Good evening, everyone. Thank you for this opportunity.
Listuguj is a Mi'kmaq community in Gespe'gewa'gi, the seventh district of Mi’gma’gi. We are in essence the gateway to Mi’gma’gi. Using more familiar terms, we are located in Quebec on the Baie des Chaleurs, immediately across the Restigouche River from Campbellton, New Brunswick.
Listuguj is party to the Peace and Friendship Treaties of 1760 and 1761. We have a right to fish and to sell fish to earn a moderate livelihood. The Supreme Court of Canada said in Marshall that Canada has the authority to regulate our fishery but can only impose restrictions on our fishery if they can be justified for a substantive public purpose, are minimally intrusive and follow meaningful consultation. If a restriction cannot be justified, then it is invalid. The general rule is that we have the right to fish and to sell fish any time of the year.
Every fall for the past 20 years, Listuguj has conducted a fall fishery for lobster. The DFO issues Listuguj a licence that restricts this fishery to food, social and ceremonial purposes. The licence prohibits us from selling the lobster we catch in the fall. The prohibition on the sale of lobster we catch in the fall serves no conservation purpose. The DFO permits us to fish, and we fish within the prescribed effort limits. Whether we eat the lobster or sell the lobster, the effect on the lobster stock is the same. The prohibition on the sale of lobster we catch in the fall has nothing to do with regional or economic fairness. These are lobsters that we will be taking from the water one way or another, whether to eat or to sell. If we sell them, that in no way diminishes any other stakeholders' access to the resource.
We asked for years for the minister to issue us a licence that would reflect our treaty right and allow us to sell lobster in the fall. The Fisheries Act and the aboriginal communal fishing licences regulations as they are currently written give the minister the power to do that. We have been negotiating and consulting with the DFO about this issue for years. Every fall we are refused. Every fall the minister insists on prohibiting us from exercising our treaty right.
We understand the need for a well-regulated fishery. We understand that with rights comes responsibility. After several years of community consultation, we adopted our own law and fishing management plan to govern our lobster fishery. Our law and plan allow our people to sell their lobster but ensure that fishing efforts remain sustainable. For the last two falls, we have conducted our own self-regulated fishery. Lobster stocks in our fishing area remain healthy. We have not seen violence like that being witnessed in Nova Scotia. We see our lobster fishery as a self-determination success story. We tried to get here working with DFO. In the end, though, we got here in spite of the DFO.
The DFO still stands in our way. Because the licence we receive for our fall fishery prohibits the sale of lobster, it is an offence under the Fisheries Act for anyone to buy our fall lobster. We have a treaty right to sell, but the DFO makes it illegal for anyone to buy. This is a significant challenge for us, and it is entirely of the DFO's making.
This is not an issue of needing to define a “moderate livelihood”. It hurts me to say it, but Listuguj is a long way from achieving a moderate livelihood through our fishery. We have 33% unemployment. This fall our lobster fishery lasted two weeks and employed 38 people—fishers, monitors, cooks and more. We cooked 10,000 pounds of lobster and distributed them directly to community members, feeding approximately 1,500 community members, including 300 elders. I'm very proud of that, but it's hardly a moderate livelihood.
This is really an issue about how we fish, not about how much we fish. The DFO insists on forcing Mi'kmaq treaty fisheries into the mould that was developed for non-indigenous commercial fisheries. We do not fit that mould. That mould was not made for us. The restrictions that mould imposes are not justifiable. We are more than capable of designing an approach to fisheries governance that does reflect our rights, values and ambitions, but the DFO has not been willing to work with us. By failing to offer any reasonable accommodation of our treaty, the DFO provides no other alternative for us than to self-regulate. In a way, I'm thankful for it. It has made it obvious to our fishers and community members that we are capable of assuming this responsibility. Self-determination and self-government are the future of our fishery.
The only reason the DFO gives us for not issuing us licences that reflect our treaty right is that it would make the fishery difficult for them to manage. I think the exact opposite is true. If we had licences that respected our treaty rights, laws and fishing plans, then we could work collaboratively with the DFO on the water to make sure our fisheries are safe and sustainable.
As it is, the DFO forces the Mi'kmaq to fish in a legal grey area. It makes us angry. It makes non-indigenous fishers angry. That is when management problems really start.
For years—