Heckler berates premier: ‘Our salmon are dying’
VICTORIA — A heckler interrupted Premier John Horgan’s news conference on protecting B.C.’s wild salmon by shouting the province is allowing the fish farms to continue operating while fish stocks are struggling to survive.
“You sold us out,” she yelled Friday. “Our salmon are dying.”
“If that’s your view, you’re welcome to put your name on a ballot any time soon,” Horgan responded.
The woman, who identified herself as Tsastilqualus, said she’s from the Alert Bay area off northern Vancouver Island, but has been living in a tent on Swanson Island near several commercial salmon farms.
She said she has also protested outside Horgan’s constituency office and his home in Langford, just west of Victoria. Tsastilqualus said salmon farms should be removed from ocean waters and operated on land in closed pens.
“I want them out of our waters completely,” she said. “We don’t have time to waste. Our salmon is the most important thing to us as Indigenous people. It’s our culture. It’s in our songs, our dances, everything. If there is no salmon, what are we?”
Horgan, who announced the formation of a 14-member advisory council to develop plans to restore and protect B.C.’s wild salmon stocks, rejected Tsastilqualus statements that his government was stalling on protecting wild salmon.
“It’s a tragedy we find ourselves in 2018 on the crest of perhaps losing this important species,” he said.
Horgan said the council will submit its recommendations to the government this fall. He said bureaucrats recently travelled to Ottawa to consult with federal officials in advance of proposed amendments this year to the federal Fisheries Act.
Brian Riddell, a salmon expert who spent 30 years at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and is the current Pacific Salmon Foundation chief executive officer, said Horgan’s appointment of a wild salmon advisory council is the start of a necessary journey to save the species.
“It’s not a simple thing to solve,” he said. “It will take time. It takes a lot of collaboration.”