My band, Mamalilikulla-Qwe'Qwa'Sot'Em, holds the western gateway to the Broughton Archipelago and the mouth of Knight Inlet.
I think you'll have to be really careful with that, because now that the central coast has been in effect for quite some time and we first nations are hearing through our cousins and relatives, “Wow, we sure got pooched with that one”, we can't do anything now because of this management plan that we helped participate in. I was a part of that back in 1991. And, God rest his soul, Chief Pat Alfred, my great uncle, who is no longer with us, brought us young men into the back room and said, “Be careful what's going on in there. This is going to affect your grandchildren.” We're now starting to see it. On the central coast, we know the Heiltsuk are dead against fish farming. The Kitasoo are booming with that industry and the spin-offs on that. They have a very strong tourism industry based on their regional draw, the spirit bear, and their river systems are in good shape.
When you come down and all of a sudden you come to the Mamalilikulla-Qwe'Qwa'Sot'Em people, sure, half my people might be against fish farming, but those are the ones who don't work. They're not assimilated into modern society, as the government has been trying since the first iron anchor hit an unnamed mud bay back in the east, in Canada. I'm speaking for the guys on the gale warning right now out on the central coast, on those fish farm boats delivering smolts and picking up farmed fish. They don't have time to go to the parliamentary lawns, to Norway in their regalia with their drums and pound them and say “Down with the industry”. They're too busy working, being assimilated as Canadian citizens living off-reserve and paying taxes, the majority of them, and that's what we have to look at with this land thing up on the central coast.
When it comes down to the government coming to a lot of the first nations down here, speaking for the Kwakwaka'wakw, some of the ones who are participating in this industry, they say “We want you guys to work with us to stop this industry's expansion”. Well, I think you're going to get a lot of our people and our leaders saying no, they're going to be working with the industry to see expansion of the fish farm industry, because when you had strong commercial fishing, you had a strong Kwakwaka'wakw culture. Our potlatches were booming. Our social problems within the confines of our communities and families weren't that bad. All of a sudden, since 1994, the salmon dropped. An 11-year cycle, maybe. Maybe it's caused by fish farming. Who knows? We're going to figure that out, though. But I know one thing: the negative issues to our families increased drastically, because we were flat broke. But now that we're working with the fish farm industry that supports us and keeps our seine boats tied to our communities' docks, so that when those salmon do return we can cut the lines and go fish, this is a happy community, Campbell River. Go to Walmart. Watch how many flat screens are being bought.