P.E.I. to win permanent access to northern shrimp, sources say
The federal government is poised to double the size of a controversial northern shrimp quota for Prince Edward Island, the home province of Fisheries Minister Gail Shea, sources say.
A consortium of Prince Edward Island companies was given a temporary quota of 1,500 tonnes of northern shrimp in 1999, involving seafood harvested off the northern coast of Newfoundland.
The move sparked outrage in the Newfoundland and Labrador fishing industry because P.E.I. had no historic attachment to the northern shrimp fishery and the province lacked any shrimp harvesting or processing capacity.
Under the arrangement for the last decade, the P.E.I. consortium made money through the deal by leasing the quota to another shrimp harvester.
A decade later, the size and value of that quota are poised to increase.
One federal Conservative source confirmed that the quota will essentially double in size, to about 3,000 tonnes. As well, the quota will become permanent, as the temporary designation will be lifted.
With Shea based in Prince Edward Island, the source admitted the quota is essentially a political one. Shea represents the riding of Egmont.
The move is already facing fierce opposition from other Tory MPs from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec, and comes at a time when the shrimp fleet is bracing for a difficult year due to market conditions.
Earle McCurdy, president of the St. John's-based Fish, Food and Allied Workers, said the expected decision is worrisome.
"Does that mean everyone with an allocation of fish from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans [has] to be looking over their shoulders for the possibility of having some of their share passed on to somebody else for whatever political reasons might be at play at a given point in time?" McCurdy told CBC News earlier this week.
McCurdy said the fishermen on Newfoundland's northeast coast who are closest to the northern shrimp fishery have already been given "a pretty tough knock on their crab quota," and thus were going to rely more heavily on proceeds from shrimp.
"The idea that somehow, for political reasons, some of that would be taken from them and given to somebody else is objectionable," McCurdy said.
Other fishing interests in Newfoundland and Labrador have already voiced their opposition to such a move.
However, with no MPs of their own in the Conservative caucus — let alone at the cabinet table — Newfoundland and Labrador has no one to raise the industry's objections inside government circles.
The province's voters shut out Conservative candidates in October's election, following an "Anything but Conservative" campaign that Premier Danny Williams launched against Prime Minister Stephen Harper.