Tag Archives: Quinlan Brothers Ltd
DFO appears to break own laws by allowing sale of commercial licences involved in alleged illegal controlling agreement
“DFO may be breaking the very fishing laws it is mandated to enforce,” says Ryan Cleary, an inshore fishery activist who has brought a number of alleged controlling agreements to DFO’s attention. The controversy surrounds La Scie-based fisherman Jimmy Lee Foss who went public earlier this year with allegations he was in a controlling agreement with Robin Quinlan of Quinlan Brothers Ltd. Foss purchased the Ocean Surfer II and suite of commercial licences in April 2022 with a $3.8-million loan from the CIBC — a deal he alleges was arranged and co-signed by Quinlan. Foss said the investigator told him a request would be made for his commercial licenses to be frozen until the probe was complete, but DFO licensing branch forwarded him a letter late last week to say that wouldn’t be the case. Foss fears the licence will end up back in Quinlan’s hands. more, >>click to read<< 20:22
Crab plant workers have punched their time in spades this season, and are being called heroes
Workers at seafood processing plants in Newfoundland have been working all summer long in an effort to make sure snow crab quotas for the shortened 2023 season are met, and they say they’re ready for a break. “This season has been one of the hardest seasons that we have worked here, because we had to do a lot of crab in a short period of time,” Louise Power, a floor supervisor at the Quinlan Brothers Ltd. plant in Bay de Verde, told CBC News Tuesday. She worked at the plant for 46 years, and has had four days off since May. “We all got through it, and made the season work,” she said. “Right now, [I’m] happy as a lark.” >>click to read<< 11:50
Quinlan Brothers Ltd. Tenacity and community can overcome adversity
Eight hours. That’s all it took to put an entire season of production, hundreds of jobs and 62 years of work by three generations of the Quinlan family in jeopardy. On April 11, 2016, a massive fire at the Quinlan Brothers’ flagship plant in Bay de Verde, Nfld., sent smoke billowing,, and though no lives were lost, nothing remained of the plant. Now, a fire is never convenient, but to hear president Robin Quinlan tell it, the timing couldn’t have been worse. “It was the start of snow crab season and that was the plant where we processed it,” he says. “There were boats in the ocean full of crab, ready to go. And we had no facility.” more >click to read< 16:45
Small-town fisherman takes on Ottawa – Kirby Elson says controlling agreements let him operate his fishing vessel
A fisherman from a small fishing town in Labrador has launched a legal challenge that could overturn decades-old federal policies in hopes of preserving independent inshore fisheries in Atlantic Canada. Kirby Elson of Cartwright, N.L., applied in June for a judicial review of a 2015 decision by the federal fisheries minister to take away his commercial fishing licences. Elson, 61, had refused to obey a DFO requirement that he exit a so-called controlling agreement with two Newfoundland and Labrador fish processors: Quinlan Brothers Ltd. and Labrador Sea Products Inc. Under the March 2003 agreement, the companies financed Elson’s snow crab licence, provided the vessel and crew, paid the insurance and covered vessel maintenance. Elson landed and sold his fish at the direction of the processors. The agreement stipulated he could not transfer the licence without company permission. Even in death, Elson’s estate was required to transfer the licence to a designate of the processors. Read the rest of the story here 07:53
Quinlan Brothers Bay de Verde fish plant to be rebuilt by next year
The Newfoundland company whose seafood plant was destroyed by fire in April says it plans to have a new processing facility ready for production by next year. Quinlan Brothers Ltd. stated in a news release the company has worked with snow crab producers since the fire to ensure fish harvesters have been serviced as normal. The company also says other companies have helped provide employment to “practically all” of the 700 workers who were employed at the Bay de Verde plant. Quinlan Brothers says remediation at the Bay de Verde site has been completed, along with geotechnical surveys and infrastructure assessments, and foundations and site work could begin in the next 10 days. Link 13:01
Bay de Verde residents in plant fire evacuation left to ‘pick up the pieces’
Bay de Verde’s mayor says residents and workers will need to ‘pick up the pieces’ following a fire that destroyed the eastern Newfoundland community’s fish processing plant. This morning we still have a smouldering mess,” Mayor Gerard Murphy told CBC’s St. John’s Morning Show on Tuesday. About 12 hours earlier, Murphy lifted a state of emergency and evacuation order in his community that saw 300 homes emptied as firefighters battled the blaze at the Quinlan Brothers Ltd. plant. The fire was reported at 5:30 a.m. NT Monday, and Murphy said the site is still one of devastation and smoke. Read the rest here 07:59
Quinlan Brothers Ltd. suing former workers, Daley-owned firm for $1M
One of the province’s biggest fish processing companies is suing two former employees and a competing firm for $1 million, alleging they have “misappropriated, disclosed and made improper use” of “confidential information and trade secrets.” The matter revolves around a piece of crab processing technology that was developed and used by Quinlan’s at its Bay de Verde plant, an automatic crab butchering machine, otherwise referred to in court documents as the “Quinlan CBM.” Read the rest here 10:31
