All
sides happy with mediator in lobster war
CHRIS MORRIS
Canadian Press
Friday, October 15, 1999
BURNT CHURCH, N.B.
There was an unusual development Friday in the East Coast lobster dispute:
people on all sides of the contentious issue agreed on something.
The ''something'' in this case was Ottawa's decision to appoint a negotiator,
James MacKenzie, to help hammer out an accommodation that will allow
native and non-native fishermen to work alongside each other instead
of fight for access to valuable resources.
''We are very pleased,'' said Chief Lawrence Paul, co-chair of the Atlantic
Policy Congress of First Nation Chiefs.
''We need meaningful dialogue with fisheries officials and commercial
fishermen. We realize we have to regulate the fishery and we have to
have quotas and conservation measures. We don't want to be deemed irresponsible.''
MacKenzie's appointment came as tensions were increasing in southwestern
Nova Scotia.
At least 75 boats piloted by non-native fishermen took to the water
off Yarmouth to look for native lobster traps.
The fishermen sailed out of Wedgeport, Pubnico, Cape Sable Island and
other tiny fishing villages along the Nova Scotia coast vowing to pull
up and smash any native traps they find.
Don Cunningham, a fish plant owner in the area, called the flotilla
''an impromptu get-together to show support that they are in this together.
''They're frustrated and feel they want to do something, even if it's
only coming to Yarmouth and gathering to show the public that the fishing
industry means something,'' he said.
Chief Deborah Robinson of the Acadia band in Yarmouth has said the reserve
will honour a moratorium on fishing. But some band residents have vowed
to ignore it and fish.
Organizers of the non-native fleet predicted the number of boats could
swell to 200 today and there was talk of blocking a ferry that operates
between Yarmouth and Bar Harbour, Me.
The appointment of MacKenzie, announced in the House of Commons by federal
Fisheries Minister Herb Dhaliwal, was seen as the most positive step
taken by Ottawa since the Supreme Court of Canada handed down its landmark
decision last month in the case of Nova Scotia native Donald Marshall
Jr.
The ruling upheld an 18th century treaty giving the Mi'kmaq and Maliseet
of what are now New Brunswick and Nova Scotia unfettered fishing and
hunting rights.
It sent shock waves through the commercial fishery, and in Burnt Church
in northeastern New Brunswick, touched off acts of violence and vandalism.
Mike Belliveau, executive director of the Maritime Fishermen's Union,
joined the chiefs in welcoming Ottawa's latest move. However, he cautioned
MacKenzie will have to have the wisdom of Solomon and bags of money
to figure how to cram hundreds of native fishermen into a system already
stretched to the limit.
''I think a negotiator is obviously going to need pretty substantial
financial backing for whatever he does because the way the fishery has
evolved, it's all limited-entry fishery,'' said Belliveau. ''That's
why there's such a controversy around natives ishing in closed seasons.''
''By everyone's consensus, we've maxed out the number of people who
should be in the fishery, so if you're bringing in a whole bunch of
new entrants, as you'd be doing under the Marshall decision, you're
going to have to have compensation for those leaving. There's no question
about it.''
MacKenzie, the federal government's chief negotiator for land claims
with the Labrador Inuit, is to start talks immediately to settle long-term
fishing arrangements. Paul and other members of the Atlantic Policy
Congress, including several chiefs, will be in Ottawa Monday for a first
meeting with MacKenzie.
Dhaliwal said a plan will be created within the next four or five months
before the spring fishing season.
''I think my view has been consistent right from day one. I said co-operation,
dialogue, sitting down with all the groups is a way to resolve this
issue,'' he said.
Alex Dedam, a Mi'kmaq adviser at the Burnt Church First Nation, said
the fishing issue soon will move beyond lobster to other species such
as snow crab and smelt.
Dedam said the problem is agreeing on mutually acceptable quotas. In
the lobster fishery, for example, federal fisheries officials have imposed
a limit of 600 traps on Burnt Church _ a limit rejected by the 1,200-member
band.
''We feel we cannot be limited,'' Dedam said. ''We can limit ourselves.
That's the problem we have to resolve the numbers.''
Indian Affairs Minister Robert Nault said Ottawa will open talks on
all treaties with native groups across Canada.
There will also be discussions later next week with provincial ministers
of the provinces involved.
Nault said negotiations will encompass other issues that include cutting
trees and gathering blueberries.
He said gathering, which is a treaty right affirmed in the Marshall
decision, still has to be defined.
''The courts give us directions that there is a treaty right and it's
now our role to define that based on the information we have from the
courts and we will do that.''
Natives in New Brunswick say gathering includes harvesting trees. There
have already been several incidents of aboriginal cutters taking trees
on Crown land, although the province insists that's illegal, despite
Marshall.
Nault urged caution on the part of natives.
''Even though we recognize that there are treaty rights, that doesn't
mean you can just go out and administer those treaty rights without
having a responsibility for the regulations that exist on the ground
today.''
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{ au: dt: 10/15/99 sc: cpress}
