Jencourt
Well-Known Member
Dear Minister Shea: Feb 22 2011
I am writing this letter to you today in direct response to your Feb 15th announcement on pacific halibut fishing for 2011.
I will begin by telling you that I have no connection or vested interest in any business that profits from fishing. I am just a lifelong sport fisher that is very concerned and angry about the direction you and your department are taking the future of our treasured resource. Your decision to uphold the current 88/12 allocation of the TAC is both unacceptable and a slap in the face to me and the large majority of Canadians that understand the issue and the implications this decision has.
In your statement you said “Our Government understands the value and significance of the Pacific halibut fishery to British Columbians”. Clearly, you do NOT, or you just don’t give a darn. I suspect both are true. Your suggestion that you will “make available to interested recreational stakeholders experimental licenses that will allow them to lease quota from commercial harvesters” is proof positive that you’re administration is only concerned with keeping the few and the richest happy.
I and many others refuse to allow you to continue making what are clearly political and selfish decisions in regards to OUR resources. By your own statement you said “All fish management decisions are made to meet the following three priorities: conservation, sustainability of the fishery and economic viability.”Well, in the case of Halibut, the conservation and sustainability is in the capable hands of the IPHC.As far as economic viability is concerned, that does NOT mean you’re own political viability and you’re closest supporters economic viability. These fish swim in Canadian waters that wash the shores of British Columbia. It is the thousands and thousands of BC residents ,as well as the many halibut fishers across Canada that depend on fair access to the resource that you continue to abandon. The fact that you support and institute the idea that the Canadian public should pay private citizens for the right to fish is a clear demonstration of your administrations selfish and narrow minded approach to managing the resource.We only need to look at your management of the Port Alberni Chinook fishery to see that.
This is not a conservation issue and it is not a case of sport fishers wanting more than they deserve. This is however a case of myself and many others demanding that you change the current allocation percentages to better represent the importance and impact that sport fishing has in Canada. This absolutely has to start with putting an end to absentee quota holders.(Slipper Skippers). Put an end to the current system that has allowed a public resource to become private property controlled by what can only be described as “Fish Lords”.
I will be sending a copy of this letter to Prime Minister Harper. In this letter I will urge him to direct you to right your wrongs or replace you with a more competent minister that will put the well being of the resource and those who rightfully own it ahead of their own personal political gain.
Ray Haines.
I am writing this letter to you today in direct response to your Feb 15th announcement on pacific halibut fishing for 2011.
I will begin by telling you that I have no connection or vested interest in any business that profits from fishing. I am just a lifelong sport fisher that is very concerned and angry about the direction you and your department are taking the future of our treasured resource. Your decision to uphold the current 88/12 allocation of the TAC is both unacceptable and a slap in the face to me and the large majority of Canadians that understand the issue and the implications this decision has.
In your statement you said “Our Government understands the value and significance of the Pacific halibut fishery to British Columbians”. Clearly, you do NOT, or you just don’t give a darn. I suspect both are true. Your suggestion that you will “make available to interested recreational stakeholders experimental licenses that will allow them to lease quota from commercial harvesters” is proof positive that you’re administration is only concerned with keeping the few and the richest happy.
I and many others refuse to allow you to continue making what are clearly political and selfish decisions in regards to OUR resources. By your own statement you said “All fish management decisions are made to meet the following three priorities: conservation, sustainability of the fishery and economic viability.”Well, in the case of Halibut, the conservation and sustainability is in the capable hands of the IPHC.As far as economic viability is concerned, that does NOT mean you’re own political viability and you’re closest supporters economic viability. These fish swim in Canadian waters that wash the shores of British Columbia. It is the thousands and thousands of BC residents ,as well as the many halibut fishers across Canada that depend on fair access to the resource that you continue to abandon. The fact that you support and institute the idea that the Canadian public should pay private citizens for the right to fish is a clear demonstration of your administrations selfish and narrow minded approach to managing the resource.We only need to look at your management of the Port Alberni Chinook fishery to see that.
This is not a conservation issue and it is not a case of sport fishers wanting more than they deserve. This is however a case of myself and many others demanding that you change the current allocation percentages to better represent the importance and impact that sport fishing has in Canada. This absolutely has to start with putting an end to absentee quota holders.(Slipper Skippers). Put an end to the current system that has allowed a public resource to become private property controlled by what can only be described as “Fish Lords”.
I will be sending a copy of this letter to Prime Minister Harper. In this letter I will urge him to direct you to right your wrongs or replace you with a more competent minister that will put the well being of the resource and those who rightfully own it ahead of their own personal political gain.
Ray Haines.
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