One fish, two fish, redfish, dead wish

It seems the Trudeau and Furey governments have some things to discuss—namely the well-being and future of west coast fishers and their communities.

On Thursday, fishers and political leaders from the province gathered at a FFAW-Unifor-organized demonstration in Corner Brook to condemn DFO’s recent redfish quota allocations as the commercial fishery prepares to reopen following a nearly three-decade hiatus.

Dozens of fishers watched as members of Furey’s caucus and cabinet expressed confusion and outrage at their federal counterparts. PC leader Tony Wakeham, AFN Regional Chief Brendan Mitchell, and fishery magnate Bill Barry also shared their indignation.

Corner Brook MHA and former provincial fisheries minister Gerry Byrne—who also served as a Liberal MP for years—called DFO “intellectually and morally bankrupt,” adding the federal department “has no capacity to understand even basic concepts of conservation, stewardship, or fair decision making.”

Provincial fisheries minister Elvis Loveless said that during meetings with his federal counterpart, Diane Lebouthillier, he felt there was a mutual understanding about the importance of ensuring sufficient quotas for coastal communities. “We agreed, we walked away, and I thought the message was loud and clear, and we felt really positive about it—well, until the announcement was made,” he said.

Loveless wasn’t the only one confused about Lebouthillier’s decision.

Bill Barry, who owns and operates a dozen fish plants in the Atlantic region, said he called Long Range Mountains MP and federal cabinet minister Gudie Hutchings.

“And Gudie said, ‘Bill, I was blindsided,’” Barry recalled. “Gudie, you’re a federal cabinet minister and you’re blindsided—how is this possible?”

Barry went on to say that he was “told by insiders that the week before this announcement was made, the decision that was being talked about in Ottawa was 50 per cent of [the redfish quota] was going to the otter trawlers in the gulf, and the other 50 percent was going to Indigenous [groups], which again would be all the inshore otter trawlers” in western Newfoundland.

“So, if that was really the decision, the week before the announcement, who changed it? This is what you got to ask yourself, the question: who is doing this?”

That’s a really good question. And now all eyes are on two people in particular as west coast communities wait for answers: Gudie Hutchings and Andrew Furey, both of whom were noticeably absent Thursday and did not send prepared statements.

Hutchings, who is minister of rural economic development and the minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, meets with Trudeau and Lebouthillier regularly. She also has their ear outside of cabinet meetings. The western Newfoundland MP may well have already picked up the phone to ask what happened with the redfish decision. But she hasn’t reported back to her constituents, who include most of the impacted inshore fishers.

While the provincial and federal Liberals have enjoyed close relations since their elections in 2015, it’s reasonable to expect Furey to amplify the concerns of his ministers—Minister of Education Krista Howell spoke at the demonstration, too—and the desperation of fishers like Brad Genge, who recently told The Independent the return of redfish “was our only chance to make a living.”

As Jenn Thornhill Verma and Leila Beaudoin report in their latest Seasplainer, on February 2 Loveless called on Lebouthillier to “increase […] the redfish quota for shrimp harvesters and [consider] a licence buyback program for impacted harvesters.”

While redfish “has proliferated,” Thornhill Verma and Beaudoin write, “the population of a more valuable fishery – Northern shrimp – has plummeted.”

With the lower-than-expected redfish quotas, it’s a situation that leaves harvesters like Genge in a fine kettle of fish, and with no way to boil the kettle.

“This was our only chance to make a living,” he said. “With no buyouts, with all the reductions in shrimp, there’s nothing left. I’m sitting here waiting for the bank to come take her,” Genge said, referring to his trawler.

Genge’s comments were acknowledged by political leaders at the demonstration. They should also be brought straight to Lebouthillier, who Byrne has called on to up the redfish quota for inshore fleets.

Watch speeches from the event here:

At the end of the speeches, Byrne got the crowd chanting “First 40, 000 to the inshore. First 40,000 to the inshore,” referring to the 25,000 metric tonnes (t) total allowable catch Lebouthillier announced the fishery would start at.

It was “significantly lower than what many expected, given advice from DFO’s Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat had considered a viable total allowable catch as high as 88,000 t to 318,000 t,” Thornhill Verma and Beaudoin write.

Numbers aside for moment, as a bare minimum in good-faith relations the Trudeau government owed it to our province—especially to west coast fishers—to communicate openly and honestly what was coming.

If Barry’s quote from his conversation with Hutchings is accurate, then even Hutchings—the MP whose constituents are being hurt by DFO’s decision—was “blindsided” by Lebouthillier.

That’s a serious problem within the Trudeau cabinet — and it’s a blow to Canada-NL relations.

If Furey remains silent, the media will eventually move on to other things and the matter risks blowing over—for everyone except the inshore fishers of western Newfoundland, that is.

We are less than two months away from Canada and Newfoundland and Labrador’s diamond anniversary.

Contrary to the popular phrase—and despite what the Liberal Party of NL may believe—diamonds are, in fact, not forever.