Changes in the fishery #nlpoli

Your humble e-scribbler was on The Broadcast with Jane Adey, discussing the campaign to split the inshore fishermen from the FFAW.  Give it a listen if you missed it: CBC podcast.

Three points:

First, there are a couple of conflicts of interest inherent in the union.  One is the conflict between the interests of inshore fishermen on the one hand and the plant workers on the other.  The other is the conflict between the unions job of representing the workers' interests to the provincial and federal government versus the union's practice of taking cash from government to run projects and programs.

Both of these have been around for a while. They have been controversial.  But this is the first time anyone has raised it as a major political issue.

Protesting too much? #nlpoli

FFAW boss Earle McCurdy responded on Friday to comments by OCI’s Martin Sullivan that the FFAW, among other things, had threatened to shut OCI down and had proposed closing the Fortune plant in exchange for trying to get some provincial government money to help OCI refurbish the Marystown plant.

Here are Earle’s comments as reported by CBC:

“What Mr. Sullivan is saying is a total fabrication and misrepresentation of any discussions we’ve had…”

So it is entirely false.

But at exactly the same time, it is something FFAW representatives said taken out of context?

Then McCurdy went off on another tack:

“What you do when you don’t want to debate the issues is you start making personal attacks.  About the only thing he didn’t accuse us of is child molesting. …He’s making it up. He’s smoking something. I don’t know what he’s doing. But what he should do is stick with the issues."

Sounds a wee bit fishy, if you will pardon the choice of words.  you see, the other thing you do when you can’t deal with the comments is protest noisily that you have been abused and attacked.

You can hear both interviews on this week’s On Point Saturday at 7:30 PM.

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Fisheries activist passes away

Father Des McGrath, the Roman Catholic priest who was instrumental in the drive to organize the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union has passed away at age 74.

McGrath was found dead in his garage by police.

Born in Corner Brook in 1935, McGrath was ordained in 1961.  in 1969, McGrath and Richard Cashin helped fisherman organize the Northern Fisherman’s Union.  It amalgamated with the Canadian Food and Allied Workers Union in 1970 to form the predecessor of the FFAW.  Cashin served a president. 

McGrath held no union office but remained an advocate for fisheries union for the remainder of his life.

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Serious lobster conservation projects in New Brunswick

Homarus Inc is just one example of what the Maritime Fishermen's Union is doing to improve lobster stocks in the waters around New Brunswick.

It's a non-profit collabrative effort of government, fishermen and the private sector aimed at several objectives:

1. Increase scientific knowledge surrounding lobster biology and habitat;
2. Provide an educational tool for raising awareness amongst stakeholders concerning the need for sustaining the resource, protecting the habitat and rehabilitating lobster stocks; and,
3. Introduce practical and effective approaches to enhancing lobster habitat and lobster stocks in our coastal waters.

A stand-alone corporation devoted to a single ocesan species with enormous economic value: now there's a direction the FFAW should be taking rather than clawing a paltry ten grand from the provincial government in order to have local lobster fishermen keep records of their catches.

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Hunter-gatherers association reinvents lobster pot with prov gov cash

On the face of it, this looks like a great project: a bunch of provincial government cash to pay a bunch of lobster fishermen to track their catches.

"This project is an example of harvesters taking a direct role in the stewardship of the fishery and having input into the management of the resource," said the Honourable Trevor Taylor, acting Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture. "As such, our government is pleased to approve funding for this initiative. This is important work because it is the most extensive attempt to date to profile lobster stocks."

Ummm.

Not exactly.

The fishermen involved in this provincial government project can't make any decisions about the lobster fishery.  They can't have any meaningful input on quotas, season or anything else.

That's because all they are going to do is write down in a notebook how many lobsters they landed (excluding the unofficial ones to be sold under the table later on), how big they were and so on.

Now while there is lots of talk about this whole thing being scientific, note that it is being run by the Fish, Food and Allied Workers Union.  That's right, the union which represents the people who will be getting the cash for making notes in a book.

There's no mention of Memorial University, the Marine Institute or any other crowd of scientists.

There's just the people who catch lobsters and their union.

Now for an example of fishermen having real control over their livelihood, take a look at the Eastport Marine Protected Area, now expanded to five sites along the northeast coast.

As for science, the whole approach in these lobster management areas is based on science.  It has been since they were established.

If the provincial fisheries department and the hunter-gatherers union really wanted to get interested in fisheries management, conservation and a scientifically based approach, they'd be working with the federal fisheries crowd. 

This provincial initiative doesn't look like anything significant.  It looks more like make-work in another guise or a political statement. 

After all, it's only $10,000.

The Newfoundland and Labrador Legacy Nature Trust already administered over half a million in federal cash on one study four years ago.

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Cooke passes Fortune; FFAW implicated

From CBC News:

A New Brunswick aquaculture company has decided not to process farmed salmon in a southern Newfoundland community this fall, dashing the hopes of workers whose plant has been idle for almost three years.

Cooke Aquaculture cited a number of reasons — including uncertainty over the future role of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers union in the workplace — for deciding to process salmon outside of Fortune.

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