Mr. Speaker, Terry Glavin, a leading expert on the devastation of salmon farming on the wild salmon fishing industry says, “In Quebec, it is about language. In British Columbia, it is about salmon”.
Last month the British Society reported that sea lice from fish farms was having a devastating effect on wild salmon stocks. The David Suzuki Foundation says that this “study shows the link is undeniable and that the situation is even worse than we had imagined. We have a small window of opportunity to reverse this damage but the window is growing smaller and smaller”.
In the fall, the Liberals en masse voted against conducting an inquiry into the B.C. fishery, once again refusing to admit that there are systemic problems that risk the entire industry.
It is time for the DFO to begin to take the west coast fishery seriously and take some proactive action to guard against further problems. As a first step, the DFO needs to put a halt to any expansion of open net salmon farming and ultimately end the practice entirely.