Thank you, Mr. Chair.
You asked a question on how we can help with the aquaculture, and it's important to hear both sides of the story. As you're aware, some of the first nations in B.C. are opposing fish farms and there are very few that are working together with fish farms.
My uncle is saying yes, we have an agreement with the fish farm. But the fish farm company understands that as first nations our priority is the environment and how we look after the environment. It has always been our number one thing.
And I know for you to get those answers is to go to those communities that are affected. Thank you for having us here, but you will get more answers from the communities and the people who know what's going on, because you can have a scientist who will come to our community for three days out of a month and get all these numbers and that, but we live in it. We live there; we know what's going on. We're not scientists, but we know how nature is working around us.
And yes, we understand that sea lice is an issue. It's been here for thousands of years. When I was out trolling, when I was out seining, you'd pick up a salmon and there were millions of sea lice on our boats, and it's been there. And I'm hoping this can be resolved for the communities, because, as my uncle has stated, it's a livelihood. We used to have a livelihood in fisheries but that is slowly disappearing.
Thank you.