The Federal Government has established an inquiry into the management of west coast salmon stocks. This has long been sought by John Cummins, MP from Delta, BC, who lays the primary blame on the First Nations and the aboriginal right to fish. It has also been sought by the NDP, who profess to care only about the salmon, and by various environmental and fish protection groups who variously lay the blame on habitat destruction, over fishing, El Nino, farm fisheries, the traditional small boat fishers, and the use of gill nets and other destructive gear. Others blame the Americans, Japanese and other non-Canadian fishers. Virtually all blame DFO and the bureaucrats and politicians who run it.

The difficulty is that all of these to some degree and in their own way are at fault. First Nations’ fishers rightfully point out that there has been a hundred year plus effort to deny them the harvest that they enjoy as a property right under the law and the constitution. Governments have ignored, denied and curtailed their access to their rightful harvest through all kinds of regulations and laws. Many First Nations have understandably seen the whole management regime as unlawful – and they are right – and so have gone ahead and ignored it all. The result has been that the management of harvests has often times become chaotic. How much overall impact this has had is hard to estimate, but it points out the difficulty of laying blame. Who is to blame – the First Nations who have rejected an illegitimate and unlawful management regime, or the governments that have created a regime that lacks credibility and is thus ignored by many?

Habitat destruction has been killing salmon stocks for generations. The whole of the lower mainland was once one of the richest salmon producing areas of the world. Developers and governments have destroyed it. Do they get a free pass because that is all in the past? Forest harvesting destroys large amounts of habitat every year. So does mining and dredging. Now hundreds of private hydro projects are set to lay waste to rivers and streams all over the province. The provincial government, municipalities and industry are hugely to blame. The inquiry can’t give them a pass.

The commercial fishers for years have operated as if their purpose is to destroy the stocks. They have often refused to accept the reality of declining stocks. They have insisted on continuing to use gill nets, one of the most destructive forms of fisheries possible. They regularly refused to accept the First Nations fisheries, making much needed co-management impossible. And they have fought amongst themselves about allocations when the real question should have been conservation. They carry more than enough blame.

Governments and industry often blame commercial fishers and fishing communities for putting social objectives ahead of industry needs. For instance, commercial fishers have long been resistant to the creation of an industrial fishery based on a few very large boats, long a favourite of government because of the ease of enforcement of catch limits with a small number of boats and of industry because of economies of scale. But who can really blame the commercial fishers – of what social use is a fishery benefiting a few large corporations with 20 or 30 monster ships plying the coast?

Fish farms undeniably are killing salmon, especially because of sea lice. But the farm fish industry remains in denial, and government and some communities want the jobs and industry wants the profits, so nothing is done. All are to blame, no question about it.

The Americans steal our fish every year, reducing our catches and undermining recovery efforts. But the Federal Government doesn’t want a fight with the US over such small potatoes and so Canada goes along. It is only ten years ago the David Anderson signed away Canada’s salmon to the Americans without a moment of remorse. He and Chretien wanted to avoid a fight with the US whatever the costs in fish. So they are to blame for sure.

The Japanese are likely aware of where at least some of our stock stay over the four years they are in the ocean. If they are, they are fishing them. This could be a big part of the explanation. So they are likely to blame, although if they are they are too clever to admit it.

And then there is El Nino. El Nino disrupts ocean habitats and ocean migrations. That is without doubt playing a part.

Salmon management is also very political. Under pressure from fishing interests, excessively high allowable catches were allowed for a very long time. Bureaucrats and politicians have let themselves be pressured into making decisions that have run down spawning numbers and thus stocks. They are for sure to be blamed.

I haven’t mentioned the scientists. They are the ones that generate the information upon which all harvesting and conservation is based. They have clearly got it wrong consistently and frequently. Just this year they estimated that 4,000,000 salmon would return to the Fraser River. None did. It is hard to be that far off. Many will ask why they can’t get it right.

The inquiry will be public as it should be. All of the claims I have set out will be made with passion. They will equally strongly be rejected by those who won’t or can’t accept their share of the responsibility. Nothing will be done by government until the Commission is finished in the hope that some claims will be rejected and others embraced by the Commission. The salmon will be swimming in treacherous water for some time to come. One hopes enough survive to see the report come out. And when it does, odds are it will sit on the shelf.

Sometimes I think it would be better if 15 or 20 people from all of these groups were locked in a room until they come up with a result that saves the salmon. This would focus them on solving the problem rather than arguing about who is to blame before a costly Commission. Of course come to think of it it would probably only work if I had the key. And come to think of it, I am available.

What is really needed are substantial allocations to First Nations, and an independent, BC located, credible, effective, powerful, informed, science driven management institution with First Nation involvement and all the provincial and federal powers needed to protect, conserve and rebuild and allocate the salmon stocks. That would take a few short months to design and set up. But it isn’t going to happen.

Instead we are going to have a long drawn out blame game and talk fest. This is just going to put off the day of reckoning some more. There is no leadership, no visionary, and no problem solver on the salmon file in BC or Ottawa. Sadly, this is all about politics. And just as sadly, we will get the predicted results.

Fish farms.

The BC First Nations Treaty Commission has just released a report highly critical of the Government of Canada and BC for the slow rate of progress of treaty negotiations.  In particular it finds that the mandates of the government negotiators are far too limited to make agreements possible.  Take this to mean that government offers are far too small to get agreement from First Nations.  The result is that only three treaty agreements have been reached in BC:  Nisga’a, Tsawwassen, and Maalnuth.

 It is worth reminding readers why treaties are needed in BC.  Under British law since 1763 (law which Canada inherited in 1867), for all land occupied by First Nations, the Federal Government must first acquire the title to it before the land can be taken over and settled.  This is because under common law original occupation and use of land constitutes ownership and thus title.  The title belongs to the First Nations unless it is lawfully acquired.  The means of acquiring the land from First Nations as set out in law is a treaty, through which rights to land are sorted out and re-defined by agreement of the parties.  This was done everywhere in southern Canada except BC, where until 1993 the government foolishly refused to abide by the law.  The result is that virtually all of the land and resources in BC are being managed and exploited illegally, with potential dire consequences for the provincial economy.  The Supreme Court has been patient with the federal and provincial governments, giving them time to reach agreements that will bring the holding of land in BC into conformity with the law.  However, this uncertainty is a great source of disquiet to long term external capital that might invest here, since capital fears more than anything else uncertainty about ownership.

In 1993, the BC and federal governments and a large proportion of BC First Nations committed to negotiating treaties to address the problem.  However progress has been difficult.  The real problem is that First Nations largely believe that they are not being offered enough to reach agreement on the sharing of the title to their land and resources.  The exceptions have been the three that have settled, where various techniques were used to get past the rigid mandates of the governments that limit what can be offered in negotiations.  In the face of this problem, the BC government tried to by-pass the need to settle treaties with its proposed Reconciliation Act, which would have temporarily bought off First Nation objections to developments on their lands with money and other benefits.  This failed for reasons that will be explored another time. 

Without settlements, the provincial economy is in trouble.  The patience of First Nations, and they have been very patient, is running out. The Federal and BC governments really have no choice but to accept the findings of the BC Treaty Commission.  They must substantially increase the amount of land and resources, including fisheries, which the First Nations will retain after the treaties are settled.  And they must increase the amount of money to be paid in compensation for leaving things for so long.  Like it or not, the cost of past intransigence has become very high.  Nothing else will bring settlements. 

The time for further delay is long passed.  The lawyers and academic experts who defended the governments for so long, and politicians and civil servants who are ignorant of the obligations of governments, cannot change the reality.  The cost to the province of continuing unlawfully to exploit land and resources is mounting and will soon become prohibitive.  It is time to get on with negotiations.  That means that the governments must work with much more generous mandates.  More money, more land and more resources.  There is no other choice.

A blog in the pages of the respectable London (UK) Telegraph contains a wild and hateful outburst by Rachel Marsden late of sexual harassment  charges and Canadian conservative politics.  Vancouverites will remember her as a nut case whose currency was outrageous lies and destructive hate.  One of her most infamous acts was to take down an SFU swim coach by claiming he ogled her underwater in the pool.  After going through a living hell, he was later re-instated when many of her claims were exposed as questionable.  Marsden was later given a conditional discharge in 2004 with one year’s probation for criminally harassing a Vancouver radio host following their breakup. She displayed no shame at being discovered to be a predator obviously suffering  from a severe psychological problem.  She later went on to make various nutty and outrageous claims and charges on Fox TV and other conservative outlets, none to the credit of serious conservative views.

The nature of her Telegraph outburst can best be understood simply by reading some of it which I quote verbatim in the following.  Remember these are her words not mine.

“Who is fighting to ensure that the immigrants of European descent are
adequately represented at next year’s Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic
Games?  Canada, was pretty third-worldish until the English, French, and various other Europeans arrived and started planning and building infrastructure and government, and
teaching the natives discipline, order, and capitalism. Canada or the USA without European immigrants would look somewhat like Africa.

It’s no coincidence that the best countries in the world are either
European or founded by Europeans. Everywhere they go, European
immigrants make things better – until they’re asked to leave, at which
point everything usually descends back into chaos. Not that they ever
get any thanks for it.

So how are the Vancouver 2010 Olympics paying tribute to these
increasingly marginalized European immigrants and their defining
contributions to Canada? By ignoring them completely, it seems.

The logo for the Games is some sort of native Indian stone carving
resembling a bloke with massive oedema of the legs. While the natives
were carving away at such lovely things, the Europeans were busy
building an entire world around them, but that’s conveniently
overlooked. The mascots for the games are various hybrids of legendary
native indian animals that could only ever exist only after a good
toke-up of Canadian weed: a half-whale half-bear hybrid (Miga), a
whale-thunderbird-bear hybrid (Sumi), and a sasquatch (Quatchi).

A feature on the 2010 Games website allows you to take a quiz to find
out which mascot you are. I can tell you, without even taking the quiz,
that even as a Canadian I would be exactly none of them because I’m not
some sort of native Indian hallucination with a Japanese name who
resembles an Asian cartoon character.  I’m descended from the people who built my country, but they’ve been forgotten.”

So there you have it.  The discriminated majority are being cut out of the Olympic games.  Not that one can tell that by looking at the people running them, the companies profiting from them, the athletes participating in them, and the jobs being created by them. In fact in one obvious case that a First Nation should have been benefiting, the 2010 Committee snubbed them while ripping off their design and reputation.

The Cowichan sweater is known throughout the world as a premium and unique West Coast First Nation  product, and would be expected to be a central part of the Canadian Olympic wear.  But when the Cowichan Tribes bid for the job, they were refused.  Instead, the Olympics  chose an expensive knockoff. The Bay is selling the expensive copy which the Cowichan Tribe could have supplied for $350, compared with $215 for the Cowichan original.  Imagine the outrage if a BC tribe made and sold knock-offs of the iconic Hudson Bay blanket or Prada jewelry.

Nor does Marsden mention that all of those First Nations symbols and icons have been appropriated by the Olympics to use in a brilliant marketing campaign through the generosity and cooperation of First Nations  and at no cost to the Olympic Committee.  No, you have to have the special insight bred by hatred and intolerance to miss these important facts that turn the racist argument on its head.  Rachel Marsden is back, bringing us the same regard for fact and truth that she so stunningly displayed in her past forays into the public arena.  One does wonder why conservative papers and broadcasters so discredit serious conservative views and analysis by publishing this sort of thing.