MILLERTIME
Member
19 Apr 2011Times Colonist
Voting for wild salmon
Perhaps salmon don’t matter much after all. Nor do the management of other West Coast fisheries. Maybe there are just a few fringe groups out there saying the sky is falling and the rest of society is shrugging its collective shoulders.
It would seem that among the other vital issues facing candidates in this federal election, the care, control and nurturing of West Coast wild fish stocks would also be high on the agenda.
But so far it hasn’t been. At least not to the extent it should be.
If preliminary reports from Justice Bruce Cohen’s inquiry into the disappearance of the Fraser River sockeye run in 2009 are any indication, we should all have serious concerns about what is happening both at provincial and federal levels of fish management.
One of the biggest concerns we should have is the gag order on government scientists. They are not allowed to speak publicly. If they are allowed to speak, they are are given a script wiped clean of any inference of ineptitude on the part of the government.
Think of it, if you were to phone up any of the hatcheries in British Columbia to ask how a certain salmon run was doing, your query would have to be vetted by someone in Ottawa before you got an answer.
But then again, maybe we don’t care enough. Maybe the salmon and other wild fish just aren’t as important to us as they used to be and maybe that’s simply because there’s only a fraction left of what used to be.
Courier-Islander, Campbell River
Voting for wild salmon
Perhaps salmon don’t matter much after all. Nor do the management of other West Coast fisheries. Maybe there are just a few fringe groups out there saying the sky is falling and the rest of society is shrugging its collective shoulders.
It would seem that among the other vital issues facing candidates in this federal election, the care, control and nurturing of West Coast wild fish stocks would also be high on the agenda.
But so far it hasn’t been. At least not to the extent it should be.
If preliminary reports from Justice Bruce Cohen’s inquiry into the disappearance of the Fraser River sockeye run in 2009 are any indication, we should all have serious concerns about what is happening both at provincial and federal levels of fish management.
One of the biggest concerns we should have is the gag order on government scientists. They are not allowed to speak publicly. If they are allowed to speak, they are are given a script wiped clean of any inference of ineptitude on the part of the government.
Think of it, if you were to phone up any of the hatcheries in British Columbia to ask how a certain salmon run was doing, your query would have to be vetted by someone in Ottawa before you got an answer.
But then again, maybe we don’t care enough. Maybe the salmon and other wild fish just aren’t as important to us as they used to be and maybe that’s simply because there’s only a fraction left of what used to be.
Courier-Islander, Campbell River
