the proposals of Mr. Risley and others this year tried to do with FPI, to dominate from Nova Scotia, or from some other place other than Newfoundland and Labrador, the fishery of Newfoundland and Labrador. There are those, Mr. Speaker, who have been involved in the fishery for many, many years, involved in important positions in the fishery, who take the position that since Confederation there has been a constant and consistent message and drive and attempt by the Nova Scotia fishing industry to take over the Newfoundland and Labrador resource. We have seen examples, Mr. Speaker, of quota being moved from Burgeo, for example, to Canso, done by the Seafreeze Corporation. Done, Mr. Speaker, under our noses.

This government, the government of the day, was unable to do or refused to do anything about it, saw it as a fait accompli; but, Mr. Speaker, that cannot be allowed to continue and we must draw the line in the sand. We must make sure that nothing can happen to accept this principle in Ottawa. We have heard Mr. Dhaliwal say that the fishery off Newfoundland and Labrador is a Canadian resource and will be allocated based on Canadian principles and Canadian values. Mr. Speaker, that is not acceptable given the nature of the fishery, the importance of the adjacency principle both in international law and in equity, in justice, and based on the historical dependence and role that the fishery has played in Newfoundland and Labrador.

This is a resolution, Mr. Speaker, of crucial importance. The enormous importance of the notion that our fishery must be first and foremost allocated to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador because of its adjacency is a fundamental principle on which we entered Confederation. I am glad that we may have an opportunity to further define some of the problems of Confederation for Newfoundland and Labrador, but I will guarantee you that what has happened to the fishery since 1949 is going to be a very, very important part of the considerations and representations made to the Royal Commission on the relationship between Newfoundland and Canada because we have seen a deterioration of priorities, we have seen a deteroriation of control, and we have seen a considerable effort, both in Ottawa and elsewhere, to take away the jurisdiction and the rights of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

MR. SPEAKER: Order, please!

The hon. member's time is up.

MR. HARRIS: Mr. Speaker, may I have a few seconds to clue up?

MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. member have leave?

AN HON. MEMBER: By leave.

MR. SPEAKER: By leave.

MR. HARRIS: We, Mr. Speaker, all of us in this House, all three parties representing this House, must do everything we can with the support and initiative of the government sitting opposite to leave no stone unturned and to take all, as the resolution says, to be unalterably opposed to limitations of the principles of adjacency and to take and resist, by all means, on all appropriate means, any decision the federal government may wish to make to allocate quotas to fishing interests that would not qualify for access under the principle of adjacency.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

MR. SPEAKER: The hon. the Member for The Straits & White Bay North.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TAYLOR: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I would like to take a few minutes now to close debate on the private member's resolution that I brought forward earlier. I would like to thank all members on both sides of the House for the comments, and the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture for the amendments. As we pointed out, the amendments certainly maintain the spirit and intent of what we wanted to say in this private member's resolution. We have no problem with those amendments. They serve to clarify what we have said in our resolution.

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, and as every member said so far, this resolution, this report, and the repercussions of this report, are of utmost importance. If the report is accepted and serves as the guidelines for access to fish resources in Atlantic Canada off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador and the Eastern Arctic, it will have serious repercussions - serious repercussions - for this Province.

Mr. Speaker, I have said a fair amount so far today on this, talked over twenty minutes on it so far, but there are a few things that I would just like to repeat and a couple of things I would like to point out, a couple of comparisons I would like to make. The comparisons that I would like to make, Mr. Speaker, partly come from a comment that the Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture made earlier. He spoke about a comment made by Earle McCurdy, the President of the Fishermen's Union. He spoke about how, during the depths of the moratorium, the darkest days after the Northern cod collapsed, the Northen cod closure, the South Coast closure, the Gulf of St. Lawrence closure, and those days when we went through what was termed by the media as the largest layoff in Canadian history, we never once went and looked for allocations, access to fish resources off the Scotian Shelf, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, other than those immediately adjacent to our own coast or anywhere else, Mr. Speaker, the Bay of Fundy, Georges Bank.

Mr. Speaker, there was one occasion, and I will relay it to this House now because I was involved with it at the time: I believe it was January or February, something like that, late February, 1994, and I was working in Corner Brook at the fishermen's union at the time, and we wanted access to crab off the West Coast of Newfoundland in area 4R+3PN; crab Zone 12 it was called, and it is called. All the allocations, all the access up to that point, had been by boats, fishermen, vessels, industry in New Brunswick primarily. I believe there might have been some access by Nova Scotia, but primarily by New Brunswick and Quebec.

We lobbied and lobbied and lobbied, Mr. Speaker. We went to Quebec. We went to Montreal for the Zone 12 crab advisory meeting, looking for access, and we were denied access for some years to that area because the area stretched right over to the West Coast of Newfoundland. We were denied access even though waters were adjacent, even though the resource was immediately adjacent in the inshore and midshore area. We were denied access until finally we were told by DFO: If you can get the Quebec industry, if you can get the industry that is there to agree with your access, we will entertain some of it.

All we wanted was the area out to the 4R+4S+3PN line. All we wanted was the area close to our coast, some access, limited access, nothing big. Finally, we spoke at the time to Gaston (inaudible) who was the representative for the fishermen in that area, and he said that while he could not support us publicly, he would not oppose us, and we got our access.

The reason I brought that up here today, Mr. Speaker, is because it shows the difference in how fish resources in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, regardless of where they are, regardless of who has fished them or who has not fished them, whether they are adjacent to a coast, irregardless of historical dependence on the resources in the area, it is treated completely different than fish resources off the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador. That is why our history has been the way it has. That is why we look at - I look at this and relate some figures here today in closing debate. People might say, as I said earlier, that we are sensationalizing this issue, that we are blowing it out of proportion. Some people have criticized us, as I said before, about our Province's reaction to the 1,500 ton shrimp deal from P.E.I. back in 2000.

Mr. Speaker, these issues that we raise here today, on both sides of the House, are issues that have been part of our history. The northern shrimp in Area 5 and Area 6 - I just took the liberty a few minutes ago of going into the DFO's Web site again. A lot of people might be surprised to know that Scotia Fundy Region - Nova Scotia in other words. Nova Scotia-based vessels in the total northern shrimp fishing area, which stretches from the Northeast Coast of Newfoundland to Davis Strait, the total quota for 2001 for Nova Scotia-based vessels was 18,434 tons. Now that is no small amount, Mr. Speaker. That is almost 40 million pounds for a province that is nowhere near the resource. We have 81,000 tons in that same area. Nova Scotia has 20 per cent of the quota and we have 80 per cent of the quota, in that area, roughly.

Compare that to Nova Scotia shrimp and how different the picture is. In Nova Scotia, Scotia Fundy holds 5,006 tons in that area. The Canso (inaudible) fishery, basically. Nova Scotia holds 5,006 tons. What does Newfoundland have in that area? Zero, nothing. Look at Gulf shrimp, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Esquiman Channel, Laurentian Channel, Anticosti and the Estuary: What do we have here? The Gulf-based vessels, which is basically New Brunswick and P.E.I., Nova Scotia, Nova Scotia Gulf side, 5,183 tons. The Laurentian Region, which is Quebec, 15,283 tons, and Newfoundland has 4,600 tons. We have 20 per cent, roughly, of a quota in an area that we have historically fished, in an area that we are adjacent to. On the other hand, we have a situation where everybody wants access to an area that they have no adjacency to.

Mr. Speaker, this has been our history. This is why, when we see reports such as the Independent Panel on Access Criteria's report, when we see these types of reports and the type of recommendations and guidelines that are recommended, that we get frustrated; that we stand up and oppose and, once again, are offended by an attitude that always seems to look at resources in Newfoundland and Labrador, resources off the Coast of Newfoundland and Labrador as resources that everybody should have access to, that no criteria - that the people of Newfoundland and Labrador have no more right to it than anybody else in the country. That is the attitude of other parts of Canada and the managers to the resources of our Province. When we look the other way, the walls come up, we cannot have access.

Mr. Speaker, in conclusion - I know we are running out of time here and I have said enough on this. I haven't said enough probably, no, but I have said enough here today because it is not here that this is going to change. It is not here that the decisions are made. It is not here that the P.E.I. shrimp deal was done. It is not here that the Nova Scotia shrimp deals were done. It is not here that the northern cod deals were done. It is in Ottawa, and that is where we have to be. That is where our industry, our communities, the Federation of Municipalities, everybody who has any kind of interest in the fishery in Newfoundland and Labrador, which should be everybody who is in this Province, should be standing up and saying: enough is enough. We have had enough of this. We have had enough of our resources being taken and shipped off to other parts of the country. We have had enough of out-migration. We have had enough of the people in the Straits area, the people of Black Duck Cove and Eddies Cove, that area there who have been lobbying for a number of years, as have the people on the east side of the peninsula, in Conche, Croque, St. Julien's and Grandois, Englee, Roddickton, Main Brook area, have been lobbying for years for access to this resource. They have a community-based allocation and have been denied. They will be lobbying for it again this year, and they should have it.

Mr. Speaker, what we see today in this report, and the reason why we all, I believe - I should hope - everybody who has spoken opposed this report and the recommendations because the recommendations in this report would give somebody in Miramichi Bay just as much right, if not more right, to access the Northern shrimp as somebody in Canada Bay. That is fundamentally wrong. There is something fundamentally wrong with that, Mr. Speaker.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TAYLOR: A number of members here today have raised the issue of foreign overfishing.

Madam Speaker, or Mr. Speaker - I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. While Madam Speaker was there I was saying Mr. Speaker, and I got used to saying Madam Speaker, so now you have to put up with the inaccuracy.

AN HON. MEMBER: He has been called worse.

MR. TAYLOR: I believe he has been called worse; so somebody says, anyway.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. TAYLOR: Stop while I am ahead, yes.

Mr. Speaker, in all seriousness, the issue of foreign overfishing is related to this issue that we debate here today. It is related to this issue because adjacency is fundamental to our argument, is key to our argument, that we should have management over the Nose and the Tail of the Grand Banks and the Flemish Cap. It is the reason why we make the argument, because it is immediately adjacent to our shores, to our waters, to the exclusive economic zone and our 200-mile limit. This report, if accepted, will throw our argument to the international community out the window, and we cannot allow that to happen.

We know that there are federal by-elections going on right now, and I think it is incumbent upon the people who are running in those federal by-elections, people who once sat in this House in some cases, to come out and strongly, in the strongest possible way, oppose this report because of the repercussions.

Mr. Speaker, on that note I will conclude. I thank all members here today for their participation, for their support for this resolution. We must continue to be vigilant on this front. We must stand up and say to Ottawa, to the fisheries managers, to the politicians, to the Minister of Fisheries in particular, that the buck stops here. This is the end of the line, and from now on adjacency must be first and foremost in the decision-making process and the access decisions and the allocation decisions for all fish in Atlantic Canada, Quebec and the Eastern Arctic, not just in Newfoundland and Labrador. We are not asking to be treated as a special case. We are not a special case. We just want what is rightfully ours. Give Nunavut what is rightfully theirs and give Nova Scotia what is rightfully theirs. That is what we are asking for.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. TAYLOR: On that note, Mr. Speaker, I thank you and I will sit down.

MR. SPEAKER: All those in favour of the amendment, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, ‘nay'.

On motion, amendment carried.

MR. SPEAKER: All those in favour of the resolution as amended, ‘aye'.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Aye.

MR. SPEAKER: All those against, ‘nay'.

On motion, resolution, as amended, carried.

MR. SPEAKER: This House now stands adjourned until tomorrow, Thursday, at 1:30 p.m.