Au contraire Absolom, it would be incongruous to just go along with the status quo then endemic, and ignore the illegality of the situation and thereby cement it. Taking on the Province as the supposed “regulators” of farms, when they clearly were not legally, and should not be, the regulators would have been to turn a blind eye to the underlying wrong of the situation. I, for one, am glad this step was taken and as GLG has posted earlier prevented the jurisdictional pointing of fingers from Federal to Provincial arenas and back again.
As for your second point, you are making a confusing generalisation which muddles two distinct roles. No one is saying the Province can, or should, save the salmon by stepping in or acting as regulators. That avenue has been rightfully closed. All that is being suggested is the Province could get involved because they do have a role as “landlord” and issue licenses of occupation. That does present a lever to move, or better yet, to close the salmon feed lots.
Absolom, I have said it in other posts and I will say it again, resource management policies of this magnitude and complexity, involving biology, chemistry, ecology, and genomics etc. should NEVER be managed by politics. Politicians have no science training, are ignorant of it, and are therefore unqualified to make decisions as though this were some issue of public policy. Therefore, your argument that it “would have been better if it were kept local” is irrelevant, because this is not and never should be a political decision. Au contraire this IS, and can only be, a science debate based on the preponderance of evidence. The politicians cannot deny evidence and that is why Alex and others are seeking it so diligently. The facts do not lie and although the spin doctors may try to twist them, because in the field of ecology nothing is absolutely certain, the weight of evidence will eventually prove to be overwhelming. The science can then overrule the politics and DFO can then be freed from the chains imposed by their politically radical masters and actually do something for the salmon. I repeat it is politics that has brought us to this sorry state and only science can get us out.
In my view, you are wrong, for the reasons stated above!