The Tfiher man
A way forward on Indian rights
Labor in the fishing industry cannot be advanced without taking into account the vital interests in the fishing industry of Indian people; and Indian people, in general, cannot advance without taking into account the vital interests of working people in general and their organized section, the trade unions, in particular.
Policy Paper on Aboriginal Rights and the Search for Unity — adopted by UFAWU1982 convention
THE crisis over Indian fishing rights provoked voked by the Tbry government's mishandling of the Gitksan-Wet'suwet'en fishing bylaws has the potential to create deep and lasting racial division in the fishing industry.
Now, as in the 1930s, the only interests which benefit from a such a division are the corporations and their government mouthpieces. A split in the industry will divert attention away from the government's mismanagement of the fishery, its failure to implement the promised salmonid enhancement program and its refusal to deal honestly with the long-standing issue of Indian claims.
Fishermen and shoreworkers remain under seige as government privatization, job loss and habitat destruction erode the resource and our livelihoods. A bitter internal struggle between Indians and non-Indians would be fatal.
Recognition of title and claims
THE UFAWU has long supported the demand of Indian people for recognition of their aboriginal title and settlement of all land and sea claims.
Unemployment and poverty in Indian communities have steadily increased in recent years as mining companies, logging corporations and the fishing processors piled up profits from the exploitation of our province's rich resources. The confrontations at Meares, on Lyell Island and now over the bylaws are indications of the determination of Indian people to have their share of the wealth their land produces.
But the union has never agreed with proposals advanced by the Liberals and now the Tories — and supported by some Indian leaders — that the claims of Indian people could or should be resolved with a single resource at the expense of working people in the fishing industry.
The issue in the Gitksan-Wet'suwet'en bylaws is not whether or not Indian-caught fish should be sold or whether 10,000 sockeye smoked at Hazelton will destroy the commercial fishery. The bylaws would create a separate management regime outside the Fisheries Act with the potential to reallocate large portions of the runs upriver and away from the coastal fishery.
The Tory Charade
FISHERIES minister Tom Siddon and Indian affairs minister David Crombie quietly authorized these bylaws on the one hand while pretending to consult the industry on the other.
When industry representatives, including the UFAWU, rejected this position, the two ministers withdrew the policy, promised to cancel the bylaws and then asked industry and Indian leaders to do what no government has had the guts to do — sit down and negotiate a settlement on Indian claims.
The charade has disintegrated and the battle lines are drawn. The Indian leadership is insisting the bylaws must be allowed before discussions can begin. Most industry organizations are insisting the bylaws must be shelved. The Gitksan-Wet'suwet'en are vowing to fish. Alcan, MacBlo and the rest of the corporations are watching quietly from the sidelines and the Social Credit government, which has spearheaded the attack on Indian rights, is preparing to use the issue in the coming election.
Basis of Unity
YET there is much more to unite Indians and non-Indians in the industry than there is to divide them. On environmental questions like Kemano Completion, CN twin-tracking, offshore drilling, Amax and the Kitimat oil port, Indian and non-Indian organizations forged a formidable alliance to defend fisheries resources. Division comes only when one group tries to expand at the expense of the other.
The UFAWU cannot support bylaws such as those proposed for the Skeena as long as they are being used by the government to forestall a real settlement. They are an ad hoc measure which would force those involved in the commercial fishery — Indian and non-Indian alike — to bear the entire cost of land and sea claims. Compare this to the experience of B.C. Packers, which received more than $11 million on behalf of three tribal councils for its gillnet fleet and then turned around and used the money to upgrade its Prince Rupert plant at the cost of hundreds of jobs.
Nor can the UFAWU support any general claims process which excludes working people. The federal government does not represent the interests of the
4/THE FISHERMAN - MAY 21,1986
people of the fishing industry and no settlement can be achieved without the involvement and consent of all concerned.
What the UFAWU does support and insists on is immediate and expedited negotiation of all outstanding claims. Such negotiations must include the provide of B.C., cover all economic and political issues and be based on the full involvement of affected third parties.
The UFAWU does support and has long called for increased economic benefits to Indian people from the fishery. In the context of a comprehensive claims settlement, such benefits could be generated upstream as well as on the coast.
Practical steps
THERE are immediate practical steps that must be taken to avert the crisis provoked by the Conservatives. These include:
• a moratorium on the implementation of the Gitksan-Wet'suwet'en bylaws until the process begun on May 5, 1986, has produced an agreement within
the 11-point terms of reference proposed by fisheries minister Tom Siddon;
• legislative action to establish the paramountcy of the Fisheries Act over the Indian Act for the conservation and management of the salmon resource and salmon fisheries, including existing and traditional Indian fisheries;
• legislative action in the longer term to clarify aboriginal title and rights beyond the vague "existing rights" protected in the Constitution and now subject to court interpretation; and
• immediate initiation by the federal government of a program for the negotiation of comprehensive, equitable and lasting claims settlements nation-wide.
The UFAWU must initiate meetings between Indian leaders and labor leaders to discuss the land claims issue and its resolution. Otherwise working people, both Indian and non-Indian, will suffer at the hands of federal and provincial politicians committed to an ad hoc approach to land claims that only creates disharmony where unity is needed.
'Save your breath'
Fish and Ships
ism
Our challenge to our readers to find a seine fisherman whose experience stretched back further than Matt Aleksich has been taken up by Gina Brillon, of Queen Charlotte City, on behalf of her grandfather, "Twinkle John" Johansen.
Matt had seined as early as 1923, and that was early enough to let him shake hands with some of the fishermen who first set seins in the Gulf of Georgia.
But Gina thinks her grandfather, now 86, may be able to edge Matt out. Old John Johansen was known as Skookum or Twinkle John and he lives in Masset.
"He was born in Trondheim, Norway," Gina writes, "and immigrated to Canada- in 1921 were he began fishing that year aboard the 50-foot seine boat Kelkane, named after Klekane Inlet just east of Butedale.
"She was built in the U.S. and originally named the Sunset. They fished salmon in Ogden Channel for Inverness Cannery.
"The skipper was Angus Mc-Calley and the crew included John McCalley, Alec McLean, Long John Matheson, Ed Johansen and John Johansen. This was a hand seine boat, if you can imagine.
"In the 53 years spent in the
• Rick Frey displays trophy chum salmon.
fishing industry, John put in his time on the halibut at five cents a pound, and on herring and salmon. His last boat was a trailer, the Far North, which he sold in 1974. John estimates that he was on about 60 fishing vessels, first as a crew member and then as a captain or many years."
That pushes us back a few more years. Are there any more veterans out there who remember the early
days of seining? Or the life on the beach seines, which lasted into the 1920s along the coast?
Proof that fishermen in Canada are not as fragmented as employers and government would like came during this month's union lobby to Ottawa on fishermen's unemployment insurance. Among the representatives of the Maritime Fishermen's Union was Colin Mills, former UFAWU northern rep now fishing out of Louisbourg and president of the MFU local. And Kevin Condon, of the Newfoundland Fishermen's Union, recalled meeting Homer Stevens during the organizational drives of the 1970's. "If anything will bring fishermen together," remarked the MFU's Gilles Theriault. "It's an attack on the unemployment insurance."
Rick Frey's campaign against fisheries management policies that banned any seining of Qualicum chums until the fish were the color of gumboots has recognized in a special commemorative plaque. The Campbell River local president proudly displayed his trophy at Fishermen's Hall last week and there is some thought to mounting it in the new boardroom.