There has been an ongoing issue on the West Coast of the Island of NL whereby halibut fishermen are essentially slowly losing their fair portion of fish quotas. The basic story is that as the overall catch limits in the Gulf of St. Lawrence are going up, the share of that quota to NL fishermen is being reduced. Apparently the share was once based on geography and NL got about 32% of the total catch, and now the total catch has gone up but the allocation is based on the fishing fleets and ant geography and NL fishermen are now looking at about an 18% share. There's also an issue of extra fish caught last season that is influencing that 18% as well. Thank goodness DFO is doing such a great job managing that resource appropriately!
So the fishermen (or fisherpeople if you prefer) have finally had enough and decided to protest by occupying the DFO office in Corner Brook. See the CBC story here. About Damn Time!
There are times when a little civil disobedience can go a long way, and I hope for their sake they are successful in their desire to change an obviously unfair practice. One quote from the story pretty much says it all:
"We just can't put up with it no more," fisherman Conway Caines said Tuesday.
We could all learn a lesson from these folks, and we should be supporting them wholeheartedly! To these brave people I say good luck and don't give up. Fight on.
Post Script
Over at VOCM.com the question of the day is asking for input by people.
"Do you agree with protests like the occupation of fisheries offices in corner brook to bck fish harvesters demands(?) why (?) or why not (?)"As of 10am on Thursday morning there are only 144 votes, and 29% of them have said no! Come on people. If this was a tory/liberal political question there would be thousands of votes! This issue is far more important then any patisan political nonsense.
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