Consider just a few recent dispatches from Canada’s fraught fishing front: On March 3, 2021, federal Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan announced Ottawa will not license any Indigenous moderate livelihood fishery in Atlantic Canada this year that does not operate within the official commercial season. She threatened to deploy an increased complement of fisheries officers, backed...
In Search of Common Ground: An interview with Arthur Bull about the lobster fishery crisis in St. Mary’s Bay
It’s been more than a month since the Sipekne’katik First Nation launched its own self-regulated lobster fishery off the Saulnierville wharf in Southwest Nova Scotia — 21 years after the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Marshall decision, affirming the 1760-61 Treaty Rights of the Mi’kmaq to fish for a “moderate livelihood.” For weeks […]
Can we have a fuller conversation about racism?
Morning File, Monday, October 19, 2020
News 1. Arrests in violent attacks The RCMP announced two arrests over the weekend related to the violence in Southwest Nova Scotia. The first arrest was related to the attack on Chief Michael Sack: RCMP charge man with assault of Chief Sack October 17, 2020, New Edinburgh, Nova Scotia…Meteghan RCMP have laid charges in relation […]
Troubled waters
There is no excuse — period, full stop — for the violence and vandalism currently taking place in southwest Nova Scotia. That said, the crisis there — and the tangled, troubled history behind it — is far more complex, nuanced and slippery that any simple hashtag-RACISM tweet can ever capture.
There is no excuse — period, full stop — for the violence and vandalism currently taking place in southwest Nova Scotia. That said, the crisis there — and the tangled, troubled history behind it — is far more complex, nuanced and slippery than any simple hashtag-RACISM tweet can ever capture. Yes, ingrained, historic racism plays […]
The fishery of frustration
The real reason for the recent confrontations between Indigenous and non-Indigenous fishers is that Ottawa has failed abysmally for more than two decades to negotiate with First Nations to define what constitutes a moderate living.
Mi’kmaw fishermen were frustrated. On Sept. 17, 1999, the Supreme Court of Canada had reaffirmed rights established in peace and freedom treaties with the British more than 200 years before. Those treaties had guaranteed them the right to fish and hunt and pursue what the court called, without explaining, a “moderate livelihood.” Two months later,...
A moderate livelihood
Morning File, Monday, September 21, 2020
News 1. Northwood review announcement coming today The Halifax Examiner is providing all COVID-19 coverage free. What will health minister Randy Delorey announce today? Who knows? Whatever it is, Stephen Kimber is not expecting anything too earth-shattering. In his weekly Halifax Examiner column, Kimber writes: [Delorey] may unveil some part of some pre-selected, non-binding recommendations […]