Sockeye Salmon

March 08, 2010

I have received a number of emails from constituents concerned with the sharp decline in the number of Sockeye Salmon spawning in the rivers of our Province. The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has appointed Judge Cohen to lead a commission which has a mandate to determine where the Sockeye Salmon have gone. The Government of Canada is also deferring the negotiations of fisheries components at treaty tables in B.C. that involve salmon, pending the findings and recommendations of the Commission of Inquiry into the Decline of Sockeye Salmon in the Fraser River.

Conservationists have pointed fingers at the fishing practices on the west coast as a reason for the decline of Sockeye stocks.  Environmentalists have laid blame on the fish farming expansion on the west coast, as well as global warming for the decline. Some have pointed to the receiving spawning streams and blamed development for the decline in Sockeye Salmon stocks.

All these issues need to be examined and based on sound science recommendations and forwarded to the Ministry of Fisheries and Oceans, the Honourable Gail Shea. Both Provincial and Federal Governments do have regulations to protect fish and fish habitat and they do enforce those regulations. The issue might not mean more regulation but better management of the resource.

Twenty-five years ago I was a Placer miner in the Klondike Gold fields. Our operation was one of the first to settle the sediment from our mine waste water. This was done voluntarily to ensure clean water was discharged into the receiving streams to protect Salmon and Salmon spawning habitat as well as providing clean water to the downstream miners. Most miners were compliant and responsible, but of course there were some that wanted to mine as usual with no regard for the water quality. On the other hand, there were people that wanted to shut the mining down completely and wanted government to set sediment regulations that were unattainable. A commission was set up to review the issue and set water discharge standards. After the commission listened to many polarizing views the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans of the day brought political direction to the commission and regulations were forwarded that accomplished certainty for the Placer Mining industry as well as sound protection for the Salmon and Salmon habitat.

I am confident that reason will prevail and the findings of Judge Cohen and the Commission will provide guidance for sound public policy for the protection of our Sockeye Salmon stocks and determine why the stocks have depleted in the past decade.

I am not, as an elected representative, going to take a position until the commission has released its findings and I have all the facts at hand.


 MP Colin Mayes, Okanagan-Shuswap