It’s Ottawa’s job to settle bitter lobster dispute

The hatred and violence that have shaken an Indigenous fishery in southern Nova Scotia this month should have no place in Canada, and the federal government is right to say so. The people who ransacked and torched a lobster pound, burned a van, set aboat ablaze and assaulted a local First Nations chief are vigilantes, not protesters.

Thank goodness four senior Liberal cabinet ministers stepped forward this week to condemn these criminals while warning off anyone who might be tempted to ape their disgusting behaviour. And thank goodness the RCMP — belatedly, we’re sad to say — stepped up its efforts to keep the peace and protect innocent lives from lawless thugs.

Yet as welcome as these interventions were, the storms battering Nova Scotia’s lobster fishery will be calmed only when Justin Trudeau’s Liberals admit they’re not just a big part of the problem, they hold the solution in their hands.

While the members of the Sipekne’katik Nation who began a tiny, off-season lobster fishery last month are acting legally and in accordance with their treaty and constitutional rights, many non-First Nations fishers fear the activity threatens their future.

The dispute between the two sides is largely rooted in the Marshall decisions set down by the Supreme Court of Canada in 1999. The country’s highest court then ruled that, based on 18th century treaties, Indigenous communities in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Quebec’s Gaspe region have a constitutional right to hunt, fish and gather to obtain a “moderate livelihood.”

But the court also declared this right was not unlimited. Indeed, it could be regulated by Ottawa, particularly to meet conservation needs, after consultation with the appropriate First Nations.

Incredibly, every government since 1999, including the current one, has failed to put the flesh on the bones of the high court’s ruling. Every one has failed to translate the court’s fine judicial principles into a sensible, workable balance between competing Indigenous and non-Indigenous interests.

As a result, today’s Nova Scotia’s lobster fishery is like an airport where the air-traffic controllers have failed to show up for work. The pilots of individual planes are doing their best to follow the rules as they take off or land. But there’s nobody keeping them in order or managing the skies to ensure everyone’s safe. That’s essentially the job the federal government must start doing in Nova Scotia today.

It’s true that federal experts with Fisheries and Oceans Canada agree the new fishery is far too small to reduce lobster stocks or raise conservation concerns. And this is the case even though the new First Nations fishery is operating during a season closed to non-Indigenous commercial fishers.

That said, it is neither surprising nor unreasonable for those non-First Nations fishers to fear the out-ofseason fishery will grow to the point that it cuts into their catches and incomes.

Somehow — and after meaningful consultations with both First Nations and non-First Nations fishing communities — the Liberals must translate the concept of a “moderate livelihood” into practical terms that will set the ground rules for any offseason Indigenous fishery.

Those rules may limit the size of the new fishery or possibly when it can operate. It may also lead to a buyout of non-First Nations fishers, a practice that has worked in other parts of Nova Scotia.

We don’t pretend accomplishing any of this will be easy. But the chaos that has descended on parts of Nova Scotia is dangerous and intolerable. Canadians expect peace and order, something that will only come with good — and responsive — government.