Not willing to throw the Whale Watching Industry under the bus just yet. Had a good talk on this with our leadership and apparently the leadership in the Whale Watching industry has been expressing lots of support for sport fishing re: the massive closure to fishing in JDF and the Gulf Islands. The bottom line is that they have money and we have the numbers (votes) and their own PR people are reportedly advising them that we are a natural alliance.
There are several hundred thousand salt water licenses holders on this coast and between the whale closures and the other massive restrictions over a million people will be harmed financially by the Liberals fishery policies including all the First Nations who have businesses that are dependent on sport fishing and many other businesses like all the car dealerships who sell a lot of high profit pickup trucks which are used to tow boats. If the Whale Watching industry does not go to bat for us with their substantial resources, if they let us down, we can make it a crusade to kill their industry later. After all if we can't fish we will have nothing but time, which is something the Federal liberals would also do well to remember.
I expect to see some published written support against these sport fishing closures from the Whale Watching industry. That would be a good indicator of their sincerity, as would expanded financial support from them for our sector and Sport Fishing Sector projects, like our "Feed the Whales" Sooke Chinook Project. If it turns out they are just playing politics with us to keep us from going negative on them, we will know soon enough. If they help us, if they want to fight a common enemy, I am willing to help them. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.